dition of Braddock against Fort Duquesne, and by the victory of Captain Howe.* In July, 1755, a part of Admiral Boscawen's fleet, under the command of Captain Howe, had fought and taken three French men-of-war. The Duke de Mirepoix had remained in England writing letters to his own Government as to the pacific disposition of the English. The Duke of Newcastle had applied himself to deceive the French Minister, and he succeeded. The Duke de Mirepoix abruptly departed from England without taking leave. He suffered a temporary disgrace at home for his credulity. The French King was exasperated, and declared he would never pardon the piracies of that insolent nation. Colonel Moncton, at the head of 3,000 troops, had laid siege to the important fort of Beau-sejour, and carried it in four days. Two smaller forts surrendered immediately, but the expedition of Braddock, at the head of 2,000 men, was a failure. He lost a considerable portion of his men and his instructions, which fell into the possession of the French. They published them, as an evidence of English hostility and treachery. Both parties seemed to have meditated war, but it so happened that it was begun by the English. The French had succeeded in uniting the Indians with them in defence of their North American possessions, but their support did not prevent the conquest of Canada. The Marquis de Montcalm predicted the fall of Canada in his correspondence with Marshal de Belleisle. He declared that the Intendant was occupied solely with making a fortune for himself, his sycophants and adherents; that cupidity had seized officers and storekeepers ; that the Government were being defrauded; that the resources were being wasted; that the commissaries at St. John, on the Ohio, and with the Indians in the upper country, were amassing immense fortunes at the expense of the public interests; that the French cause was ruined by the venality and corruption that every where prevailed; that every one seemed anxious to make a fortune before the country passed into other hands; and that many of its officials desired its conquest as the only effectual means of concealing their infamy.§ However this may be, Quebec was taken in 1759, and at the capitulation of Montreal, in September, 1760, Canada was delivered up by the Marquis de Vaudreuil to General Amherst.|| It is rather remarkable that the Articles of Capitulation do not any where expressly say that Canada is to be given up to the English, but this, however, may be very obviously inferred from several of them. On the 7th of September, 1760, Vaudreuil sent Colonel de Bougainville and Captain de Lac with proposals for Capitulation, accompanied by a brief note, in which he informs General Amherst that "you may rely on all that the said Colonel shall say to your Excellency in my name." Sir Jeffry Amherst returned the terms of Capitulation with those which he had resolved to grant, at the same time informing the Marquis de Vaudreuil that he shall make no alteration in those terms. M. de Bougainville was again sent to General Amherst with a note from the Governor in which he stated "I send the said Colonel back to your Excellency, and I persuade myself that you will allow him to make by Walpole's Memoirs of the Reign of Geo. II., Vol. II. chaps. 1 and 2. Entick's Hist., Vol. I. Lord Mahon's Hist. of Eng., Vol. IV. p. 46 et seq. + Walpole's Memoirs of the Reign of Geo. II., Vol 1I. p. 28. Ibid. Albach's Annals. § Montcalm's letters in the N. Y. Hist. Doc., Vol. X. Entick's History, Vol. IV. pp. 436-480, where the correspondence will be found. word of mouth, a representation to your Excellency which I cannot dispense myself with making." To this the following reply was made: CAMP BEFORE MONTREAL, September 7th, 1760. SIR, -Major Abercrombie has this moment delivered to me the letter with which your Excellency has honoured me, in answer to that which I had addressed to you with the conditions on which I expect that Canada shall surrender. I have already had the honour to inform your Excellency that I should not make any alteration in them: I cannot deviate from this resolution. Your Excellency will therefore be pleased to take a determination immediately, and acquaint me in answer whether you will accept or not. I have the honour to be, &c., JEFF. AMHERST. The conditions were accepted the following day, when a duplicate of the Articles of Capitulation was sent to Governor Vaudreuil. The first Article provides for the surrender of the garrison of Montreal. ARTICLE 3 provides :-The troops and militia who are in garrison in the fort of Jacques Cartier, and in the Island St. Helen, and other forts shall be treated in the same manner, and shall have the same honours; and these troops shall go to Montreal or Three Rivers, or Quebec, to be there embarked for the first seaport in France, by the shortest way. The troops who are in our posts, situated on our frontiers on the side of Acadia, at Detroit, Michillimackinac, and other posts, shall enjoy the same honours, and be treated in the same manner. All these troops are not to serve during the present war, and likewise shall lay down their arms. The rest is granted. ARTICLE 4.-The militia, after being come out of the above towns, forts, and posts, shall return to their homes, without being molested, on any pretence whatever, on account of their having carried arms. Granted. ARTICLE 7.