MISCELLANEOUS. 1137 



perish of cold and hunger: by the loss of a Dart, Providence saved all 

 the rest." Of course, an expedition consisting of fifteen ships-of-war 

 and forty transports, of troops fresh from the victories of Maryborough, 

 and of colonists trained to the severities of a northern climate, and 

 sufficient for the service, under such chiefs, accomplished nothing but a 

 hasty departure. 



Peace was concluded in 1713. Down to this period the French 

 fisheries had been more successful, probably, than those conducted by 

 the English or the American colonists. 



Their own account is, indeed, that, at the opening of the century, 

 their catch of codfish was equal to the supply of all continental or 

 Catholic Europe. By the treaty of Utrecht, in the year just men- 

 tioned, England obtained what she had so long contended for, as her 

 statesmen imagined namely, a supremacy in,. or monopoly of, the 

 fisheries of our seas. 



On the coast of Nova Scotia, or Acadia, the French were utterly 

 prohibited from approaching within thirty leagues, beginning at the 

 Isle of Sable, and thence measuring southwesterly; while the uncon- 

 ditional right of England to the whole of Newfoundland, and to the 

 Bay of Hudson and its borders, was formallv acknowledged. 



Yet, at Newfoundland, the privilege of fishing on a part of the east- 

 ern coast from Cape Bonavista to the northern point, and thence along 

 the western shore as far as Point Riche, was granted to the subjects of 

 Louis. It is to be observed that England reserved the exclusive use of 

 the fishing-grounds considered the best, and also the territorial juris- 

 diction; that the French were not permitted to settle on the soil, or 

 erect any structures other than fishermen's huts and stages; and that 

 the old and well-understood method of fishing was to be continued 

 without change. 



By one party this adjustment of a vexed question was deemed 

 favorable to England and just to France. But another party insisted 

 that their rival, humbled oy the terms of the peace in other respects, 

 should have been required in this to submit to her own doctrines and 

 to an unconditional exclusion from the American seas. The oppo- 

 nents of the treaty did not view the case fairly. The cession of 

 Acadia was supposed to include the large island of Cape Breton; and, 

 this admitted, the French were to be confined to a region from which 

 their further, or at least considerable, interference with vessels wearing 

 the English fla^ was hardly possible: while, with regard to that very 

 region, it should be recollected that, though England claimed New- 

 foundland by the discovery of Cabot and the possession of Gilbert, no 

 strenuous or long-continued opposition had been made, at any time, to 

 all nations fishing, or even forming settlements, there; and that 

 France was entitled to special consideration, inasmuch as her estab- 

 lishments for conducting the fishery had been held without interrup- 

 tion for more than half a century, and had been recognised at tne 

 peace of Ryswick. Besides, she had captured several English posts 

 in addition, and, in fact, was in actual possession of a large part of the 

 island and its valuable appendages. 



The party in opposition assailed the ministry in terms of bitter 

 denunciation. It was said that they "had been grossly imposed 

 upon," that they "luul directly given to France all she wanted," and 



92909 S. Do,-. S70. <5l-3. vol :j 83 



