48 FISHERIES OF THE PROVINCE OF QUEBEC 



an Acadian priest, and the members of Jolliet's family taken 

 prisoners on board his barque, namely, his wife, and her 

 mother, Madame Lalande. 



THE MAGDALEN ISLANDS. 



The Magdalen Islands were included in the concession of 

 a large part of Acadia to Nicholas Denys in 1653. Ten years 

 later, together with the rights of fishery thereto pertaining, 

 they were handed over by the Company of Naw France to 

 Francis Doublet of Honfleur, who was commissioned to estab- 

 lish a colony and fisheries thereon. He did neither, but he 

 gave proof to all succeeding generations of his conjugal af- 

 fection^ by changing the name Brion, by which the islands 

 had been known up to that time, from the days of Jacques 

 Cartier, to Madeleine, in honor of his wife. And Madeleine, 

 or the English equivalent, Magdalen, they have ever since 

 been called. In 1720, these islands, with the fishery rights 

 thereto pertaining, were conceded by letters patent to the 

 Count de St. Pierre, equerry to the Duchess of Orleans. The 

 exclusive fishing rights of the islands were conceded by the 

 King in March, 1742, to the Sieurs Antoine and Joseph 

 Pascaud for the term of eleven years, which was extended in 

 1751 for another term of nine years. In 1798 the Magdalen 

 Islands were granted by George III. under letters patent, to 

 Admiral Isaac Coffin, who inaugurated upon them the system 

 of feudalism which proved so disastrous to the fishermen of 

 the islands that it finalty drove hundreds of them into volun- 

 tary exile on the Labrador coast, as will be shown more fully 

 later on. 



RIVERIN'S FISHERY ENTERPRISE. 



The first preparations to establish permanent fishery 

 settlements on the Gaspe coast after the time of Denys, seem 

 to have been made by the Sieur Riverin about the year 1688. 

 On the 12th of Mrch of that year he received a Crown 

 grant of the river and bay of Cap Chat on the Gaspe coast, 



