And, in truth, up to this point in the little insurrection it is not easy to condemn the wild Metis of the North-west—­wild as the bison which he hunted, unreclaimed as the prairies he loved so well, what knew he of State duty or of loyalty?  He knew that this land was his, and that strong men were coming to square it into rectangular farms and to push him farther west by the mere pressure of civilization.  He had heard of England and the English, but it was in a shadowy, vague, unsubstantial sort of way, unaccompanied by any fixed idea of government or law.  The Company—­not the Hudson Bay Company, but the Company-represented for him all law, all power, all government.  Protection he did not need-his quick ear, his unerring eye, his untiring horse, his trading gun, gave him that; but a market for his taurreau, for his buffalo robe, for his lynx, fox, and wolf skins, for the produce of his summer hunt and winter trade, he did need, and in the forts of the Company he found it.  His wants were few-a capote of blue cloth, with shining brass buttons; a cap, with beads and tassel; a blanket; a gun, and ball and powder; a box:  of matches, and a knife, these were all he wanted, and at every fort, from the mountain to the banks of his well-loved River Rouge, he found them, too.  What were these new people coming to do with him?  Who could tell?  If they meant him fair, why did they not say so? why did they not come up and tell him what they wanted, and what they were going to do for him, and ask him what he wished for?  But, no; they either meant to outwit him, or they held him of so small account that it mattered little what he thought about it; and, with all the pride of his mother’s race, that idea of his being slighted hurt him even more than the idea of his being wronged.  Did not every thing point to his disappearance under the new order of things?  He had only to look round him to verify the fact; for years before this annexation to Canada had been carried into effect stragglers from the east had occasionally reached Red River.  It is true that these new-comers found much to foster the worst passions of the Anglo-Saxon settler.  They found a few thousand occupants, half-farmers, half-hunters, living under a vast commercial monopoly, which, though it practically rested upon a basis of the most paternal kindness towards its subjects, was theoretically hostile to all opposition.  Had these men settled quietly to the usual avocations of farming, clearing the wooded ridges, fencing the rich expanses of prairie, covering the great swamps and plains with herds and flocks, it is probable that all would have gone well between the new-comers and the old proprietors.  Over that great western thousand miles of prairie there was room for all.  But, no; they came to trade and not to till, and trade on the Red River of the North was conducted upon the most peculiar principles.  There was, in fact, but one trade, and that was the fur trade.  Now, the fur trade is, for some reason