BRITISH CONTRIBUTION 145 



of the map in 1776, Governor Thomas Pownall, himself 

 something of a surveyor, could say, "Where local Precision 

 has been necessary this Map has been referred to not simply 

 n private but public Transactions, such as the Great Indian 

 urchase and Cession". 

 Governor Pownall was also associated with another and 

 Qiore famous map of this period; John Mitchell's 'Map of the 

 British and French Dominions in North America', published 

 by Thomas Jeffreys in 1755. Mitchell was a botanist who had 

 settled in Virginia early in the century, returning to England 

 in 1747. Little is known of his cartographical work, and his map 

 probably owes something to Jeffreys. It represents eastern 

 North America from the southern shores of Hudson Bay to 

 the Mississippi delta, on the scale of approx. forty-three miles 

 ;o the inch. A prominent feature is the detailed statement of 

 the authorities followed in its compilation. It is stated that the 

 map was undertaken 



"with the Approbation and at the request of the Lords 

 Commissioners for Trade and Plantations and is chiefly 

 composed from Draughts, Charts and Actual Surveys . . . 

 great part of which have been lately taken by their Lordships' 

 Orders". 



With this official character, it is not surprising that the map 

 clayed an important part in the peace negotiations between 

 Jie American colonies and Britain in 1782, for on it the 

 boundary between Canada and the United States was laid 

 down. 



The second great field for British cartography was in India, 

 before the time of D'Anville there was nothing approaching an 

 iccurate map of the sub-continent, and large areas of the 

 nterior were blank. From about 1750 onwards, the East India 

 Company, to forward their commercial expansion, actively 

 promoted the charting of the coasts, and this work was later 

 timulated by their hydrographer, Alexander Dalrymple. 

 The first systematic land surveys resulted from the activities of 

 Major James Rennell in the Bengal Presidency, the first 



