or that may be granted to them. On the other hand, the re-annexing to Nova Scotia all that tract of land from the Cape Roziere, along the Gulph of St. Lawrence with the whole coast of the Bay of Fundy to the River Penobscot or to the River St. Croix, will be attended with this peculiar advantage of leaving so extensive a line of sea coast to be settled by British subjects, and all the new settlers upon this tract of land will with greater facility be made amenable to the jurisdiction of Nova Scotia than to that of Canada, and upon this same principle it will likewise be necessary to re-annex the Islands of Cape Breton and St. John's to the government of Nova Scotia." The main objects of the policy thus sketched out were to establish a boundary between the colonists and the Indian nations, and to secure that the lands belonging to the latter should only be opened up by Crown purchases made by public Treaty between the Governor or Commander-in-chief and the tribes. The undeveloped territories were to be kept open for future settlements, but without encouraging them prematurely at the expense of the Indian population. Of the extreme claims of the existing coast colonies under their charters to a right of indefinite extension westwards, Shelburne would seem thus early to have formed an unfavourable opinion,[1] though he considered the English title to be based on the discovery and settlement of the Atlantic sea-board.
In his reply Egremont immediately refused to allow the Board of Trade to correspond directly with the Commander-in-Chief in America, and proposed to include in the new province, all the great lakes, and all the Ohio valley to the Mississippi.[2] Shelburne however remained firm. "If this great country," he said, "should be annexed to the government of Canada, we are apprehensive that the powers of such government would not be properly carried into execution, either in respect to the Indians or British traders, unless by means of the garrisons at the different posts and forts in that country, which must contain the greatest part of your Majesty's American forces, and the
- ↑ See Vol. II. 194.
- ↑ Egremont to Shelburne, July 14th, 1763.
