The half-century which followed the American War of Independence was not, indeed, barren of results in other directions than those indicated by the East India Company. Canada was saved from the seductions of American independence by a wise recognition of its established customs and religion (1774), and was strengthened by the influx of United Empire Loyalists who would not bow the knee to republican separatism. Provision was made for the government of these some what discordant elements by dividing Canada into two provinces, one predominantly French, the other British, and giving each a legislature for the voicing of its grievances (1791). So, too, the impulse of the Seven Years' War survived the War of Independence in other quarters of the globe. Naval officers, released from war-like operations, were sent to explore the Pacific; and, among them, Captain James Cook surveyed the coasts of Australia and New Zealand (1770). The enthusiastic naturalist of the expedition, Joseph Banks, persistently sang the praises of Botany Bay; but the new acquisition was used as a convict settlement (1788), which was hardly a happy method of extending British civilization. The origin of Australia differed from that of New England, in that the Pilgrim Fathers wanted to avoid the mother- country; while the mother-country wanted to avoid the convicts; but in neither case was there any imperialism in the aversion. India was, in fact, the chief outlet at that period for British imperial sentiment. It is true that Great Britain laid down in solemn official language, in 1784, that the acquisition of territory was repugnant to the principles of British government. But so had Frederick the Great begun his career by writing a refutation of Machiavelli; circumstances, and something within which made for empire, proved too strong for liberal intentions, and the only British war waged between the Peace of Versailles in 1783 and the rupture with Revolutionary France in 1793 resulted in the dismemberment of Tippoo Sultan's kingdom of Mysore (1792). The crusading truculence of the French republicans, and Napoleon's ambition, made the security of the British Isles Pitt's first consideration; but when that was confirmed by naval victories over the French on the 1st of June, 1794, and at the battle of the Nile in 1798, over the Dutch at Camperdown and over the Spaniards at Cape St. Vincent in 1797, over the Danes at Copenhagen in 1801, and over the French and Spaniards combined at Trafalgar in 1805, Great Britain concentrated its energies mainly on extending its hold on India and the Far East, and on strengthening its communications with them. The purpose of the battle of the Nile was to evict Napoleon from Egypt, which he had occupied as a stepping-stone to India, and Malta was seized (1800) with a similar object. Mauritius, too, was taken (1810), because it had formed a profitable basis of operations for French