-The magazines, the artillery, firelocks, sabres, ammunition of war, and in general everything that belongs to His Most Christian Majesty, as well in the Towns of Montreal and Three Rivers, as in the forts and posts mentioned in the Third Article, shall be delivered up, according to exact inventories. to the Commissaries who shall be appointed to receive the same in the name of His Britannic Majesty. Duplicates of the said inventories shall be given to the Marquis de Vaudreuil. ARTICLE 12. papers without their being examined. The Marquis de Vaudreuil shall take with him his which shall be necesssary for the government of the country. ARTICLE 13. If before or after the embarkation of the Marquis de Vaudreuil, news of peace should arrive, and that by the treaty Canada should remain to His Most Christian Majesty, the Marquis de Vaudreuil shall return to Quebec or Montreal, everything shall return to its former state under the Dominion of His Most Christian Majesty, and the present capitulation shall become null and of no effect. "Whatever the King may have done on this subject shall be obeyed." except that the Marquis de Vaudreuil and all the officers of whatever rank they may be, shall faithfully deliver up to us all the charts and plans of the country.” ARTICLE 36.-If by the treaty of Peace, Canada remains to His Britannic Majesty, all the French, Canadians, Acadians, Merchants, and other persons who choose to retire to France, shall have leave to do so from the English General, who shall procure them ARTICLE 37.-The lords of manors, the military and civil officers, the Canadians, as well in the towns as in the country, the French settled or trading in the whole extent of the colony of Canada, and all other persons whatsoever, shall preserve the entire peaceable property and possession of their goods, noble and ignoble, moveable and immoveable, merchandizes, furs, and other effects, even their ships; they shall not be touched nor the least damage done to them on any pretext whatsoever. They shall have liberty to keep, let, or sell them, as well to the French as to the English; to take away the produce of them in bills of exchange, furs, specie, or other returns, whenever they shall judge proper to go to France, paying their freight as in the 26th Article. They shall also have the furs which are in the posts above, and which belong to them, and may be on the way to Montreal. And for this purpose, they shall have leave to send this year or the next, canoes, fitted out to fetch such of the said furs as shall have remained in those posts. ARTICLE 48 makes similar provision for the property of officers, civil and military, of France, in Canada. ARTICLE 39. None of the Canadians, Acadians or French, who are now in Canada, and on the frontiers of the colony, on the side of Acadia, Detroit, Michillimackinac and other places and posts of the countries above, the married and unmarried soldiers remaining in Canada, shall be carried or transported into the English Colonies, or to Old England, and they shall not be troubled for having carried arms. "Granted; except with regard to the Acadians."* In these Articles of Capitulation, there is nothing said about the limits of Canada. Provisions are made for the surrender of the garrisons at various posts; but some of these are not expressly named in the Articles. They are embraced by the phrase "other posts." Early in 1761 negotiations were carried on between France and Great Britain with a view to establishing "a safe, honourable and adequate peace" between the two nations. Hans Stanley embarked at Dover on the 24th of May as British Minister to treat with the French Court at Paris, and M. Bussy was at the same time sent to treat with the British Ministry at London. The negotiations were to begin upon the basis of a previous correspondence, in which the Kings of both countries had declared their anxiety to put an end to the war. The last letter in this correspondence was written from Versailles on the 26th of March, by the Duc de Choiseul to Mr. Pitt, and was transmitted by the hands of Prince Gallatzin, the Russian ambassador at London. The object of the memorial was to put an end to the alliance between England and the King of Prussia, by establishing a separate peace with England. Mr. Pitt replied at once. He said the King desired peace, but he could not abandon the King of Prussia and his other allies. His letter was ac *The Acadians were claimed to be British subjects under the Treaty of Utrecht. All were held to have been guilty of treason in taking up arms on the side of France. companied by a memorial, acknowledging the objects which brought on the war between France and England to be totally foreign to the cause of the war upon the continent of Europe. On the 15th of July, France proposed : I. The King cedes and guarantees Canada to the King of England, such as it has been, and in right ought to be possessed by France, without restriction, and without the liberty of returning upon any pretence whatever against this cession and guaranty, and without interrupting the Crown of England in the entire possession of Canada. II. The King, in making over his full right of sovereignty over Canada to the King of England, annexes four conditions to the cession: First. That the free exercise of the Roman Catholic religion shall be maintained there, and that the King of England will give the most precise and effectual orders that his new Roman Catholic subjects may, as heretofore, make public profession of their religion according to the rits of the Roman Church. Secondly. That the French inhabitants, or others who have been subjects of the King in Canada, may retire into the French colonies with all possible freedom and security; that they may be allowed to sell their effects and transport their property as well as their persons, without being restrained in their emigration on any pretence whatever (except for debt); and the English Government shall engage to procure them the means of transportation at as little expense as possible. Thirdly. That the limits of Canada with regard to Louisiana shall be clearly and firmly established, as well as those of Louisiana and Virginia, in such manner that after the execution of peace, there may be no more difficulties between the two nations, with respect to the construction of the limits with regard to Louisiana, whether with respect to Canada or the other possessions of England. [N. B.