After 16 years of working in the fur trade, first with the North West Company and then with the Hudson’s Bay Company after the merger of both companies, James Douglas is appointed as a Chief Trader. Chief traders received one of eighty-five equal cuts of forty percent of the company’s net profits or losses, amounting to £400 on a good year. These profit shares were dependent upon the price and market situation of beaver skins, in which Indigenous labour and participation were crucial.

Sage, W.N. (Walter Noble). Sir James Douglas and British Columbia. (Toronto: The University of Toronto Press, 1930), 71-72.