J.S. McLennan, Louisbourg: From Its Foundation To Its Fall (Sydney: Fortress Press, 1969)

© Fortress Press

Chapter 1

The foundation of Louisbourg was the result of a crisis in French colonial development. Before the readjustment of territory arranged by the Treaty of Utrecht, April 1713, [1]  France possessed the fairest colonial empire the world had seen. India knew her fleets and her factories. She held, on the seaboard of America, from the Arctic to what is now the State of Maine. Her influence was paramount from the St. Lawrence to the mouth of the Mississippi, in the vast backlands of the continent, to the westward of the Alleghanies. The West Indian islands belonging to her were the most prosperous of European settlements in those seas. At Placentia in Newfoundland she had an establishment, founded about 1660, which served as a base for her fisheries, and although weak as a place of arms, it was yet strong enough to resist English attacks and to send out expeditions which captured St. John's, the principal seat of the rival power.

Wars between England and France had gone on with brief intermissions from 1689 to 1713. The War of the Spanish Succession, in which Europe formed a coalition to resist the pretensions of the Great Louis, had left France exhausted. Many treaties, signed at Utrecht, settled the terms of the peace, but certain clauses in the one between France and England alone concern this narrative. It was agreed that the French should evacuate Placentia, retaining certain fishing rights on the coasts of Newfoundland ; that Acadia, unhappily with indeterminate limits, should be yielded to England, but that France should hold with full sovereignty the islands lying in the Gulf of the St. Lawrence and its outlets. The most important of these was Cape Breton. The first position taken by the English negotiators was that France should not be allowed to fortify the island. This was, however, yielded. Although England, by previous ownership, or this Treaty, thereafter held the littoral of North America from Hudson's Bay to the Spanish territory of Florida, the belief survived in New England  

1. Cf. Les Grands Traités de Louis XIV, Vast, Paris, Paris, Picard, 1893.

for a generation that these terms were the result of the purchase of the English plenipotentiaries by French gold. [1]

Acadia was the earliest of European settlements on the northern coast of America. Its history had been an extraordinary one, made up of neglect at home, internal strife by rival proprietaries in its forests, and frequent harryings of its struggling settlements by English colonists. These began with the foray of the Virginian Argal in 1613, and only ceased in 1710, when it was captured by New England forces, supported by an English fleet. So pitiful is its story that it is a cause for wonder that its chief place, Port Royal, survived, and that there, and at other settlements, lived about 2400 Acadians on lands so fertile that they excited the cupidity of the invaders.

The pastoral prosperity of these people made them self-supporting. They contributed little to the trade of France ; therefore the relinquishment of Acadia, which so inadequately fulfilled the purpose for which colonies were established, the enrichment of the mother-country, would not justify describing the consequence in America of the Treaty of Utrecht as making a crisis in French colonial affairs. That expression is made accurate by two conditions which were of vital importance : for one affected her retention of Canada, the most extensive of her dependencies ; the other, the prosecution of a trade, not only important from its own profits, but indirectly from the commerce of which it was the source, and the military [2] advantages of its permanent prosperity.

Newfoundland and Nova Scotia being in the hands of England, Cape Breton was a sentinel in the gateway of the St. Lawrence,[3] through which passed the traffic of Canada-through which, in event of new hostilities, attack on that colony would be made. The value of Cape Breton, as a naval base to protect Canada and French commerce in the Western Ocean, is so obvious that it need not be more than mentioned.

The trade of such importance was that of the North Atlantic fisheries. It had been vigorously followed, at all events, from the beginning of the sixteenth century ; Portuguese, Basques from the Spanish side of the Bidassoa, those of their French ports, Bayonne and St. jean de Luz, the fishermen of Bordeaux, of Normandy, as well as West Country English, visited the teeming waters of the western coasts of the North Atlantic. New England, too, about the mid-seventeenth century, turned, with far-reaching effects on her people, from the demoralizing fur trade. 

1. Douglass Summary, London, 1760, vol. i. p. 3.
2. The distinction between naval and military forces was of later date than this time. Macaulay, with his usual brilliancy and wealth of illustration, states the relation of the sea and land forces which continued in France until later than the fall of Louisbourg (Macaulay's Hist. Eng. vol. i. chap. iii.)
3. The Strait of Belle Isle was not used at this time..

"The two pursuits had very little in common. One partook of the departing barbarism, the other was a sure harbinger of the incoming civilisation. The one, lusty in its occasional prosperity, lean in its certain periods of scarcity, bred the lazy lounger of the trading-post, half-savage, half-pinchbeck citizen. The other, an uncertain chance combined with industry, made the hardy fisherman and bold sailor of the New England coast." [1] 

The thrift of her people saved from the harvest of the sea the beginnings of that wealth which the enterprise of their descendants has made so potent in developing the resources of this continent. In early times, after providing for sustenance, they exploited the land as subsidiary to the fisheries, and the traffic over seas of which they were the origin. First fishing, then coasting, then deep-sea voyages, the building of vessels for these trades, the providing cargo for them from their other industries, mark the course of New England's early economic development. It is fitting that a golden codfish hangs in the legislative chamber of Massachusetts, to remind the representatives of her people of the origin of their prosperity.

The importance of the fisheries was of more than colonial significance. The direct returns of the enterprise were large, and at the beginning of the eighteenth century were mostly the fruits of voyages made from Europe. " While many finny fellows have finer tissues and more exquisite flavours, few survive time, endure salt, and serve dally use as well as the Cod." These qualities opened for it large markets among the Catholic countries of Europe, as well as the Mahometan people of the Levant. Trade in other commodities followed that in fish, with proportional benefits to the nation, so that all interested in its prosperity set a high value on an industry the indirect advantages of which were so widespread and conspicuous. [2] 

The industry was fostered, also, by statesmen as a "nursery of seamen." France, but a few years before, owned a navy which, under Tourville, had withstood the combined fleets of England and Holland. [3] Her naval decline was still incipient, so the reserve of seamen employed in her fisheries was a prime factor in its encouragement. [4] As these cost the King nothing in time of peace, and are immediately available for his ships in time of war, and are no less skilled in handling a vessel on dangerous coasts than intrepid in combat," the commercial value of this industry was enhanced by its military importance. 

1. Weeden's Economic and Social History of New England, vol. i. p. 129. 
2. As the fisheries of the French increased, English writers expressed alarm over this aspect of the situation. Weeden has a score of allusions to the importance of this trade. 
3."Of Maritime powers France was not the first. But though she had rivals on the sea, she had not yet a superior. Such was her strength during the last forty years of the seventeenth century, that no enemy could singly withstand her, and that two great coalitions, in which half Christendom was united against her, failed of success " (Macaulay, vol. i. chap. ii.)
4.Shirley about 1745 estimated the number as 27,000.

