However extravagant the pretension may appear, of converting the discovery of an inhabited country into conquest, if the principle has been asserted in the first instance, and afterwards juaintained ; if a country has been acquired and held under it ; if the jjroperty of the great mass of the community originates in it, it becomes the law of the land and

cannot be questioned The law of conquest,

founded in force, but limited by that humanity or policy which incorjiorates the conquered with the victorious, spares all wanton oppression, and protects title to property, whether the vanquished became incorporated, or were governed as a distinct society, was incapable of application to the aborigines of this country. The tribes of Indians were fierce savages, whose occupation was war, and whose subsistence was chiefly from the forest. To leave them in possession of their country, was to leave the country a wilderness ; to govern them as a distinct people was impossible, because they were as brave and high spirited as they were fierce, and were ready to repel by arms every attempt on their independence. To mix with them was impossible. The Europeans were then compelled either to abandon the country, and all

THE ORIGIN AND HISTORY OF THE MANORS.

claim to their discovery, remain exposed to perpetual hazard of massacre, or enforce their claim by the sword. Wars, in which the whites were not always the aggressoi-s, ensued. European policy, numbers, and skill, prevailed. As the white j)opulation advanced, that of the Indians necessarily receded. The country in the neighbourhood of agriculturalists became unfit for them. The game fled into thicker and more unbroken forests, and the Indians followed. The soil to which the CVown originally claimed title, being no longer occupied, was parceled out according to the will of the sovereign power, and taken possession of by those claiming under it.