Treaty of Aix la Chapelle Commissaries were in the Year 1750 appointed to settle with Commissaries

on the part of France the limits of each others possessions in North America, they were instructed to insist that France had no right to any possession on the South side of the River St. Lawrence.

Under these circumstances therefore and for as much as we are clearly of opinion that the Stipulations of the Treaty of Paris, by which Canadian property spirit of them refer

is

reserved doth both in the letter and

only to the property and possession of the Canadians in Canada of which we

insist that the Country upon Lake Champlain was no part, we cannot recommend to Your Lordships

to advise his Majesty to Comply with what

is

requested by the Petitioner or to do any Act which

may in any respect admit a right in the Crown of France to have made those Grants under which the possessions upon Lake Champlain are now claimed either by Canadian Subjects or others deriving that Claim under purchases from them

:

We do not, however, mean by any opinion of Ours to prejudice their Claims in any suit they may bring for establishing those claims by due course of Law and

we submit under any circumstances of the Case the question in dispute between these Claimants and the possessors under New York Grants cannot be properly decided by his Majesty in Council, unless

upon any appeal from such Courts as have constitutionally the cognizance of such matters. On the other hand when we consider that many of his Majesty's subjects trusting to the validity of the Canadian Titles have become proprietors of those Seigneuries under purchases for valuable considerations We cannot but be of opinion that the making Grants under the Seal of New York of any part of those Seigniories was an unjust and unwarrantable proceeding, That the claimants therefore ought to be quieted in the possession of at least those parts which remain yet ungranted by such order as his Majesty's Law Servants shall think more effectual for that purpose that the Governor of New York should receive the most positive orders not to make any further Grants whatever of any part of the Lands within the limits of any of those Seigneuries and that a suitable compensation should be made to the Claimants for what has already been taken away by giving them gratuitous Grants, equivalent in quantity, in other parts of his Majesty's Provinces of Quebec or New York.