216 



ginning, and who, in the triumph of the cause which had had their 

 prayers, went meekly — as woman ever meets a sorrowful lot — ^into 

 hopeless, interminable exile. It is to be lamented that better counsels 

 did not prevail. Had New York, Massachusetts, and Virginia espe- 

 cially, been either merciful or just, transactions which, in ages to come, 

 will be very likely to put us on our defence, would not stain our annals. 

 The example of South Carolina should have been followed by all. As 

 it was, whigs whose gallantry in the field, whose prudence in the 

 cabinet, and whose exertions in diplomatic stations abroad, had con- 

 tributed essentially to the success of the conflict, were regarded with 

 enmity on account of their attempts to produce a better state of feeling 

 and more humane legislation. 



As a matter of expediency, how unwise was it to continue to per- 

 petuate the opponents of the Revolution, and to keep them a distinct 

 class, for a time, and for harm yet unknown! How ill-judged the 

 measures that caused them to settle the hitherto neglected possessions 

 of the British crown ! Nova Scotia had been won and lost, and lost 

 and won, in the wars between France and England, and the blood of 

 New England had been poured upon its soil like water ; but when we 

 drove thousands and tens of thousands of our countrymen tO' seek a 

 refuge there, what was it? Before the war, the fisheries of its coast — 

 for the prosecution of which Halifax itself was founded — comprised, in 

 public estimation, its chief value ; and though Great Britain had quietly 

 possessed it for about seventy years, the emigration to it of loyalists 

 from the United States, in a single year, more than doubled its popula- 

 tion. By causing the expatriation, then, of the adherents of the British 

 crown, among whom were the well-educated, the ambitious, and the 

 well-versed in politics, we became the f(:)unders of two British colonies, 

 for it is to be remembered that New Brunswick formed a part of Nova 

 Scotia until 1784, and that the necessity of the division then made 

 was of our own creation. In like manner, we became the founders of 

 Upper Canada. The lo3^alists of our Revolution were the first settlers 

 of the territorjr thus denominated by the act of 1791 ;* and the princi- 

 pal object of the line of division of Canada, as established by Mr. Pitt's 

 act, was to place them, as a body, by themselves, and to allow them to 

 be governed by laws more congenial than those which were deemed 

 requisite for the subordination of the French on the St. Lawrence. The 

 government for which they had become exiles was liberal to them; it 

 gave them lands, tools, materials for buildings, and means of sul^sist- 

 ence for two 3^ears, and to each of their children (at the age of twenty- 

 one) two hundred acres of land. And besides this, of the offices 

 created by the organization of a new colonial government, they were 

 the chief recipients. 



Should it be rephed that Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Canada 

 "West, without accessions from the United States, would have risen to 

 importance ere this, I answer, that there is good reason to doubt it; 



* It was in a debate on this bill, that Fox and Bm-ke severed the ties of friendship which 

 had existed between them for a long period. The scene was one of the most interesting that 

 had ever occurred in the House of Commons. Fox, overcome by his emotions, wept aloud. 

 Burke's previous course with regard to the French revolution had rendered a rupture at soia© 

 time probable, perhaps certain. 



