THE THIRD ANGLO-FRENCH DUEL 133 



Point Rich, and of those that did some correctly placed it 

 north of Ingornachoix Bay, 1 others at the Bay of Islands, 2 or 

 even at Cape Ray, 3 which is 2 10 sea-miles south of where Point 

 Rich ought to be. The charts of the whole west coast north 

 of St. George Bay, except, oddly enough, the interior of the 

 Bay of Islands, were out of drawing and mutually inconsistent 

 until 1768, and few Frenchmen and no Englishmen knew 

 anything whatever about it. Accordingly Captain Cook, who 

 had served in Newfoundland under Lord Graves in 1762, 

 was sent to survey this coast. Apparently the coast was 

 then deserted, so that he threw no light on its inhabitants or 

 visitors; but his masterly survey amongst other things pre- 

 sented Newfoundland in its correct shape for the first time 

 (1768), delineated Port Saunders in Ingornachoix Bay, 

 traced the River Humber from its mouth in the Bay of Islands 

 to the neighbouring Deer Lake, and fixed the latitude of Point 

 Rich ; but that unruly Point immediately afterwards broke 

 loose from its moorings, and the outbreak of war with France 

 (1778) surprised diplomatists in the midst of their unfinished 

 arguments as to its locality. 



Exclusive jurisdiction, exclusive rights of settlement were therefore 

 questioned ; and geographical fixed points wandered like ^yl^' 

 will-of-the-wisps. The recognition of equal rights for French sailles sub- 

 and British on Bonavista and Exploits Bays, which had been c^Ll st 

 exclusively occupied by the British for three-quarters of John and 

 a century, was monstrous. It was plainly the duty of diplo- ca&eBona 

 matists to sweep away these uncertainties and anachronisms, vista and 

 Accordingly the Treaty of Versailles (1783) deleted Cape ^"^ 

 Bonavista and Point Rich from the Treaties of Paris and 1783. 

 Utrecht and substituted Cape St. John, beyond which there 



1 See e.g. British Museum, Royal Library, Maps, K. 119 (98), Moll's 

 Map (1700?); British Museum 71090 (2), Gibson's New and Correct 

 Map (1762) ; and 71095 (i) Kitchen's New Map (1760?), &c. 



Jean Denys' Map; comp. J. Friend's chart (1713) in British 

 Museum, S. 9 (8) 36. 



s British Museum, Royal Library, Maps, K. 118 (38), Moll's Map 

 (1715) ; British Museum MSS. 22875, fol. 100 ^1752 ?). 



