"I'd be willing to give you fifty dollars to turn around and carry me to St. Johns," said Cabot.
"Couldn't do it if you offered me a hundred, much as I need the money, and glad as I would be to oblige you, for I've got to get home in a hurry if I want to find any home to get to. You see, it's this way," continued White, noting Cabot's look of inquiry, "Pretty Harbour being on the French shore——"
"What do you mean by the French shore?" interrupted Cabot. "I thought you lived in Newfoundland, and that it was an English island."
"So it is," explained White; "but, for some reason or other, I don't know why, England made a treaty with France nearly two hundred years ago, by which the French were granted fishing privileges from Cape Bay along the whole west coast to Cape Bauld, and from there down the east coast as far as Cape St. John. By another treaty made some years afterwards France was granted, for her own exclusive use, the islands of Miquelon and St. Pierre, that lie just ahead of us now.
"In the meantime the French have been allowed to do pretty much as they pleased with the west coast, until now they claim exclusive rights to its fisheries, and will hardly allow us natives to catch what we want for our own use. They send warships to enforce their demands, and these compel us to sell bait to French fishermen at such price as they choose to offer. Why, I have seen men forced to sell bait to the French at thirty cents a barrel, when Canadian and American fishing boats wore offering five times that much for it. At the same time the French officers forbid us to sell to any but Frenchmen, declaring that if we do they will not only prevent us from fishing, but will destroy our nets."
"I should think you would call on English warships for protection," said Cabot. "There surely must be some on this station."
"Yes," replied the other, bitterly, "there are, but they always take the part of the French, and do even more than they towards breaking up our business."
"What?" cried Cabot. "British warships take part with the French against their own people! That is one of the strangest things I ever heard of, and I can't understand it. Is not this an English colony?"
"Yes, it is England's oldest colony; but, while I was born in it, and have lived here all my life, I don't understand the situation any better than you."
"It seems to me," continued Cabot, "that the conditions here must be fully as bad as those that led to the American Revolution, and I should think you Newfoundlanders would rebel, and set up a government of your own, or join the United States, or do something of that kind."