accessions were made to the population of that Colony from other sources. For twenty years, the country bordering on the Great Lakes was decidedly American. Our expatriated countrymen were generally poor, and some of them were actually without means to provide for their common wants rom day to day. The government, for which they had become exiles, was as liberal as they could have asked. It gave them lands, tools, materials for building, and the means of subsistence for two years; and to each of their children, as they became of age, two hundred acres of land. And besides this, of the offices and patronage created by the organization of a new colonial government they were the chief recipients. The ties of kindred and suffering in a common cause created a strong bond of sympathy between them, and for years they bore the appellation of " United Empire Loyalists."

As we mentioned in our last number some of the places settled by adherents of the crown in Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, we might dispense with particulars here. Still, it may not be amiss to add some general observations. When the revolutionary struggle commenced in Massachusetts, the inhabitants of these two Colonies, then forming but one, were sadly immoral and wretchedly poor. A letter from a Mr. Grant to Dr. Stiles is preserved, in which the writer quaintly says of Halifax, his place of residence, "We have upwards of one hundred licensed houses, and perhaps as many more which retail spirituous liquors without license; so that the business of one half the town is to sell rum, and of the other half to drink it"; and from the same source we learn, that on the river St. John, a tract now teeming with thousands of our lineage, the population was only four hundred. Both at Halifax and on the St. John there was a strong feeling in favor of the Whigs. Objections were made to the Loyalists finding a refuge at the former place, while the Colony generally not only furnished some recruits for the patriot cause, but two very respectable men, who came from it, attained the rank of colonels in the American service. Emphatically, then, do we again affirm, that Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, as we have just now seen in the case of Upper Canada, were founded by our errors, and our want of foresight and humanity. And while rebuking the policy of England in her dealings with the Canadians, we

may also remember, that a wiser course on our own part would have given us fewer rival wheat-growers, less Colonial tonnage, and less competition on the fishing-grounds and at the ports of shipment of our great staples.

The structure of society, then, in three of the four Colonies to which our attention has been directed, was originally like our own. Emigration from the United States and from Great Britain, during the last forty years, has produced great changes. The old order of things is passing away. The Loyalists and the new comers are in hostile array against each other. The former received the places of honor and emolument, at the commencement, because there were no others on whom to confer them. They and their kindred and connections by marriage have kept them, through the monarchical rule of perpetuating official rank in families. The latter have now become numerous, and, having practised leaders, they claim participation in the royal favor, and even the entire dispensation of it. Every effort to reconstruct the Legislative and Executive Councils, and to shorten or change the judicial tenure, which we have mentioned, has been designed to lessen or overturn the power of the Loyalists and their adherents. As highly conservative now as they and their fathers were two generations ago, they insist, that nothing shall be altered; but that, while the Colonial system, as regards commercial and manufacturing rights, has been materially improved for the benefit of the industrious classes, the political influence shall not depart from the "old families." The coalition between them and the "British party," which, in Upper Canada, under Sir Francis Head's administration, threw the Liberals into a minority in his new House of Assembly, was but transient; and we have shown how short-lived were the coalition ministries of Sir Charles Metcalfe and Lord Falkland, formed of Englishmen, Loyalists, and Liberals. The first was broken up, as appears by Sir Charles's statement, because he would not be ruled by those of the latter party; and we know certainly, that the second was dissolved because his Lordship put a check upon the hitherto supreme authority of Mr. Howe.

In Lower Canada, the inhabitants of British origin suffer wrong. Their government induced them to settle there, upon the royal promise of a "free system of English laws "; and

it has been recreant to truth and honor in not fulfilling this engagement. There, Englishmen are striving against Frenchmen; but elsewhere, the Saxon race is contending against itself. Thus, in Upper Canada, the Liberals are composed of the three branches into which this race is divided; the disaffected among the Loyalists, the emigrants from the Old World, and persons whose emigration from the United States had no reference to the Revolution. The strength of the party from this latter branch may be seen from the fact, that the Assemby dissolved by Sir Francis Head contained thirteen, or nearly one quarter of the whole number, who were Americans. In Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, there is much the same division; and the head of the Liberals in the former Colony, as we have already mentioned, is of a Loyalist family. As of the opposition, so of the friends of the administration; the Conservatives are made up of the same materials, though in dissimilar proportions. Few lately removed from the republic are Conservatives, while still fewer of those who were driven from among us by the civil war are Liberals; and probably as many of the English, Irish, and Scotch, whose property qualifications give them political privileges, range themselves one side as the other.

