The furriers' shops are by no means to be overlooked. There were sleigh-robes of buffalo, bear, fox, wolf, and racoon, varying in price from six to thirty guineas; and coats, leggings, gloves, and caps, rendered necessary by the severity of a winter in which the thermometer often stands at thirty degrees below zero. People vie with each other in the costliness of their furs and sleigh equipments; a complete set sometimes costing as much as a hundred guineas.
I went into the Romish cathedral, which is the largest Gothic building in the New World. It was intended to be very imposing--it has succeeded in being very extravagant; and if the architects intended that their work should live in the admiration of succeeding generations, like York Minster, Cologne, or Rouen, they have signal y failed. Internal y, the effect of its vast size is total y destroyed by pews and galleries which accommodate ten thousand people. There are some very large and very hideous paintings in it, in a very inferior style of sign-painting. The ceiling is painted bright blue, and the high altar was one mass of gaudy tinsel decoration. In one corner there was a picture of babies being devoured by pigs, and trampled upon by horses, and underneath it was a box for offerings, with "This is the fate of the children of China" upon it.
By it was a wooden box, hung with faded pink calico, containing small wooden representations, in the Noah's-ark style, of dogs, horses, and pigs, and a tal man holding up a little dog by its hind legs. This peep-show (for I can call it nothing else) was at the same time so inexplicable and so ludicrous, that, to avoid shocking the feelings of a devout-looking woman who was praying near it by an "_eclat de rire_," we hurried from the church.
I met with many sincere and devout Romanists among the upper classes in Canada; I know that there are thousands among the simple _habitans_; and though, in a thoughtless moment, the fooleries and puerilities of their churches may excite a smile, it is a matter for the deepest regret that so many of our fel ow-subjects should be the dupes of a despotic priesthood, and of a religion which cannot save.
Close to the cathedral is the convent of the Grey Sisters, who, with the most untiring zeal and kindness, fulfil the vocations of the Sisters of Charity. There are several other convents, some of them very strict; and their high wal s and grated windows give Montreal a very Continental appearance. On a lady remarking to a sister in one of these, that the view from the windows was very beautiful, she replied, with a suppressed sigh, that she had never seen it. There are some very fine public buildings and banks; but as I am not writing a guide-book, I wil not dilate upon their merits.
We walked round _Le Champ de Mars_, formerly the great resort of the Montreal young ladies, and along the Rue Notre Dame, to the market-place, which is said to be the second finest in the world, and, with its handsome _facade_ and bright tin dome, forms one of the most prominent objects from the water. As those disgusting disfigurements of our English streets, butchers' shops, are not to be seen in the Canadian towns, nor, I believe I may say, in those in the States, there is an enormous display of meat in the Montreal market, of an appearance by no means tempting. The scene outside was extremely picturesque; there were hundreds of carts with shaggy, patient little horses in rows, with very miscel aneous tents--
cabbages and butter jostling pork and hides. You may see here hundreds of _habitans_, who look as if they ought to have lived a century ago--shaggy men in fur caps and loose blue frieze coats with hoods, and with bright sashes of coloured wool round their waists; women also, with hard features and bronzed complexions, in large straw hats, high white caps, and noisy _sabots_. On all sides a jargon of Irish, English, and French is to be heard, the latter general y the broadest patois.
We went into the Council Chamber, the richly cushioned seats of which looked more fitted for sleep than deliberation; and I caught a glimpse of the ex-mayor, whose timidity during a time of popular ferment occasioned a great loss of human life. That popular Italian orator, "_Father Gavazzi_"
was engaged in denouncing the superstitions and impositions of Rome; and on a mob evincing symptoms of turbulence, this mayor gave the order to fire to the troops who were drawn up in the streets. Scarcely had the words passed his lips, when by one volley seventeen peaceful citizens (if I recollect rightly), coming out of the Unitarian chapel, were laid low.
Montreal is a turbulent place. It is not very many years since a mob assembled and burned down the Parliament House, for which exercise of the popular wil the city is disqualified from being the seat of government. I saw something of Montreal society, which seemed to me to be quite on a par with that in our English provincial towns.
I left this ancient city at seven o'clock on a very dark, foggy evening for Quebec, the boats between the two cities running by night, in order that the merchants, by a happy combination of travelling with sleep, may not lose that time which to them is money. This mode of proceeding is very annoying to tourists, who thereby lose the far-famed beauties of the St.