The experience of a century had shown that an establishment near the fishing grounds was essential. Boat as well as bank fishing was important. Vessels required a port in which they could refit in security. The taste of certain markets demanded a fish which had to be dried on shore. The necessity of selecting a site for this establishment, and removing to it the people of Placentia, required by the Treaty to be evacuated, so that no delay should imperil one of the most productive industries of the kingdom, was the crisis with which Pontchartrain, Minister of Marine, was confronted.

Before going on to recount in outline the progress of the colony which was carried on under his administration and that of his successors, for colonial affairs were in charge of this Ministry, it is fair to caution the reader that a narrative dealing only with the affairs of one colony is quite untrustworthy as a ground for condemning men or systems. The basis for such a comparison is only sound when it embraces knowledge of what was happening in other establishments where conditions were not essentially different.

The perusal of the scores of volumes of documents dealing with the affairs of Louisbourg leaves an impression that the administrators of that colony must have been corrupt and inefficient beyond all men then in similar positions ; that the Minister was indifferent to its fortunes; that its soldiers were ill-fed and clothed, its fortifications ineffective, its people drunken, its growth trifling, the establishment more likely to perish from its own corruption than to require formidable armaments for its capture.

Corruption was also charged against officials in the English colonies. Ill-clothed soldiers in Nova Scotian winters kept watch wrapped in their blankets. On the eve of a war foreseen for years, one writes of an English outpost, " Canso lyes naked and defenceless " ; another, of Annapolis, the chief seat of English power in the province, as so weak, that even the cow of the neutral Acadian found its moat and ramparts practicable for assault. The consumption of spirits during the colonial occupation of Louisbourg shows that drunkenness was a vice the ravages of which were not confined to the French ; while the failure of the English colony of Georgia, founded not long after Louisbourg, proves that disappointing results followed enterprises under other flags than the white standard of the Bourbons. This introduction is not the place for these illuminating comparisons. It must, however, touch on some general considerations which will make more intelligible the narrative of the events which took place in Louisbourg.

France applied to her colonies the same paternal system of administration as at home. Colbert thus stated in one of his letters the principles on which a sound colonial administration was founded : 

"Apply your industry and knowledge of affairs to these three points, the complete expulsion of foreigners, liberty to all French, and cultivate with care, justice, and good order."[1] 

Such was the standard Colbert set. Unmodified as an ideal, it guided the policy of successive ministers.[2] 

But, while they wished the colonies to develop along these lines, other considerations modified this desire. No foreigner should live in them, nor were French heretics welcome. One of the advantages of the colony was that to it might be sent those whose presence in France was a disgrace to their families or a danger to the community. [3] It was in the sands of Louisiana that the frail grace of Manon ceased from troubling her generation. In its commercial development passion for working to a plan, often conceived with foresight and elaborated with intelligence, imposed on its people regulations which checked their enterprise. Its authorities were ordered to undertake elaborate schemes for development, beyond their ability and their resources to carry out.

Trades and occupations were regulated ; the wages paid, and the prices of commodities produced, were determined by enactments, which, in one form or another, had the force of Royal authority. France with this system had reached, in the years immediately preceding this period, a commanding position, not only in military affairs, but in arts, manufactures, and shipbuilding. [4] Her industries still retain the direction, and in instances the eminence, they attained in the earlier years of Louis's reign before Louvois became more powerful in his councils than Colbert. A system which produced such results, one akin to that under which modern nations are making great progress, had unquestioned merits. These are, however, most conspicuous in a country of settled conditions, of regular economic development. Among the ever-changing circumstances of a new settlement, regulations made by the best intentioned of bureaucrats were hampering to the settlers. The system accounts, in part at least, for the centrifugal tendency of the people of the French colonies. The energetic and the enterprising went to the confines of colonial civilization to escape rules which fettered their activities. This tendency is most marked among the coureurs du bois of Canada. It is also seen in Isle Royale, for Ingonish soon became, after Louisbourg, the principal place in the colony. This was attributed by the authorities to the absence there of any settled administration. Distance, the lack of supervision, the personal interest of 

1. Colbert, Deschamps, p. 162.
2. Cf. Mims, Colbert's West Indian Policy, Yale Historical Press, 1912.
3. Instances were not uncommon in Louisbourg.
4. Even when, at a later time, England was destroying her naval power, supremacy in shipbuilding had not passed from France. It was acknowledged in the saying current in the rival service, "The French to build ships, the English to fight 'em."

officials, however, made it easy to ignore instructions from the home authorities, of which the rigid observance was unpopular, inconvenient, or unprofitable. [1] 

These regulations have sometimes been described as if the intention of the authorities was to gratuitously vex and annoy the colonist. There is abundant evidence that the intention was to help him. The dependence of English ministers on parliamentary majorities, of which the members of trading constituencies were a part, made a care of the commercial interests of the country indispensable. Their French contemporaries were also zealous in doing all they could to promote trade. Suggestions were made of means by which the volume of business could be increased or more effectively carried on. The early history of Cape Breton furnishes these examples. In 1687 coal was taken from the island to France and tried in the royal forges ; a little earlier (1681) trade with the West Indian colonies was considered ; while a scheme for establishing an entrepôt at which seagoing ships would exchange cargoes with lighter vessels, the former, thus relieved from the tedious voyage to Quebec, to have time for two voyages a year instead of one, was favourably looked on by Colbert. [2] Coal from Cape Breton was made free of duty, as at a later date were its other principal products.

