Nicolay to Desart (Parliamentary Under-Secretary)

In accordance with your request I send You some Memoranda on the
importance of the N.W. coast of British North America.

Although they have run to Some length I feel that no portion of the
subject is fairly represented. I am however prepared to go fully into
eavry part of it.

I take the liberty to caution Your Lordship against a hasty
judgement with respect to the interests of this country on the Pacific
at the same time that I would beg you to remark that the opinion I have
expressed does not in the main affect the subject of the accompanying
memoranda. But more especially I would venture to warn You against
accepting the statements of the Hudsons Bay Co as satisfactory with
respect to the condition or government of their territories. The truth
can only be got at primarily by careful Examination on the spot by
some one well acquainted with the history of the fur trade & of
discovery on the N.W. Coast.

I do not wish to be considered as making any reflection on its
Governors but it is not in the nature of things that a trading monopoly,
the operations of which are carried on among savages, should fairly
represent itself or that it should be in a condition to undertake large
and important national affairs.

A perusal of the statements of all witnesses on the Subject might
lead to a moral but not probably a judicial opinion.

I would also add that what is true of the natives as to isolation
would be equally true of convicts if the government desired to Land any
where their labour might compensate for the Expense of their
maintenance.

I would also suggest to you whether the cure of many of our social
evils at home may not more easily be found in the extension of our
Colonial Empire not in territory but in men & the consequent
extension of our Commercial and manufacturing relations, than by any
other means. Since the accompanying memoranda were written we have
learnt from the daily papers the formidable nature of the preparations
made at San Francisco for the occupation of Queen Charlottes Island by
American citizens which has by this time taken place. Also of their
having Caused a republic to be proclaimed at Honolulu & of their
intentions to do the same shortly at the Sandwich Islands—the latter
has been long the avowed object of their diplomatic agents in centeral
America & the Pacific