We have now seen the dangers which threaten Canada, we have to some extent examined the means of resisting them, and have followed the process by which a severe injury was inflicted on her powers of defence. Mr. Webster was a grand specimen of unscrupulous intelligence—he was a colossal “Yankee.” It will be observed that he regarded the acquisitions so dexterously made—quocunque modo rem—as valuable on account of their military capabilities—that he took the highest point accessible to the American mind when he showed that his work could be made available for the annoyance and injury of Great Britain. In so far he betrayed—if indeed there is any deception in the matter—the animating principle of American political life. Let any public man prove that he has hurt the English power or affronted it—that he has damnified its commerce and lowered its prestige, and the popular sentiment will applaud him, no matter the agency by which his purpose was effected. Recent events have greatly inflamed the spirit which always burned against us. The very events which have broken up the Union may resolve its fragments into a new combination more formidable and more aggressive.
The course open to Canada, which may feel once more the force of that permanent principle in the American mind, is plain. Great Britain may be too far off. She may be too much engaged to be able to aid Canada efficiently and fully. But on the borders of Canada there are provinces with great resources and a great future, which have hitherto been prevented by various considerations from welding themselves into a Confederation. The time has come now in the white heat of American strife for the adoption of the process. The Confederation of States with divers interests under a weak executive has fallen to pieces. All the more reason for a Confederation of States with common interests and with one governing principle. If we accept the common governing principle of all the Colonies and Provinces to be their attachment to Monarchical institutions, any pressure from the influences of Republican institutions can but consolidate their union.
Under the circumstances in which the various distinct dependencies of the British Crown in the Continent of North America find themselves placed, it is not surprising that the idea of a Confederation for the purposes of common defence and military corroboration should have arisen. It is surprising that it should have floated about so long, and have stirred men to action so feebly. I think it is the first notion that occurs to a stranger visiting Canada and casting about for a something to put in place of the strength which distant England cannot, and Canadians will not, afford. At least, there is no sign as yet that the Canadians will quite arouse from a sleep which no fears disturb, although they hear the noise of robbers. They will not prepare for war, because they wish for peace, and it is plain enough that if war should come instead of peace, England would be too late to save them, because she would be too far. Now, let it not be supposed that any confederation of the Canadas and British North American provinces would yield such an increase of force as would enable the collective or several members of it to resist the force of the Republic of the Northern American United States—at least, not just now. But in the very conflict in which the Northern and Southern Confederations are engaged, we see the vast energy and resources of a union of States in war time as compared with the action of States not so joined:—France, Great Britain, Turkey, and Sardinia were associated in the war with Russia, but their power would have been much greater had they acted under a common head. There is in every association of the States the danger of ultimate convulsions, and of death itself, whenever the Constitution and ideas of one State differ from those of another: for the difference of constitution and ideas is sure to produce soon a conflict of interests and opinions which the bond of Federation cannot compress. In the two Canadas there are certain opposing principles at work which have interfered with harmonious action at times. These might receive greater vitality and power on each side if the cohesion of the British dependencies were not complete. The religious questions which now are mixed with questions of race would perhaps acquire development, and become more active and more mischievous. But the actual positive visible dangers of non-Confederation are more weighty than those which may come by-and-by from the adoption of a common central government subject to the Crown. Setting out with the principle of submission to the Throne—with the recognition of the sovereignty of the monarch of Great Britain and Ireland—with the full acknowledgment of the rights and prerogatives pertaining to the Crown—with the charters of their several and collective liberties in their possession, the only great schism to be apprehended is one which might arise from the exercise of Parliamentary control over the action of the Confederation, because colonists will never admit that the Parliament can stand in the place of the Crown. Let us take a glance at the vast area, and consider the importance of the various colonies which own now no bond of connection, except a common obedience to the Queen, in order that we may appreciate their strength as a Confederation.
