32 HISTORY OF PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND. seized in terms of a law passed near ten years since, and the proceedings conducted by the law officers,—I have no doubt properly. " There is some idea, I find, of rescinding the purchases, and that government will order it. Whoever has formed guch an idea must have strange notions of government. Government may order me ; and, if J have a mind to he laughed at, I may issue my orders to the purchasers ; but can anyone believe they will be obeyed? Surely not; nor would I be an inhabitant of any country where such a power existed. My money may with as much justice be ordered out of my pocket, or the bread out of my mouth. A gover¬ nor has just as much power to do the one as the other. I should like to know what opinion you would have of a country where the validity of public contracts depended on •the will of the governor. " The purchases were made in the very worst period of the war, when the property was very precarious indeed, and when no man in England would have given hardly a guinea •for the whole island. It is now peace, and fortunately we Still remain a part of the British Empire. The lands are consequently esteemed more valuable, and the proprietors have become clamorous for their loss. Had the reverse taken place,—had the island been ceded to France,—let mo :ask, what would have been the consequence? Why, the purchasers would have lost their money, and the proprietors would have been quiet, hugging themselves on their own 'better judgment. There can be no restoring of the lots •which were sold. There has not been a lot sold on which a single shilling has been expended by way of settlement, nor upon which there has been a settler placed; so that those proprietors who have expended money in making settle- ■jnents .have no cause of complaint."