We are now in Nova Scotia, where I am delayed a few days before starting on the long land journey over the western continent. CHAPTER VI. _NOVA SCOTIA._ Early Colonization--De Monts--Champlain--Sir William Alexander-- Capture of Quebec--The Treaties--The Acadian Evangeline-- Louisbourg--First Capture--Peace of Aix la Chapelle--Boundary Disputes--The Final Struggle--Deportation of the Acadians-- Nova Scotia constituted a Province. The first attempt at the colonization of Nova Scotia which was made from France was singularly unfortunate. In 1598, we read, the Marquis de la Roche left Saint Malo with a crew, almost entirely composed of convicts. He landed forty of them at Sable Island until he could select a place fit for settlement, when a westerly storm drove his ship back to France. These settlers, if they can be so called, remained unnoticed for seven years, and when they were found twelve only remained. Had it not been for De Lery, who placed some live stock here in 1518, which in the interval had greatly multiplied, they must have starved. Their houses were built of the timbers of wrecked vessels, and it would seem no little of the fuel was derived from the same source. There is a letter from one John Butt to Henry VIII., which states that in 1527, seventy years previously, he met fifteen vessels in the harbour of Newfoundland, and there is every ground to warrant the belief that individual enterprise led to constant communication between the maritime nations of Europe and America from the early days of the discovery of Newfoundland, and that very many vessels penetrated to the shores of Nova Scotia and to the St. Lawrence before the days of Verazzano and Cartier. The object being alone that of trade with the Indians, and to obtain fish, no settlement followed, and doubtless many a wreck lay on the dreary shores of the exposed island where these unfortunate men had been landed.