And now let us see what the “eaters of pemmican” proceeded to do after their forcible occupation of Fort Garry.  Well, it must be admitted they behaved in a very indifferent manner, going steadily from bad to worse, and much befriended in their seditious proceedings by continued and oft repeated bungling on the part of their opponents.  Early in the month of December, 1869, Mr. M’Dougall issued two proclamations from his post at Pembina, on the frontier:  in one he declared himself Lieutenant-Governor of the territory which Her Majesty had transferred to Canada; and in the other he commissioned an officer of the Canadian militia, under the high-sounding title of “Conservator of the Peace,” “to attack, arrest, -disarm, and disperse armed men disturbing the public peace, and to assault, fire upon, and break into houses in which these armed men were to be found.”  Now, of the first proclamation it will be only necessary to remark, that Her Majesty the Queen had not done any thing of the kind, imputed to her; and of the second it has probably already occurred to the reader that the title of “Conservator of the Peace” was singularly inappropriate to one vested with such sanguinary and destructive powers as was the holder of this commission, who was to “assault, fire upon, and break into houses, and to attack, arrest, disarm, and disperse people,” and generally to conduct himself after the manner of Attila, Genshis Khan, the Emperor Theodore, or any other ferocious magnate of ancient or modern times.  The officer holding this destructive commission thought he could do nothing better than imitate the tactics of his French adversary, accordingly we find him taking possession of the other rectangular building known as the Lower Fort Garry, situated some twenty miles north of the one in which the French had taken post, but unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, not finding within its walls the same store of warlike material which had existed in the Fort Garry senior.

The Indians, ever ready to have a hand in any fighting which may be “knocking around,” came forward in all the glory of paint, feathers, and pow-wow; and to the number of fifty were put as garrison into the place.  Some hundreds of English and Scotch half-breeds were enlisted, told off to companies under captains improvised for the occasion, and every thing pointed to a very pretty quarrel before many days had run their course.  But, in truth, the hearts of the English and Scotch settlers were not in this business.  By nature peaceably disposed, inheriting from their Orkney and Shetland forefathers much of the frugal habits of the Scotchmen, these people only asked to be left in peace.  So far the French party had been only fighting the battle of every half-breed, whether his father had hailed from the northern isles, the shires of England, or the snows of Lower Canada; so, after a little time, the Scotch and English volunteers began to melt away, and on the 9th of December the