published, whether before or after he has obtained his grant, prospecting and finding minerals on his land, he shall have prior right to a lease under the General Mining Act, of mining rights on such land, and any minerals mined thereon shall be exempt from royalty for a period of five years after the taking out of such lease.

NOVA SCOTIA

BY JAMES S. MACDONALD

(Of Halifax, N.S.)

IN furnishing a brief paper on my native province, Nova Scotia, I feel at the outset the difficulty of presenting in a few pages but a brief outline of the long, varied, and interesting record of this, the eldest colony of Britain. In condensing, I will endeavour to avoid the lumber of historical articles, statistics, and minute references to unimportant facts, and only give those leading events without which the paper would be valueless. Connected as Nova Scotia and her people are by ties of blood and tradition with Britain, we are gratified to find that the indifference with which the colonies were treated in former years is rapidly changing to a vital interest, which will be well appreciated by those younger branches of the empire; this interest will prove beneficial to all concerned, it will preserve and strengthen their attachment to Britain, thus contributing to the stability of all.

The history of every country in Europe commences in the region of fable, and the accounts given of the early ages at all, are at best plausible conjectures. The discovery of the western continent of America is in this respect just the reverse. The discovery was an event of modern occurrence, and was accompanied by the important art of printing, which, by multiplying the copies, preserved the journals of those who explored and settled the New World. But if the materials of American history are unlike those of Europe, the events

are even more different. The progress and change from

a state of nature towards an elevated civilisation is always slow, and the troublous settlement of America affords an interesting study and subject for contemplation.

The claim of Britain on Nova Scotia was founded upon discovery. During the tranquil reign of Henry VII., commerce and manufacture increased to such an extent as to attract to England merchants from all parts of Europe, among them a Venetian named Cabot, an experienced mariner. The short route to India was his hobby, and he so influenced the king that he was granted a commission in 1496, with powers to sail with three ships to seek and discover all the isles, regions, and lands of heathens unknown to Christians. This commission included powers to his three sons, Sebastian, Saucas, and Louis, who were to accompany him. Henry reserved to himself the dominion of all discovered. Thus in this voyage of discovery the object of the sovereign was dominion, while gain stimulated the subject. Two caravels were fitted out at the public expense, freighted by merchants of London and Bristol, manned by three hundred men, and sailed from Bristol on 4th May 1497. Sailing west they sighted land, much earlier than they had anticipated, on 24th June 1497, which prima vista is now determined to have been the "Sugar-Loaf," a lofty peak of the Cape North range, in Cape Breton, eastern Nova Scotia; so that the colony has a claim to prominence in the fact that it possesses the point upon which the discoverer's eye first rested when he so unexpectedly found America. Thus Cabot in the name of Henry VII. had discovered and acquired the continent of America before Columbus had visited any part of the mainland, his voyages up to that date not having extended beyond the islands in the Gulf of Mexico. The discovery of Cabot in 1497, and the formal possession taken of the country

in Elizabeth's reign, are considered by Britain as the foundation of the right and title of the Crown of England to the whole of its possessions in North America.

Here I may say that the constitution of England, as it stood at the discovery of America, had nothing in its nature providing for colonies. The colonies have therefore at different periods of their growth experienced very different treatment. At first they were considered lands without the limits of the "realm of England," and not annexed to it. The king assumed the right of property and government of the settlers, "his liege subjects," to the preclusion of the jurisdiction of the State. The king called them "his possessions abroad," not parts and parcels of the realm, and as not yet under the Crown. Upon this assumption the colonies were first settled by the king's licence, the governments established by Royal Charter, while the people emigrating to those colonies considered themselves out of the realm, and the king their only sovereign lord. This went on until the reign of Charles II., when Parliament asserted the right of government, and interfered in their regulation and guidance. So much for Britain's right to North America. After the American revolution in 1776, the colonies preserved to England attained freedom from taxation, all duties, taxes, and assessments being paid to and for the use of the colony or province alone. The Colonial Office directed, but the colonies attained a liberal share of self-government.

For several years subsequent to Cabot's discovery, an indifference to the new region appears to have prevailed in England. The venture of the merchants concerned in freighting the expedition was not a profitable one, and other adventures were cultivated for trade by those connected with Cabot. The French, then very aggressive traders, knowing this, sent Baron de

Lery out, with powers to make a settlement, in 1518; but he returned, his mission having failed. The second attempt was made by London barristers, under the direction of a Mr. Hoare, of the Inner Temple, in 1536, but it came to grief. Then, in 1583, Elizabeth encouraged Sir Humphrey Gilbert to cross to the new region, which he did, and took formal possession for England, but the expedition failed, and Gilbert was lost on his way back to England. The next attempt and the first successful settlement was made by the French, under the Sieur de Monts, in 1603, when Port Royal was founded. The name of this place was changed to Annapolis Royal when taken by the English in later conquests. In 1604, Sir William Alexander, a Scottish knight and favourite of James I., received a grant of Acadia as it was then called, and sailed to settle the country with a large band of adventurers. The king, to encourage the settlement, created a new order of knights called "Baronets of Nova Scotia." The baronial lands of these new knights were of the most shadowy description, but still they served to attract attention to the new settlement across the seas, and the descendants of those baronets of Nova Scotia to-day, ninety-one in number, hold their titles as proudly as any other of their honours. Nova Scotia may be a grander name than Acadia, by which the colony was previous to this date known, but it has in later days been a great drawback to the Province, as it has been confounded with Nova Zembla, and amusing diplomatic mistakes are recorded, by which Nova Scotia has been confounded with a miserable Russian island away up in the Arctic waters. From 1603 to 1763, when France renounced all claims to her once proud possessions in North America, Nova Scotia, and her castern annex Cape Breton, became the very shuttlecocks of European diplomats, France and England alternately in treaties now acquir