The Council of Commerce founded by Colbert in 1664, the scope of which was greatly extended in 1700, did much to promote French trade and to relieve it from regulations which fettered it. Many volumes of its deliberations are extant. [3] In these it is rare to find a case in which the decision is not in favour of the trader. An English writer in 1745 ascribes to its fostering "the Steps by which the French Commerce and Colonies, from being inferior to ours, have risen to a dangerous Superiority over us, in less than half a Century." [4] 

The decisions of this body and the enactments of all contemporary authorities were dominated by a theory which has had some influence to within memory of the living, namely, the conception that colonies were entirely for the benefit of the mother-country. It was stated as follows by the writer of a memorial on the settlement of Cape Breton : " Colonies are necessary only as they are useful to the states from which they take their origin ; they are useful only in as much as they procure for these states new advantages and solid means of extending their commerce." When the interests of the French merchant clashed with those of the colonist, the latter had to give way. [5] There does not seem to be any evidence that the French had, as had in a misty 

1.  " A des distances aussi grandes, quelle peut être l'énergie des loix de la métropole sur les sujets, l'obéîssance des sujets à les loix? " (Raynal, Isles Françoises, p. 3). The same disregard was shown in the English colonies. Cf Channing, History of the U.S. vol. ii. chap. viii. 
2. Ar. Col. B, vol. 1, p. 137. Other references are B, vol. 13, pp. 59 and 67, and MSS. Que. vol. 1, pp. 243, 276. 
3. Ar. Nat. F. 12.  
4. State of the British and French Trade Compared, London, 1745, quoted in "Two Letters on Cape Breton," London, 1746.  
5.  Instances of this occur in the history of Louisbourg. Cf. p. 49.

instinctive way the English, the foreshadowing of the Imperial idea of mother-country and colony, sharing burdens and mutually adapting production to a common profit. We do not find in their administration anything to correspond to the permitted competition on equal terms of the cheaply built colonial ship with English vessels, [1] nor the prohibition of growing tobacco at home, for the advantage of the southern colonies.

There followed from this theory the prohibition of trade with foreigners. In this regard the system broke down. Communities in which trade was of paramount importance evaded and defied those enactments, which interfered with profits. A course of illicit trade which could scarcely be called smuggling, so open and well known it was, contributed to the prosperity of every European establishment over seas. Louisbourg did much trade with New England. The condition in these British colonies is thus described :

" The existing records of original transactions are few and scattered, yet enough remains to show clearly that the commercial business of New England went forward under different forms in the several governments, but always towards one end. That end was money and profit, parliamentary law and Crown administration to the contrary notwithstanding. The interesting letter cited from Gilbert Deblois, a Boston official, to Samuel Curwin,, a prominent merchant of Salem, reveals the practice of Boston and Salem in handling imported merchandise which had escaped the King's duties : 

                                                                                                                        "Bos. Aug. 6, 1759. 

" Sam. Curwin, Esq.,

                               "Sir: I shall Esteem it a fav. you'l take an Opp^y to Inform all your Merchts. & Others, Concerned in Shipping up Wine, Oyl, Olives, Figs, Raisins, &c., that I am Determined Publickly to Inform the Collector of this Port, of any those Articles I can find out, are on board any Vessell Commanded by or under the Care of Captain Ober, in order they may be Seized. I shall not Concern myself ab^t any other Coaster, let em bring up what they will, but this Capt. Ober has Cheated me in such a manner (tho to no great Value), that I'm determined to keep a good look out on him, therefore would have all those Concern'd in that Trade, Regulate themselves accordingly, & if they will Risque any such Prohibetted Goods in S^d Ober^s Vessell, they must not (after such notice of my Design) think hard of me, as what I may do will be to punish S^d Ober and not them - I have just told S^d Ober that I would send this notification to Salem and W^d Certainly get his Vessell & Cargo Seized sooner or Later. 

                                                                                               I am S^r 

                                                                                                              Your hble Serv^t 
                                                                                                                        Gilbr. Deblois. 

"P.S. I'm a lover of Honest Men, therefore dont be Surprised at the above, as I look upon Obcr to be a great Cheat. 
" Pray destroy this when done with." 
" Answered Augt 13th." 

1. In 1724 sixteen shipbuilders of the Thames complained to the King that their trade was injured and their workmen emigrating on account of the New England competition (Weeden, vol. ii. p. 573). (For a brief, lucid statement of the English position, the reader is referred to Cambridge Modern History, vol. vi. ch. ii.)

                               "The honest candour of the energetic Deblois in visiting vengeance on Captain Ober - who had offended the official - is as astonishing as it is naive. Here a public officer deliberately warns a community of respectable law-breakers that they will suffer the penalty due any and all transgression, if they presume to ship their goods by a particular and prescribed captain. 'They must not (after such notice of my Design) think hard of me, as what I may do will be to punish S^d Ober and not them.' Debauched public sentiment and corrupt official practice was never more plainly manifest in an individual action. If we had Ober's counter idea of honesty and cheating, then eighteenth-century public morality would stand out in full relief." [1]

These practical and effective modifications of a parental system of administration, and the exploitation of colonies for the benefit of the merchant of the home ports, fitted in with the practice of others than the trading classes. Offices were bought, and the fees attached to them made their salaries comparatively unimportant. The command of a British regiment which long served in Nova Scotia was computed to be worth  £44000 a year. Prize money stimulated the commanders of King's ships, as booty the privateersman, nor did the commanders in the French navy disdain the profits of trade for which they carried a store of goods.

Nevertheless the splendid spirit of the seventeenth century which rings out in Lescarbot's address to France [2[ was not entirely dead. The letter of instructions to each new Governor of Isle Royale brings to his notice that the sole purpose of the King in colonization was the promotion of religion. This purpose so far held good, that, notwithstanding the enormous disadvantages at which the prohibition of the sale of drink placed the French trader competing for the trade of the natives, that prohibition was enforced. It also finds an expression for example, in the letter of the Minister Pontchartrain to the officials of Isle Royale in which he says : " Nothing can contribute more to the success of the establishment, nor draw down on it more effectively the blessings of Heaven, than good order and the repression of license." [3] Nevertheless, it was in the main true of France, as of her rivals, that " the period is one of peace, uneventful, almost undisturbed ; its chief crisis due to stock- jobbing ; its chief disputes about currency ; its chief victories those of commerce ; its type, if not its hero, the business man." [4]

Such was the general spirit of the times, the general principles on which the new colony was to be governed.

The island had long been known. It was possibly a land-fall of the first explorers. The Basques, who were among its earliest fishermen, claimed that 

1. Weeden, p. 660.
2. Lescarbot, Champlain Society, vol. i. p. 12. 
3. 3 June 4, 1715, B, 37, f. 226.
4. Cambridge Modern History, vol. vi. p. 40.

long before Columbus their ancestors had visited its ports. It seems to owe its name to the town which stands at the place where the Adour once flowed into the Bay of Biscay. [1] Traders visited it for traffic with the Indians, and during each season the fishermen carried on their industry on the adjacent banks. Each nationality kept to its own ports for mutual help and protection, and the names of the principal harbours show this usage. Until 1713 Louisbourg was known as English Harbour (Havre à I'Anglois) ; as late as the last generation deeds described lots as situated on the shores of " Sydney or Spanish Bay " (Baie des Espagnols), and a favourite patroness of the French gave her name, St. Anne, to the port frequented by the fishermen of that nation. Certain it is that during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries it was constantly visited by European fishermen. In 1629 rival and ephemeral- settlements were made on it by Lord Ochiltree for England, and Captain Daniel for France. About twenty years later Nicholas Denys of Tours had settlements at two places on Cape Breton, St. Peter's and St. Anne's, so well established that traces of them had not in a half-century of abandonment been obliterated by the wilderness.

