They sailed up the river Laquille and surveyed the fields, barns, and mills of the colony – but left them untouched. The English returned to the fort and destroyed it. When Biencourt returned, he found the fort destroyed and requested an interview with the English commander. They met in a meadow with only a few of their followers. Biencourt petitioned the English to allow them to remain at Port Royal and to give up Father Beart– in return the French would grant the English the mines they had found, as well as a share in the fur trade. As Argall had no authority to make such a deal, his response was that
he had been sent to drive him out, and he threatened him as an enemy if he would ever find him there again.
Their dispute may not have been resolved if not for an unlikely mediator: It was an Indian who approached, and in broken French, tried to make peace between them.
The Native was successful in his efforts. “The English went away; some of the French went to Canada; some went further into the country and lived with the savages; and some were carried to England and got back to France…”
When King James the First was King of England, Sir William Alexander told him, if the English did not settle the country to the East of New England, the French would take possession of it. “As this gentleman seemed to take interest in the country, the king gave it to him under the name of Nova Scotia.“
About 1623: Sir Alexander sent someone (unnamed) to take possession of Port Royal about ten years after Argall’s invasion. They attacked some French vessels as well, and among these vessels was a French Protestant named Claude de La Tour who was going to take possession of some land on the river St. John, which had been granted him by the French Government.
“When La Tour stayed in England, he married a maid of honor to the Queen, and agreed to settle in Nova Scotia with Scotch people. He told the English, his son had command of a fort in the
service of the French, but he had no doubt that he would immediately give it up to him. so two ships were given him, and he sailed over the ocean, and came to the fort at Cape Sable where his son was.”
After explaining the benefits bestowed upon him by the English to his son he was disappointed to hear that his son would not submit the fort to him.
When young La Tour heard his father propose that he should become a traitor, and surrender the fort which had been given him to guard, he was very angry indeed; he told his father that he was incapable of treason, and that he would defend his fort with his life, rather than give it up to the English
.” Senior La Tour attacked the fort without success, losing many of his own men in the effort. He felt too ashamed to return to England without acquiring the fort he had said would be easily handed over to him, so he sent the surviving men back to England without him. Young La Tour refused to allow his father access to the fort.