too respectable and too numerous to permit such courses to
arrive at a head. Once rouse the yeomanry of Canada West, and their
energies would soon manifest themselves in truly British honesty and
British feeling. John Bull is not enamoured of the tender mercies of
canallers and loafers, and the French Canadian peasantry and small
farmers are innocent of the desire to imitate the heroes of
Poissardism.

No person in public life can judge better of the feelings of the
people as a mass, in Canada, than those who have commanded large
bodies of the militia. Put the query to any officer in the army who
has had such a charge, and the universal answer will be: "The militia
of Canada are loyal to Britain, without vapouring or boasting of that
loyalty; for they are not by natural constitution a very speaking
race, or given at every moment to magnify; but they will fight, should
need be, for Victoria, her crown, and dignity."

It may be said that an officer in the army is not the best judge of
the feelings of the people, as they would not express them in his
presence; but when an officer has been intimately mingled with them by
such events as those of the troubles of 1837 and 1838, and has so long
known the country, the case is altered; he comes to have a personal as
well as a general knowledge of all ranks, degrees, and classes, and
can weigh the ultimate objects of popular expression. I have no
hesitation in saying, possessed as I have been of this knowledge, that
_the people_ of Canada have not a desire to become independent now,
any more than they have a desire to be annexed to and fraternize with
the United States.

Many years ago, on my first visit to Canada, in 1826, when such a
thing as expressions of disloyalty was almost unknown, and long before
Mackenzie's folly, I remember being struck with the speech at a
private dinner party of a person who has since held high office,
respecting the independence of Canada: he observed that it must
ultimately be brought about. The colony then was in its mere infancy,
and this person no doubt had dreams of glory, although in outward life
he was one of the most uncompromising of the colonial ultra-tories.

Just before the rebellion broke out, I was conversing with another
person, now no more, of a similar stamp, but possessing much more
influence, who began to be alarmed for his extensive lands, all of
which he had obtained by grants from the Crown, and he feared that the
time spec