Little was known of it ; even its shape, that of a closed hand, with the index finger pointing to the north-east, is inaccurately given in all the earlier maps. Its strategic and commercial possibilities drew attention to it long before its resources were known. In 1613 it was proposed as the seat of a Viceroy controlling French interests in it and Newfoundland .[2] Under Colbert, in addition to the efforts to develop its trade already cited, a project was submitted which looked towards using the coal of the shores of Sydney harbour, the refining there of West India sugars, and the building of ships with the oak which grew to the water's edge.

With the beginning of the eighteenth century interest in it was heightened. The Ste. Maries officers in the colonial troops asked for a grant of the island in 1700. [3] Memorials flowed in to the Minister. He asked a report from Raudot, Intendant of Canada, on its settlement, which Raudot sent on in 1706, [4] and followed by other papers on the subject. About simultaneously with his first report, an anonymous memoir was sent to Pontchartrain. Raudot shows in his dealing with the question not only the capacity of the experienced administrator, but also of the political thinker. His estimate of the required outlay of the proposed establishment was not materially exceeded for many years after the foundation of the colony. Long before Adam Smith published his book, he recognized the advantages of freer trade. He thus concluded his first memoir 

1. Duceré, Les Corsaires.
2. Bn. Nat. MSS., Moreau, 781.
3. Arch. de la Fn., Carton 3, No. 130.
4. This paper contains so much that is valuable about Cape Breton, as it was then thought to be more important than later acquired knowledge of its resources, that a précis is given later, p. 23.

" If it is desired to establish this Island so that its commerce shall flourish, it is necessary to open to it intercourse with all the ports of France, of Spain, of the Levant, of the French West Indies and of New England." [1]

One is inclined to ascribe the difficulties of the establishment on Cape Breton to the incapacity of Pontchartrain, as his defects have been kept alive for readers of memoirs in the scathing pages of St. Simon. For five or six years no project concerned with the American colonies had been placed before him more fully. He was apparently not only interested, but convinced of the advantages to France of the colony, and deferred action only until the end of the war. Before the Treaty was concluded he was aware that Placentia was to be ceded, and therefore that the establishment on Cape Breton was essential. He had warned his colonial subordinates to prepare for the change.

When the time for action came, Pontchartrain took the ground that he was inadequately informed, and secured the sanction of the Council for his scheme. It passed an order that a vessel should be sent with certain officers from the garrison of Placentia, who with L'Hermitte, major and engineer of that place, should select the most suitable port. This, the Minister states in his letter of instructions, must be good, easy for ingress, exit, and defence ; that the fisheries shall be abundant and near; that there shall be plenty of beaches and space for curing ; that there shall be good lands near ; but that the excellence of the port and the fishing is of prime importance. [2]

This policy was carried out ; Placentia was handed over to the English, the inhabitants and the movable property transferred to Cape Breton, but as the English were not ready to take possession,[3] Costebelle [4] the Governor and part of the garrison had to remain there until the transaction was completed, and until preparations were made for receiving the inhabitants in their new homes.

This disturbing of their organizations for the prosecution of the fisheries led to appeals from the people of the fishing ports of France to have an arrangement made with England by which they could carry on in Newfoundland that industry during 1714. Pontchartrain, however, informed, among others, the Bayle and Jurats of Siboure and of St. jean de Luz that this was impossible, and described to them Isle Royale in attractive colours. St. Ovide de Brouillant [5] was in France in the spring of 17I3 and received instructions to go at once to 

1. Raudot's paper is summarized by Charlevoix and in Brown's History of Cape Breton.
2. B, vol. 35.
3. English Documents in C.O., Grants and Warrants, vol. 15.
4. Philippe Pasteur de Costebelle, Lieut. at Placentia, 1692; Capt. 1694; Lieut. de Roi, 1695; Governor Placentia, 1706; Chev. de St. Louis, 1708; Governor Isle Royale, 1714; died Nov. 16, 17I7.
5. Ste. Ovide de Brouillant, nephew of de Brouillant, Governor of Newfoundland and Acadia, entered the naval service as Garde-Marine in 1689. He went to Newfoundland in 1691 and took part in the defences and attacks of the local war until 1710, in which year he served on the frigate La Valeur, received two wounds, and spent some time in prison in England. Passing to Isle Royale in 1713 as King's Lieutenant, he succeeded Costebelle as Governor in 1717, and retired with a pension of 3100 livres in 1738.

La Rochelle and embark on the Semslack, [1] commanded by Lieut. Meschin,[2] then a young officer whose service in the navy was to extend in all over sixty years. Ste. Ovide was to command the expedition. On her also were to embark the officers and men of the Acadian Companies who had been at Oleron near Rochelle since their surrender in 1700 at Port Royal.

In his course Pontchartrain gave some weight to the representations of Villien, an officer of long experience in garrison at Port Royal in Acadia, who represented that the troops from this place, familiar with local conditions, should form part of the garrison ; that some Acadians, for the same reason, should be sent, and that great care in choosing a site should be exercised, as mistakes had been made both in Canada and in Louisiana which had proved costly to the King and discouraging to the inhabitants ; a frank criticism which is not unique in correspondence of the Navy Department.

The officers who embarked in France were four in number, with two cadets, two servants, and fifteen soldiers. At Placentia the Semslack took on board L'Hermitte, de la Ronde Denys, de la Vallière, and twenty-five soldiers, some officials, women, and children, the meagre stores which the Minister had ordered to be sent, and sailed from Placentia on July 23. Pontchartrain ordered her to proceed after Placentia to Quebec. Vaudreuil the Governor, and d'Alogny, commander of the troops in Canada, had been ordered to select from the troops under their charge forty or fifty men, some of them skilled axemen, but all steady, strong, handy, and industrious. These men, under command of two officers who were serving in Canada, De Rouville and Péan, were to form part of the new garrison. The Semslack could not get to Quebec in time; Begon the Intendant therefore chartered from Boularderie - a name we shall continually meet - a vessel in which he, a retired naval officer, was trading, on which these troops and some provisions were carried to Cape Breton.

