usages, manners, habits, and feelings, had taken deep root and were widely diffused among the mass of the people; and that where the contrary was visible, in the remoter localities, it seemed to arise from accident and ignorance, and not from any settled preference for anything else. Indeed it may be safely said that in no country out of Great Britain would the younger sons of her nobility and gentry find themselves so much "at home," or have a nobler field of usefulness before them, or a finer scope for all the active and manly enjoyments of country life, than in Canada. Seventhly, The financial credit of the colony is in so sound and satisfactory a state, and the prospects of increasing wealth and revenue so great, that they may well inspire confidence in the future, in any one disposed to go there. According to the Return of the Public Accounts of the colony for the year 1850 (Toronto, 1851), it appears (p. 66) that the total amount of the public debt was 4,512,4687. 14s. 9d., and that there had been applied to its redemption, since the union of

the provinces in 1841, 518,4837. 12s. 6d. (being the excess of revenue over expenditure), including 62,3667. 10s. 7d. invested in England on account of the sinking fund for the guaranteed loans. All future investments are to be on account of the latter. There was, as far back as last summer, as I was informed, a sum of nearly a quarter of a million, either invested or ready to be so, on account of the last three years, for the same purpose. The annual interest of the debt is at present (p. 89) 197,0291. 3s. 5d.; and it appears by the same "Abstract of Revenue and Expenditure," that in the improbable case of any serious falling off of revenue, or any unwillingness to increase taxation to meet it if it occurred, the sums now voluntarily applied to two heads of expenditure only those of Education and Agricultural Societies, amounting together to upwards of 66,8007.-might be applied to the payment of one-third of the annual interest of the debt. But as the revenue for the year 1851 was upwards of 800,000l., and as the interest of the debt is about 200,000l., there can be no doubt of

the completeness of the security for its payment. Since the great commercial changes which were effected in 1846 and subsequently, the Imports into Canada have risen as follows:In 1848 they were 2,058,7987., in 1849, 3,002,5997., in 1850, 4,245, 5177.* The value of Exports of domestic products for the year 1849 was 2,327,564l., and for 1850, 2,669,9987. The growing inland trade with the United States in all the most important staples of the colony (timber, wheat, flour, oats, ashes, &c.), is one of the most encouraging features. Great however as has been the recent increase of that trade (323 per cent. during the last year), it is exceeded by that with Great Britain, which, during the same time, "notwithstanding all assertions to the contrary, had increased at the rate of 44 per cent., and with the Sister Provinces of British North America, under the operation of reciprocal Free Trade, about 100 per cent." (Speech of the Inspector-General,

* Montreal Banker's Circular, quoted in Scobie's Canadian Almanac, p. 58 (Toronto, 1852), which contains an excellent summary of all the statistics of the colony.

† I add a further and very instructive extract from the same speech in the Appendix (G), p. 313.

the Hon. Francis Hincks, to the Legislative Assembly, July 16, 1851, Toronto, 1851.) Although therefore the sudden and rapid changes in our commercial legislation in those and previous years, occasioned great losses in the colony, and much very natural irritation at the want of due consideration for the circumstances and the interests of Canada, shown at the time by some of our public men then in power, a new career of prosperity has commenced; and as no further changes, except beneficial ones in the shape of further relaxations of commercial tariffs, are to be anticipated, trade and commerce are now upon a firm basis. And by none are the future prospects of Canada, and indeed of the British Provinces generally, considered brighter than by the best-informed of their enterprising neighbours; as will be seen by the following passage which I extract from a very remarkable document lately issued at Washington. (A Report of the Trade and Commerce of the British North American Colonies with the United States and with other Countries, em

bracing full and complete Tabular Statements from 1829 to 1850. Presented to the United States Senate by Thomas Corwin, Secretary to the Treasury, Washington, 1851.) The facts brought out in this document will greatly strengthen the conviction of the mutual advantages to be derived from the proposed measure of reciprocal free-trade between those colonies and the United States. The Report is drawn up by Mr. J. D. Andrews, United States Consul at St. John's, New Brunswick. At p. 34 there is the following passage:

"A cursory glance at the resources of Canada will impress the most casual observer with a profound sense of the influence she must soon exert over the general commerce of this continent. To her unsurpassed physical capabilities are added majestic internal improvements, reflecting credit on a government and people who projected and completed such admirable auxiliary pathways from the ocean to the interior, to facilitate the transport of the products of the industry of her population from that interior to the markets of the world. If the sanguine anticipations of the Canadian government and people are realised, by the St. Lawrence becoming one of the great channels through which the vast supplies of merchandise required for the consumption of the population of the interior and far west will be carried, the revenue derivable