ratification of the reciprocity treaty with the United States. As I
have only been able so far in this historical narrative to refer in a
very cursory manner to these very important questions, I propose now
to give in the following chapter a succinct review of their history
from the time they first came into prominence down to their settlement
at the close of Lord Elgin's administration in Canada.




CHAPTER VII



THE HISTORY OF THE CLERGY RESERVES, (1791-1854)

For a long period in the history of Canada the development of several
provinces was more or less seriously retarded, and the politics of the
country constantly complicated by the existence of troublesome
questions arising out of the lavish grants of public lands by the
French and English governments. The territorial domain of French
Canada was distributed by the king of France, under the inspiration of
Richelieu, with great generosity, on a system of a modified feudal
tenure, which, it was hoped, would strengthen the connection between
the Crown and the dependency by the creation of a colonial
aristocracy, and at the same time stimulate the colonization and
settlement of the valley of the St. Lawrence; but, as we shall see in
the course of the following chapter, despite the wise intentions of
its promoters, the seigniorial tenure gradually became, after the
conquest, more or less burdensome to the _habitants_, and an