Of course when the bargain was known in Massachusetts and New York there was great indignation. But the wiser heads amongst the colonists saw that the welfare of a whole empire is greater than the welfare of any part, and so bided their time, knowing full well that another and final blow would some day be struck. Meanwhile, all {179} the money that the colonists had spent on their expedition was given back to them by Britain. Although eight years of peace followed the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle, it was a peace only in name. In Canada and America there were two nations who could never be free from war until one had conquered the other. One of the great causes of offence and perpetual squabbling was that as yet neither knew the precise boundaries of French and British territory. It seems strange that where so much land existed and so few people, that there should be any fighting over boundaries; but if you study the wars of history you will see there is nothing that nations are so ready to quarrel over as this question of boundaries. Besides, there was a vast region constantly being explored, and even surveyed, upon which dwelt tribes of Indians whose allegiance was claimed by one of the two parties to the dispute. So while the Marquis de la Jonquière languished in an English prison, the acting Governor-General of Canada, Galissonière, was kept extremely busy. It was his idea, and he was never tired of expressing it, that although Acadia had been surrendered to England, Acadia meant only the peninsula of Nova Scotia. As for the great region of the west now known as New Brunswick and Eastern Maine, that he claimed to belong to France. He sent out several hundred French agents to conciliate the Indian tribes, to warn off English traders, and to mark out the boundary line between New England and Canada. The Governor ordered forts to be built at Gaspereau and Beauséjour, and another {180} on the St. John River. In the west many other forts were built, including Fort Ticonderoga, at the head of Lake George. He asked King Louis to send him 10,000 colonists to settle along the line of the Alleghany Mountains, and so form a barrier against the English on the east. But, however anxious he was to keep New France, by this time King Louis thought he had lost sufficient of his subjects in the late wars, and refused the request. The English traders and frontiersmen were meanwhile pressing westward. If France's title to all the country on the other side of the Alleghanies was to be something better than waste-paper, something more must be done to assert it. Galissonière therefore resolved to take swift and effective action. And so the curious episode called "The Planting of the Leaden Plates" began. {181} CHAPTER XII THE ACADIANS ARE BANISHED FROM ACADIA