was all delightful. When I left Quebec I felt as much regret as
I do every time that I leave my little native town.

* * * * *

I have been told that the works of Voltaire are prohibited in Quebec,
not so much because they are irreligious as because they were written by
a man who, after the loss of Quebec to the French Crown, exclaimed: "Let
us not be concerned about the loss of a few acres of snow." The memory
of Voltaire is execrated, and for having made a flattering reference to
him on the platform in Montreal two years ago, I was near being
"boycotted" by the French population.

The French Canadians take very little interest in politics--I mean in
outside politics. They are steady, industrious, saving, peaceful, and so
long as the English leave them alone, in the safe enjoyment of their
belongings, they will not give them cause for any anxiety. Among the
French Canadians there is no desire for annexation to the United States.
Indeed, during the War of Independence, Canada was saved to the English
Crown by the French Canadians, not because the latter loved the English,
but because they hated the Yankees. When Lafayette took it for granted
that the French Canadians would rally round his flag, he made a great
mistake; they would have, if compelled to fight, used their bullets
against the Americans. If they had their own way, the French in Canada
would set up a little country of their own under the rule of the
Catholic Church, a little corner of France two hundred years old.

The education of the lower classes is at a very low stage; thirty per
cent. of the children of school age in Quebec do not attend school. The
English dare not introduce gratuitous and compulsory education. They
have an understanding with the Catholic Church, which insists upon
exercising entire control over public education. The Quebec schools are
little more than branches of the confessional box. The English shut
their eyes, for part of the understanding with the Church is that the
latter will keep loyalty to the English Crown alive among her submissive
flock.

The tyranny exercised by the Catholic Church may easily be imagined from
the following newspaper extract:

A well-to-do butcher of Montreal attended the Catholic Church at Ile
Perrault last Sunday. He was suffering at the time with acute cramps,
and when that part of the service arrived during which the
congregation kneel, he found himself unable