TWENTY-FIVE YEARS' SERVICE IN THE HUDSON'S BAY TERRITORY
By John M'Lean
The Champlain Society of Toronto, which does admirable work by printing good editions of the original sources of Canadian history, has issued a reprint, carefully edited by Ma W. S. Wallace, of John M'Lean's Notes of a Twenty-five Years' Service in the Hudson's Bay Territory. M'Lean, a high-spirited Highlander from Mull, entered the service in January, 1821, and left it after a dispute with the Governor of Rupert's Land in 1845. He was stationed first among the Indians near Ottawa, later in British Columbia, and after- wards near Hudson's Bay and in Ungava among the Eskimo. He made a pioneer journey across Labrador and discovered the Great Falls, which are much higher than those of Niagara, but less spectacular. M'Lean's account of his experiences is of great interest, though he was probably unfair to his employers. It helps one to realize what a wilderness Western Canada was less than a century ago. Writing in 1849, after his retirement, M'Lean advocated the withdrawal of the Company's charter in the interests of the Indians. But he had no idea that within a generation the prairies would be attracting white settlers and that a railway would be under construction. He knew the Far West as it had always been.
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