INTRODUCTION. "8 



had been published. Besides all this the Welsh and Irish, as also 

 the Icelanders, put in the claims of being early visitors. Thus the 

 difficulties of origin increase rather than diminish. 



The first established colony in Labrador was at "Brest," now 

 Bradore. It was founded about 1508, was a trading post, con- 

 tained the residence of the Governor and other officers, and, 

 it is said, contained "200 houses and 1000 inhabitants in winter, 

 which latter were trebled in the summer." Thus you will see 

 that very early this was an important trading post, though it 

 gradually lost its importance, and soon dwindled to a few houses 

 whose inhabitants were settlers, who took what they could find 

 as they found it, and were without law and government, as one 

 might truly say. 



You will understand that this settlement at Bradore was not a 

 permanent one, that is, dependent upon other settlements on the 

 coast ; but was one, so to speak, complete in itself for the purpose 

 of carrying on fisheries at that place, while the greater portion of 

 the coast had neither been much settled nor much explored ; conse- 

 quently, at the time called the Conquest, when the Esquimaux were 

 nearly exterminated from these districts, and when the owning foreign 

 monarch began to cut up this almost thriving colony into special 

 grants to his favorites, its prosperity began to decline . Though at first 

 the fish, whale, and fowl were everywhere abundant, a slow but per- 

 ceptible decrease of these productions tended also to dishearten 

 the colony ; and a natural unfavorableness of the coast, being then, 

 as it now is, a mass of granite rock, as also the severity of the cli- 

 mate, combined with a dread of extennination, to scatter them 

 completely. You will now also understand why, if Labrador was 

 once in a way to become a popular fishing station, it broke up 

 rather than increased in its settlements and thus possible fu- 

 ture growth. Having thus broken up, you will see why it has re- 

 mained waiting for the energy and determination of Americans to 

 combine with the sturdy hold on of the English, who have now 

 gained possession of the coast and added it to their already im- 

 portant Canadian and Newfoundland Colonies, to open it again to 