Lawrence. It is very obnoxious likewise to timid travellers, of whom there are a large number both male and female: for collisions and striking on rocks or shoals are accidents of such frequent occurrence, that, out of eight steamers which began the season, two only concluded it, two being disabled during my visit to Quebec.
Scarcely had we left the wharf at Montreal when we came into collision with a brig, and hooked her anchor into our woodwork, which event caused a chorus of screams from some ladies whose voices were rather stronger than their nerves, and its remedy a great deal of bad language in French, German, and English, from the crews of both vessels. After this we ran down to Quebec at the rate of seventeen miles an hour, and the _contretemps_ did not prevent even those who had screamed the loudest from partaking of a most substantial supper, which was served at eight o'clock in the lowest story of the ship. The _John Munn_ was a very fine boat, not at al the worse for having sunk in the river in the summer.
I considered Quebec quite the goal of my journey, for books, tongues, and poetry alike celebrate its beauty. Indeed, there seems to be only one opinion about it. From the lavish praise bestowed upon it by the eloquent and gifted author of 'Hochelaga' down to the homely encomiums pronounced by bluff sea captains, there seems a unanimity of admiration which is rarely met with. Even commercial travel ers, absorbed in intricate calculations of dollars and cents, have been known to look up from their books to give it an enthusiastic expression of approval. I expected to be more pleased with it than with anything I had seen or was to see, and was insensate enough to rise at five o'clock and proceed into the saloon, when of course it was too dark for another hour to see anything. Daylight came, and from my corner by the fire I asked the stewardess when we should be in sight of Quebec? She replied that we were close to it. I went to the window, expecting that a vision of beauty would burst upon my eyes. All that I saw might be summed up in very few words--a few sticks placed vertically, which might be masts, and some tin spires looming through a very yel ow, opaque medium. This was my _first_ view of Quebec; happily, on my _last_ the elements did full justice to its beauty. Other objects developed themselves as we steamed down to the wharf. There were huge rafts, some three or four acres in extent, which, having survived the perils which had beset them on their journey from the forests of the Ottawa, were now moored along the base of the lofty cliffs which, under the name of the Heights of Abraham, have a world-wide celebrity. There were huge, square-sided, bluff-bowed, low-masted ships, lying at anchor in interminable lines, and little, dirty, vicious-looking steam-tugs twirling in and out among them; and there were grim-looking muzzles of guns protruding through embrasures, and peripatetic fur caps and bayonets behind parapets of very solid masonry.
Above al , shadowing all, and steeping al , was the thickest fog ever seen beyond the sound of Bow-bel s. It lay thick and heavy on Point Diamond, dimming the lustre of the bayonets of the sentinels as they paced the lofty bastions, and looked down into the abyss of fog below. It lay yet heavier on the rapid St. Lawrence, and dripped from the spars and rigging of ships. It hung over and enveloped the town, where, combined with smoke, it formed a yel ow canopy; and damp and chill it penetrated the flag of England, weighing it down in heavy folds, as though ominous of impending calamity.
Slowly winding our tortuous way among multitudinous ships, al vamped in drizzling mist, we were warped to the wharf, which was covered with a mixture of mud and coal-dust, permeated by the universal fog. Here vehicles of a most extraordinary nature awaited us, and, to my great surprise, they were all _open_. They were cal ed _calashes_, and looked something like very high gigs with hoods and C springs. Where the dash-board was not, there was a little seat or perch for the driver, who with a foot on each shaft looked in a very precarious position. These conveyances have the most absurd appearance; there are, however, a few closed vehicles, both at Montreal and Quebec, which I believe are not to be found in the civilized world elsewhere, except in a few back streets of Lisbon.
These consist of a square box on two wheels. This box has a top, back, and front, but where the sides ought to be there are curtains of deer-hide, which are a very imperfect protection from wind and rain. The driver sits on the roof, and the conveyance has a constant tendency backwards, which is partially counteracted by a band under the horse's body, but _only_
partially, and the inexperienced denizen of the box fancies himself in a state of constant jeopardy.
In an open calash I drove to Russell's Hotel, along streets steeper, narrower, and dirtier than any I had ever seen. Arrived within two hundred yards of the hotel, we were set down in the mud. On alighting, a gentleman who had been my fel ow-travel er politely offered to guide me, and soon after addressed me by name. "Who can you possibly be?" I asked--so completely had a beard metamorphosed an acquaintance of five years'
standing.
