56 HISTORICAL GEOGRAPHY OF NEWFOUNDLAND 



fishermen, who had used these seas, coasts, and shores, for 

 a century, and would be unlikely to submit without a struggle 

 to the new yoke. Moreover, colonists were hard to find, and 

 would probably be far too few and feeble to impose the yoke 

 by force. They straggled in by forties at a time. 

 Guy found- Alderman John Guy, the first Governor, set sail in 1610 

 'folony at** w ^ instructions to trade with the fishermen for dry fish and 

 Cupers wine, and to settle in Conception Bay or elsewhere. 1 Ac- 

 Cove,i6io~ cording ] y he chose Cuper's Cove (Port de Grave), on the 

 west coast of Conception Bay, as his capital; and shortly 

 afterwards 2 a sub-settlement, called Bristol's Hope, was 

 formed at Harbour Grace, a few miles to the north. Guy, 

 says Sir W. Vaughan, was ' the first Christian that planted 

 and wintered in that island ', and a letter from Guy to his 

 employers (1611) informs us that the colonists spent their 

 first winter in building an enclosure 120 feet by 90 feet, and 

 within the enclosure, a storehouse, dwelling-house, and work- 

 house, and a platform for three cannon. A boat was built, 

 skins and furs were cured, sawpits and smiths' forges were 

 used, corn was sown in spring, .and the goats, pigs, and 

 swine survived the ordeal of a winter which was mild. Of 

 the thirty-nine human inhabitants who wintered there, four 

 died, one of whom ' died of thought, having slain a man in 

 Rochester, which was the cause that he came this voyage' ; 

 so that they were not quite all West-countrymen, nor quite 

 so guileless as Bacon wished them to be. 



and issued In August 1611, Guy issued ordinances fining subject and 

 ^re'ula f rei g n fishermen for throwing ballast into harbours, destroy- 

 ttons,i6u, ing fishing-stages and cook-rooms, taking up too much space 

 tteaf ere n ^ ie s ^ ore ' defacing boat-marks, stealing boats, firing 

 1621, &c., woods, or spiriting settlers away. Accused of these seven 



1 Ik. Mus. Cotton MSS. Otho E. VIII. 3; Prowse, History of 

 Newfoundland, p. 94. 



2 Eight years, Sir R. Whitbonrne ; one year, Bacqueville de la 

 Potherie, Hist, de PAmtrique Septentrionale, 1721-2, vol. i, pp. 44-5. 



