t it is another matter when the Plain
Rangers ride across the prairie from Fort Gibraltar armed, and pour such
hot shot into Fort Douglas that the colonists, frenzied with fear, huddle
to the fort for shelter. To insure the safety of his colonists,
MacDonell surrenders to the Nor'westers and is sent to Eastern Canada for
a trial which never takes place. No sooner has Governor MacDonell been
expelled than Cuthbert Grant, warden of the Plain Rangers, rides over to
the colony and warns the colonists to flee for their lives, from Indians
enraged at "these land workers spoiling the hunting fields." What the
Indians thought of this defense of their rights is not stated. They were
silent and unacting witnesses of the unedifying spectacle of white men
ready to fly at each other's throats. It was too late for the colonists
to reach Hudson Bay in time for the annual ships of 1815, so the
houseless people dispersed amid the forests of Lake Winnipeg, where they
could be certain of at least fish for food.

Word of the two hundred settlers having been moved from Red River by the
Nor'westers, of MacDonell's forcible expulsion, and of the dispersion of
the rest of the colony had, of course, been sent to Selkirk and his
agents in both Montreal and London. Swift retaliation is prepared.
Colin Robertson, who speaks French like a Canadian and knows all the
Nor'west voyageurs of the St. Lawrence, is sent to gather up two hundred
French boatmen under the very noses of the Nor'westers at Montreal. With
these Robertson is to invade the far-famed Athabasca, whence come the
best furs, the very heart of the Nor'westers' stamping ground. Robert
Semple is appointed governor of the colony on Red River, with
instructions to resist the aggressions of the Nor'westers even to the
point of "_a shock that may be felt from Montreal to Athabasca_."
Selkirk himself comes to Canada to interview the Governor General about
military forces to protect his colony.

Robertson, with his two hundred voyageurs for Athabasca, follows the old
Ottawa trail of the French explorers, from the St. Lawrence to the Great
Lakes, and from the Great Lakes to {391} Red River by way of Winnipeg
Lake. Whom does he find on the shores of the lake but Selkirk's
dispersed colonists! Ordering John Clarke, an old campaigner of Astor's
company on the Columbia, to lead the two hundred French voyageurs on up
to Athabasca, Colin Robertson rallies the colonists together and leads
th