Canadians should be treated agreeable to his Majesty's kind and humane intentions. No invasion on their properties or insult on their persons have gone unpunished; all reproaches on their subjection by the fate of arms, revilings on their customs or country, and all reflections on their religion have been discountenanced and forbid. No distinction has been made betwixt the Briton and Canadian, but equally regarded as subjects of the same prince. The soldiers live peaceably with the inhabitants, and they reciprocally acquire an affection for each other.' .

The Canadian people, some sixty-five thousand in num- Character ber, made a very favourable impression on their first English of people. rulers. They were a frugal, industrious, and moral race, jealous of their religion. They were, however, very ignorant; it had been the policy of the French Government to keep them so. Very few could read, and there had been no printing press in Canada before the British occupation. The gentry were for the most part poor and somewhat vain, holding trade in contempt. The common people stood in the relation of tenants to the seigniors, whom they were accustomed to respect and obey. Although the tenants did not hold by military service, their lords could call upon them for such in case of need. Thus lord and tenant had shared in common the dangers of the field, and the general calamities of their country had but served to increase their mutual affection. The influence of the clergy was still great, though after the conquest there appeared a tendency to avoid the payment of tithes. Writing some years later, a traveller described the common people as indolent and attached to ancient prejudices. Limiting their exertions to an acquisition of the necessaries of life, they neglected its conveniences. Indolence kept them poor, but, as their wants were few, they remained happy. He noted that their address to strangers was more polite and unembarrassed than that of any other peasantry in the world.' Travels through the Canadas, by G. Heriot. London, 1807.

Military rule and

the English

Treaty of
Paris.

Such being the material to deal with, the military rule which prevailed from the conquest till 1764 proved successful. population. The personal relations between rulers and ruled were very friendly, and the law administered was, in the main, the French Civil Law. In addition, however, to the French inhabitants there was a small English population which proved a continual thorn in the side of the British Governors. According to Murray most of them were followers of the army, of mean education, or soldiers disbanded at the reduction of the troops. 'All have their fortunes to make, and, I fear, few of them are solicitous about the means when the end can be obtained.' By the Treaty of Paris, signed February 10, 1763, France, besides renouncing all pretensions to Nova Scotia or Acadia, ceded and guaranteed to Great Britain Canada with all its dependencies, including Cape Breton. The liberty of the Catholic religion was guaranteed to the people of Canada; the undertaking being made that the most effectual orders would be given to secure to the new Roman Catholic subjects ⚫ the exercise of their religion as far as the laws of Great Britain allowed. (It was afterwards pointed out by the shrewd Maseres how equivocal was the above language.) It was held by some that the retention of Canada after the peace was from one point of view a mistake, in that it removed the one check to American aspirations after independence. But, unless the spirit of the British rule had been radically altered, it is very doubtful how long, even though Canada had remained French, the permanence of British ascendancy over the American colonies could have been secured. It is possible that as these colonies grew in strength and population they might themselves have conquered French 'Canada. The old colonial empire need not have been rendered much more permanent by a short-sighted policy which should have preferred Guadeloupe to Canada.

Proclama

tion of

October 7,

1763.

The first act of the British Government after the peace was to issue a Proclamation, on October 7, 1763, dividing the new

Question of

General
Assembly.

American acquisitions into four separate and distinct provinces, Quebec, East Florida, West Florida, and, in the West Indies, Grenada. The province of Quebec was bounded on the Labrador coast by the river St. John. From thence the boundary ran from a line drawn from the head of that river through Lake St. John to the south end of Lake Nipissing. The boundary from this point, crossing the river St. Lawrence and the Lake Champlain in forty-five degrees of north latitude, passed along the high lands which divided the rivers that fell into the St. Lawrence from those that fell into the sea. Thence it passed along the north coast of the Bay des Chaleurs and the coast of the Gulf of St. Lawrence to Cape Rosiers. From thence it crossed to the north side of the river St. Lawrence by the west end of the island of Anticosti and again met the river St. John. Already at this time the Secretary of State, Lord Egremont, was in favour of including within the limits of Canada the Indian reserves to the west of the American provinces, but the Board of Trade, under Lord Hillsborough, made strong objections, and Egremont's successor, Lord Halifax, deferred to their representations.

The Governors of the new colonies were given power and direction, as soon as circumstances would admit, to summon General Assemblies similar to those existing in the American colonies. Meanwhile all person's dwelling in or resorting to the new colonies were promised the enjoyment of the benefit of the laws of England. The promise was made of the establishment of regular Courts of Judicature, in which causes both civil and criminal might be determined according to law and equity, and, so far as possible, to the laws of England.

The announcement of the intention to call a General Assembly was expressly made on the ground that it would give confidence and encouragement to people to settle in Canada. But the task of giving effect to such promise proved very difficult. Murray, who had been left in command of Quebec after its surrender, was formally appointed

Governor of the new province in November 1763. Murray, Murray's
as has been shown, was very hostile to the British settlers. opinion of
English
Magistrates, he complained, had to be appointed and juries settlers.
to be composed from four hundred and fifty contemptible
sutlers and traders'. Nothing, he asserted, would content the
'licentious fanatics' trading in Canada but the expulsion of
the Canadians. Such men were little calculated to make the
new subjects enamoured with English laws, religion, or
customs, much less to be raised to the position of rulers.
The Canadian noblesse, Murray asserted, were hated because
their birth and behaviour entitled them to respect, and the
peasants were abhorred because they had been saved from the
oppression they had been threatened with. Murray, against
whom complaints had been made to the home Government by
the British section of the population, gloried in having been
accused of warmth and firmness in protecting the Crown's
Canadian subjects, and in doing the utmost in his power to
gain to the King the affections of that brave and hardy people.3
Murray was further troubled by the conduct of his subor- Murray's
difficulties
dinate Burton, who, on Gage becoming Commander-in-Chief at and recall.
New York, had been moved to Montreal, and, on the ground
of his military rank, questioned Murray's authority. Disputes
between the soldiers and the English residents at Montreal were
fermented by one Walker, whom Benjamin Franklin some
years later recognized as having, along with his wife, an ex-
cellent talent in making themselves enemies, . . . live where
they will, they will never be long without them.' The treatment
of Walker by some of the officers and the subsequent legal
proceedings bulk large in the official records; undoubtedly
they caused much worry to the British Governor. Murray,
who rightly or wrongly had given great offence to the English,
was recalled in 1766; but fortunately his successor, Guy
Carleton, proved equally acceptable to the French inhabitants.
1 Letter to Lord Shelburne, of August 20, 1766.

2 Report to Board of Trade, of October 29, 1764.
3 Letter of August 20, 1766.