The Province of New Brunswick contains just 28,000 square miles; it lies between 45° and 48° lat. (north), and 63° 45’ and 67° 50’ long. (west), washed on the east by the waters of the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and on the south by those of the Bay of Fundy. It has a very extensive seaboard, not less than two-thirds being maritime; whilst on the west it is bounded by the frontier of the State of Maine, and on the north by Lower Canada. The population in 1851 was 193,000, and it probably is not less now than 225,000 souls. The boastfulness of the Americans, and more especially of New Englanders, in all that relates to their country, causes us to overlook the progress of our own colonies, and we shall be surprised to find the increase of people in New Brunswick has been greater than that of Vermont, Maine, or New Hampshire, by an average of 10 per cent. within the decade up to 1851. The Government is vice-monarchical and parliamentary; the Lieutenant-Governor of the Province being Commander-in-Chief, Admiral, and Chancellor. His ministers are the Executive Council, consisting of nine members, whose tenure of office depends on the will of the people, inasmuch as they must retire on a vote of want of confidence. The Parliament consists of the Legislative Council, which is somewhat analogous to the House of Peers. It is composed of 21 members, who are appointed by the Crown durante placito, but who usually hold office for life. Although the Peers of Parliament are in one sense nominated by the Crown, they are legislators durante vitâ, and cannot be removed from their functions by the Crown, and in other respects there are defects in an analogy between them and the House of Lords. The House of Assembly, consisting of 41 members, is elected every four years by the people of the fourteen counties, and of the city of St. John. The House levies taxes and duties, and regulates the expenditure and internal affairs of the Province; but the Legislative Council may reject all its measures except those relating to money matters, and the assent of the Governor-General is needed to all measures whatever. But it does not follow that the consent of Council, Assembly, and Lieutenant-Governor will do more than stamp the measure with the popular and official imprimatur in the eyes of the Home Government, because Her Majesty in Council may reject any law whatever. It is rather in theory than in practice, however, that such an exercise of prerogative exists; but in case of any marked difference of opinion between the Home Government and the Colonial Legislature, it is obvious that such a power, however consonant with monarchical right and tradition, might cause serious antagonism and create wide breaches. The risk of such disturbing influences would, of course, be diminished by the action of a general government.
It is little more than 100 years since a number of English settlers and colonists, then loyal, coming from Massachusetts, sailed from Newbury Fort to the coast of New Brunswick, which had been ceded by France to the British in 1713. Constantly menaced by the French Canadians, the few English who represented the Crown could scarcely be considered to hold the most attenuated possession of the Province, until the French were obliged finally to cede all claims to the possession of an acknowledged nationality in British North America. The English maintained that the whole tract of country now known as Nova Scotia and New Brunswick belonged to the Crown by virtue of the discoveries of Sebastian Cabot; but the French were the first to found permanent settlements, and certainly gave good reason why Acadia, as they termed the district, despite its frosts and snows and long lugubrious winters, should belong to the fleur-de-lys. As soon as Wolfe’s victory had established the power of England, the enterprising spirit of the New Englanders led them to undertake settlements in these neglected regions. They carried with them what they had derived from the old country—a love of law, not of litigation; the forms of justice in the courts which administered its substance:—a magistracy, a police, a moral life and social liberty; these were possessed by the settlers at a time when the vast majority of the people of Ireland was deprived of any semblance of such rights; and when Scotland, unsuccessful in her last effort for legitimacy and the Divine right of kings, was just recovering from the swoon into which she had fallen as the last volleys rolled away from Culloden.
The New Englanders who settled Mangerville and civilised Sunbury were loyal to the Crown in the revolt of the colonies; they formed a nucleus round which gathered many of the New England Tories and their families, so that in 1783 it was considered expedient by the Government to locate those who were called loyalists, and who shook the dust off their feet at the door of the New Republic, along the cleared settlements adjoining the Bay of Fundy and the water of St. John. It is strange that the first newspaper should have been printed by these outcasts at a time when there were scarcely half-a-dozen journals known in the mother country; but the peculiar circumstances under which these immigrants were placed no doubt developed the energies of a press which was not shackled by any political censorship. The wealth of the people lay around them; their mines were in the forest, and the axe provided them with currency. To Sir Guy Carlton, the first Governor, when New Brunswick received a distinct Charter and a new Constitution and was separated from Nova Scotia, in 1788, must be conceded the credit of having nursed for twenty years, with singular care and success, the infancy of the colony:—a succession of Presidents or Governors and Councillors, whose names are reproduced in the history of the American colonies,—such men as Beverley, Robinson, Putman, Winslow, and Ludlow,—succeeded in the charge, and gradually developed the resources of the rising community.
