was too late; that as they had refused the oath under
persuasion, they could not be trusted when they took it under
compulsion. It remained to see whether the people at large would profit
by their example.

"I am determined," wrote Lawrence to the Lords of Trade, "to bring the
inhabitants to a compliance, or rid the province of such perfidious
subjects."[273] First, in answer to the summons of the Council, the
deputies from Annapolis appeared, declaring that they had always been
faithful to the British Crown, but flatly refusing the oath. They were
told that, far from having been faithful subjects, they had always
secretly aided the Indians, and that many of them had been in arms
against the English; that the French were threatening the province; and
that its affairs had reached a crisis when its inhabitants must either
pledge themselves without equivocation to be true to the British Crown,
or else must leave the country. They all declared that they would lose
their lands rather than take the oath. The Council urged them to
consider the matter seriously, warning them that, if they now persisted
in refusal, no farther choice would be allowed them; and they were given
till ten o'clock on the following Monday to make their final answer.

[Footnote 273: _Lawrence to Lords of Trade, 18 July, 1755._]

When that day came, another body of deputies had arrived from Grand Pre
and the other settlements of the Basin of Mines; and being called before
the Council, both they and the former deputation absolutely refused to
take the oath of allegiance. These two bodies represented nine tenths of
the Acadian population within the peninsula. "Nothing," pursues the
record of the Council, "now remained to be considered but what measures
should be taken to send the inhabitants away, and where they should be
sent to." If they were sent to Canada, Cape Breton, or the neighboring
islands, they would strengthen the enemy, and still threaten the
province. It was therefore resolved to distribute them among the various
English colonies, and to hire vessels for the purpose with all
despatch.[274]

[Footnote 274: _Minutes of Council, 4 July--28 July_, in _Public
Documents of Nova Scotia_, 255-267. Copies of these and other parts of
the record were sent at the time to England, and are now in the Public
Record Office, along with the letters of Lawrence.]

The oath, the refusal of which had brought such consequences, was a
simple pledge of fidelit