h
of the country was beginning to attract attention for Villebon, a year
or two later, sent home to France a mast, as a specimen, 82 feet long,
31 inches in diameter at one end and 21 at the other.

The French privateers were not allowed to ply their vocation with
impunity, they often had spirited encounters with the British ships in
which there were losses on both sides.

In 1694 one Robineau of Nantes, who had taken several English vessels,
was forced to burn his ship in St. John harbor, in order to escape
capture by an English ship, and to defend himself on shore. The
vessels employed as privateers evidently were small, for they
sometimes went up the river to Villebon's fort. The prisoners taken
were kept at the fort or put in charge of the French inhabitants
living on the river, and from time to time ransomed by their friends
or exchanged for French prisoners taken by the English. Villebon
informs us that in June, 1695, an English frigate and a sloop arrived
at Menagoueche (St. John) on business connected with the ransom of
eight captives who were then in the hands of the French. Messages were
exchanged with Nachouac and the captain of the English ship, a jovial
old tar, expressed a wish to meet Governor Villebon and "drink with
him" and to see Captain Baptiste, whom he called a brave man, but his
overtures were declined.

The ships Envieux and Profond, before proceeding to the attack of Fort
Pemaquid, had landed at St. John a number of cannon and materials of
all sorts to be used in the construction of the new fort. This project
was not viewed with complacency by the people of New England, and
Lieut.-Governor William Stoughton, of Massachusetts, thus explains the
line of action proposed against the French in a communication
addressed to Major Benjamin Church, the old Indian fighter, who had
been sent from Boston in August, 1696, on an expedition against the
settlements of Acadia: "Sir, His Majesty's ship Orford having lately
surprised a French shallop with 23 of the soldiers belonging to the
fort (at Nashwaak) upon St. John's river in Nova Scotia, together with
Villieu, their captain, providence seems to encourage the forming of
an expedition to attack that fort, and to disrest and remove the enemy
from that post, which is the chief source from whence the most of our
disasters do issue, and also to favor with an opportunity for gaining
out of their hands the ordnance, artillery, and other warlike stores
and pro