In Canada she governed a belt of country stretching from the Atlantic to
the Pacific, divided for administrative purposes into two areas, one of
which, Lower Canada - embracing the cities of Quebec and Montreal, and
including the basin of the St. Lawrence - was populated principally by
people of French origin. It would be too much to suppose that these
colonists, who jealously preserved the French language and the French
tradition, were indifferent to the doings of their kin across the water;
and there were, indeed, many who cherished the hope that events would so
shape themselves as to restore the authority of France in this part of
the New World. But the habitant was Roman Catholic as well as French, and
the hierarchy was profoundly distrustful of the regime which it regarded
as the heritage of the hateful ideas of 1789. We may speculate as to what
would have happened if Napoleon had set himself to woo the affections of
the French Canadians. But throughout the great wars Canada remained loyal
to the British connection, despite internal difficulties and discontents.
Great Britain also held Newfoundland, as well as those maritime provinces
which have since become federated as part of the Dominion.
In South America she possessed British Guiana, and for a period, as
related above, French Guiana also.
In the West Indies, in 1800, her flag flew over the entire crescent of
the Windward and Leeward groups from Granada to the Virgins; she was
mistress of Trinidad, Tobago, Jamaica, the "still vexd" Bermudas and the
whole bunch of the Bahamas; and she had interests in San Domingo. At the
Peace of Amiens she retained only Trinidad of the islands captured during
the war; and she presented no very stubborn resistance to the negro
revolt that lost her any further control over the largest of the sugar
islands.
She had the Cape of Good Hope in her custody in 1800, but weakly allowed
it to be bartered away by diplomacy at Amiens; only, however, to reassert
her power there six years later, when it became at length apparent to
British statesmen - as it surely should have been obvious to them
throughout - that Australia and India could not be secure while the chief
southern harbour of Africa was in foreign possession.
Ceylon was retained as a sparkling jewel for the British crown when so
much that had been won in fair fight was allowed to slip away. The
capture of Java (1811) and its restoration to the Dutch belong to a later
period; whilst the growth of British power in India scarcely falls within
the scope of a brief review of the colonial situation, though of great
importance in its effects.
Malta, which has usually been classed as a colony, though its principal
value is rather strategic than colonial, was occupied by the British in
September 1800, and the cat-footed efforts of Napoleonic diplomacy to get
her out of the island made it a storm centre in European politics in
these fiery years. Out she would not come, and did not. Neither Tzar nor
Emperor could get her out, by plot or by arms; and there she still
remains.
PART 4.
The position of the British in the South Seas demands special
consideration, as being immediately related to our subject. In 1800 the
only part of Australasia occupied by white people was Norfolk Island and
the small area at Port Jackson shut in between the sea and a precipitous
range of mountains that for thirteen years to come presented an
unconquerable barrier to inland exploration, despite repeated endeavours
to find a way across them. The settlement had spread only a few miles
beyond the spot where Governor Arthur Phillip had resolved to locate his
First Fleet company twelve years before. As yet no attempt had been made
to occupy Tasmania, which had been determined to be an island only two
years previously. New Zealand also was virgin ground for the European
colonist. The Maori had it all to himself.
The means of defending the little colony, in the event of an attack
during the war which raged from five years after its foundation till
1802, and again from 1803 for twelve years more, were insignificant. The
population in 1800 numbered rather more than five thousand, only about
one-half of whom were soldiers, officials, and free people.* (* The total
population of Sydney, Parramatta, and Norfolk Island on January 1, 1801,
was declared to be 5100, of whom 2492 were convicts - 1431 men, 500 women,
and 561 children. Of the remainder, 1887 were "free people," being
neither on the civil nor the military establishment.) The remainder were
convicts, some of them being Irishmen transported for participation in
the rebellion of 1798, including not a few men of education. These men
were naturally writhing under a burning sense of defeat and oppression,
and were still rebels at heart. They were incarcerated with a
miscellaneous horde of criminals made desperate and resentful by harsh
treatment. It is scarcely doubtful that if a French naval squadron had
descended on the coast, the authorities would have had to face, not only
an enemy's guns in Port Jackson, but an insurrection amongst the unhappy
people whom the colony had been primarily founded to chastise. The
immigration of a farming and artisan class was discouraged; and it is
scarcely conceivable that, apart from the officials, the gaolers, and the
military, who would have done their duty resolutely, there were any in
the colony who, for affection, would have lifted a hand to defend the
land in which they lived, and the regime which they hated.
There was at the Governor's command a small military force, barely
sufficient to maintain discipline in a community in which there were
necessarily dangerously turbulent elements;* (* In a report to Governor
King, April 1805, Brevet-Major Johnson pointed out that the military were
barely sufficient for mounting guard, and urged "the great want of an
augmentation to the military forces of this colony" (Historical Records
of New South Wales 6 183). Colonel Paterson, in a letter to Sir Joseph
Banks, 1804, remarked that "it will certainly appear evident that our
military force at present is very inadequate" (Ibid 5 454). John
Blaxland, in a letter to Lord Liverpool, 1809, wrote that "it is to be
feared that if two frigates were to appear, the settlement is not capable
of opposing any resistance" (Ibid 7 231). An unsigned memorandum in the
Record Office, "bearing internal evidence of having been written by an
officer who was in the colony during the Governorship of Hunter," pointed
out that "a naval force is absolutely necessary on the coast of New South
Wales...to protect the colony from an attack by the French from the
Mauritius, which would have taken place long ago if the enemy had
possessed a naval force equal to the enterprise" (Ibid 7 248 to 250).)
but he was destitute of effective vessels for service afloat.
