Murray was greatly concerned about the military strength of Quebec, then, as always, the key of Canada. Like the unfortunate Montcalm he found the walls of Quebec badly built, badly placed, and falling into ruins, and he thought they could not be defended by three thousand men against 'a well conducted Coup-de-main.' He proposed to crown Cape Diamond with a proper citadel, which would overawe the disaffected in Quebec itself and defend the place against an outside enemy long enough to let a British fleet come up to its relief. The rest of the country was defended by little garrisons at Three Rivers and Montreal as well as by several small detachments distributed among the trading-posts where the white men and the red met in the depths of the western wilderness.
The relations between the British garrison and the French Canadians were so excellent that what Gage reported from Montreal might be taken as equally true of the rest of the country: 'The Soldiers live peaceably with the Inhabitants and they reciprocally acquire an affection for each other.' The French Canadians numbered sixty-five thousand altogether, exclusive of the fur traders and coureurs de bois. Barely fifteen thousand lived in the three little towns of Quebec, Montreal, and Three Rivers; while over fifty thousand lived in the country. Nearly all the officials had gone back to France. The three classes of greatest importance were the seigneurs, the clergy, and the habitants. The lawyers were not of much account; the petty commercial classes of less account still. The coureurs de bois and other fur traders formed an important link between the savage and the civilized life of the country.
Apart from furs the trade of Canada was contemptibly small in the eyes of men like the London merchants. But the opportunity of fostering all the fur trade that could be carried down the St Lawrence was very well worth while; and if there was no other existing trade worth capturing there seemed to be some kinds worth creating. Murray held out well-grounded hopes of the fisheries and forests. 'A Most immense Cod Fishery can be established in the River and Gulph of St Lawrence. A rich tract of country on the South Side of the Gulph will be settled and improved, and a port or ports furnished with every material requisite to repair ships.' He then went on to enumerate the other kinds of fishery, the abundance of whales, seals, and walruses in the Gulf, and of salmon up all the tributary rivers. Burton recommends immediate attention to the iron mines behind Three Rivers. All the governors expatiate on the vast amount of forest wealth and remind the home government that under the French regime the king, when making out patents for the seigneurs, reserved the right of taking wood for ship-building and fortifications from any of the seigneuries. Agriculture was found to be in a very backward state. The habitants would raise no more than they required for their own use and for a little local trade. But the fault was attributed to the gambling attractions of the fur trade, to the bad governmental system, and to the frequent interruptions of the corvee, a kind of forced labour which was meant to serve the public interest, but which Bigot and other thievish officials always turned to their own private advantage. On the whole, the reports were most encouraging in the prospects they held out to honest labour, trade, and government.
While Murray and his lieutenants had been collecting information for their reports the home government had been undergoing many changes for the worse. The master-statesman Pitt had gone out of power and the back-stairs politician Bute had come in. Pitt's 'bloody and expensive war'—the war that more than any other, laid the foundations of the present British Empire—was to be ended on any terms the country could be persuaded to bear. Thus the end of the Seven Years' War, or, as the British part of it was more correctly called, the 'Maritime War,' was no more glorious in statesmanship than its beginning had been in arms. But the spirit of its mighty heart still lived on in the Empire's grateful memories of Pitt and quickened the English-speaking world enough to prevent any really disgraceful surrender of the hard-won fruits of victory.
The Treaty of Paris, signed on the 10th of February 1763, and the king's proclamation, published in October, were duly followed by the inauguration of civil government in Canada. The incompetent Bute, anxious to get Pitt out of the way, tried to induce him to become the first British governor of the new colony. Even Bute probably never dared to hope that Pitt would actually go out to Canada. But he did hope to lower his prestige by making him the holder of a sinecure at home. However this may be, Pitt, mightiest of all parliamentary ministers of war, refused to be made either a jobber or an exile; whereupon Murray's position was changed from a military command into that of 'Governor and Captain-General.'
The changes which ensued in the laws of Canada were heartily welcomed so far as the adoption of the humaner criminal code of England was concerned. The new laws relating to debtor and creditor also gave general satisfaction, except, as we shall presently see, when they involved imprisonment for debt. But the tentative efforts to introduce English civil law side by side with the old French code resulted in great confusion and much discontent. The land laws had become so unworkable under this dual system that they had to be left as they were. A Court of Common Pleas was set up specially for the benefit of the French Canadians. If either party demanded a jury one had to be sworn in; and French Canadians were to be jurors on equal terms with 'the King's Old Subjects.' The Roman Catholic Church was to be completely tolerated but not in any way established. Lord Egremont, in giving the king's instructions to Murray, reminded him that the proviso in the Treaty of Paris—as far as the Laws of Great Britain permit—should govern his action whenever disputes arose. It must be remembered that the last Jacobite rising was then a comparatively recent affair, and that France was equally ready to upset either the Protestant succession in England or the British regime in Canada.
