Part 2 (1/2)
Before doubling the Horn the Isaac Todd was to sail from Quebec to England for convoy of a war-s.h.i.+p. The Nor' Westers nave a.s.surance of victory was only exceeded by their utter indifference to danger, difficulty, and distance in the attainment of an end. In view of the terror which the Isaac Todd was alleged to have inspired in MacDougall's mind, it is interesting to know what the Nor' Westers thought of their s.h.i.+p. ”_A twenty-gun letter of marque with a mongrel crew_,” writes MacDonald of Garth, ”_a miserable sailor with a miserable commander and a rascally crew_.” On the way out MacDonald transferred to the British convoy Racc.o.o.n, leaving the frisky old Governor MacTavish with his gay barmaid Jane[19] drinking pottle deep on the Isaac Todd, where the rightly disgusted captain was not on speaking terms with his Excellency.
”_We were nearly six weeks before we could double Cape Horn, and were driven half-way to the Cape of Good Hope; ... at last doubled the cape under topsails, ... the deck one sheet of ice for six weeks, ... our sails one frozen sheet; ... lost sight of the Isaac Todd in a gale_,”
wrote MacDonald on the Racc.o.o.n.
It will be remembered that Hunt's overlanders arrived at Astoria months after the Pacific Company's s.h.i.+p. Such swift coasters of the wilderness were the Nor' Westers, this overland party came sweeping down the Columbia, ten canoes strong, hale, hearty, singing as they paddled, a month before the Racc.o.o.n had come, six months before their own s.h.i.+p, the Isaac Todd.
And what did MacDougall do? Threw open his gates in welcome, let an army of eighty rivals camp under shelter of his fort guns, demeaned himself into a pusillanimous, little, running fetch-and-carry at the beck of the Nor' Westers, instead of keeping sternly inside his fort, starving rivals into surrender, or training his cannon upon them if they did not decamp.
Alexander Henry, the partner at the head of these dauntless Nor'
Westers, says their provisions were ”nearly all gone.” But, oh! the bragging _voyageurs_ told those quaking Astorians terrible things of what the Isaac Todd would do. There were to be British convoys and captures and prize-money and prisoners of war carried off to Sainte Anne alone knew where. The American-born scorned these exaggerated yarns, knowing their purpose, but not so MacDougall. All his pot-valiant courage sank at the thought of the Isaac Todd, and when the campers ran up a British flag he forbade the display of American colours above Astoria. The end of it was that he sold out Mr. Astor's interests at forty cents on the dollar, probably salving his conscience with the excuse that he had saved that percentage of property from capture by the Racc.o.o.n.
At the end of November a large s.h.i.+p was sighted standing in over the bar with all sails spread but no ensign out. Three shots were fired from Astoria. There was no answer. What if this were the long-lost Mr. Hunt coming back from Alaskan trade on the Beaver? The doughty Nor' Westers hastily packed their furs, ninety-two bales in all, and sent their _voyageurs_ scampering up-stream to hide and await a signal. But MacDougall was equal to the emergency. He launched out for the s.h.i.+p, prepared to be an American if it were the Beaver with Mr. Hunt, a Nor'
Wester if it were the Racc.o.o.n with a company partner.
It was the Racc.o.o.n, and the British captain addressed the Astorians in words that have become historic: ”_Is this the fort I've heard so much about? D---- me, I could batter it down in two hours with a four-pounder!_”
Two weeks later the Union Jack was hoisted above Astoria, with traders and marines drawn up under arms to fire a volley. A bottle of Madeira was broken against the flagstaff, the country p.r.o.nounced a British possession by the captain, cheers given, and eleven guns fired from the bastions.
At this stage all accounts, particularly American accounts, have rung down the curtain on the catastrophe, leaving the Nor' Westers intoxicated with success. But another act was to complete the disasters of Astoria, for the very excess of intoxication brought swift judgment on the revelling Nor' Westers.
The Racc.o.o.n left on the last day of 1813. MacDougall had been appointed partner in the North-West Company, and the other Canadians re-engaged under their own flag. When Hunt at last arrived in the Pedler, which he had chartered after the wreck of Mr. Astor's third vessel, the Lark, it was too late to do more than carry away those Americans still loyal to Mr. Astor. Farnham was left at Kamtchatka, whence he made his way to Europe. The others were captured off California and they afterward scattered to all parts of the world. Early in April, 1814, a brigade of Nor' Westers, led by MacDonald of Garth and the younger MacTavish, set out for the long journey across the mountains and prairie to the company's headquarters at Port William. In the flotilla of ten canoes went many of the old Astorians. Two weeks afterward came the belated Isaac Todd with the Nor' Westers' white flag at its foretop and the dissolute old Governor MacTavish holding a high carnival of riot in the cabin.
No darker picture exists than that of Astoria--or Fort George, as the British called it--under Governor MacTavish's _regime_. The picture is from the hand of a North-West partner himself. _”Not in bed till 2 A.
M.; ... the gentlemen and the crew all drunk; ... famous fellows for grog they are; ... diced for articles belonging to Mr. M.,”_ Alexander Henry had written when the Racc.o.o.n was in port; and now under Governor MacTavish's vicious example every pretence to decency was discarded.
”_Avec les loups il faut hurler_” was a common saying among Nor'
Westers, and perhaps that very a.s.similation to the native races which contributed so much to success also contributed to the trader's undoing.
White men and Indians vied with each other in mutual debas.e.m.e.nt. Chinook and Saxon and Frenchmen alike lay on the sand sodden with corruption; and if one died from carousals, companions weighted neck and feet with stones and pushed the corpse into the river. Quarrels broke out between the wa.s.sailing governor and the other partners. Emboldened, the underlings and hangers-on indulged in all sorts of theft. ”All the gentlemen were intoxicated,” writes one who was present; _seven hours rowing one mile_, innocently states the record of another day, _the tide running seven feet high past the fort_.
The spring rains had ceased. Mountain peaks emerged from the empurpled horizon in domes of opal above the clouds, and the Columbia was running its annual mill-race of spring floods, waters milky from the silt of countless glaciers and turbulent from the rush of a thousand cataracts.
Governor MacTavish[20] and Alexander Henry had embarked with six _voyageurs_ to cross the river. A bl.u.s.tering wind caught the sail. A tidal wave pitched amids.h.i.+ps. The craft filled and sank within sight of the fort.
So perished the conquerors of Astoria!
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 18: A son of the English officer of the Eighty-fourth Regiment in the American War of Independence.]
[Footnote 19: Jane Barnes, an adventuress from Portsmouth, the first white woman on the Columbia.]
[Footnote 20: In justice to the many descendants of the numerous clan MacTavish in the service of the fur companies, this MacTavish should be distinguished from others of blameless lives.]
CHAPTER IV
THE ANCIENT HUDSON'S BAY COMPANY WAKENS UP
Those eighty[21] Astorians and Nor' Westers who set inland with their ten canoes and boats under protection of two swivels encountered as many dangers on the long trip across the continent as they had left at Fort George.
Following the wandering course of the Columbia, the traders soon pa.s.sed the international boundary northward into the Arrow Lakes with their towering sky-line of rampart walls, on to the great bend of the Columbia where the river becomes a tumultuous torrent milky with glacial sediment, now raving through a narrow canon, now teased into a white whirlpool by obstructing rocks, now tumbling through vast shadowy forests, now foaming round the green icy ma.s.ses of some great glacier, and always mountain-girt by the tent-like peaks of the eternal snows.