THE peace which came in 1815, was nowhere more heartily welcomed than it was in the Province of New Brunswick. For more than twenty years, except for a brief period after the Peace of Amiens, Great Britain had been at war with France. For three years there had been war with the United States, a most unnatural and unfortunate contest between two people of the same race and language, who should be always at peace. The generation of young men just grown up had never known any other condition but that of war, bat now they were on the eve of a great change. For the next forty years Great Britain was to be at peace with every civilized nation, and neither wars nor rumors of wars were to interfere with the peaceful progress of the Empire. New Brunswick was about to begin a period of development which, in the course of a few years entirely altered the conditions of life in the Province ; indeed this development had already begun. The first indication of the change was a sudden and extraordinary increase in the revenue. In 1815, the first year of peace, the revenue was just four times as great as it was in 1811 In 1810 it was five times as great as it had been the year before. Then there was a falling off, but only for one year for in 1818 the revenue was greater than it had been

in 1815, and in 1819 it rose above the figures of 1816. Part of this increased revenue was due to higher duties, but the principal cause of it was increased trade. The commerce of the province was beginning to be important, and its merchants were growing wealthy. St. John had ceased to be a village and had become a town, and Fredericton, although less favorably situated for trade was also growing. Judge Winslow in a letter to his son written just before the out-break of the war describes, the improvements in that town, and with the contempt of an aristocrat for the common people says "our shoemakers are all turned merchants, and appear to have made their fortunes." St. Andrews was then a busy and thriving place which aspired to rival St. John, and the Miramich district was rapidly rising to importance. Its magnificent resources in timber were beginning to be developed, and the time was near when its exports would equal those of St. John.

The legislative session of 1816 was the last of that House of Assembly, which had only met five times, although it had been elected seven years. The legislature met on the 11th of January, and sat until the 16th of March. President Smyth made a longer speech than usual, and directed the attention of the members to many important, subjects, such as the revenue, the militia law, schools, the opening of roads and the improvement of the navigation of the large rivers. He was able to congratulate them on the prosperity of the Province, which he chose to attribute to the British Constitution which had been extended to New Brunswick. Thirty-two acts were passed including a new militia law, an act to establish a grammar school in St. Andrews, and another to establish grammar schools in the other counties of the Province. There was also an act for the establishment of certain highways as great roads, the foundation of the later law on that subject, and an act to encourage, the establishment of schools. This provided for the appointment of school trustees in each parish by the Justices in Sessions, and the raising of money for school purposes by assessment when ordered at a meeting of the freeholders and taxpayers. This was a long step in advance of any previous law, but two years later the power of assessing the inhabitants for the support of schools-was taken away, and the sum of one hundred pounds appropriated from the public treasury to each parish not more than twenty pounds to be given annually to any one school. This was a step backward, and it was not until more than half a century had passed that the true principle of maintaining schools for the education of the youth of the country, by assessment, was adopted.

At this session was also passed the first act of the legislature giving a bounty to fishermen. It applied to vessels of thirty tons and upwards engaged in the cod and scale fisheries and the bounty was twenty shillings per registered ton. The whole amount to be given in bounties was limited to three thousand pounds in any one year. This act was renewed and continued in operation until 1822, when it was replaced by another, similar in its main provisions which remained in operation until 1833. There was a conflict between the House and the Council in regard to bills to regulate assessments and to ascertain rateable estates. The Council succeeded in defeating both these necessary-measures, acting as usual in the interests of themselves and their friends. The spirit in which they acted is thus stated by Mr. R. Pagan and Mr. S. D. Street, who had been appointed to manage the conference with the Council 0:1 these bills: "The effect of the objectionable amendments is evidently to take the tax or burthens from one description of persons, and impose it on another; as for instance, to relieve the owners of large and valuable tracts of unimproved land, which are constantly growing in value by the labors of the owners of small tracts of but little comparative value, from any part of the assessment, and thereby necessarily to impose additional burthens upon those of the latter description."

