He cared more for the game than the winnings; and the game of sitting
still and drawing a pension for doing nothing was altogether too tame
for Radisson. Groseillers gave up the struggle and retired for the
time to his family at Three Rivers. At Quebec, in 1676, Radisson heard
of others everywhere reaping where he had sown. Jolliet and La Salle
were preparing to push the fur trade of New France westward of the
Great Lakes, where Radisson had penetrated twenty years previously.
Fur traders of Quebec, who organized under the name of the Company of
the North, yearly sent their canoes up the Ottawa, St. Maurice, and
Saguenay to the forests south of Hudson Bay, which Radisson had
traversed. On the bay itself the English company were entrenched.
North, northwest, and west, Radisson had been the explorer; but the
reward of his labor had been snatched by other hands.
[Illustration: "Skin for Skin," Coat of Arms and Motto, Hudson's Bay
Company.]
Radisson must have served meritoriously on the fleet, for after the
wreck he was offered the command of a man-of-war; but he asked for a
commission to New France. From this request there arose complications.
His wife's family, the Kirkes, had held claims against New France from
the days when the Kirkes of Boston had captured Quebec. These claims
now amounted to 40,000 pounds. M. Colbert, the great French statesman,
hesitated to give a commission to a man allied by marriage with the
enemies of New France.
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