1901-2.] The Beginning of Municipal Government in Ontario. 419 



Kingston and Napanee, the proclamation should be posted there, a 

 suggestion which was accepted. Again, having no officers corresponding 

 to the French notaries, mortgages and other documents requiring 

 registration could not be registered. Further, under the French system 

 the public highways were under the direction of the officers of the 

 militia, subject to the supervision of the grand voyer. But this arrange- 

 ment could not be carried out in the English districts. The granting of 

 licenses to keep taverns was in the hands of the Secretary of the 

 Province or his agent, and could be arranged only in Montreal. And 

 finally it is prayed that if Government will not grant them any relief 

 from the French system, then, inasmuch as they are entirely ignorant of 

 the requirements of that system, the Government may send them full 

 instructions as to the laws and how they are to be enforced.^ But by 

 this time a change in the constitution had been recognized as inevitable 

 and was then being prepared, hence no action was taken on this 

 memorial. In default of instructions the justices in civil matters simply 

 followed the laws and customs which they had known, and decided 

 cases on the good old English principle of equity and good conscience. 



The duties of the Court of Quarter Sessions, as interpreted, were 

 partly judicial, as in connection with the maintenance of the peace, 

 partly legislative, as in prescribing what animals should not run at large, 

 or what conditions should be observed by those who held tavern 

 licenses, and partly administrative, as in appointing certain officials, and 

 in laying out and superintending the highways." We find, for instance, 

 that before 1789 the magistrates had appointed church wardens for the 

 township of Fredericksburg, and doubtless for several others, and that 

 these church wardens were exercising their powers as if they were living 

 in an English colony under English laws.^ 



It is noteworthy that most of the civil or municipal administration 

 undertaken by the justices of the peace was based upon the old English 

 law and custom as it was in the days of Queen Elizabeth and the 

 Stuarts, and not as subsequently modified in Britain.* 



The first loyalist settlers were chiefly military men, many of them 

 not having been actual settlers in the colonies, and some of them being 

 German auxiliaries. They came to Canada under command of their 

 officers, who, as we have seen, were appointed the first magistrates of 

 the districts. As might be expected, most of these settlers did not take 



1 Canadian Archives, Q. 43, i and 2, pp. 404-415. 



2 Early Records of Ontario, Queen's QtiaHerly, Vol. VII. 



3 Early Records of Ontario, Queens Quarterly, Vol. VII, p. 58. 



4 Early Records of Ontario, Queen's Quarterly, Vol. VII., pp. 58, 243, 327. 



