Lectured in Bowmanville, Ont., on the 12th, in Brantford on the 13th, and in Sarnia on the 14th, and am now on my way to Chicago, to go from there to Wisconsin and Minnesota.
From Brantford I drove to the Indian Reservation, a few miles from the town. This visit explained to me why the English are so successful with their colonies: they have inborn in them the instinct of diplomacy and government.
Whereas the Americans often swindle, starve, and shoot the Indians, the English keep them in comfort. England makes paupers and lazy drunkards of them, and they quietly and gradually disappear. She supplies them with bread, food, Bibles, and fire-water, and they become so lazy that they will not even take the trouble to sow the land of their reservations. Having a dinner supplied to them, they give up hunting, riding, and all their native sports, and become enervated. They go to school and die of attacks of civilization. England gives them money to celebrate their national fêtes and rejoicings, and the good Indians shout at the top of their voices, God save the Queen! that is—God save our pensions!
THE BRITISH INDIAN.
England, or Great Britain, or again, if you prefer, Greater Britain, goes further than that. In Brantford, in the middle of a large square, you can see the statue of the Indian chief Brant, erected to his memory by public subscriptions collected among the British Canadians.
Here lies the secret of John Bull’s success as a colonizer. To erect a statue to an Indian chief is a stroke of genius.
.......
What has struck me as most American in Canada is, perhaps, journalism.
Montreal, Toronto, Ottawa, Quebec possess excellent newspapers, and every little town can boast one or two journals.