In 1812 the first Selkirk settlers arrive in Red River. In 1863 there took place tbe sale of the Hudson's Bay Company to the International Finance Corporation. The intervening period contains all that distinctively and pecularity belongs to tbe life of the Red River Settlement. This thesis presupposes a working knowledge of the political development of tbe country. Education and missionary work has received special and somewhat detailed treatment. An attempt has been made in tbe Introduction to give a graphic setting to a study which may tend to become prosaic in an effort to avoid fiction and rhetoric and to arrive at truth and accuracy. The fact that the material available has been well nigh all of a secondary nature has made the attainment of this ideal doubly difficult. The thesis falls into three distinct sections and it is hoped that the general plan of the work will be self-evident. As further aid to the reader a table of contents has been included and the several chapters sub-divided.