prevented from becoming English. If in later years the solidarity
and aloofness of the French-Canadian people were sometimes to
prove inconvenient to British interests, it was always to be
remembered that this situation was due in great part to the
deliberate action of Great Britain in strengthening
French-Canadian institutions as a means of advancing what she
considered her own interests in America. "The views of the
British Government in respect to the political uses to which it
means to make Canada subservient," Marriott had truly declared,
"must direct the spirit of any code of laws."

The Quebec Act multiplied the area of the colony sevenfold by the
restoration of all Labrador on the east and the region west as
far as the Ohio and the Mississippi and north to the Hudson's Bay
Company's territory. It restored the old French civil law but
continued the milder English criminal law already in operation.
It gave to the Roman Catholic inhabitants the free exercise of
their religion, subject to a modified oath of allegiance, and
confirmed the clergy in their right "to hold, receive and enjoy
their accustomed dues and rights, with respect to such persons
only as shall confess the said religion." The promised elective
Assembly was not granted, but a Council appointed by the Crown
received a measure of legislative power.

On his return to Canada in September, 1774, Carleton reported
that the Canadians had "testified the strongest marks of Joy and
Gratitude and Fidelity to their King and to His Government for
the late Arrangements made at Home in their Favor." The "most
respectable part of the English," he continued, urged peaceful
acceptance of the new order. Evidently, however, the respectable