The ordinary sources do not give any account of the voyage of the Semslack, but the declaration of taking possession indicated generally their course, and that the Quebec detachment had joined them before they arrived. This declaration runs as follows :

In the year 1713 and the 2nd day of September, we, Joseph Ovide de Brouillant, King's Lieutenant at Plaisance, Knight of the Military Order of St. Louis, commanding His Majesty's ship Semslack with M. L'Hermitte, Major and Engineer, La Ronde and 

1. The Semslack was a vessel of 270 tons, captured from the Dutch in 1703, and used by the French as a freighter and fire-ship. Her crew and armament on a peace footing was 100 men and 14 guns, in war 140 men and 28 guns, half of which were six and the others four pounders. She was described as an ordinary sailer, and disappears from the Navy Lists in 1718 (Arch. Nat. Marine, II, and B5, Marine 3)
2. Jérémie de Meschin, born in 1674, entered as Garde-Marine at Rochefort in 1687, promoted Enseigne in 1700, commanded a fire-ship in 1711, but did not reach the full grade of Capitaine de Vasseau until 1738. He saw much service. He died in 1757 (Dictionnaire de la Noblesse, La Chenaye-Debois, vol. x., Paris, 1775)

Rouville, Captains, and other officers named below, have seized and taken possession of the Island of Cape Breton, situated in the entrance to the Gulf of St. Lawrence, following the orders which we have thereon from His Most Christian Majesty, dated the 20th day of March of the present year, to place there the inhabitants of Plaisance, St. Pierre, and other places which have been ceded by the treaty of peace to the Queen of Great Britain. 

We declare and testify to all whom it may concern, to have found on the said island but one French inhabitant and twenty-five or thirty families of Indians, and that the said Island of Cape Breton was ceded about eighty years ago to Messieurs Denis of Tours, who established there two forts, one in the Bay of Ste. Anne's and the other at Port St. Peter near the Strait of Canceau, of which we have still found traces, and after having visited all the ports in the said Island of Cape Breton which have been indicated to us, we believed and decided that we could not make a better choice for the present than that of Port St. Louis, formerly known as English Harbour, in which port we have this day landed the troops, the munitions of war and provisions which we have left under the orders of Sr. L'Hermitte. Signed by Decouagne, De Lavalliere, De Laperrelle, Péan Delivandiere, de Pensens, La Ronde Denys, de Rouville, Duvivier, f. Dominique De Lamarche (Recollet), L'Hermitte, St. Ovide de Brouillant.

The Semslack sailed back to France with St. Ovide on board, and arrived in the first part of December at the lsle d'Aix. [1] He made his report to the Minister, and the tentative name of Port St. Louis, which they gave to Havre à l'Anglois, was changed to Louisbourg. [2] Ste. Anne's was to be called Port Dauphin ; St. Peter's, Port Toulouse ; and the whole island, Isle Royale. [3]

The little band of 116 men, 10 women, and 23 children, the founders of Louisbourg, were left on the thickly wooded shores of that harbour with an inadequate equipment and an unknown wilderness before them.

The supplies were four fishing boats and their gear, four herring nets and a seine ; six cannons from St. John's, balls, masons' tools and picks, two hundredweight of resin, a forge and bellows, and the King's mules and the horses from St. John's ; from Quebec three hundredweight of flour, ten barrels of peas, one barrel of Indian corn, forty pairs of snowshoes, 150 pairs of mocassins, one deerskin, 1000 planks, thirty shovels, eighty little axes, 300 pounds of tobacco, three barrels of tar, and six cows. Costebelle added to this a few pounds of steel and sixty axes, all he could obtain in Placentia. An ample list had been made out for supplies from France, but were apparently only partly shipped. The Minister ordered specially 100 axes from a maker, one Bidard, near Bayonne, as he had the reputation of being a specially good workman. [4]

They made their encampment at the Barachois, formed by a little brook, directly across the south-west arm of Louisbourg harbour from the site on which the town was afterwards built.'[5]They made some rough preparations for shelter, and began thereafter the task which lay before them. The first thing which 

1. Marine, B², f. f 235 
2. Arch. Col., B, vol. 36.
3. The importance of the illegitimate children of the King is shown in the honour done to the Comte de Toulouse, the son of Madame de Montespan.
4. Arch. Col. B, 35, f. 230. 
5. The advantages of the beaches on the latter side caused some of the people to settle there at once.

 was done was to cut through the woods a road to the Miré, along the banks of which was the most available supply of timber. At this they were working early in October, and later the detachments were sent into the woods to cut timber for the proposed buildings, in particular the barracks, which L'Hermitte had at once designed. A detachment of troops under Duvivier was placed at the head of the river, and that of Rouville about twelve miles lower down. Duvivier was in a poor district, and a month was wasted before L'Hermitte visited the encampment and moved him to a more favourable place. The inexperience of most of the officers told against their effectiveness. L'Hermitte wished for four or five like Rouville, and while he considered all the soldiers good, the Canadians proved particularly valuable. On the other hand, he says that only five men in Duvivier's detachment knew how to saw, and that had it not been for a small quantity of steel sent by Costebelle, they would have been without axes ; but in spite of all these disadvantages they got out more timber than they were able to transport in the next season to Louisbourg.

The season was a bad one ; winter set in early, the men suffered from scurvy, and as early as December they had to kill the cattle sent from Quebec. Three of their horses, the spoils of the capture of St. John's, succumbed ; and out of twenty-one head of cattle with which they began, only two were alive in the spring, which this year reached almost the extreme limit of the island's climatic unsatisfactoriness. Snow was on the ground, and drift-ice off the coast, as late as the end of May. The first vessel to arrive, the Hercule, was in the icefields for twenty days, and a small vessel laden with provisions for the troops at Miré was wrecked on her voyage.

La Ronde Denys, Couagne, who was an engineer, and Rouville had been sent to examine Port Dauphin and to explore the country. They came back with a good report, having examined the fertile lands on the Bras d'Or about Baddeck, and found them suitable for settlement.

In the interval L'Hermitte worked over his plans for fortifications, and submitted them to Vaudreuil and Begon, the Governor-General and Intendant of Canada, who arrived at Louisbourg on the 20th of May and remained there until the 7th of June. He discussed with them on the ground the simple system of isolated forts which he proposed to build. He received from the Minister instructions that the works should be built solidly, and, in his trouble, bitterness of heart showed through the respectful phrases of his reply. There was neither building stone nor lime, and as the vessels had brought no supplies, his many workmen were ineffective, for he had neither nails nor iron, and only eighteen bad axes and twelve picks. He also was without funds, and found that the Indians would not work without pay.