Among the acts of 1816 was one relating to the plaster trade, a business which apparently caused the legislators of that day a great deal of anxiety. To avoid the absurd navigation laws of both countries this trade was carried on by conveying plaster from the quarries of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, in British vessels to the waters of Passamaquoddy Bay where it was transferred to American vessels. The Act now passed made it unlawful to land plaster at any port in the United States east of Boston or anywhere within the limits of the Province except at St. John or St. Andrews. The object of this measure was to throw the carrying trade in plaster to American ports into the hands of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia shipowners. It was deemed so important that when it was passed it was sent hy special messenger to Nova Scotia at a cost of fifty pounds, in order that a similar act might be passed by the Legislature of Nova Scotia. The legislature of the sister province passed an act identical in all respects, and both acts received the Royal appropbation and came into force by proclamation on the 31st January, 1817. These acts proved quite ineffective, and led to immediate retaliation on the part of the United States. One act passed in March, 1817, forbade the importation of plaster from any country' from which it could not be brought by vessels of the United States, while another passed at the same time, provided that no goods, wares, or merchandise, should be imported into the United States from any foreign port, except in vessels of the United States or in such foreign ships as truly belonged to the citizens or subjects of the country in which the goods were produced. This last act was aimed more particularly at Great Britain.

As the plaster law was evidently not helping the shipping of New Brunswick, business men were very anxious to have it repealed, and in 1818 an act was passed authorizing the government to suspend its operation. The matter rested until 1820, when it suddenly occurred to the members of the legislature that a duty might be collected on plaster exported and it become a source of revenue. Accordingly another plaster act was passed imposing a duty of seven shillings and six pence a ton, on all plaster brought into the County of Charlotte.. By the same act authority was given to appoint a preventive officer to see that the law was enforced. This law was no more successful than its predecessor. Mr. Stephen Humbert, the preventive officer, with only a few men at his command, found himself utterly powerless to put a stop to the illegitimate trade or collect duty. He was resisted by the captains and crews of the plaster vessels with muskets and other weapons, and his life put in jeopardy. At one time as many as fifty vessels, laden with plaster, were anchored in Passamaquoddy Bay and their crews were combined to resist Mr. Humbert and his men. The attitude of the plaster men was one of utter defiance, and they were supported <n their resistance by the public sentiment of the people of Nova Scotia, who did not relish the idea of plaster from their province being forced to pay tribute in the shape of duty in New Brunswick. Both branches of the Nova Scotia legislature addressed a remonstrance to the Governor of that province against the New Brunswick plaster law, and although this remonstrance was treated by the New Brunswick Council as a breach of privilege, the law was repealed at the session of 1821. Probably the action of the legislature in repealing this law was-hastened by an act which had been passed by the Congress of the United States forbidding any British vessels from the British North American Colonies to enter United States ports, and making it unlawful to import any goods from these colonies except such as they produced.

At this session of the Legislature an act was passed authorizing the purchase by the Province, ol the House, in which Governor Carleton had resided. The latter had become a large owner ot land in the vicinity ot Fredericton and had built himself a residence on the site still occupied by the old building known as Government House. This House and about fifty acres of land, were sold to the Province for three thousand five hundred pounds, and one hundred and fifty pounds was paid to the College in commutation of ground rent, for a part ot the land had been leased from the College. This transaction closed the connexion of Governor Carleton with the Province of New Brunswick, and he died a few months after it was completed. He had. tilled the office of Governor tor almost thirty-three years, during about fourteen of which he had been an absentee, enjoying one-half the salary of his office but doing nothing to earn it. During his long residence in England he seems to have ceased to exercise any influence on the affairs of this Province, his recommendations were not regarded, and all substantial power passed out of his hands. Even those who had been his firmest supporters forsook him in his old age, and made cruel remarks about his indolence, his coldness of heart and his indifference to the interests of his friends. The party which he had gathered about him while in New Brunswick, kept together for some years after his departure, but death began to deplete its ranks and the rise of new men to influence, modified its character. It was no longer supreme in the Province, as it had been in the good old days when the Governor and hip Council controlled everything.