Once within the hotel, I had the greatest difficulty in finding my way about. It is composed of three of the oldest houses in Quebec, and has no end of long passages, dark winding staircases, and queer little rooms. It is haunted to a fearful extent by rats; and direful stories, "horrible, if true," were related in the parlour of personal mutilations sustained by visitors. My room was by no means in the oldest part of the house, yet I used to hear nightly sorties made in a very systematic manner by these quadruped intruders. The waiters at Russell's are complained of for their incivility, but we thought them most profuse both in their civility and attentions. Nevertheless, with al its disagreeables, Russell's is the best hotel in Quebec; and, as a number of the members of the Legislative Assembly live there while Parliament meets in that city, it is very lively and amusing.
When my English friends Mr. and Mrs. Alderson arrived, we saw a good deal of the town; but it has been so often described, that I may as wel pass on to other subjects. The glowing descriptions given of it by the author of '_Hochelaga_' must be familiar to many of my readers. They leave nothing to be desired, except the genial glow of enthusiasm and kindliness of heart which threw a _couleur de rose_ over everything he saw.
There are some notions which must be unlearned in Canada, or temporarily laid aside. At the beginning of winter, which is the gay season in this Paris of the New World, every unmarried gentleman, who chooses to do so, selects a young lady to be his companion in the numerous amusements of the time. It does not seem that anything more is needed than the consent of the maiden, who, when she acquiesces in the arrangement, is cal ed a
"_muffin_"--for the mammas were "muffins" themselves in their day, and cannot refuse their daughters the same privilege. The gentleman is privileged to take the young lady about in his sleigh, to ride with her, to walk with her, to dance with her a whole evening without any remark, to escort her to parties, and be her attendant on al occasions. When the spring arrives, the arrangement is at an end, and I did not hear that an engagement is frequently the result, or that the same couple enter into this agreement for two successive winters. Probably the reason may be, that they see too much of each other.
This practice is almost universal at Montreal and Quebec. On the fine, frosty, moonlight nights, when the sleigh-bel s ring merrily and the crisp snow crackles under the horse's feet, the gentlemen call to take their
"muffins" to meetings of the sleighing-clubs, or to snow-shoe picnics, or to champagne-suppers on the ice, from which they do not return til two in the morning; yet, with al this apparent freedom of manner, the Canadian ladies are perfectly modest, feminine, and ladylike; their simplicity of manners is great, and probably there is no country in the world where there is a larger amount of domestic felicity.
The beauty of the young ladies of Canada is celebrated, and, though on going into a large party one may not see more than two or three who are strikingly or regularly beautiful, the _tout ensemble_ is most attractive; the eyes are invariably large and lustrous, dark and pensive, or blue and sparkling with vivacity. Their manners and movements are unaffected and elegant; they dress in exquisite taste; and with a grace peculiarly their own, their manners have a fascination and witchery which is perfectly irresistible. They generally receive their education at the convents, and go into society at a very early age, very frequently before they have seen sixteen summers, and after this time the whirl of amusement precludes them from giving much time to literary employments. They are by no means deeply read, and few of them play anything more than modern dance music. They dance beautiful y, and so great is their passion for this amusement, probably derived from their French ancestors, that married ladies frequently attend the same dancing classes with their children, in order to keep themselves in constant practice.
At the time of my visit to Quebec there were large parties every night, most of which were honoured with the presence of Lord Elgin and his suite.
One of his _aides-de-camp_ was Lord Bury, Lord Albemarle's son, who, on a tour through North America, became enamoured of Quebec. Lord Elgin's secretary was Mr. Oliphant, the talented author of the 'Russian Shores of the Black Sea,' who had also yielded to the fascinations of this northern capital. And no wonder! for there is not a friendlier place in the whole world. I went armed with but two letters of introduction, and received hospitality and kindness for which I can never be sufficiently grateful.
