The Europeans who "discovered" North America, it has been said, were those men who believed least in its existence: merchants and adventurers looking for a northwest ocean passage to the Far East. The continent - inhabited by Inuits and Amer-Indians - that blocked their way gradually became the site of permanent settlements, first French and then English. Eventually bitter trade rivalry, leading to war between Britain and France, resulted both in the decimation of the …showed first 75 words of 230 total…

…showed last 75 words of 230 total…rewarded with land grants - added another indelible mark on the Canadian character, which is generally seen as more respectful of law and order and less ruggedly individualistic than the American. Loyalist immigration not only strengthened the political, social, and economic dominance of the white Anglo-Saxon Protestant community, but it also determined that Canadian literature in English would represent the confluence of the two main streams in the language-those of Britain and the United States.