The fifth House of Assembly was dissolved in July, 1816, and tlie elections took place immediately. There were a considerable number of changes in the representation of the different constituencies, the most noticeable being the absence of William Pagan, who had sat continuously as a representative of St. John since 1786. Mr. Pagan's legislative record was an honorable one, for he was always found on the side of the people. In 1817 he was appointed a member of the Council, being the first man, not a member of the Church of England, who obtained a seat in that body. Mr. S. D. Street was another of the old members who did not appear in the new House. He had been a member of the third and fifth Assemblies and had been a most useful representative, supporting Mr. Glenie most loyally in his efforts to improve the administration of public affairs. No man in the Province except Mr. Glenie, had been the victim of so much vulgar abuse from the persons who posed as gentlemen and members of the Provincial Aristocracy. He had been systematically excluded from every position of honor or emolument, although his claims were undoubtedly superior to those of many who were preferred to him. He was now well advanced in years and perhaps age had weakened his regard for the rights of the people, for in 1819 he became a member of the Council and fell into the ways of that obstructive body. Two of his sons who entered political life, abandoned altogether the path which their father had taken in. his. youth, and became violent supporters of the old family compact and all its abuses. They were admitted into the sacred circle that had been closed to their father and associated with men who had made him the object of their ridicule and abuse.

The Legislature met in 1817, on the 4th February, and it was not prorogued until the 22nd March. As the Speaker of the former House had become Provincial Treasurer and was not a member of the new House, it became necessary to elect A new Speaker, and this honor fell to William Botsford, a son of the first Speaker, who had been elected to represent the County of Westmorland. The President who met the Legislature, was not General Smyth, who had been called to Nova Scotia, but Lt. Col. Hams W. Hailes, an old officer, who had been a resident of the Province from its first formation, tilling the office of Fort Major, and who now, as the Senior military officer in the Province, assumed the government. Hailes must have found his position rather an awkward one, being placed over the heads oi so many men who were his superiors in everything else but military rank. An ex-Fort Major must have seemed a very small man to such a personage as Judge Saunders or Jonathan Odell, yet the regulations oi the British Government of that day made him their superior. There was no order given by the home authorities that was so unpopular as that which took away the right oi succession to the presidency from the senior member of the Council, and gave it to the senior military officer. But the Council in 1817, was a very different body from the Conned of 1784. Of the original members of the Council the only survivor was Jonathan Odell. Of the others who were appointed prior to the close of the eighteenth century Daniel Bliss, Judge Upham, and Beverley Robinson were also dead, and George Leonard had not sat in the Council for several years. The only members who attended its meetings regularly, were Chief Justice Bliss, Judges Saunders, Bliss and Chipman, Mr. Odell and Mr. Sproule. All these men were officials in the pay of the province, or of the British Government and four of them, in addition to their duties as members of the Executive and of the Legislature, had also to perform judicial functions.

President Hailes in his opening speech, suggested a number of topics for the consideration of the Legislature, the state of the revenue, the improvement of the means of communication, and the encouragment of agriculture by means of bounties. He did not refer to a matter which immediately engaged the attention of the legislature, the destitution which hail arisen in consequence of the failure of the crop throughout the Province, which had left some without food, and many without seed or the means of procuring it. At an early day in the session, a committee was appointed to inquire into the necessities of the inhabitants occasioned by the failure of the crop, arid the sum that would be required to relieve them. As a result of their inquiries, an act was passed providing for the expenditure of six thousand pounds by commissioners, in the purchase of grain and potatoes, for seed to be distributed to persons who were in need of them Receipts were to be taken for the articles given, and payment was to be made in money or work on the roads. The Province is still in possession of most of these receipts, and it is almost unnecessary to say that they have never been paid. The accounts of the Commissioners show that they sold flour to the destitute, in small quantities. All the articles brought famine prices; Hour was six pence a pound, or twenty-one dollars a barrel, rye flour twelve dollars a barrel, wheat three dollars and a half a bushel; corn two dollars and a half a bushel, potatoes about one dollar a bushel. The amounts disbursed to each person were in most cases quite small, 328 persons being relieved in St. John county, at a cost of £1,008 2s. 6d., and ninety-five persons in Sunburv, at a cost of £351. An act was passed at the same session, forbidding the exportation of corn, meal, flour and potatoes, from the province for four months.

