On the whole it may be as well for the reader to dismiss the French pretensions. They are no longer of interest, save to the hair-splitting student of the country's annals: but in their day they gave rise to a wilderness of controversy, through which we in the twentieth century may yet grope vainly for the light. For all practical purposes the question of priority was settled forever by the Ontario Boundary Commission of 1884. Let us turn rather to behold to what account the Honourable Adventurers turned their new property.
[15] Jean Bourdon was of the Province of Quebec; he was well known to the Jesuits and trusted by them. He subsequently accompanied Father Jacques on an embassy to Governor Dongan, the Governor of the Province of New York.
In Shea's _Charlevoix_, Vol. III, pp. 39, 40, it is stated that Père Dablon attempted to penetrate to the northern ocean by ascending the Saguenay. Early in June, two months after they set out, they found themselves at the head of the Nekauba river, 300 miles from Lake St. John. Warned of the approach of the Iroquois, they dared not proceed farther. In the New York Historical Documents (p. 97) there is an account of Dablon from the time of his arrival in Canada in 1655. He was immediately sent missionary to Onondaga, where he continued with a brief interval until 1658. In 1661 he set out overland for Hudson's Bay, but succeeded only in reaching the head waters of the Nekauba, 300 miles from Lac St. Jean.
First Public Sale at Garraway's -- Contemporary Prices of Fur -- The Poet Dryden -- Meetings of the Company -- Curiosity of the Town -- Aborigines on View.
On the seventeenth day of November, 1671, the wits, beaux and well-to-do merchants who were wont to assemble at Garraway's coffee-house, London, were surprised by a placard making the following announcement:--"On the fifth of December, ensuing, There Will Be Sold, in the Greate Hall of this Place, 3,000 weight of Beaver Skins,[16] comprised in thirty lotts, belonging to the Honourable, the Governour and Company of Merchants-Adventurers Trading into Hudson's Bay."
Such was the notice of the first official sale of the Company. Up to this date, the peltries brought back in their ships had been disposed of by private treaty, an arrangement entrusted chiefly to Mr. John Portman and Mr. William Prettyman, both of whom appear to have had considerable familiarity with the European fur-trade. The immediate occasion of this sale is a trivial matter. The causes lying behind it are of interest.