AN ENGLISH CANADIAN ON THE FRENCH CANADIANS.
I To THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR." I SIE,—AS you have noticed the " coming-of-age banquet " of the Canadians in London, I venture to address a few lines to you to express my regret that we English-speaking Canadians of the Province of Quebec cannot agree with the remarks of Lord Lansdowne and other prophets of smooth things on the growing unity of this country. The real fact of the case is that we are not becoming a more united people as time goes on ; and those Englishmen who try to persuade themselves and others that the cure of Ireland's ills might be obtained by the adoption of a Constitution similar to ours, should take warning by our fate in this province. The English minority in this province are exactly in the position in which the Protestants of Ireland would find themselves should the Gladstone-Parnell combination succeed in persuading the British people to grant Home-rule to Ireland,—i.e., the educated, enterprising, and industrious minority are ruled and taxed by the ignorant, unenterprising, prejudiced majority in alliance with the Church of Rome. Ever since Confederation has placed the minority of this province at the mercy of the majority, appeals to race and religious prejudice have become more and more frequent among the French Canadians, both in municipal and provincial politics, until at the last provincial elections the firmness of the Dominion Government in refusing to interfere with the sentence of death pronounced by a com- petent Court on the murderous rebel Riel, gave one of the ablest as well as most unscrupulous of the French politicians of this province the chance to appeal to the race and religious prejudices and feelings of his compatriots, and enabled him to form a so-called National Party and Government on distinctly National lines, in which the
Protestant English of this province have not one repre- sentative. The career of this Government since its formation has been most ominous with respect to the prospects of the English in this province. The French have completely thrown off any mask they may have hitherto worn, and openly and defiantly announce their determination of running this province by and for the French. Three most iniquitous measures have been passed by this Government in the last Session of the Provincial Parliament, viz. :—(1.) A Bill which imposes a tax of varying magnitude on all Banks, Insurance
Companies, and manufacturing, industrial, or trading joint- stock Companies, as these institutions are almost entirely owned and managed by British Canadians. This tax, besides its disastrous tendency in a new country where capital is urgently required for the development of the resources of the country, is of a most odious class-character, and appeals strongly to the ignorant habitants of the country parishes, as so much out of the pocket of messieurs lee Anglais of the cities for the benefit of the country. (2.) An Act to enable the Government to force the holders of provincial bonds to accept bonds bearing a lower rate of interest, or a forced conversion. (3.) A grant of a large sum of money ($400,000) from the Treasury of this province in settlement of the so-called Jesuit claims, claims of which the Provincial Premier himself, a pupil of the Jesuits, has ad- mitted that they have not a shadow of legal foundation. All these measures were carried by the French majority in defiance of the protests of the minority, and very distinctly point out the future before us. Under these circumstances, it is not at all wonderful that a strong feeling is developing amongst the English of this province in favour of annexation to the United States as the only solution of a question that is becoming increasingly serious.
Owing to the idiotic terms of the Treaty of Union, by which the French settlers were guaranteed their religion, laws, and language—the first not as other religions are guaranteed, but as an established State Church—we have in the centre of the Dominion, between the English Maritime and Western Pro- vinces, a compact province French in all its sympathies and traditions, and passionately Ultramontane in religion. This state of things a great many of us think can only be improved now by absorption in the great neighbouring Republic.— I am, Sir, &c.,
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