Naxouat, and at the Jemseg to the south. The thinly-peopled northern parts of Maine and Massachusetts were thus constantly exposed to attack, and it was manifestly necessary to the protection of New England that a garrison of sufficient strength should be established in a locality where it would be available to meet an excursion from Canada, if French encroachments were to be resisted. It was thus that attention was directed to Port Royal, which had been taken in the expedition under Nicholson in 1710, and now received the name of Annapolis, from the reigning Queen. Halifax was then unknown, and the whole settlement of Nova Scotia consisted in what went under the name of Acadia, which did not contain 1,000 souls. It was resolved, however, to hold Nova Scotia permanently, and a garrison was left at Annapolis. It was not until 1755, forty-five years after this date, that the deportation of the Acadians took place, and what follows in the history of Nova Scotia must be remembered in connection with the relentless policy of Governor Lawrence, which enforced their banishment. Many have formed their idea of that measure by Mr. Longfellow’s well known poem of “_Evangeline_,” but it must be judged in a far wider view than what is suggested by those polished hexameters. Few can deny that the measure was one bringing much suffering with it, and that many innocent persons underwent tribulation, and that there is a hard, unbending purpose running through the proceeding to cause feelings of horror and pain. This cannot be denied. But what is all war but an unvarying scene of individual misery and wrong? A private execution of the most notorious malefactor makes an appeal to one’s more merciful feelings. The real question to be considered is; was this step a merciless, treacherous, unnecessary brutality like the massacre of Glencoe, inflicting uncalled for suffering on a defenceless people, taken unawares, who had no chance given them to avoid such a fate; or was it an act of necessary policy entailed by most pressing circumstances, by consideration for the safety of a community, which the sufferers could have avoided, without the slightest sacrifice of principle, feeling or of individual right. The fact must be clearly stated. The Acadians, as a conquered people, obtained every consideration and kindness, and for years they were called upon earnestly to be loyal and to abstain from injury to those who were now their masters. No one ever received the slightest individual injury. They were treated with justice, with forbearance, with mercy. They were assured the practice of their religion, the maintenance of their property and their personal liberty. All they were asked to do was to give a solemn assurance, to become in fact and by their lives, subjects of their conquerors. Not to side with their foes, but to defend the land on which they held their property, against its enemies, and above