Page 10 - Fur Trade program Curriculum

leave system. The offenders would be severely punished: those who equipped the
coureurs des bois or who bought their pelts would pay fines and their merchandise
would be confiscated. As for those who went 'wood running' without a leave signed by
the Governor himself, they would be flogged or even condemned to the galleys.

This decree gave birth to two groups of traders: those who held legitimate licenses or
leaves; these individuals soon adopted the name "voyageurs" to differentiate
themselves from the coureur des bois, who were henceforth trading illegally. From the
hero he was some fifteen years before; the coureur des bois became an outlaw.

In November 1674, two years following his decree, Frontenac was exhilarated. He
wrote to Minister Colbert that he had been successful in suppressing wood running, and
that the hanging of one coureur des bois intimidated the others to such an extent that
there were but five left in the whole of Canada.

However, the marquis de Frontenac took care not to reveal to the Minister of the
Colonies of Louis XIV that, since his arrival in the colony, he had been trying to control
the trade for his own profit. For many years, regardless of their position, most
administrators in New France had their eyes set on the profits generated by the fur
trade.

This phenomenon endured until the end of the XVIIth century and it was one of the
reasons why the numbers of coureurs des bois kept increasing. The Governor
extended trading leaves to those voyageurs that he gained over to his cause. The
others, among who were many merchants and even the Governor of Montréal, were
forced to call upon the coureurs des bois.

Nevertheless, the first act of the story of the coureurs des bois was coming to an end.
During the 1670s, the expansion of the reservoir of pelts led the coureurs des bois to
the west and the southwest. In the early 1680s, some traders settled on the shores of
Hudson Bay. These movements naturally produced increases in the numbers of furs
and pelt harvested.

Thus, from 1675 to 1685, the average annual production of beaver pelts was about
89,500 pounds (weight); that number rose to 140,000 pounds from 1685 to 1687. Two
years later, 160 canoes arrived in Montréal with a cargo of about 800,000 pounds of
beaver pelts. However inexhaustible the source, the French market could only absorb
40,000 to 50,000 pounds of pelts per year.

In 1690, the metropolitan authorities deplored such surpluses. Their complaints were
ignored in the colony, because the French merchants were obliged to pay a fixed price
for all the pelts brought to their stores by the Canadian traders. Year after year, the
unsold pelts piled up and rotted in the stockrooms.

In 1696, Louis XIV published a decree virtually restricting the trading activities to the
establishments located along the St. Lawrence River. This document was a turning