to help them. We are impatiently expecting every day news from France. We hope that there will be some regulation. If the limits are not regulated, at least we shall know what to depend upon, and we will despatch a courier to you, with as detailed a memorandum of our wants as can be made. The Canabas, who were on the Chebucto road, have seized the letters of the English who were writing to Mines and Port Royal. I will have them sent to you by the first courier. We learn that the English are getting ready to come and settle at Chinecto. Captain Rous with two other ships is to go to Bay Verte. We are always in expectation of having the English on our hands. If all our savages were Frenchmen we should not be embarrassed; but the wretches get tired and will perhaps leave us in our greatest need. They are getting tired at not hearing from France; and it is very surprising that there are no letters for us, although a vessel has arrived at Louisbourg with three hundred soldiers on board.

The two vessels which passed each other on the banks have arrived at Louisbourg. It is said that we are threatened with an approaching war. It is reported that they are recruiting the regiments and calling out a large militia force.

Our gentlemen expect to be relieved. If that be true it would be necessary to make one's arrangements for the magazines either at Echedack or at the river Gasparos in Bay Verte for the houses and lodging of soldiers and militiamen. We are waiting here only for news from France to decide. upon our course,

The foregoing letter was found in a French Sloop captured by Captain Le Cras, of H. M. Ship Trial.

Extract from a Letter of Gov. Cornwallis to Duke of Bedford, dated Novr. 27, 1750.

I have now an affair of a more extraordinary nature to inform you of Captain How was employed upon the Expedition to Chignecto as knowing the country well and being better acquainted both with the Indians and Inhabitants, and poor man, fancied he knew the French better and personally those villains La Corne* and Le Loutre. His whole aim and study

*Chevalier Pierre La Corne, one of the most active disturbers of the peace of this country, was son of Capt. La Corne, who was Town Major of Quebec in 1719. His first service was with Sieur Joncaire, on an embassy to the Indians of Niagara, in 1720. He, in conjunction with M. St. Pierre, defeated the Indian incursion at La Chene Rapids in 1747, and was the same year sent to Acadia with De Ramezay. He was in the action at Grand Pre, and took command of the French force on De Ramezay's

was to try at a peace with the Indians and to get our prisoners out of their hands. For which purpose he had frequent conferences with Le Loutre and the French Officers under a flag of Truce. La Corne sent one day a Flag of Truce by a French officer to the waterside a small river that parts his People from our Troops. Captain How and the officer held a Parley for some time across the river. How had no sooner taken leave of the officer, than a party that lay perdue fired a volley at him and shot him through the Heart. An instance of treachery and barbarity not to be paralleled in history, and a violation of a flag of Truce which has ever been held sacred and without which all faith is at an end, and all transactions with an enemy.

Extract from a Document entitled, "A short account of what passed at Cape Breton, from the beginning of the last War until the taking of Louisburgh in 1758, by a French Officer."+

It was very wrongfully, and with the greatest injustice, that the English accused the French of having a hand in the horrors committed daily by Loutre with his Indians. What is not a wicked priest capable of doing? He clothed in an officer's regimentals, an Indian named Cope, whom I saw some years after at Miramichy in Acadia, his hair curled, powered, and in a Bag; and, laying an ambuscade of Indians near to the Fort, he sent Cope to it, waving a white handker

being wounded. On that occasion he attacked and carried the house occupied by Col. Noble, the English Commander, who was killed in its defence. From Grand Pre, he returned to Beaubassin, and thence proceeded to Canada, where he remained on active service, until 1749, when he was again sent to Beaubassin, to engage, in concert with Le Loutre the priest, in seducing the Acadians from their allegiance. He had directions from Jonquiere, Governor of Canada, to take possession of all Acadia north of the Bay of Fundy and the Isthmus, and to induce the Acadians to remove thither. At this time he was said to be in command of about 2500 men, some of whom were supposed to be Acadians. This step was taken by the Governor of Canada while the two nations were at peace. After the failure of this enterprise, he returned to Canada, where he appears to have been actively employed for ten years. He was wounded in the action at the Rapids, Lake Ontario, in 1759; and the same year, his name appears in the dispatches as having distinguished himself at the siege of Quebec, in command of a Battalion of Colonial troops, when he was again wounded.

M. La Corne, like Le Loutre, possessed an intimate knowledge of the Indian, languages, by means of which he was enabled to afford valuable service to his employers at Quebec.-Nova Scotia Documents. N. Y. Colonial Documents.

* The French officers denied this statement, and charged (the crime on Le Loutre the priest.

