Governor Bayly of the Hudson’s Bay Company was astounded to find the French at Rupert’s River.  Now he knew what had allured the Indians from the bay, but he hardly relished finding foreigners in possession of his own fort.  The situation required delicate tact.  Governor Bayly was a bluff tradesman with an insular dislike of Frenchmen and Catholics common in England at a time when bigoted fanaticism ran riot.  King Charles was on friendly terms with France.  Therefore, the Jesuit’s passport must be respected; so Albanel was received with at least a show of courtesy.  But Bayly was the governor of a fur company; and the rights of the company must be respected.  To make matters worse, the French voyageurs brought letters to Groseillers and Radisson from their relatives in Quebec.  Bayly, no doubt, wished the Jesuit guest far enough.  Albanel left in a few weeks.  Then Bayly’s suspicions blazed out in open accusations that the two French explorers had been playing a double game and acting against English interests.  In September came the company ship to the fort with Captain Gillam, who had never agreed with Radisson from the time that they had quarrelled about going from Port Royal to the straits of Hudson Bay.  It has been said that, at this stage, Radisson and Groseillers, feeling the prejudice too strong against them, deserted and passed overland through the forests to Quebec.  The records of the Hudson’s Bay Company do not corroborate this report.  Bayly in the heat of his wrath sent home accusations with the returning ship.  The ship that came out in 1674 requested Radisson to go to England and report.  This he did, and so completely refuted the charges of disloyalty that in 1675 the company voted him 100 pounds a year; but Radisson would not sit quietly in England on a pension.  Owing to hostility toward him among the English employees of the company, he could not go back to the bay.  Meantime he had wife and family and servants to maintain on 100 pounds a year.  If England had no more need of him, France realized the fact that she had.  Debts were accumulating.  Restless as a caged tiger, Radisson found himself baffled until a message came from the great Colbert of France, offering to pay all his debts and give him a position in the French navy.  His pardon was signed and proclaimed.  In 1676, France granted him fishing privileges on the island of Anticosti; but the lodestar of the fur trade still drew him, for that year he was called to Quebec to meet a company of traders conferring on the price of beaver.[15] In that meeting assembled, among others, Jolliet, La Salle, Groseillers, and Radisson—­men whose names were to become immortal.

It was plain that the two adventurers could not long rest.[16]

[1] Chailly-Bert.

[2] The Jesuit expeditions of Dablon and Dreuillettes in 1661 had failed to reach the bay overland.  Cabot had coasted Labrador in 1497; Captain Davis had gone north of Hudson Bay in 1585-1587; Hudson had lost his life there in 1610.  Sir Thomas Button had explored Baffin’s Land, Nelson River, and the Button Islands in 1612; Munck, the Dane, had found the mouth of the Churchill River in 1619, James and Fox had explored the inland sea in 1631; Shapley had brought a ship up from Boston in 1640; and Bourdon, the Frenchman, had gone up to the straits in 1656-1657.