ting possession of their arms.

Miles MacDonell, formerly of the King's Royal Regiment, New York,
governor of the Hudson's Bay Company at Fort Douglas, at once issued
proclamations forbidding Indians to trade furs with Nor' Westers and
ordering Nor' Westers from the country. On the strength of these
proclamations two or three outlying North-West forts were destroyed and
North-West fur brigades rifled. Duncan Cameron,[23] the North-West
partner at Fort Gibraltar, countered by letting his _Bois-Brules_, a
ragged half-breed army of wild plain rangers under Cuthbert Grant,
canter across the two miles that separated the rival forts, and pour a
volley of musketry into the Hudson Bay houses. To save the post for the
Hudson's Bay Company, Miles MacDonell gave himself up and was shipped
out of the country.

But the Hudson's Bay fort was only biding its time till the valiant
North-West defenders had scattered to their winter posts. Then an armed
party seized Duncan Cameron not far from the North-West fort, and with
pistol cocked by one man, publicly horsewhipped the Nor' Wester.
Afterward, when Semple, the new Hudson's Bay governor, was absent from
Fort Douglas and could not therefore be held responsible for
consequences, the Hudson's Bay men, led by the same Colin Robertson who
had brought the large brigade from Montreal, marched across the prairie
to Fort Gibraltar, captured Mr. Cameron, plundered all the Nor' Westers'
stores, and burned the fort to the ground. By way of retaliation for
MacDonell's expulsion, the North-West partner was shipped down to Hudson
Bay, where he might as well have been on Devil's Island for all the
chance of escape.

One company at fault as often as the other, similar outrages were
perpetrated in all parts of the north fur country, the blood of rival
traders being spilt without a qualm of conscience or thought of results.
The effect of this conflict among white men on the bloodthirsty
red-skins one may guess. The _Bois-Brules_ were clamouring for Cuthbert
Grant's permission to wipe the English--meaning the Hudson's Bay
men--off the earth; and the Swampy Crees and Saulteaux under Chief
Peguis were urging Governor Semple to let them defend the Hudson's
Bay--meaning kill the Nor' Westers.

The crisis followed sharp on the destruction of Fort Gibraltar. That
post had sent all supplies to North-West forts. If Fort Douglas of the
Hudson's Bay Company, past which North-West canoes must paddle to turn
we