120 ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 
CONCLUSION. 
Such briefly told, is the story of the Foundation of the Dignity of 
Baronet of Nova Scotia, an Order which still flourishes with all its an- 
cient privileges unimpaired, and though the Baronets in these days exer- 
cise but few of them, their right thereto nevertheless exists; nor has the 
legal possession of the Baronies in the Royal Province, held by their 
ancestors, ever really passed away from them. 
The right of recovery of these Baronies by the heirs of the first 
grantees has been disputed, on the ground that the Royal Province had 
been conquered by France, whereas the French occupation was merely a 
usurpation, and this formed the base of the British Commissioners’ claim 
for its restitution to the Crown of Great Britain in the reign of Queen 
Anne. “The British and provincial troops of New England had re-ac- 
quired possession of the country by the force of their arms; the demand 
that the country should be altogether retroceded to Great Britain, made 
at the treaty of Utrecht, proceeded therefore on the fact that the French 
had made entry upon the same by usurpation, but never by conquest or 
by cession.” ? It is certain that King Charles the First never intended 
to resign to France the Royal Province itself which he had granted to 
Sir William Alexander whose patent subsequent to the French occupa- 
tion was still in force. Therefore, “if Great Britain never lost or for- 
feited anything by the treaty of St. Germains in 1632, or of Breda in 
1667, so neither Sir William Alexander nor the baronets lost or forfeited 
their rights of proprietorship.” ? 
Another objection put forward to the claims of the Baronets of 
Nova Scotia to their ancient Baronies being, “ the length of time of non- 
user, and a conclusion therefrom of a voluntary abandonment of their 
claims, it is requisite to remark that in the charters of King Charles to 
Sir William Alexander, there is a special clause which declares that the 
grant shall be valid, sufficient, and effective in all time coming, in all 
points, in law, in all the king’s courts, and in all other places notwith- 
standing any law, custom, prescription, practice, decree, or constitution 
before made, decreed, or published, or afterwards at whatever time to be 
made, decreed and published, ordained or provided. As forfeiture for 
any cause was thus specially guarded against, so the same provision ex- 
tended to the knights baronets, the assignees of sir William Alexander, 
in their lands granted to them by him. These reservations seem to have 
been so strongly used with an allusion to the Scottish prescription then 
recently introduced by the act 1617, (c. 12); the law of Scotland there- 
fore was directly excluded and the law of England could not apply. The 
inference therefore of a non-user even voluntarily continued, cannot 
