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EAST SIDE MAIN STREET, LOOKING NORTH. SPRING i879. See Page 26.

‘NEST SIDE MAIN STREET LOOKING NORTH. SPRING 1879. See Page 26.

general trade only since I871, as I be lieve the terms of relinquishment were not fully complete and made practical until that time.

THE SILKIRK SETTLEMENT.

In 180.3, Lord Silkirk, a visionary but k'nd hearted Scotchman and a mem- ber of the II. B. Company, penetrated in his wanderings from the company's forts on Hudson Bay, as far as the valley of lhe [ted River. lie \vas so charmed with the country that he conceived the i‘ea of starting colonies here. in 181i he succeeded in obtain- ingagrant of land for that purpose, from the H. B. Company along this river. a.d in the Autumn of 1812 he reached here via Hudson Bay and

Lake “ innipeg with asmall party of Highland Scotchmen. They at once commenced building, but were stopped by the H. B. Company's competitors, the Northwest Company, were driven away and obliged to spend the winter in tents at Pembina, some 70 miles south. The following spring they re- turned and after putting in a crop, which was maturing finely, in Septem- be!‘ wrre again driven to Pembina, where they remaimd the second win- ter, returning again the next spring. By September i814 they numbered some two hundred. They built hou~es and called their settlement Kildonan, after their old Parish, in Scotlmd. In the spring 0t 181-3. trouble again came upon them. Their storehouses w< re

broken open androbbed; their Gover- nor arrested and sent to Montreal; dis- satisfaction became so general, that un- der the guidance of lriendlv Indians, they started in June of that year for Lake Winnipeg, intending to return to Scotland; but meeting officers of the H. B. Company, t' ey were induced to return the following spriUE, under the o special care of that company. In 1516 Lord Silkirk accompanied by more emigrants r- ached the settlement and by his presence and prompt action in arresting some of the tiggl essive North- west Couipany’s lenders and sending them to Montreal, l':Sl()f€(I the colony to pmce. The next year he return< d to Scotland, but the croys of that year were insuilicient and they were obliged