is styled Baccalaos on the Hakluyt map of 1597, though the present name appeared from a very early date in English statutes and records.  The island, however, for a century and longer, was practically little more than “a great ship moored near the banks during the fishing season, for the convenience of English fishermen,” while English colonizing enterprise found a deeper interest in Virginia with its more favourable climate and southern products.  It was England’s great rival, France, that was the pioneer at the beginning of the seventeenth century in the work of exploring, and settling the countries now comprised within the Dominion of Canada.

France first attempted to settle the indefinite region, long known as La Cadie or Acadie[1].  The Sieur de Monts, Samuel Champlain, and the Baron de Poutrincourt were the pioneers in the exploration of this country.  Their first post was erected on Dochet Island, within the mouth of the St. Croix River, the present boundary between the state of Maine and the province of New Brunswick; but this spot was very soon found unsuitable, and the hopes of the pioneers were immediately turned towards the beautiful basin, which was first named Port Royal by Champlain.  The Baron de Poutrincourt obtained a grant of land around this basin, and determined to make his home in so beautiful a spot.  De Monts, whose charter was revoked in 1607, gave up the project of colonizing Acadia, whose history from that time is associated for years with the misfortunes of the Biencourts, the family name of Baron de Poutrincourt; but the hopes of this adventurous nobleman were never realized.  In 1613 an English expedition from Virginia, under the command of Captain Argall, destroyed the struggling settlement at Fort Royal, and also prevented the establishment of a Jesuit mission on the island of Monts-Deserts, which owes its name to Champlain.  Acadia had henceforth a checquered history, chiefly noted for feuds between rival French leaders and for the efforts of the people of New England to obtain possession of Acadia.  Port Royal was captured in 1710 by General Nicholson, at the head of an expedition composed of an English fleet and the militia of New England.  Then it received the name of Annapolis Royal in honour of Queen Anne, and was formally ceded with all of Acadia “according to its ancient limits” to England by the treaty of Utrecht.

[1:  This name is now generally admitted to belong to the language of the Micmac Indians of the Atlantic provinces.  It means a place, or locality, and is always associated with another word descriptive of some special natural production; for instance, Shubenacadie, or Segubunakade, is the place where the ground-nut, or Indian potato, grows.  We find the first official mention of the word in the commission given by Henry IV of France to the Sieur de Monts in 1604.]