The Indians were also an object of special solicitude in the royal proclamation. 'The Indians who live under our Protection should not be molested in the possession of such parts of our Dominions and Territories as, not having been ceded to or purchased by Us, are reserved to them.' The home government was far in advance of the American colonists in its humane attitude towards the Indians. The common American attitude then and long afterwards —indeed, up to a time well within living memory—was that Indians were a kind of human vermin to be exterminated without mercy, unless, of course, more money was to be made out of them alive. The result was an endless struggle along the ever-receding frontier of the West. And just at this particular time the 'Conspiracy of Pontiac' had brought about something like a real war. The story of this great effort of the Indians to stem the encroachments of the exterminating colonists is told in another chronicle of the present Series. [Footnote: The War Chief of the Ottawas.] The French traders in the West undoubtedly had a hand in stirring up the Indians. Pontiac, a sort of Indian Napoleon, was undoubtedly cruel as well as crafty. And the Indians undoubtedly fought just as the ancestors of the French and British used to fight when they were at the corresponding stage of social evolution. But the mere fact that so many jealously distinct tribes united in this common cause proves how much they all must have suffered at the hands of the colonists.
While Pontiac's war continued in the West Murray had to deal with a political war in Canada which rose to its height in 1764. The king's proclamation of the previous October had 'given express Power to our Governor that, so soon as the state and circumstances of the said Colony will admit thereof, he shall call a General Assembly in such manner and form as is used in those Colonies and Provinces in America which are under our immediate government.' The intention of establishing parliamentary institutions was, therefore, perfectly clear. But it was equally clear that the introduction of such institutions was to depend on 'circumstances,' and it is well to remember here that these 'circumstances' were not held to warrant the opening of a Canadian parliament till 1792. Now, the military government had been a great success. There was every reason to suppose that civil government by a governor and council would be the next best thing. And it was quite certain that calling a 'General Assembly' at once would defeat the very ends which such bodies are designed to serve. More than ninety-nine per cent of the population were dead against an assembly which none of them understood and all distrusted. On the other hand, the clamorous minority of less than one per cent were in favour only of a parliament from which the majority should be rigorously excluded, even, if possible, as voters. The immense majority comprised the entire French-Canadian community. The absurdly small minority consisted mostly of Americanized camp-following traders, who, having come to fish in troubled waters, naturally wanted the laws made to suit poachers. The British garrison, the governing officials, and the very few other English-speaking people of a more enlightened class all looked down on the rancorous minority. The whole question resolved itself into this: should Canada be handed over to the licensed exploitation of a few hundred low-class camp-followers, who had done nothing to win her for the British Empire, who were despised by those who had, and who promised to be a dangerous thorn in the side of the new colony?
What this ridiculous minority of grab-alls really wanted was not a parliament but a rump. Many a representative assembly has ended in a rump, The grab-alls wished to begin with one and stop there. It might be supposed that such pretensions would defeat themselves. But there was a twofold difficulty in the way of getting the truth understood by the English-speaking public on both sides of the Atlantic. In the first place, the French Canadians were practically dumb to the outside world. In the second, the vociferous rumpites had the ear of some English and more American commercial people who were not anxious to understand; while the great mass of the general public were inclined to think, if they ever thought at all, that parliamentary government must mean more liberty for every one concerned.
A singularly apt commentary on the pretensions of the camp-followers is supplied by the famous, or infamous, 'Presentment of the Grand Jury of Quebec' in October 1764. The moving spirits of this precious jury were aspirants to membership in the strictly exclusive, rumpish little parliament of their own seeking. The signatures of the French-Canadian members were obtained by fraud, as was subsequently proved by a sworn official protestation. The first presentment tells its own tale, as it refers to the only courts in which French-Canadian lawyers were allowed to plead. 'The great number of inferior Courts are tiresome, litigious, and expensive to this poor Colony.' Then came a hit at the previous military rule—'That Decrees of the military Courts may be amended [after having been confirmed by legal ordinance] by allowing Appeals if the matter decided exceed Ten Pounds,' which would put it out of the reach of the 'inferior Courts' and into the clutches of 'the King's Old Subjects.' But the gist of it all was contained in the following: 'We represent that as the Grand Jury must be considered at present as the only Body representative of the Colony, ... We propose that the Publick Accounts be laid before the Grand Jury at least twice a year.' That the grand jury was to be purged of all its French-Canadian members is evident from the addendum slipped in behind their backs. This addendum is a fine specimen of verbose invective against 'the Church of Rome,' the Pope, Bulls, Briefs, absolutions, etc., the empanelling 'en Grand and petty Jurys' of 'papist or popish Recusants Convict,' and so on.