he most
brilliant supporters Sir Wilfred Laurier ever had flung his chances of
a Cabinet place to the winds in opposing Canada's participation in the
Boer War. He not only flung his chances to the winds, but he ruined
himself financially and was read out of the party. The motive behind
this opposition to Canada's participations in the Imperial wars is,
perhaps, three-fold. French Canada has never forgotten that she was
conquered. True, she is better off, enjoys greater religious liberty,
greater material prosperity, greater political freedom than under the
old regime; but she remembers that French prestige fell before English
prestige on the Plains of Abraham. The second motive is an unconscious
feeling of detachment from British Imperial affairs. Why should French
Canada embroil herself and give of her blood and means for a race alien
to herself in speech and religion? The Monroe Doctrine forever defends
Canada from seizure by European power. Why not rest under that defense
and build up a purely Canadian power? The third motive is almost
subconscious. What if a European war should involve French-Catholic
Canada on the side of Protestant England against French-Catholic
France, or even Catholic Italy? Quebec feels herself a part of Canada
but not of the British Empire; and it is a great question how much
Laurier's support of the British in the Boer War had to do with that
partial defection of Quebec which ultimately defeated him on
Reciprocity; for if there is one thing the devout son of the church
fears more than embroilment in European war, it is coming under the
republicanizing influence of the United States. Under Canadian law the
favored status of the church is guaranteed. Under American law the
church would be on the same footing as all other denominations.

IV

When one comes to Ontario, one is dealing with the kitchen garden of
the Dominion--in summer a land of placid sky-blue lakes, and
amber-colored wooded rivers, and trim, almost garden-like farms, and
heavily laden orchards, and thriving cities beginning to smoke under
the pall of the increasing and almost universal factory. Under its old
boundaries Ontario stood just eighteen thousand square miles larger
than France. Under its new boundaries extending to Hudson Bay, Ontario
measures almost twice the area of France. France supports a population
of nearly forty millions; Ontario, of barely two and a half millions.
Both Ontario and France ar