This threatened famine seems to have aroused the Legislature to the necessity of doing something to increase the productiveness of the province, for at this session, an act was passed granting bounties on wheat, rye, Indian corn, buckwheat, barley and oats, grown on new land. This act was continued, by an act passed in 1820, and again in 1826, and expired in 1833. Its passage at this time was a proof that the neglect of agriculture is not a modern evil, and that eighty-five years ago there was a disinclination on the part of the young men of the Province to settle on wilderness land. The complaint was then heard, as it has been many times since, that the lumber industry was injuring -agriculture by withdrawing the most active and vigorous of the young men from the farms.

Evidently the great want of New Brunswick was-population, and this view had so strongly impressed itself on the legislature in 1810, that a sum of one thousand pounds was voted to encourage immigration. The result of this movement was the arrival of one hundred and eleven persons from Greenock, in the ship Favorite, in the autumn of the same year. Most of these people had little or no means, and some additional expense had to he incurred in settling them so that they could make their own way. This was the beginning of an emigration to New Brunswick which at one time reached large proportions, for the close of the great war was followed by hard times in Great Britain, and many persons were thrown out of employment, Both the 104th Regiment and the New Brunswick Fencibles were disbanded this year, and a considerable proportion of the men settled on wilderness farms. There was also another and less desirable element added to the population of the province about this tune. During the operations of the British fleet on the coast of the Southern States during the war, many slaves fled to the warships to escape a life of hopeless servitude. The British would have preferred not to be troubled with them but in many cases their pleading for liberty could not be resisted, and about two thousand of them arrived in Halifax after the war. In April, 1813, the Governor of Nova Scotia communicated the news of their arrival to the President of New Brunswick, and asked him to provide for tour or five hundred of them. This was submitted to the Council and agreed to. They arrived in May to the number of about 400, and were disposed of in various ways, a good many of them being allowed grants of land, 50 acres with a frontage of 20 rods being given to each. The settlement at Loch Lomond was founded by these negroes. They did not make good settlers being lacking in those qualities oi thrift and industry which are so essential to success in a new country'. The negro population of New Brunswick was never considerable. although the loyalists brought with them several hundred slaves. There are now less than two thousand colored people ill the province, about half of whom live in the cities and towns. Two thirds of these negroes are probably descendants of the slaves that were brought to the province in 1783.

President Hailes, a few days after the opening of the. legislature, sent a message to the House recommending that provision be made for the payment oi the members of the Council, acting in their executive capacity. The House went into committee on this message, but declined to take any action, a decision which seems to have greatly provoked the Council, for two days later they passed a resolution that in future no bill, resolution or other proceeding founded on any application addressed to the House oi Assembly, be sustained by the Council unless an application to the same effect, with such documents as may accompany the same, be also presented to the Council. This meant that all petitions sent to the Assembly must also be sent to the Council. From this time until the end of the session, the conduct of the Council was only distinguished by its perversity. They threw out about halt the bills sent up to them by tbe House and rejected nearly all the bye road grants for roads and bridges, absolutely refusing to agree to the request of the House for a conference on these grants. A large number of other important grants for necessary services were also negatived by these petulant legislators. The interests of the Province were nothing to iheru so long as their own spiteful feelings could be gratified. Among the grants thus summarily rejected, was one for one hundred and sixty pounds to aid in the establishment of the Scotch settlement at Napan.

