<P> In 1670, Charles II incorporated by royal charter the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC), granting it a monopoly on the fur trade in the area known as Rupert's Land, which would later form a large proportion of the Dominion of Canada . Forts and trading posts established by the HBC were frequently the subject of attacks by the French, who had established their own fur trading colony in adjacent New France . </P> <P> Two years later, the Royal African Company was inaugurated, receiving from King Charles a monopoly of the trade to supply slaves to the British colonies of the Caribbean . From the outset, slavery was the basis of the British Empire in the West Indies . Until the abolition of its slave trade in 1807, Britain was responsible for the transportation of 3.5 million African slaves to the Americas, a third of all slaves transported across the Atlantic . To facilitate this trade, forts were established on the coast of West Africa, such as James Island, Accra and Bunce Island . In the British Caribbean, the percentage of the population of African descent rose from 25% in 1650 to around 80% in 1780, and in the Thirteen Colonies from 10% to 40% over the same period (the majority in the southern colonies). For the slave traders, the trade was extremely profitable, and became a major economic mainstay for such western British cities as Bristol and Liverpool, which formed the third corner of the triangular trade with Africa and the Americas . For the transported, harsh and unhygienic conditions on the slaving ships and poor diets meant that the average mortality rate during the Middle Passage was one in seven . </P> <P> In 1695, the Parliament of Scotland granted a charter to the Company of Scotland, which established a settlement in 1698 on the Isthmus of Panama . Besieged by neighbouring Spanish colonists of New Granada, and afflicted by malaria, the colony was abandoned two years later . The Darien scheme was a financial disaster for Scotland--a quarter of Scottish capital was lost in the enterprise--and ended Scottish hopes of establishing its own overseas empire . The episode also had major political consequences, persuading the governments of both England and Scotland of the merits of a union of countries, rather than just crowns . This occurred in 1707 with the Treaty of Union, establishing the Kingdom of Great Britain . </P> <P> At the end of the 16th century, England and the Netherlands began to challenge Portugal's monopoly of trade with Asia, forming private joint - stock companies to finance the voyages--the English, later British, East India Company and the Dutch East India Company, chartered in 1600 and 1602 respectively . The primary aim of these companies was to tap into the lucrative spice trade, an effort focused mainly on two regions; the East Indies archipelago, and an important hub in the trade network, India . There, they competed for trade supremacy with Portugal and with each other . Although England ultimately eclipsed the Netherlands as a colonial power, in the short term the Netherlands' more advanced financial system and the three Anglo - Dutch Wars of the 17th century left it with a stronger position in Asia . Hostilities ceased after the Glorious Revolution of 1688 when the Dutch William of Orange ascended the English throne, bringing peace between the Netherlands and England . A deal between the two nations left the spice trade of the East Indies archipelago to the Netherlands and the textiles industry of India to England, but textiles soon overtook spices in terms of profitability, and by 1720, in terms of sales, the British company had overtaken the Dutch . </P>

All of the following areas were part of the british empire in the far east except