While this work was going on steps were taken towards the removal of the Acadians to Isle Royale. By Article XIV of the Treaty of Utrecht, they were entitled to remove from Acadia with their personal effects within one year. Queen Anne, to mark her recognition of Louis XIV. having released, at her request, French Protestants from the galleys, gave special permission to those who left the country to sell their lands.[1]

The twenty-four hundred Acadians affected by these provisions were the descendants of about sixty families brought from Western France in 1633-38, and of one hundred and twenty or thirty men who settled in the colony between that time and its cession to England. [2] The earliest settlers were familiar with the reclamation of marsh lands by dyking as practised in their native districts. They found conditions favourable to this system on the shores of the Bay of Fundy, " the Coasts whereof and the banks of the adjacent Rivers abound with Salt Marshes, which by the Force of a Rich Soil, constantly recruited with marine Salts, and so, not to be impoverished, by constant Tillage, produce large crops of English grain, with little labour to the Husbandman." [3]

The waters of this bay are indeed a fountain of perpetual youth, for some of these lands, never fertilized but by the deposits of its tides, still bear most abundant crops within dykes built by the French, and in the work of bringing in the marshes which is now going on about the Isthmus of Chignecto no change has been made from the methods of the Acadian pioneers. As land of this extraordinary fertility could be obtained for the most part by cooperative dyking, and yielded its crops with a minimum of labour, the Acadian was indisposed to attack the adjoining forest to obtain land relatively poor. Their settlements, except as determined by the seat of Government, were therefore at points where these advantages could be obtained. Vetch, who governed Annapolis for three years, says they had five thousand black cattle " and a great number of Sheep and Hoggs," indicative of a fair degree of prosperity. The name of Port Royal had been changed to Annapolis Royal, and there, Francis Nicholson, who had seen a varied service in all the colonies from Virginia northwards, had charge of Acadia as Governor-General and Commander-in-Chief of all the forces in that province and in Newfoundland. His Lieutenant-Governor was Thomas Caulfield, and these two, with a very small military and civil establishment, administered a British colony, none of the people of which were British subjects. The French Court was extremely anxious to accomplish the removal of its former subjects to French territory. The Ministerial correspondence contains many letters to Vaudreuil, to the other Canadian officials, and to the priests of Acadia, asking for their help to incite the Acadians 

1. N.S. Arch. vol. 1, p. 15.
2. Hannay, History of Acadia, p. 290.
3. Shirley Memoirs, 1747, p. 3.

to take advantage of their treaty rights. [1] The efforts made went further. Baron de St. Castin received much praise for not having availed himself of a leave of absence, but instead spent the winter among the Acadian Indians with whom he was allied by ties of companionship and blood, in an effort to induce them to move to Isle Royale. In this he was not successful, but he received praise for having kept alive their unfriendly feelings against the English, and these good offices doubtless led the authorities to condone his behaviour iii the previous winter by which he had scandalized the nuns in Quebec.[2]

L'Hermitte, on the 23rd of July 1714, addressed a letter to Nicholson, quoting the terms of the treaty by which the Acadians might withdraw. His orders were that should he learn that the Acadians were hindered in taking advantage of these privileges he should send an officer to confer with Nicholson, to whom was addressed the Queen's letter [3] granting the additional concessions. He goes on to say that several Acadians had informed him that Caulfield had refused permission to certain who wished to leave, and in consequence he sends to him Captain La Ronde Denys, bearing the orders of the King, to discuss the matter with him, and trusts that Nicholson has no other views than carrying out the wishes of his Sovereign, concluding with a request that they should mutually return deserters for the benefit of each colony. A few days later St. Ovide also writes that he is sending Captain de Pensens with L'Hermitte's letter, and asks Nicholson to discuss these questions with the two officers.

They set out from Louisbourg on two vessels, both of which had arrived at Annapolis before July 23, for on that day they write to Nicholson beginning, " We de la Ronde Denys and de Pensens, Captains of Companies Franches de la Marine, which His Christian Majesty maintains at Isle Royale, sent by Monsieur St. Ovide de Brouillan, Lieutenant du Roy of the said Island to represent to Monsieur de Nicholson General de la Nouvelle Ecosse et Isle de Terre Neuve " the rights which Her British Majesty has been pleased to accord to the inhabitants of the said country, and as the intention of His Most Christian Majesty is to maintain them, we beg the General to give attention to the following articles. These were : a request that he would cause to be assembled, first the inhabitants of Port Royal, thereafter those of the other settlements, and appoint a British officer who with one of them would hear and register the decisions of the inhabitants as to remaining in Acadia or leaving ; that those who decide to go shall have a year from the time permission is given, during which time they may live without molestation from the authorities, carry away all their personal property ; build vessels for this purpose ; that there shall be no obstacles to bringing in French rigging for such vessels ; that the General 

1. I.R. Series B, vols. 35 and 36. 
2. A.N. C¹¹, (Canada), vol. 33, f. 265. 
3. June 13, 1713.

should publish in all inhabited places permission for them to sell their lands, for the English to buy them, and that if within the year they cannot sell, they shall have the right to give a power of attorney to some one to act for them until buyers are found ; and finally, that justice shall be done to those who have suffered at the hands of Vetch and Colonel Hobby in the time between the capitulation and the treaty of peace. To this they add a postscript, saying that as 'one of them must return at once to give a report, they beg that he will assemble the inhabitants no later than Sunday the 25th.

This was immediately taken into consideration by the Council, and, as an answer, a copy of the minutes was returned. The assembly of the inhabitants was granted, Major Mascarne and Lieut. Bennett were appointed to go with the French envoys to the other settlements and carry out the negotiations in the same way as at Annapolis, and to arrange with Denys their time of leaving and the means of transport ; the Governor would not fix the time when the year of grace was to begin, but would submit the matter to the decision of Her Majesty, as well as all the other points raised, except the last, on which he asked for all available information, and promised full justice.

The proclamation calling together the inhabitants was issued and the meeting held on the feast-day of St. Louis at the fort of Annapolis. The Governor, Lieutenant- Governor, and the principal officers of the garrison were present, as were two missionaries, the Fathers Justinien and Bonaventure, and Father Gaulin the priest. La Ronde Denys alone represented France as De Pensens was unwell. A list was made of the inhabitants present, they numbered nine hundred and sixteen, represented by one hundred and sixty-nine heads of families.[1] They encircled the officers in the square, and heard read to them Nicholson's order for the meeting and the Queen's letter, both of which were translated for them, and the latter formally compared with La Ronde's copy. Then, invited by Nicholson, La Ronde made his propositions. If his letters indicate his oratorical style he was a fervid speaker, careless of grammar, and not altogether accurate as to facts. [2] He, on this occasion, went beyond his instructions in the promises he made to the Acadians. He spoke of the goodwill of the King who would furnish to them vessels for their transport, provisions for a year to those who needed them, freedom from duties on all their trade for ten years, and added a promise which was of great importance to them, for the Acadians disliked the land system of Canada, that there would be no seignories, but that they would hold their lands direct from the King. Nicholson added that he was ready to receive any complaints of bad treatment. La Ronde thanked 

1. 151 men, 165 women, 325 boys, 275 girls. 
2. L'Hermitte said of him that his flatteries and lies would trouble the universe. The Minister wrote to Beauharnois May 18, l728 about La Ronde Denys then serving in Canada, "Of all the officers in the colony he is the least deserving of consideration" (B, vol. 53).

him in the name of all the inhabitants for " the civil, upright and frank manner " in which he had acted with them, and then by his permission they went to La Ronde's lodgings and there one hundred and forty-six of them signed " avec toute la joie et le contentment dont nous sommes capables " the document by which they pledged themselves to live and die faithful subjects of Louis and to migrate to Isle Royale.

