THE FIRST ANGLO-FRENCH DUEL 103 



their captors for awhile. A few barbarities were committed 

 by the Micmac Indians, who were accordingly sent back to 

 Acadia. But the settlers were undismayed. Women and 

 children were 462 in 1698, 636 in 1706, 448 in 1707, 451 in 

 1709, and 612 in 1710. They dwindled — but for three years 

 only — to the figure at which they stood in 1698. Otherwise 

 the permanent population whose homes were in Newfound- 

 land was unaffected. As a conqueror of men and nations 

 St. Ovide must be classed with those who wage war with 

 phantoms. 



The war had an important constitutional effect, for The con- 

 Newfoundland Governors, like constitutions, were not made '"fap]ains 

 but grew. From 1675 to 1698 the convoy-captains played «f^^^ «f 

 the part of Governors. Their reign was briefer than that of owners of 

 a Roman consul. Nominally they were statisticians and Inquiry, 

 inquired into and reported on disorders. But a census had^^^^'^^^ 

 been the despot's weapon since the days of Moses, captains A^//^, 

 of the Royal Navy never drew nice distinctions between; 

 interrogatives and imperatives, and the words 'oyer' andi 

 ' audiencia ' remind us that ears are the distinctive attributes! 

 of judges. Instructions were annually given to the convoy-j 

 captains to inquire into breaches of the latest editions of, and) 

 additions to the old decalogue of 1634, and even before the 

 Act of 1699, which invested them with judicial attributes, we 

 read from time to time of offenders being whipped or ducked 

 at the yardarm, and of offenders* houses being removed. In 

 addition to compulsory, there was a voluntary jurisdiction, 

 and masters and servants referred to them their mutual 

 disputes. ' It hath been customary ', wrote George Larkin 

 (1701), 'for the Commander-in-Chief upon complaints to 

 send his lieutenant^ to the several harbours and coves to 

 decide all differences and disputes that happen betwixt 

 commanders of merchant ships and the inhabitants and 

 planters, and betwixt them and their servants,' and he added 

 1 i. e. * surrogate ' in Admiralty Law, ' 



