It is greatly to be regretted that the volumes subsequent to 1737 appear to be missing. The other, and by far the most fertile repository, is a series of upwards of an hundred enormous "cartons" or port-folios, each larger than two ordinary folio volumes, and in which, at the time of my examination, were placed loosely and without chronological order, or even the least attempt at arrangement, a mass of original documents relating to Canada, from 1G30 to the Treaty of Paris, 10th February, 1763. The state of deplorable confusion in

GENERAL INTRODUCTION. xxxiii

which I found the contents of these cartons can scarcely be conceived by any one who has not made personal investigations, and it must be very evident that it was embarrassing in no small degree. It not only very greatly increased the labor of the research, but it was found that in many instances papers of presumed importance were missing from the mass. It is

hoped, however, that under the superintendence of the present competent and intelligent chief of the archives, M. Davezac, these valuable papers, whose present confusion (one of the results, perhaps, of the Revolutionary fury of 1793) exhibits such a striking contrast to the system and order tliat generally prevail in the French government bureaus, will soon be arranged in a manner consistent with their high importance and worthy the dignity of the nation. Several months were occupied in a careful and toilsome investigation of these documents, and such as were found to relate to our history were selected and transcribed. "'Knowing, however, that tlie archives of the Department of the Marine and the Colonies was not the only source from which to obtain information, an application was addressed to the Minister of War, Marshal Soult, Duke of Dalmatia, which was promptly answered by a had been given for my admission to the dep6t and archives of the letter stating that orders War Department, " for the purpose of examining and copying all the documents relative to the operations of the French, in Canada, until the period of the Treaty of Paris, in 1763." This frank and liberal order, so characteristic of the gallant soldier wiio presides over tiie