308 ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 
all through the winter it was not only the route to Nova Scotia but 
the only possible route through British territory to England. In 
times of peace the mails could be sent to England by courtesy of the 
United States through American ports, but military men foresaw 
that in time of war this would be impossible, and as a military mea- 
sure the communication with England by way of the Madawaska and 
St. John must be kept open at all hazards. Now, Massachusetts, 
according to the treaty, as we have seen, cut completely across this 
communication, making it possible for the British to use it in time of 
peace only by the courtesy of a foreign nation, and in time of war 
only by the expedient of capturing and holding it. As long as Massa- 
chusetts and Nova Scotia were under the Government of Great Brit- 
ain this did not of course matter in the least ; the Revolution 
changed all that and gave the subject great importance. Naturally 
it was the military authorities at Quebec who first perceived the 
importance of the subject, and the case was very clearly stated by 
Lord Dorchester, Governor-General of British ‘North America in 
1785, to whom! belongs the credit not only of perceiving the issue 
clearly but also of formulating ‘the claim for a boundary at the 
central highlands, afterwards adopted by Great Britain and main- 
tained until 1842. Lord Dorchester’s claim that, if the boundary 
between Quebec and New Brunswick were placed on the northern 
highlands it would aid to place the international boundary there, 
was made immediately in connection with the interprovincial bound- 
ary controversy which had arisen between Quebec and New Brunswick. 
This subject will be found fully discussed in the later part of this 
paper (under Interprovincial Boundaries) and it is enough to point 
out here, that the importance of the north-west angle question was 
clearly apparent to the authorities of British America as early as 
1785. Moreover, as I shall show a little later, all of the men promin- 
ent at the time in New Brunswick, Governor Carleton, Winslow, 
Chipman and others accepted it as a fact beyond dispute that the 
north-west angle was to lie on the highlands just south of the St. 
Lawrence, that the communication with Quebec was thus to be cut 
off, and that in order to preserve it some special negotiation must be 
made, a view taken by the British Government, as we shall see, until 
1814 or later. 
So much for one side of the question. In the United States the 
subject appears not to have attracted attention so early, and naturally 
enough since the States had none of their population in the region 

1 And by no means to the British authorities in consequence of the war 
of 1812 as Winsor supposes (America, VII., 174). 
