"How do you know?"
"From the testimony of General Robertson in the House of Lords. And if these soldiers are Irishmen, you can wager they're Catholics. And why should we pass laws 'gainst these crowds of Irish Papists and convicts who are yearly poured upon us, unless they were Catholic convicts fleeing from the laws of persecution?"
"What ails ye, Forrest," rejoined Jim, "can't be cured."
"Take care 'f yourself," angrily retorted the Colonel, "an' I'll take care o' myself."
"If ye did, and yer likes did the same, we'd git along better and the war'd be over. I s'pose ye know that yer friend Jay lost Canada to us."
"What if he did. Wazn't he right?"
And then he explained to him.
II
Canada had been surrendered to England by France in a clause of the Treaty of Paris in 1763, with a stipulation, however, that the people of the territory in question would be permitted the free use of the French language, the prescriptions of the French code of laws, and the practice of the Catholic religion.