of trial or danger will certainly pass into impatience, and anxiety to be free from colonial appendages? If it be so, then, indeed, the superlative degree of blundering and misery is approaching; but the misery, like the blundering, will be found this time, not in the colonies, but in England. For sixteen years after the treaty of Breda, Port Royal was left comparatively undisturbed; the French population reaching, in the year 1671, 361 souls; 364 acres having been brought under cultivation, and nearly 1000 sheep and cattle being owned by the settlers. In 1680, however, the English again, for the fifth time, obtained possession of it; and again lost it. After its recapture, and before 1686, considerable additions had been made to the fortifications by the French; and in the treaty of that year between France and England, it was resolved—a resolution which was never kept—that although the mother countries might quarrel, their respective American subjects might continue to maintain mutual peaceable relations. After the Revolution of 1688, war broke out in Europe once more between France and England, and their American children followed suit. Port Royal being the head- quarters for the French ships attracted the attention of Sir William Phipps, who after capturing and pillaging it abandoned it again to the French. And the treaty of Ryswick again officially announced that the whole of Nova Scotia was French territory. In 1699, and again in 1701, considerable labour was devoted by the French to strengthening the works of Port Royal; an increase to the garrison was made from France, and the militia in the surrounding settlements were carefully trained and armed. Every difficulty was interposed by the French governors between the settlers and the New England merchants, who were mutually eager for trade. Exasperated by prohibitory duties on their wares, the latter first tried smuggling, and then hostile expeditions. One such was made from Boston in 1704; and although Port Royal made a successful resistance, much damage was done to the surrounding country.