Then
as a British peer and a Scottish Nobleman, the fun-loving but
hard-headed Scottish traders of Montreal took him to their hearts. He
met them at their convivial gatherings, he heard the chanson sung by
voyageurs, and the "habitant" caught his fancy. He was only a little
past thirty, and that Canadian picture could never be effaced from his
mind. In after days, these "Lords of the North" abused Lord Selkirk for
spying out their trade, for catching the secrets of their business which
were in the wind, and for making an undue use of what they had disclosed
to him. In this there was nothing. His schemes were afire in his own
mind long before, his Montreal experiences but fanned the flame, and led
him to send a few Colonists to Upper Canada to the Settlement to
Baldoon. This settlement was, however, of small account.
In 1808 though inactive he showed his bent by buying up Hudson's Bay
Company stock. During this time projects in agriculture, the condition
of the poor, the safety of the country, and the spread of civilization
constantly occupied his active mind. The Napoleonic war cut off the vast
cornfields of America from England, and as a great historian shows was
followed by a terrible pauperization of the laboring classes.
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