The cholera, which in America assumes nearly the fatality and rapidity of the plague, had during the summer ravaged Quebec. It had entered and desolated happy homes, and, not confining itself to the abodes of the poor and miserable, had attacked the rich, the gifted, and the beautiful. For long the Destroying Angel hovered over the devoted city--neither age nor infancy was spared, and numbers were daily hurried from the vigour of living manhood into the silence and oblivion of the grave. Vigorous people, walking along the streets, were suddenly seized with shiverings and cramp, and sank down on the pavement to rise no more, sometimes actually expiring on the cold, hard stones. Pleasure was forgotten, business was partially suspended; all who could, fled; the gloom upon the souls of the inhabitants was heavier than the brown cloud which was supposed to brood over the city; and the steamers which conveyed those who fled from the terrible pestilence arrived at Toronto freighted with the living and the _dead_. Among the terror-stricken, the dying, and the dead, the ministers of religion pursued their holy calling, undaunted by the terrible sights which met them everywhere--the clergy of the different denominations vied with each other in their kindness and devotedness. The priests of Rome then gained a double influence. Armed with what appeared in the eyes of the people supernatural powers, they knew no rest either by night or day; they held the cross before many a darkening eye, and spoke to the bereaved, in the plenitude of their anguish, of a world where sorrow and separation are alike unknown. The heavy clang of tol ing bel s was hourly heard, as the pestilence-stricken were carried to their last homes. Medical skil availed nothing; the "pestilence which walketh in darkness" was only removed by Him in whose hand are the issues of life and death.
Quebec had been free from disease for about six weeks before I visited it; the victims of the pestilence were cold in their untimely graves; the sun of prosperity smiled upon the fortress-city, and its light-hearted inhabitants had just begun their nightly round of pleasure and gaiety. The viceroyalty of Lord Elgin was drawing rapidly to a close, and two parties, given every week at Government House, afforded an example which the good people of Quebec were not slow to follow. There were musical parties, _conversaziones_, and picnics to the Chaudiere and Lorette; and people who were dancing til four or five o'clock in the morning were vigorous enough after ten for a gal op to Montmorenci.
The absolute restlessness of the city astonished me very much. The morning seemed to begin, with fashionable people, with a desultory breakfast at nine o'clock, after which some received callers, others paid visits, or walked into the town to make trifling purchases at the stores; while not a few of the young ladies promenaded St. Louis Street or the ramparts, where they were generally joined by the officers. Several officers said to me that no quarters in the world were so delightful as those at Quebec. A scarlet coat finds great favour with the fair sex at Quebec--civilians, however great their mental qualifications, are decidedly in the background; and I was amused to see young ensigns, with budding moustaches, who had just joined their regiments, preferred before men of high literary attainments. With balls, and moose-hunting, and sleigh-driving, and "tarboggining," and, last but not least, "muffins," the time passes rapidly by to them. A gentleman, who had just arrived from England, declared that "Quebec was a horrid place, not fit to live in." A few days after he met the same individual to whom he had made this uncomplimentary observation, and confided to him that he thought Quebec "the most delightful place in the whole world; for, do you know," he said, "I have got a muffin."
With the afternoon numerous riding parties are formed, for you cannot go three miles out of Quebec without coming to something beautiful; and cal s of a more formal nature are paid; a military band performs on Durham Terrace or the Garden, which then assume the appearance of most fashionable promenades. The evening is spent in the bal -room, or at smal social dancing parties, or during the winter, before ten at night, in the gal eries of the House of Assembly; and the morning is well advanced before the world of Quebec is hushed in sleep.
Society is contained in very smal limits at Quebec. Its _elite_ are grouped round the ramparts and in the suburb of St. Louis. The city until recently has occupied a very isolated position, and has depended upon itself for society. It is therefore sociable, friendly, and hospitable; and though there is gossip--for where is it not to be found?--I never knew any in which there was so little of ill-nature. The little world in the upper part of the city is probably the most brilliant to be found anywhere in so small a compass. But there is a world below, another nation, seldom mentioned in the aristocratic quarter of St. Louis, where vice, crime, poverty, and misery jostle each other, as pleasure and politics do in the upper town. This is the suburb of St. Roch, in whose tal dark houses and fetid al eys those are to be found whose birthright is toil, who spend life in supplying the necessities of to-day, while indulging in gloomy apprehensions for to-morrow--who have not one comfort in the past to cling to, or one hope for the future to cheer.
