Page:Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 26.djvu/218



The charter of the Hudson's Bay Company expired in 1842, was renewed and even extended by the British Government, without awaiting the result of the negotiations pending with the cabinet at Washington for the demarcation of the western boundary. In the meantime, the agents residing in America, and who as has been said, are not stockholders, noting the progressive diminution of fur animals, and fearing that the English Government might abandon the left bank of the Columbia, formed among themselves, three years ago, a corporation called the Puget Sound Agricultural Company. They chose in advance the most fertile part of the territory around Puget Sound and its excellent harbors, and there assembled and intrusted to the free settlers five thousand horned cattle and horses and eight thousand sheep. This association is entirely independent of the Hudson's Bay Company; its capital has been increased to one hundred thousand pounds sterling (two million five hundred thousand francs). The chief factors subscribed one thousand pounds each, the principal clerks five hundred, and the apprentices from one hundred to two hundred pounds. Doctor MacLoughlin contributed fifty thousand francs. He is the director of the association and receives as such, five hundred louis a year.

The chief factors, in forming this association, acted with great shrewdness, since whatever may be the outcome of events, they will be masters of the richest part of the territory and of its best port; they have at their disposal, from now on, excellent lands, which they can transfer, or cattle, which they can sell to new settlers, and as a writer, an officer of the Hudson's Bay Company,