In point of number, ability, and influence, the Colonial newspapers ranged on opposite sides may be nearly equal. In Canada, in 1843, the Liberals had about twenty-three, including neutrals, or those which are moderate in opposition; and the Conservatives, nineteen or twenty. Of these, seventeen of the former description, and fourteen that support the crown, are in what was the Upper Colony. In the other two Colonies, there are not more than twenty-four of both parties. With several of these we are intimately acquainted. The tone and temper of some of them show, that they are under the control of gentlemen, while the manners of others might be sensibly improved. The spirit of the Conservative press, with here and there an exception, is unrelentingly hostile towards us and our institutions. Whenever there appears a paragraph of unusual bitterness, it may safely be attributed to the pen of a Loyalist.

What is to be the issue, reconciliation or separation? "Canada," said King William, is not to be lost, or given away." That this part, or, indeed, any portion, of British America is to be permanently retained by the crown of

Great Britain, is a matter of great doubt at this time among the public men of all parties in the mother country. At the usual rate of increase, Canada will contain, in twenty years, a population equal to that of the thirteen Colonies in 1776; and, while they will be less scattered, they will have no servile race to weaken their strength, and no savages to annoy or terrify them. At the time of the revolt of the United States, none were bold enough to hope that the connection with England could be dissolved peaceably. But with regard to the present British possessions in America, such a hope may reasonably be entertained. As far back as 1828, Mr. Huskisson expressed the wish, that, if Canada was not to remain a dependency, the separation might occur "by amicable arrangement." Two years after, Sir Henry Parnell, member of parliament and chairman of the committee. of finance, declared, that his countrymen "derived no commercial advantage from the Colonies, which they might not have without them," and that "the discovery of the real sources of wealth has shown the folly of wasting lives and treasure on colonial possessions." Again, it was said in a quarterly journal, which represented the opinions of a numerous party at that period, "We desire any one to point out a single benefit, of any sort whatsoever, derived by us from the possession of Canada and our other Colonies in North America." And the leading organ of the Conservatives admitted, that "there can be no doubt, that the value to Great Britain of various colonies is materially diminished by the altered circumstances of the world." It admitted further, that, "if the duties protecting the Colonial timber trade were abolished, the North American Colonies would become, pro tanto, valueless." The duties on Baltic timber have been much diminished, and, if this reasoning be correct, the partial abandonment of the policy of protecting the transatlantic timber interests has produced the consequences predicted. The same work, the London Quarterly Review, in closing its pungent remarks on Lord Durham's Report, used these words: "We can venture to answer, that every uncontradicted assertion of that volume will be made the excuse of future rebellions, every unquestioned principle will be hereafter perverted into a gospel of treason; and that, if that rank and infectious Report does not receive the high, marked, and energetic discountenance and indignation of the VOL. LX. No. 126.

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imperial crown and parliament, British America is lost." How many of the principles and recommendations of that "rank and infectious Report" have been adopted since 1839 !

There may be two great objections to parting with domains of such questionable value. The first is an unwillingness to lessen British consequence in the eyes of the world. Feelings of national pride are generally praiseworthy, and only blamable when so far indulged as to cause detriment to the public. But the colonial interests of England have become so multiform and conflicting, that legislation for one class of them is almost sure to prove injurious to another, while a general system which shall apply to all alike is impracticable. There is, therefore, continual complaint from some part of her dominions, and it can hardly be lessened, make what laws she may. The charges of intentional oppression of any branch of colonial industry are idle; and yet the ministry is continually vexed with remonstrances and deputations from aggrieved colonists. They can send no governor, however wisely selected, that will please all the colonial parties. If English gentlemen of any description are to be appointed governors of Canada, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick, who more unobjectionable in every point of view than Sir Charles Metcalfe, Lord Falkland, and Sir William Colebrooke? The excellent Sir John Sherbroke expressed his conviction, many years since, that changes should be made in colonial governors as often as once in three years. great alterations have occurred since he was a colonial ruler, that, on his principles, a gubernatorial term ought not now to endure six months. There can be no satisfaction to British statesmen of any party in governing remote provinces under circumstances like these. British America cannot cost the national treasury less than two millions of dollars annually, which sum is a direct loss; and if it be true, as many Englishmen assert, that the protection of the colonial interests costs the residents in the British isles two or three times that sum in the enhanced price of products which could be obtained cheaper elsewhere, we do not know what reason, other than that of retaining unbroken her chain of influence throughout the world, can induce England to continue her rule in America. Whether, under this state of things, and under the burden of a vast debt and a grievous taxation, it

So