Fifteen embarked immediately on the Marie Joseph and went to Cape Breton with De Pensens. Of these only one of those whose age is given was under forty, and as regards social status they were about equally divided between those who had a trunk and those who had their property in bags.' Charles D'Entremont, Sieur de Pobomicou, his wife, son, and daughter, went on their own vessel with a crew of two, and four passengers. The details bear out Vetch's statement that these first emigrants were of no very great substance.

The transaction at Annapolis being thus concluded, La Ronde Denys and the two British officers went to Minas, where the inhabitants met them, were numbered, and one hundred and thirty-nine agreed to go to Isle Royale. [Population : 139 men, 140 women, 306 boys, 289 girls ; total, 874 ; heads of families, 145.] At Cobequid seventeen signed. [Population : 20 men, 20 women, 52 boys, 44 girls ; total, 136 ; 21 heads of families.] La Ronde Denys then told the English officers that everything had been done to his satisfaction. They set sail together and the vessels parted company in the basin of Minas on September 8, La Ronde on the St. Louis, having with him several inhabitants, one of them with a substantial quantity of grain.

These transactions were carried out with great formality, certified copies of all documents were interchanged, and there was no disagreement between the parties. Nicholson wrote civilly to L'Hermitte and St. Ovide, and both Governors sent a report of these events to the home authorities. In the accounts of the meetings at Cobequid and Minas, there is no mention of the priests having been present. The proportion of signers at these two meetings was even greater than at Annapolis, so that the inhabitants did not require the direct presence of their leaders to make them follow wishes, which, however, these leaders had previously many opportunities of making known to them. In any community so simply organized that it contains no great landed proprietors and few, if any, lawyers or professional men, whether the religion of that community be Roman Catholic or Protestant, the influence of the clergymen in all matters is great. It seems to have been so in New England at that time ; those who knew Cape Breton a generation ago, know its force then, and that in civil affairs the dictum of a Presbyterian divine was as potent as that of a priest. It 

1. The live stock they took with them was twelve sheep, three bullocks, a cow and a calf. 

is inevitable that such power should exist ; its justification is in the results which follow its exercise.

The mission of La Ronde was highly successful. With a few exceptions all the people he saw agreed to go to Isle Royale. No obstacle was put in their way, and the outcome would seem to have depended entirely on the French authorities carrying out the promises which had been made on their behalf. The population of Beaubassin and the other settlements about the isthmus of Chignecto were not visited by La Ronde and Mascarene.[1]

While but a score or so of Acadians accompanied the Envoys on their return to Isle Royale, certain others more enterprising had previously gone there. Two brothers from the head of the river at Annapolis, anxious about their destiny, " which they could not ascertain in that country," [2] started in a Biscay shallop towards the end of May, and coasted along the shores of Nova Scotia to Isle Royale. On the eighth day they arrived at St. Peter's and Isle Madame, then they spent a day at Louisbourg, another at Mordienne (Port Morien), the following at St. Anne's, where a Canadian had already settled and the fisheries were being successfully prosecuted. Returning, they called at L'Indienne (Lingan), abounding in coal and oysters, with one inhabitant ; at Menadou (Mainadieu), and came back to Louisbourg on June 15. There they remained, building a house for M. Rodrigue, lately King's pilot at Annapolis, until August 12, and then proceeded along the coast, through Canso, home by Bale Verte. They give a fair picture of Louisbourg, with what they describe as a large fort which was being built, many cannons landed on the shore, ninety-three from Placentia, vessels making a good catch of cod, two King's ships about to sail for Placentia. Reports were abroad that the Charente would shortly arrive with supplies, and also the Affriquain from Quebec with 

1. The authorities for this episode are to be found at Ottawa (M. 395\3), and Record office; B.T.N.S. vol. 1, has the English version. The population is based on a table prepared for me at the Canadian Archives, which may be condensed thus: 

ANNAPOLIS

151

165

325

275

916

169

MINAS. 

139

140

306

289

874

145

COBEQUID

20

20

52

44

157

21

BFAUBASSIN

55		58		136		102		351		56
-		-		-		-		-		-
365		383		819		710		2277		391

 A total population of 2277, which with 123 at outlying points makes 2400. One third of the signers of the declarations were able to sign their names; Out of 302 heads of families all but 100 signed with a mark. 
2 B.T.N.S. vol. 2, 66.

Vaudreuil on board. They saw there a Boston trader with boards, salt, and general merchandise ; and on their way home passed another from Cascoe Bay, with the same cargo. All these facts they swore to in a declaration made before Nicholson on their return, but this document is silent as to their destinies.

Another Acadian, one Arceneau, adventurous enough to voyage in a canoe from Bale Verte to the Baie de Chaleurs, and then in a shallop to Louisbourg, makes the same report of good fishing not only on the Cape Breton coast but among the many Basque vessels in the Gulf of St. Lawrence [1] L'Hermitte, authorized to place people on the land at the King's pleasure, gave, up to the end of August, permission to twenty-four Acadians to settle on a little river near St. Peter's. Another party was also sent there, but without any definite promise of land, as L'Hermitte wished to have them as settlers at Port Dauphin. After Vaudreuil's second visit in October a party of Acadians was sent under the leadership of De Couagne to inspect the lands on the Bras d'Or, but they did not approve of them, and the officials thought that their secret desire was to go to the Isle St. jean (Prince Edward Island). The comparison from a farming standpoint of the best lands in well-wooded Isle Royale, and the meadows which they had reclaimed, or which lay ready for reclamation, along the Bay of Fundy, was so obviously to the disadvantage of the former, that it demanded a genuine loyalty to consider emigration. A council was held at Louisbourg on October 16, at which Vaudreuil and the Recollect Missionary, Felix Pain, were present, with Costebelle and the new Commissaire-Ordonnateur, Soubras. Regret was expressed that the promises made to the Acadians had not been kept, and they were specifically renewed for another year.

