They then abandoned Astoria,
and built a large establishment sixty miles up the river, on the
right bank, which they called Fort Vancouver.
This was in a
neighborhood where provisions could be more readily procured, and
where there was less danger from molestation by any naval force.
The company are said to carry on an active and prosperous trade,
and to give great encouragement to settlers. They are extremely
jealous, however, of any interference or participation in their
trade, and monopolize it from the coast of the Pacific to the
mountains, and for a considerable extent north and south. The
American traders and trappers who venture across the mountains,
instead of enjoying the participation in the trade of the river
and its tributaries, that had been stipulated by treaty, are
obliged to keep to the south, out of the track of the Hudson's
Bay parties.
Mr. Astor has withdrawn entirely from the American Fur Company,
as he has, in fact, from active business of every kind. That
company is now headed by Mr. Ramsay Crooks; its principal
establishment is at Michilimackinac, and it receives its furs
from the posts depending on that station, and from those on the
Mississippi, Missouri, and Yellow Stone Rivers, and the great
range of country extending thence to the Rocky Mountains. This
company has steamboats in its employ, with which it ascends the
rivers, and penetrates to a vast distance into the bosom of those
regions formerly so painfully explored in keel-boats and barges,
or by weary parties on horseback and on foot. The first irruption
of steamboats in the heart of these vast wildernesses is said to
have caused the utmost astonishment and affright among their
savage inhabitants.
In addition to the main companies already mentioned, minor
associations have been formed, which push their way in the most
intrepid manner to the remote parts of the far West, and beyond
the mountain barriers. One of the most noted of these is Ashley's
company, from St. Louis, who trap for themselves, and drive an
extensive trade with the Indians. The spirit, enterprise, and
hardihood of Ashley are themes of the highest eulogy in the far
West, and his adventures and exploits furnish abundance of
frontier stories.
Another company of one hundred and fifty persons from New York,
formed in 1831, and headed by Captain Bonneville of the United
States army, has pushed its enterprise into tracts before but
little known, and has brought considerable quantities of furs
from the region between the Rocky Mountains and the coasts of
Monterey and Upper California, on the Buenaventura and Timpanogos
rivers.
The fur countries, from the Pacific, east to the Rocky Mountains,
are now occupied (exclusive of private combinations and
individual trappers and traders) by the Russians; and on the
northwest from Behring's Strait to Queen Charlotte's Island, in
north latitude fifty-three degrees, and by the Hudson's Bay
Company thence, south of the Columbia River; while Ashley's
company, and that under Captain Bonneville, take the remainder of
the region to California.
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