It will be seen, later, that Shirley’s timely application to the ministry, on behalf of Nova Scotia, involved the fate of Louisburg itself. Orders were promptly sent out to Commodore Warren, who was in command of a cruising squadron in the West Indies, to proceed as early as possible to Nova Scotia, for the purpose of protecting our settlements there, or of distressing the enemy, as circumstances might require. Shirley himself had also written to Warren, requesting him to do this very thing, at the same time the ministry were notified, though it was yet too early to know the result of either application. All eyes were now opened to Louisburg’s dangerous power. But, come what might, Shirley was evidently a man who would leave nothing undone. [1]Louisburg had cost the enormous sum of 30,000,000 livres or £1,200,000 sterling. [2]Pepperell was besieging Louisburg at the same time the French were Tournay. [3]Canso was taken by Duvivier, May 13, 1744. The captors burnt everything, carrying the captives to Louisburg, where they remained till autumn, when they were sent to Boston. These prisoners were able to give very important information concerning the fortress, its garrison, and its means of defence. V “LOUISBURG MUST BE TAKEN” However Shirley’s efforts to avert a present danger might succeed, nobody saw more clearly than he did that his measures only went half way toward their mark. With Louisburg intact, the enemy might sweep the coasts of New England with their expeditions, and her commerce from the seas. The return of spring, when warlike operations might be again resumed, was therefore looked forward to at Boston with the utmost uneasiness. Merchants would not risk their ships on the ocean. Fishermen dared not think of putting to sea for their customary voyages to the Grand Banks or the Gulf of St. Lawrence. Here was a state of things which a people who lived by their commerce and fisheries could only contemplate with the most serious forebodings. It was fully equivalent to a blockade of their ports, a stoppage of their industries, with consequent stagnation paralyzing all their multitudinous occupations. Public Opinion aroused.