President Hailes continued to administer the affairs of the Province for more than a year, or until November, 1817, when he was succeeded by General Smyth, who had been appointed Lieutenant Governor on the 28th February, just twenty-six days after the death of General Carleton. As Smyth was in Halifax when Carleton died, he must have hail influential friends '.a England working for his interests. General Smyth professed to regard this appointment as a tribute to his own merit, and it greatly increased his idea of his own importance. He therefore returned to the Province in a frame of mind but little suited to a course of moderation and conciliation with regard to the legislature and the people, and certainly no more unfit person could have been selected to govern a colony like New Brunswick, than General Smyth. Reared in a barracks and accustomed from his earliest youth to implicit obedience to all orders given by his superiors, he could have no correct idea of the feelings of the people he governed, or sympathy with their views. The maintenance of the old system by which the Province had been misgoverned for thirty-five years, was the leading feature of his policy, and he looked upon the efforts of the House of Assembly to bring about a better state of affairs as seditious and even treasonable.

The Treaty of Ghent by which peace was made between Great Britain and the United States provided for a commission to decide the ownership of the Islands in Passainaquoddy Bay, all of which since the capture of Eastport, had been in the possession of the British. The Commissioners selected ior this important work were Thomas Barclay for Great Britain, and John Holmes for the United States. The British agent was Ward Chipman. The Commission first met at St. Andrews in September, 1816, and adjourned to meet in Boston in May of the following year. The decision, which was finally rendered in November, 1817, gave Moose Island, Dudley Island and Frederick Island to the United States and all the other Islands, including Grand Manan, to Great Britain. This decision was accepted by both nations, and one portion of the vexatious boundary question set at rest. Eastport, which had been held by the British since its capture in 1814, was, under this decision, restored to the United States.

When the legislature met on the 21st January, 1818, Governor Smyth was able to congratulate its members on the favorable result of the boundary commission His speech was mainly made up of an eulogy of the conduct of Great Britain in bringing the late war in Europe to a successful close, in abolishing the slave trade and diffusing the Holy Scriptures to the remotest nations in their own languages. His only references to the local concerns of the province, were with regard to the success of the settlements of the disbanded soldiers of the 104th and New Brunswick Fencibles on the link of communication with Canada, and to the schools which had been founded under the acts for extending and improving education. There was an air of peace and contentment about the Governor's speech which seemed to promise a peace in land harmonious session. Yet all this apparent calm was merely on the surface, for this session was the beginning of a period of agitation which never ceased until the old order of things had passed away and the battle of reform had been won. The first movement hostile to the Governor, came from Capt. Agnew, a member tor York, who for many years had supported the Governor, asking him to lay before the House copies of such portions ol the royal instructions with regard to the granting of crown lands, as he might think proper, and also copies of the regulations under which the fees on land grants had been taken at the different public offices. This was carried and when the papers were brought down they were referred to a select committee, who reported that they could find nothing in the royal instructions to justify the system, which hail been recently adopted at the Crown and Office, of compelling each applicant for land to take out a separate grant. The reason why the Crown Land officials insisted on a separate grant to each applicant, was that their fees were thereby increased. These fees were so enormous that the officials who exacted them speedily became rich. For a lot of land not exceeding three hundred acres they amounted to £11 13s. 4d., and for one thousand acres granted to ten grantees in severalty the fees charged were £55 11s. 10d., or about $222 of the money of the present day. Enjoying such enormous perquisites it is not surprising that the officials of those days desired no change, and looked upon all who criticized their conduct as little better than rebels. The committee, in their report, expressed the opinion that if the system then in force was continued, it would be highly injurious to the interests of the public and amount almost to a prohibition of the future settlement of the province. Acting on this report the House again requested the Governor to furnish them with such parts of the royal instructions as he deemed necessary, and he sent them a copy of a letter from Lord Bathurst as to the mode of passing the King's grants. This letter which was dated May 13di, 1817, stated that in future the grants should be made out separately to each individual applying for them. The committee of the House reported that Lord Bathurst evidently did not understand the mode of granting lands in this province, and that as his letter merely pointed out a remedy for evils that did not exist, it could not be taken to justify the system complained of by the House. This was followed up by a resolution of the Assembly, asking the Council to join with them iu an address to the Prince Regent against the existing system of granting land, and asking that the practice of including several grantees i.i one grant he again adopted. The Council declined to accede to this request, alleging as a reason for their refusal that, in their capacity of privy councillors, they had already adopted measures to carry the object of the address into effect. This was true enough, hut there was no reason why they should not join the House in the address. As it was the address of the House to the Prince Regent was forwarded, without reference to the Council, and a reply was received from Lord Bathurst in which he stated that he saw no objection to continuing the system including a number of grantees in one grant. The whole affair was a singular illustration of the loose manner in which the affairs of the department which had charge of the Colonies were conducted. Apparently President Hailes had been influenced by the officials who profited by the change to suggest this new method of issuing grants, and it was adopted by Todd Bathurst without any farther inquiry.

