22 LABRADOR 



who, when presented at the French court, filled with admi- 

 ration the young king, Louis XVI. 



The conquest of Canada in 1763 by the English worked a 

 revolution on the Labrador coast. Shortly after the con- 

 quest many of the French-Canadian gentry went back 

 to France; we know, for instance, that in 1767 Captain 

 Croizille de Courtemanche, half-brother of M. de Brouague, 

 went back. At the same time there flocked into the coun- 

 try a number of English and Scotch adventurers "four 

 hundred and fifty contemptible sutlers and traders," as Gov- 

 ernor Murray called them. Some of these men bought up 

 the concessions along the Labrador coast which the French 

 Canadians were leaving. Between 1759 and 1808 they 

 acquired nearly the whole coast from the Mingan Islands 

 to Bradore Bay, and formed what was known as the Lab- 

 rador Company, the leading spirit in which was Mathew 

 Lymburner, the Quebec merchant who spoke so ably at 

 the bar of the House of Commons in Westminster against 

 the Constitutional Act of 1791. 



From 1763 also dates the first authentic account of a 

 settled English fishery between the Strait of Belle Isle 

 and Hamilton Inlet. Under the French regime Canada 

 had included all Labrador; but by the proclamation of 

 1763 its eastern boundary became the River St. John. 

 Labrador and Anticosti were annexed to Newfoundland. 

 Adventurers immediately began to establish themselves 

 in the new territory. Captain Nicholas Darby, of Bristol, 

 set up near Cape Charles, and the firm of Noble and Pinson, 

 long well known on the coast, began to do business at 

 Temple Bay. 



