I have received a communication from the Governor & Directors of
the Hudsons bay Company stating, that they and the Puget Sound Company
are about to occupy some land in this Island and that the sum of Four thousand pounds is to be expended on public buildings, under my
direction, subject to the approval, and sanction of their Agent, and
further indicating the neighbourhood of their own posts as the place
where such buildings are to be erected.
Unless the colony is intended to be merely an enlarged depot of
the Hudsons bay company which I do not conceive was the intention of Her
Majesty's Government in making the grant of the Island, it will be a
waste of public money to expend it in the way they indicate, as the
public buildings will then be surrounded by their Reserves which they
are neither prepared to use or sell.
The Large tract of land called their Reserves, of about thirty
square miles in extent includes the only part of the Island, in the
Straights of Fuca, in the any way adapted for the first settlement, there
are other large tracts on the Canal de Arro, and the gulf of Georgia but
they are at present so inaccessible that their settlement and occupation
must be gradual. The quantity of land at Soke is too small to make it
of any importance and the rest of the coast is one mass of rock without
harbours. The Hudson's bay company does not profess to require all
these Reserves, either for its own purposes or those of the Puget Sound
Company, but say they cannot tell what portions of them they may require
till surveys have been sent to them in England. These surveys they have
taken no steps at all to obtain, they have never even engaged a
surveyor. A Mr Grant, who had studied for a short time at the
Military College at Sandhurst, commenced a survey of part of the
Companys land last summer, but it was discontinued and has never been
resumed. The Agent here tells me that he expects a surveyor from Canada
in the autumn if one can be engaged, supposing that he does come, the
winter rains will prevent any operations till the following spring,
which will bring it far into the fourth year of the Hudson's bay
Company's possession of the Island. In the meantime these Reserves effectually prevent any bona fide colonists from settling.
No site for a Town has ever been mentioned, and indeed till the
question of the Reserves is settled it would be useless to select one,
for by refusing to sell the land around it, taking it as their own and
setting an extravagant price on it, as they have already done near
Victoria they will completely isolate and prevent the occupation of any such town. When a Town site shall be selected, that will be the place
for the public buildings not in the vicinity of the Companys posts
where there is no probability of a population ever gathering beyond a
few of their own servants. Until such site be selected and the
adjoining land brought into the market fairly, I do not think it will be
expedient or even just to the future prospects of the colony to expend
the produce of the land sales on buildings,