That he had a talent for strategizing—or scheming, depending on how one might look at it—is obvious from his plans for the smallpox-in-a-bottle, from his marriage to Comcomly’s daughter, from his taking control so thoroughly of Astoria at the colony’s outset and ultimately selling the place out. Even Franchère, one of the most generous of the Astoria chroniclers and a fellow Canadian besides, finally takes to calling the Scotsman “the crafty M’Dougall” and declares that the “charge of treason will always be attached” to Astoria’s leadership.