-M. Bussy has a memorial on the subject of the limits of Louisiana which gives him power to come to a final treaty on that Article with the Ministry of his Britannic Majesty.] Fourthly. That the liberty of fishing and drying their cod-fish, may, on the Banks of Newfoundland, be confirmed to the French as heretofore; and as this confirmation would be illusory, if French vessels had not a shelter in those parts appertaining to their nation, the King of Great Britain, in consideration of the guaranty of his new conquests, shall restore Isle Royal, or Cape Breton, to be enjoyed by France in entire sovereignty. It is agreed to fix a value on this restitution, that France shall not under any denomination whatever, erect any fortification on the Island, and shall confine herself to maintain civil establishments there, and the port for the convenience of the fishing vessels landing there. On the 27th of July, 1761, Mr. Pitt forwarded the memorial of the Court of St. James to Mr. Hans Stanley in answer to the French propositions, the first two of which relate to Canada. They are as follows:: I. His Britannic Majesty will never recede from the entire and total cession on the part of France, without any new limits, or any exception whatever, of all Canada, with its appurtenances; and His Majesty wiil never relax with regard to the full and complete cession on the part of France of the Isle of Cape Breton, and of the other islands in the Gulf and River of St. Lawrence, with the right of fishing, which is inseparably incident to the possession of the aforesaid coasts, and of the canals or straits which lead to them. II. With respect to fixing the limits of Louisiana with regard to Canada or the English possessions situated on the Ohio, as also on the coast of Virginia, it can never be allowed that whatever does not belong to Canada shall appertain to Louisiana, nor that the boundaries of the last Province shall extend to Virginia, or to the British possessions on the borders of the Ohio; the nations and countries which lie intermediate, and which form the true barriers between the aforesaid provinces, not being proper, on any account, to be directly or by necessary consequence ceded to France, even admitting them to be included in the limits of Louisiana. To which France answered on the 5th of August I. The King consents to cede Canada to England, in the most extensive manner, as specified in the Memorial of Propositions, but His Majesty will not recede from the conditions which he has annexed to the same Memorial, relative to the Catholic religion, and to the power, facility and liberty of emigration for the ancient subjects of the King. With regard to the fishery in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, the King means to maintain the immemorial right which his subjects have of fishing in the said gulf, and of drying their fish on the banks of Newfoundland, as it was agreed by the Treaty of Utrecht. As this privilege would be granted in vain if the French vessels had not some shelter appertaining to France in the gulf, His Majesty proposed to the King of Great Britain the restitution of the Island of Cape Breton; he again proposes either that island, or the island of St. John [Prince Edward], or such other port without fortifications in the gulf, or within reach of the gulf, which may serve the French as shelter, and secure to France the liberty of fishing, from whence His Majesty has no intention to recede. II. The King has in no part of his Memorial of Propositions affirmed that all which did not belong to Canada, appertained to Louisiana; it is even difficult to conceive such an assertion could be advanced. France, on the contrary, demands that the intermediate nations between Canada and Louisiana, as also between Virginia and Louisiana, shall be considered as neutral nations, independent of the sovereignty of the two Crowns, and serve as a barrier between them. If the English Minister would have attended to the instructions of M. Bussy on this subject, he would have seen that France agreed with England, as to this proposition. To this ultimatum of France, Mr. Pitt replied on the 17th August, as follows::I. The King will not desert his claim to the entire and total cession of all Canada, and its dependencies, without any limits or exceptions whatever, and likewise insists on the complete cession of the Island of Cape Breton and of other islands in the Gulf and River St. Lawrence. Canada, according to the lines of its limit as traced by the Marquis de Vaudreuil himself, when that governor surrendered the said Province by capitulation to the British general, Sir J. Amherst, comprehends on one side the Lakes Huron, Michigan, and Superior; and the said line drawn to Red Lake takes in, by a serpentine progress, the River Ouabachi (Wabash), as far as its junction with the Ohio, and from thence extends itself along the latter river as far, inclusively, as its influx into the Mississippi. It is in conformity to this state of the limits, made by the French Governor, that the |