George Bancroft, History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent, Vol. 5, 13th edition.

[212] had been collected by the most Christian king. A

chap. X.} 1764 Sept.

small return to the exchequer blinded Grenville to the principles of British law.¹ The same reasoning was applied to the Canadians; and the Attorney and Solicitor-Generals of Great Britain gave their opinion, that the duties payable in Canada to its former government at the time of the conquest, might be legally collected by the authority of the British king.² But arbitrary taxation was the only relic of French usages which was retained. All the laws, customs, and forms of judicature³ of a populous and long-established colony were in one hour⁴ overturned by the ordinance of the seventeenth of September; and English laws, even the penal statutes against Catholics, all unknown to the Canadians, and unpublished, were introduced in their stead.

The improper choice and the number of the civil officers sent over from England, increased the disquietude of the colony. The ignorant, the greedy, and the factious, were appointed to offices which required integrity, knowledge, and abilities.⁵ The judge pitched upon to conciliate the minds of seventy thousand foreigners to the laws and government of Great Britain, was taken from a jail, and was entirely unacquainted with the civil law and the language of the people. The Attorney-General, with regard to the language,