Costebelle had remained at Placentia. He was advised in the autumn of I713, that to avoid the hardship of moving in the inclement season the evacuation was off until the spring, and at the close of the year issued a proclamation to the people announcing the cession of the island and the necessity for removal to Cape Breton. The English expedition to take possession of Newfoundland, two regiments under the command of Colonel Moody, had been driven into Vigo and had spent the winter at Lisbon, and only arrived in Newfoundland the next year. During the season the guns and stores were transported to Cape Breton. On July 23, 1714, Costebelle himself left on the Heroes, and in the autumn the inhabitants straggled over in their own boats. The weather was bad, some were lost, and all suffered in this difficult voyage.

Thus the year ended. Some building was done, but L'Hermitte was in despair about the ineffectiveness of the troops, the lack of care of the King's stores, the use by private individuals of the building material he had gathered, 

1. These voyages in small boats may stand to the credit of the Acadians against the many bad reports given of them by the French authorities.

and the evils of divided authority. Soubras, the newly appointed Commissaire-Ordonnateur, complained of the bad effects of drink ; of the gambling and mutinous soldiery, who, nevertheless, were better paid, fed, and clothed than any troops he had ever seen ; and of the ineffectiveness of L'Hermitte. The soldiers had not received the bonus for their work which had been promised. This had not only made it exceedingly ineffective, but had aggravated them to the point of mutiny, and they had begun that excessive indulgence in drink with which the authorities were powerless to cope.

It had been intended that the troops should winter in Bale des Espagnols, but the necessary arrangements were not made, and in December it was decided to place them at Miré, where the cabins left standing from last year could be utilized. Sickness prevailed, and the first death noted at Louisbourg is that ot M. Du Vivier. On the other hand the fishing had been excellent, fourteen or fifteen vessels had engaged in it, fewer than would have been the case had there not been a scarcity of salt in France. As it had been bad in Newfoundland, it gave the newcomers a favourable impression of the country, arduous as had been the struggle with the elements by which they reached it.

The population in January 1715 numbered about 720, exclusive of unmarried soldiers, but including military and civil officers. It was arranged by habitations, and with few exceptions they were the people from Placentia (men, 118 ; women, 80 ; children, 170 ; servants, 39 ; fishermen, 300). Incidentally this document throws light on the way of life in the colony. The Governor, Costebelle, whose salary was 4000 livres, lived alone. His establishment consisted of a secretary, one woman and two men servants, and seventeen fishermen. St. Ovide had with him his wife, three children, and three men servants, a gardener, cook and valet, arid he employed thirteen fishermen. Soubras kept a bachelor establishment with two young officers, Fontenay and Péan, and had ten fishers. L'Hermitte had a clerk and eight fishers, and his household arrangements were looked after by his wife and one servant. St. Marie had twelve fishers and seven men on his boat (batteau), but La Ronde, Rouville, Legondez, and other officers did not fish.[1]

The merchants who flourished at Louisbourg, and whose names reappear from time to time in the scanty records of its commerce, for the most part came this year, and already had formed establishments, the largest of which were those of Berrichon, Rodrigue, and Daccarette, respectively of twenty-nine, twelve, and nineteen men. There were among the women five widows of the official class, the most recent being Madame Du Vivier, who had arrived with her children from France only a short time before her husband's death, and eight others, of whom three had fishing establishments, two of them of importance, one with twelve and the other with thirteen men. The widow Onfroy of St. Malo claimed that she was the first to send vessels to Cape

1. I.R.G, 466.

Breton, and with such satisfactory results that the fleets of St. Malo and Grandville imitated her.[1] This much is certain at this early time, that the fishing was largely done by Basques. The Acadian explorers of this year mention only Basque vessels on their voyages in the gulf and on the coasts of Cape Breton.

The new establishment was amid surroundings which might appear unfavourable, and while it was inadequately supported by the home authorities, its personnel could not have found Louisbourg relatively unsatisfactory. Most of the officers had been a long time in Placentia, and although Costebelle places both towns " in the most sterile deserts of America," in climate and other conditions the comparison is not against Isle Royale. Rouville and his Canadians were now in a less severe climate than Quebec, and the nucleus of the population were fisher-folk from Newfoundland, skilled in an art which they began at once to practise under conditions which they found, allowance being made for the unsettled condition and high prices of a new colony, not unfavourable. With an Acadian population drawn to Isle Royale, as seemed probable, its position would be strong. Colonel Vetch, unlikely to overvalue the Acadians, thus expresses the advantage to France of the conditions which they expected to find the next year (1715) in Cape Breton :

"And as the accession of such a number of Inhabitants to Cape Breton will make it at once a very populous Colony ; (in which the strength of all the Country's consists) So it is to be considered that one hundred of the French, who were born upon that continent, and are perfectly known in the woods, can march upon snowshoes, and understand the use of Birch Canoes, are of more value and service than five times their number of raw men, newly come from Europe. So their skill in the Fishery, as well as the cultivating of the soil, must inevitably make that Island, by such an accession of people, and French, at once the most powerful colony the French have in America, and of the greatest danger and damage to all the British Colony's as well as the universal trade of Great Britain." [2]

One, Jethro Furber, who declared vaguely that, being on a voyage, probably smuggling, he took refuge in Louisbourg, gives an interesting picture, closely tallying with that of the Acadians, of the new settlement, " with forty vessels loading and six sail of men-of-warr in its harbour, commodious enough for five hundred sail of shipps," its fishing so good that the boats twice daily brought in their loads, and its people elated that " ye English gave them a Wedge of Gold for a piece of silver." [3]

These testimonies seem to justify entirely the view taken in the first appeal for funds for Louisbourg which Pontchartrain makes to the King's Treasurer: 

1. Arch. Col. B, 36. 
2. Nova Scotia Archives, vol. 1, p. 6. 
3. An affidavit signed at Kingston in Jamaica, April 20, 1715 (B.T.N.S. vol. 2). 

"The English are well aware of the importance of this post, and are already taking umbrage in the matter. They see that it will be prejudicial to their trade, and that in time of war it will be a menace to their shipping, and on the first outbreak of trouble they will be sure to use every means to get possession of it. It is therefore necessary to fortify it thoroughly. If France were to lose this Island the loss would be an irreparable one, and it would involve the loss of all her holdings in North America." 

1. Arch. Col. B, Vol. 37, f.26, 1/2 .