St. Roch is as crowded as the upper town, but with a very different population--the poor, the degraded, and the vicious. Here fever destroys its tens, and cholera its hundreds. Here people stab each other, and think little of it. Here are narrow alleys, with high, black-looking, stone houses, with broken windows pasted over with paper in the lower stories, and stuffed with rags in the upper--gradations of wretchedness which I have observed in the Cowgate and West Port at Edinburgh. Here are shoeless women, who quiet their children with ardent spirits, and brutal men, who would kil both wives and children if they dared. Here are dust-heaps in which pigs with long snouts are ever routing--here are lean curs, wrangling with each other for leaner bones--here are ditches and puddles, and heaps of oyster-shel s, and broken crockery, and cabbage-stalks, and fragments of hats and shoes. Here are torn notices on the wal s offering rewards for the apprehension of thieves and murderers, painfully suggestive of dark deeds. A little further are lumber-yards and wharfs, and mud and sawdust, and dealers in old nails and rags and bones, and rotten posts and rails, and attempts at grass. Here are old barrel-hoops, and patches of old sails, and dead bushes and dead dogs, and old saucepans, and little plots of ground where cabbages and pumpkins drag on a pining existence. And then there is the river Charles, no longer clear and bright, as when trees and hil s and flowers were mirrored on its surface, but foul, turbid, and pol uted, with ship-yards and steam-engines and cranes and windlasses on its margin; and here Quebec ends.
From the rich, the fashionable, and the pleasure-seeking suburb of St.
Louis few venture down into the quarter of St. Roch, save those who, at the risk of drawing in pestilence with every breath, mindful of their duty to God and man, enter those hideous dwel ings, ministering to minds and bodies alike diseased. My first visit to St. Roch was on a Sunday afternoon. I had attended our own simple and beautiful service in the morning, and had seen the celebration of vespers in the Romish cathedral in the afternoon. Each church was thronged with well-dressed persons. It was a glorious day. The fashionable promenades were al crowded; gay uniforms and brilliant parasols thronged the ramparts; horsemen were cantering along St. Louis Street; priestly processions passed to and from the different churches; numbers of calashes containing pleasure-parties were dashing about; picnic parties were returning from Montmorenci and Lake Charles; groups of vivacious talkers, speaking in the language of France, were at every street-corner; Quebec had all the appearance, so painful to an English or Scottish eye, of a Continental sabbath.
Mr. and Mrs. Alderson and myself left this gay scene, and the constant tol of Romish bel s, for St. Roch. They had lived peaceful y in a rural part of Devonshire, and more recently in one of the prettiest and most thriving of the American cities; and when they first breathed the pol uted air, they were desirous to return from what promised to be so peculiarly unpleasant, but kindly yielded to my desire to see something of the shady as wel as the sunny side of Quebec.
No Sabbath-day with its hal owed accompaniments seemed to have dawned upon the inhabitants of St. Roch. We saw women with tangled hair standing in the streets, and men with pallid countenances and bloodshot eyes were reeling about, or sitting with their heads resting on their hands, looking out from windows stuffed with rags. There were children too, children in nothing but the name and stature--infancy without innocence, learning to take God's name in vain with its first lisping accents, preparing for a maturity of suffering and shame. I looked at these hideous houses, and hideous men and women too, and at their still more repulsive progeny, with sallow faces, dwarfed forms, and countenances precocious in the intel igence of vil any; and contrasted them with the blue-eyed, rosy-cheeked infants of my English home, who chase butterflies and weave May garlands, and gather cowslips and buttercups; or the sal ow children of a Highland shantie, who devour instruction in mud-floored huts, and con their tasks on the heathery sides of hil s.
Yet, when you breathe the poisoned air, laden with everything noxious to health, and have the physical and moral senses alike met with everything that can disgust and offend, it ceases to be a matter of wonder that the fair tender plant of beautiful childhood refuses to grow in such a vitiated atmosphere. Here al distinctions between good and evil are speedily lost, if they were ever known; and men, women, and children become unnatural in vice, in irreligion, in manners and appearance. Such spots as these act like cankers, yearly spreading further and further their vitiating influences, preparing for all those fearful retributions in the shape of fever and pestilence which continual y come down. Yet, lamentable as the state of such a population is, considered merely with regard to this world, it becomes fearful when we recollect that the wheels of Time are ceaselessly rolling on, bearing how few, alas! to heaven--what myriads to hel ; and that, when "this trembling consciousness of being, which clings enamoured to its anguish," not because life is sweet, but because death is bitter, is over, there remains, for those who have known nothing on earth but misery and vice, "a fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation," when they that have done evil "shall rise to the resurrection of damnation."