The Council and House of Assembly joined in another address to the Prince Regent on a subject which was beginning to become interesting, the British timber duties. The duty on foreign timber in Great Britain was heavy, while in 1818, Colonial timber went in free. There was an apprehension which proved in the end to be well founded, that the duties on foreign timber would be reduced, and a duty placed on Colonial timber. The address of the Council and House of Assembly to the Prince Regent was a protest against the imposition of such a duty, and it was stated that the exports of squared timber from New Brunswick in the year 1817, were upwards of two hundred thousand tons, all of which went to the United Kingdom. This was the first of a long series of similar protests, some of which will he noticed in future pages, hut which in the end proved wholly ineffectual. The timber duties were (loomed, and although many years passed before they were finally abolished, the time at length came when they were swept away, and both foreign and colonial timber placed on the same footing.

But although the Council and Assembly joined in this address the relations of the two branches of the legislature were by no means cordial during the session. An unusually large number of bills that the House had passed, were rejected by the Council and many appropriations were also thrown out, among them all the grants for the bye roads. The Council also threw out the grant of one hundred pounds to the Speaker ot the House, and twenty shillings a day to each member for his expenses and travelling charges. This was a revival of the old quarrel which had left the Province without either a revenue act or an appropriation act twenty years earlier. The Assembly nothing daunted by this rebuff sent up a separate bill to provide payment for the Speaker and members, and this act was agreed to by the Council The act was to remain in operation during the existence of that House of Assembly. It was followed by another bill to provide for the payment of the actual expenses of the members of the Council, This was also agreed to by the Council, with a proviso that it should not come into operation until it had received the approbation of His Majesty. This proviso had a curious result. Nothing more was heard of the hill until the year 1822, four years after it had been passed, when a despatch was received from Earl Bathurst stating that it had been disallowed, and that the bill for the payment of members of the House had also been disallowed. The latter bill had not been reserved, the Speaker and members had been paid under its authority and it had expired, because the House that passed it had ceased to exist. Another House had been elected and had passed a similar law, and it had also been dissolved by the irate Governor. A third House was now holding its second session, having at its first passed an act providing for the payment of members, and yet after all these changes, Lord Bathurst suddenly wakes up and disallows an act which was not reserved for his consideration, and which had already done its work. The reason given for the disallowance of these two acts, was, that "It would be more suitable to the dignity and independence of legislative bodies to meet in General Assembly without receiving daily pay, and their Lordships have no reason to apprehend that the Province of New Brunswick could not furnish representatives who would be ready to perform their duties as members of the Legislature, without receiving a pecuniary allowance for that service. The truth of the matter was that their Lordships knew nothing about the matter and cared less. They acted on the advice of the Colonial Minister, who received his inspiration from Governor Smyth, who had made up his mind to prevent the members receiving pay.