+French Documents relating to Acadia, among N. S. Archives.

chief in his hand, which was the usual sign for the admittance of the French into the English Fort, having affairs with the commander of the Post. The major of the Fort, a worthy man, and greatly beloved by all the French officers, taking Cope for a French officer, came out with his usual politeness to receive him. But he no sooner appeared than the Indians in ambush fired at him and killed him. All the French had the greatest horror and indignation at Loutre's barbarous actions; and I dare say, if the Court of France had known them, they would have been very far from approving them; But he had so ingratiated himself with the Marquis de la Galissoniere, that it became a crime to write against him. It is needless to explain further Abbe Loutre's execrable conduct. Cruelty and inhumanity has ever been sacerdotal from all ages. The English Garrison at length, exasperated, and losing patience, after a long series of such priestly scenes, besieged Beausejour, which, being very weakly defended, they took it in the spring of the year 1755. It would have been, nevertheless, more conformable to equity and justice, if the English had endeavoured to catch Abbé Loutre and hang him as the sole author and actor of these abominations.

Extract from a Letter of the Lords of Trade to Governor Cornwallis, dated March 22d 1750-1.

You judged very right in refusing Leave to the French Inhabitants of the district of Menis and Annapolis to withdraw upon their Application to you for that purpose; We are extreamly glad to hear, that so few of the better sort of those Inhabitants have withdrawn themselves, and have no doubt but that if you shall be able to prevent their abandoning their Settlements just at this time, when the ffrench are particularly industrious to draw them off from their Allegiance to the Crown of Great Britain, and the Province is contending against all the Disadvantages to which a New and disputed settlement can be exposed, You will be able hereafter by a good Correspondence with them and making them feel the Advantages of the Settlement to remove their Prejudicses and firmly unite them to the British Interest.

Extract from a letter of Governor Hopson* to Lords of Trade, dated Halifax, 10th December, 1752.

-I should be glad to have your Lordships opinion as early in the Spring as possible, concerning the Oaths I am to tender to the French Inhabitants as directed by the 68th article of my Instructions.

Mr. Cornwallis can thoroughly inform your Lordships how difficult, if not impossible, it may be, to force such a thing upon them, and what ill consequences may attend it. I believe he can likewise acquaint you that the inhabitants of Chignecto (who had taken them before with General Philipp's conditions) made it a pretence to quit their Allegiance and retire from their lands, tho' it was not otherwise offered to them than by issuing the Kings Proclamation to that effect.

As they appear to be much better disposed than they have been, and I hope will still amend and in a long course of time become less scrupulous, I beg to know from your Lordships in the Spring how far His Majesty would approve my silence on this head till a more convenient opportunity.

Mr. Cornwallis can inform your Lordships how useful and necessary these people are to us, how impossible it is to do without them, or to replace them even if we had other settlers to put in their places and at the same time will acquaint you how obstinate they have always been when the Oaths have been offered.

(Order Book.)

Extract from Instructions to the Officers Commanding the Fort at Vieux Logis† and Fort Edward. ‡

You are to look on the French Inhabitants in the same light with the rest of His Majesty's Subjects, as to the protec tion of the Laws & Government, for which reason nothing is to be taken from them by Force, or any Price set upon their goods but what they themselves agree to; and if at any time the Inhabitants should Obstinately refuse to comply with what His Majesty's Service may require of them, You are not to redress yourself by Military Force, or in any unlawfull manner,

*P'eregine Thomas Hopson succeeded Governor Cornwallis in August, 1752.. Mr. Cornwallis returned to England in the Summer of that year.

† Old Barracks at Minas.

+ At Pisiquid.

but to lay the case before the Governor & wait His Orders thereon. You are to cause the following orders to be stuck up in the most Publick part of the Fort, both in English & French:

1. The Provisions or any other commodities that the Inhabitants of the country shall bring to the Fort to sell, are not to be taken from them at any fixed price, but to be paid for according to a free agreement made between them & the Purchasers.

2. No Officer, non-Commissioned Officer, or Soldier, shall presume to insult or otherwise abuse any of the Inhabitants of the Country, who are upon all occasions to be treated as His Majesty's Subjects, & to whom the Laws of the Country are open, to protect as well as to Punish.

At the Season of laying in fuel for the Fort, You are to signify to the Inhabitants by their Deputys, that it is His Exclly's pleasure they lay in the Quantity of Wood that you require, & when they have complyed, you are to give them certificates specifying what Quantity they have furnished, which will entitle them to payment at Halifax.

Since my arrival in this Government, I have used my utmost endeavours to come at an exact knowledge of the State of the Province, by which means I might be able to shew Your Lordsps. whence our difficulty arise that you may from thence judge what would be the most probable means of removing them, and of making this Colony more advantageous & less expensive to its Mother Country. I have not succeeded as yet in my endeavour, so perfectly as I would have wished as intelligence is so difficult to be had, but I shall proceed to give your Lordships the best account I can procure of ye French Inhabitants and Indians.

There are of the former, according to the best Computation we can make, about 973 families in the whole, the chief part and those we have the most commerce with reside at Pisiquid, River Canard, Mines and Annapolis Royal, the other settle