It was not that the miserable degraded appearance of St. Roch was anything new to me; unfortunately the same state of things exists in a far greater degree in our large towns at home; what did surprise me was, to find it in the New World, and that such a gigantic evil should have required only two hundred years for its growth. It seemed to me also that at Quebec the gulf which separates the two worlds is greater even than that which lies between Belgravia and Bethnal Green or St. Giles's. The people who live in the lower town are principal y employed on the wharfs, and in the lumber trade. But my readers wil , not thank me for detaining them in a pestiferous atmosphere, among such unpleasing scenes; we will therefore ascend into the High-street of the city, resplendent with gorgeous mercers' stores, and articles of luxury of every description. This street and several others were at this period impassable for carriages, the roadways being tunnelled, and heaped, and barricaded; which curious and highly disagreeable state of things was stated to arise from the laying down of water-pipes. At night, when fires were lighted in the narrow streets, and groups of roughly dressed Frenchmen were standing round them, Quebec presented the appearance of the Faubourg St. Antoine after a revolution.
Quebec is a most picturesque city external y and internally. From the citadel, which stands on a rock more than three hundred feet high, down to the crowded water-side, bustling with merchants, porters, and lumbermen, all is novel and original. Massive fortifications, with guns grinning from the embrasures, form a very prominent feature; a broad glacis looks peaceful in its greenness; ramparts line the Plains of Abraham; guards and sentries appear in all directions; nightfal brings with it the challenge
--"_Who goes there?_" and narrow gateways form inconvenient entrances to streets so steep that I wondered how mortal horses could ever toil up them. The streets are ever thronged with vehicles, particularly with rude carts drawn by rough horses, driven by French peasants, who move stolidly along, indifferent to the continual cry "_Place aux dames_." The stores general y have French designations above them, the shop men often speak very imperfect English; the names of the streets are French; Romish churches and convents abound, and Sisters of Charity, unwearied in their benevolence, are to be seen visiting the afflicted.
Notices and cautions are posted up both in French and English; the light vivacious tones of the French Canadians are everywhere heard, and from the pil ar sacred to the memory of Wolfe upon the Plains of Abraham, down to the red-coated sentry who chal enges you upon the ramparts, everything tel s of a conquered province, and of the time, not so very far distant either, when the lilies of France occupied the place from which the flag of England now so proudly waves.
I spent a few days at Russel 's Hotel, which was very ful , in spite of the rats. In Canadian hotels people are very sociable, and, as many during the season make Russel 's their abode, the conversation was tolerably general at dinner. Many of the members of parliament lived there, and they used to tell very racy and amusing stories against each other. I heard one which was considered a proof of the truth of the saying, that "the tailor makes the gentleman." A gentleman cal ed on a Mr. M----, who had been appointed to a place in the government, and in due time he went to return the visit. Meeting an Irishman in the street, he asked, "Where does Mr.
'Smith' live?"--"It's no use your going there." "I want to know where he lives, do you know?"--"Faith, I do; but it's no use your going there." Mr.
M----, now getting angry, said, "I don't ask you for your advice, I simply want to know where Mr. 'Smith' lives."--"Wel , spalpeen, he lives down that court; but I tel ye it's no use your going there, for I've just been there myself, and _he's got a man_." It is said that the discomfited senator returned home and bought a _new hat!_
Passing out by the citadel, the Plains of Abraham, now a race-course, are entered upon; the battle-field being denoted by a simple monument bearing the inscription "_Here died Wolfe victorious_." Beyond this, three miles from the city, is Spencer-Wood, the residence of the Governor-General. It is beautiful y situated, though the house is not spacious, and is rather old-fashioned. The ball-room, however, built by Lord Elgin, is a beautiful room, very large, admirably proportioned, and chastely decorated. Here a kind of vice-regal court is held; and during the latter months of Lord Elgin's tenure of office, Spencer-Wood was the scene of a continued round of gaiety and hospitality. Lord Elgin was considered extremely popular; the Reciprocity Treaty, supposed to confer great benefits on the country, was passed during his administration, and the resources of Canada were prodigiously developed, and its revenue greatly increased. Of his popularity at Quebec there could