Fire has wrought more than one great wrong to this land of frost and snow. Yet it would not be just to describe New Brunswick as a Siberia. From Christmas to March the country is tolerably well provided with a coating of snow. From April to May ploughing and seed time last, and before October the harvests are generally gathered in. A glorious autumn yields to the rainfalls of November, and these in their turn harden to sleet and snow in December; but, after all, nearly seven months give space for sowing, ploughing, reaping, and saving. The New Brunswickers, indeed, believe that the very seventy of the frost in winter tends to render the cultivation of the land more easy than it is in Britain; and certainly rainfalls, and all the variableness of climate, do more injury in England than they do in New Brunswick. The greatest ranges of temperature are in the Gulf of St. Lawrence, where they reach from 20° below zero to 90° above it; the highest temperature at St. John may be reckoned at 86°, the lowest at 14°. There are about 180 clear days and 120 cloudy days in the year, and the snow-storms rarely last more than two days at a time. Now here is a region to which one would think the bedrenched Highlander, the betaxed Englishman, and much-vexed Irishman would resort in myriads. And there is land for many. At least 6,000,000 acres of land suited for crops and wood settlements are still to be disposed of. For half-a-crown a man may buy an acre of land, but of that sum only 7½d. is demanded on sale, and the remainder may be paid in instalments extending over three years. The sales of the country lands are monthly. If the settler likes to pay on the spot he can have his land for 2s. an acre. Think of that, conacre men of Tipperary and Leitrim! Think of that, farmers of the Lothians, or tenants of the Highland straths! Shall I ask the men of Dorsetshire and East Gloucester to think of it too? Nor need they fear to change their mode of life, except it be for the better, after the first rude work of labour is done; nor need they fear to suffer from climate or disease. Typhus will cease to kill—fever and dysentery to decimate. And if the settler has kinsmen and friends willing to join with him, he can claim for himself and each of them 100 acres of land, and pay for it by the work of road-making in the new country, so that in four years, if the work set by the Commissioners be executed, each man who has been one year resident and has brought ten acres into cultivation, becomes, ipso facto, owner of the whole lot of 100 acres. Now this is in a country which has been described by no incompetent witness, not as the peer of any region on earth in the beauty of wood and water, but as the superior of the best. The St. John flows in all its grandeur through the midst of the province, and the Restigouche gives a charm of scenery to the forest not to be surpassed. Lakes and streams open up dell, valley, and mountain pass. Every creek in the much-indented coast swarms with fish. The Bay of Fundy abounds with codfish and pollock, bake, haddock, shad, herring, halibut, mackerel, eels, skate, and many other kinds of fish. The mouths of the rivers swarm with salmon, trout, striped basse, gaspereaux, shad, and white trout. The Gulf of St. Lawrence and the Bay of Chaleurs yield nearly every description of valuable fish, as well as lobsters, crabs, oysters, and other shellfish. The Province receives nearly 100,000l. a year in exchange for the fish packed in ice, or cured and exported to foreign countries. Its wealth in timber is incalculable, because the value rises gradually with the demand for the produce of its forests all over the world, and, with prudent management, these forests may be considered as inexhaustible. Coal of a bituminous character has been worked for some years past in several districts; iron, manganese, lead, and copper, also exist in considerable quantities, and the mineral produce of the Province will no doubt add much to its importance as the works receive greater development.
Although the trade of shipbuilding does not show a regular increase, the size of the vessels built at St. John and Miramichi has been increasing. Upwards of 100 ships were launched at these ports in 1860, with a measurement of 41,000 tons, and were worth upwards of 320,000l. Various branches of trade have obtained respectable dimensions and are growing steadily. Fredericton, the capital of the Province, is situated on the St. John, eighty-two miles from the sea, where the navigation for sea-going ships may be regarded as at an end. The number of great lakes which are available for internal commerce and transport complete the facilities offered by the river system and by the main roads, the latter of which have been liberally promoted by the Province. The water power of the colony is boundless. Education is provided by the Legislature, so that the poorest man can give his children the advantage of a sound instruction almost without cost. Religion is free, and the voluntary system mitigates the animosity of sects. Emigrants from the South of Ireland have found here all the conditions of prosperity, and have turned them to good account. Scotch and English thrive exceedingly. Indeed, if it were not that the greater clamour and bustle of the United States had succeeded in overpowering the appeals of New Brunswick to the favour of the emigrant, many thousands of our countrymen would have there found the ease and comfort which they have sought in vain under the rule of the Republic. The very name, New Brunswick, has no doubt repelled settlers. A New Brunswick ship they know nothing of even if they see one, and the name itself rarely reaches their ears.