The war between England and France, though at an end on the continent of America, was still continued among the West India Islands, France in this case also being the loser. Martinique, Grenada, St. Lucia, St. Vincent’s—every island, in fact, which France possessed among the Caribbees—passed into the hands of the English. Besides which, being at the same time at war with Spain, England took possession of Havanna, the key to the whole trade of the Gulf of Mexico. In November, 1763, a treaty of peace was signed at Paris, which led to further changes, all being favourable to Britain; whilst Martinique, Guadalope and St. Lucia were restored to France, England took possession of St. Vincent’s, Dominica and Tobago islands, which had hitherto been considered neutral. By the same treaty all the vast territory east of the Mississippi, from its source to the Gulf of Mexico, with the exception of the island of New Orleans, was yielded up to the British; and Spain, in return for Havanna, ceded her possession of Florida. Thus, says Hildreth, was vested in the British crown, as far as the consent of rival European claimants could give it, the sovereignty of the whole eastern half of North America, from the Gulf of Mexico to Hudson’s Bay and the Polar Ocean. By the same treaty the navigation of the Mississippi was free to both nations. France at the same time gave to Spain, as a compensation for her losses in the war, all Louisiana west of the Mississippi, which contained at that time about 10,000 inhabitants, to whom this transfer was very unsatisfactory. Three new British provinces were now erected in America; Quebec and East and West Florida. East Florida included all the country embraced by the present Florida, bounded on the north by the St. Mary’s. West Florida extended from the Apalachicola River to the Mississippi; from the 31st degree of latitude on the north, to the Gulf of Mexico on the south, thus including portions of the present states of Alabama and Mississippi. The boundary of Quebec corresponded with the claims of New York and Massachusetts, being a line from the southern end of Lake Nipissing, striking the St. Lawrence at the 45th degree of latitude, and following that parallel across the foot of Lake Champlain to the sources of the Connecticut, and thence along the highlands which separate the waters flowing into the St. Lawrence from those which fall into the sea.[9]