30 HISTORY or PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND.

reflecting on the conduct of the governor in disposing of' the land, which contributed in no small degree, as Mr. Stuart affirms, in causing the act of relief to be prepared. After referring to business matters, which have no bearing on our story, the governor says: “ \Vhat appears most pressing at present is to say something in answer to my friend Captain McDonald’s proceedings. But first I must express my aston— ishment at your not having received any letters from me since December, 1781. I wrote and sent two by the express, which went to the continent in February, 1782,—not to you, indeed, because I thought you had sailed for India ; but DIr. Townshend received them, I am certain, for I have answers to them from you. I wrote a long one to you in October, 1782, on a variety of subjects. If' this letter has not reached you, I am very unfortunate, as I have no copy of it. I wrote you three others in the course of the winter, copies of which shall accompany this, though they will be now, I fear, of little use, except to show that I have not been idle, or negli- gent in my attention to the interests of this government. If I succeed, I may be re\ aided by my own feelings, but as to any grateful returns, I expect them not. In bodies of men there is no such Virtue as (ratitude, nor indeed but very rarely in individuals, I feel this, and in few instances more sensibly than in the behaviour of Captain McDonald. Believe me, my friend, I have rendered him and his family many disinterested and essential services; nor do I know

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that I can let an opportunity slip of doing so, when in my power. But now, when he thinks his interest is in the least affected, he becomes my enemy, and that, too, in a matter where I am only a spectator, or rather, when I ought to have been only such; for the fact is, I did step out of" my line in the lmsiness of lei-t'eiting the lots, but then it was only to continue my wonted practice to benefit the propri-