My mother did not speak. I saw that a conflict was going on within her, the conflict that had to be fought out in so many Loyalist breasts between pride and necessity in Canada. But in this, as in most other cases, necessity won. My proud-spirited mother was finally overborne in her opposition to my sister's proposal. Before we slept that night, it was agreed that Caroline should enter a Halifax family where she would earn some ten shillings per week teaching two children and doing some other light duties. We were surprised the next morning by an early visit from Duncan Hale. 'The Governor,' he said addressing me, 'will give you a place as secretary to one of the officers who is to go to St. John with Lieutenant-Governor Hughs to attempt to pacify the Indians. The salary will be six shillings per day. Will you go?' 'Yes,' I said eagerly; 'I will.' Chapter X The Treaty The details of the expedition to the Indians on the St. John were finally arranged, and we set off. Duncan Hale was to act as secretary to Sir Richard Hughs, the lieutenant-governor, while I was assigned to a similar position under a certain Colonel Francklin, who had been appointed by the Government as superintendent of Indian affairs. There went with us also a Rev. Father Bourg, a former missionary to the Indians, a Romanist, a man of French descent, but, as I was afterwards to learn, a valuable and loyal subject of King George. Our party, including soldiers and a few gentlemen who went to look over the country north of the bay, with a view to getting some of the many farmers who had come from Boston to settle upon it, numbered, in all, twenty-seven persons. Somewhat tired from the long journey on horseback over a road that was exceedingly rough, we finally reached Annapolis. The country about here was partly settled, and seemed to be remarkably fertile. There were wide, rich marshes, orchards, and many well-cultivated farms, occupied mainly by settlers who had come in from the American Colonies before the war. These lands, Father Bourg explained to me, had originally been occupied by his ancestors, who had come from France over a hundred years previously. From Annapolis we took a sailing vessel, and were soon across the Bay of Fundy, and in the harbour at the mouth of the great St. John River. The shores of the harbour seemed to be particularly rocky and forbidding. At a place called Portland Point, where we landed, there were a few buildings, somewhat rudely constructed, and used mainly by a trading company that, for years, had done business with the Indians and others up the river. On a hill to the eastward was a fort, called Fort Howe; everywhere else, down even to the water's edge, stretched the black, unbroken forest.