To become a judge, no doubt, is the aspiration of many young Canadians, and not for a moment would any one attempt to decry the desirableness of that honorable position. Yet the fact is, that we have altogether too many young men aspiring for legal positions. “Too many lawyers in Canada by three-fourths” is heard among us as common everyday talk. Since Canada has no foreign consular service, all consularships are squarely and flatly out of our reach. Bayard Taylor began as a boy tramping over Europe on foot, and gave the world his boyish volume of “Views Afloat,” which is quite as readable to-day as when first penned. And he kept on travelling until he became quite familiar with most of the languages of modern Europe. Then a consulship was given him, and he really obtained a position worth working for. At different courts he became the representative of the great American nation, and enjoyed social advantages which can fall only to the lot of persons thrown in contact, as he necessarily was, with people from every quarter of the globe. Finally he became ambassador at Berlin, and enjoyed the highest honors there. There he died, and his body was sent back to his American home, having been accorded especial honors by the German court. Here was a career, it appears to the writer, which was really worth striving for. He was not a lawyer, nor in any wise specially educated in any particular specialty, but yet with the career open to him, by dint of his own push and good common-sense, he really rivalled in position any of those among us who make political fights to get to Ottawa, or pore over the midnight oil to become eminent in law. And what is true in Mr. Taylor’s case is equally true in the case of many representatives who to-day are the accredited representatives of the American Government at the court of St. James. Take, for instance, the case of S. S. Cox, who was American representative at Constantinople. Mr. Cox was, no doubt, a tolerably clever man, but not a lawyer, though generously educated. Like Taylor, he travelled and gave to the world the result of his observations in his “Arctic Sunbeams” and “Orient Sunbeams.” True, he had been a member of Congress, but even if one were to become an M.P. in Canada that would not further him in any way for foreign preferments. No one will for a moment doubt but that Cox’s position as charge d’affaires at Constantinople was far preferable to that of any M.C. at Washington, or an M.P. at Ottawa.
We have a High Commissioner, some one reminds me. Yes, and we may instance Sir Charles Tupper at London; but the social status of that gentleman over there must have been so doubtful that one can hardly jump to the conclusion that his position was desirable after all. Of course, his salary would be desirable, but of that I am not speaking. Do not for a moment suppose that Sir Charles would be very graciously received by the representative of the Czar, for instance. Obviously not, for he was not a real ambassador, or even a consul, and he had no particular powers, anyhow. The representative of the little kingdom of Greece, as the representative of three millions of people, would have far more social status in London than our Sir Charles, who ought to represent over five millions, and half a continent. So I think I might as well give over this matter of consulship, for there’s really nothing to be attained in that direction.
We educate a young man at home in one of our universities, and then to give him a good finish send him off to Oxford, or perhaps to Heidelberg, and our young man comes home the representative of one of our best Canadian families. He has not been educated for a profession particularly, for his parents as well as himself realize that the professions are already quite full enough, and also that there’s no éclat to be gained from the hardest drudgery in any one of them. Now, I ask, what position is open to him at all commensurate with his careful education and his talents? Really among us, as Canadians, there is none. No doubt, at Oxford or Heidelberg, he has studied the laws of nations and many matters of civil polity, and ought to be as well qualified, after a little apprenticeship, as any one anywhere to be the foreign representative of his own country at St. James, St. Cloud, or St. Petersburg. But he cannot, and must either lead the life of a gentleman of leisure among his people or go in for sordid money-getting. If he leads the life of a gentleman of leisure he does not fully fill the sphere of usefulness his countrymen are by right of common citizenship obviously justly entitled to. As to common money-getting, we hope never to see the day when the most cultivated in our young country will give themselves over wholly to that sordid life.
An aristocracy in Canada is not what I am aiming at. But we do certainly need some peer among us to leaven the mass, and keep us refined and up to the social standard. The United States is already possessing such persons. The case of Charles Sumner, for instance. He could have made money as a lawyer, no doubt. But with his great talents and careful education, he spent his life among his New England kin, except when travelling or at Washington, and no one will for a moment deny but that he leavened his fellows during his whole life. Political preferments or legal standing he never sought after, but he, with his culture and pure life, did real good to his fellows.
It would be easy to elaborate and speak of many more such examples, both in the United States and Britain. But having illustrated the point, I have said sufficient to prove that such a cultured few among us are desirable and to be commended. They do not call them aristocrats in the United States, and I do not see why they should be so termed here. In the future, as our country grows, and our old families become stable with the steady growth of our country, their sons must be educated broadly and generously, and will no doubt be a benefit to us by leavening the lump; and we certainly do not want to cast our ringers at them, even if they do not get down to sordid money-getting, but seek for something higher. Yet, as I set out to prove, there are really few positions among us worth their striving for. If they would rise among us and make themselves known, I fail to know where or how they are to do it. Is a clerk or head of a department needed at Ottawa? Canadians, we are led to know, do not as a rule get the preference. In very many instances some one must be imported from the British Isles and given that position right over the heads of our own fellows. Now, we all love honor, and respect our common Mother Country, but this is carrying the matter too far, without a doubt. Do not for a moment suppose any Canadian will be exported from Canada to London to fill any one of the clerkships or offices over there. Such an instance is not within my knowledge, and I am at a loss to know why we need do it for the young English, Scotch or Irish man. The remedy for the want of a goal for Canadians I am not going to speak of. Let those who can, and wish, take the matter up and tell us. Yet we do not want independence just now that we may have foreign consuls and the like, and thus open careers for our young men of abilities, for we are too poor yet to do all that. Nor do we want annexation to the United States, for our people are unmistakably British, disguise the fact as one may. Our people are really British in thought and feeling, and are not disposed to throw off the Mother Country. If Imperial federation ever takes place, it is probable that the different colonies will then have a resident charge d’affaires at each sister colony, and our chosen members would assemble at the central parliament at London. In this there would be a help to our ambitious young men, and perhaps some remedies will thus come about. But it is absurd to think that our rising young men will always be content to go on as we are, finding no goal in our midst worth striving for. These young men see, perhaps, their college-mates in the United States away ahead of them in positions of trust, while they cannot possibly get higher as Canadians, and are apt to become in a measure disgusted with home. The writer can recall instances of his fellow college-mates in the United States whom he thinks were no cleverer than himself, nor had they any special advantage over him in any wise. Yet to-day in his memory he can fix upon a number of such American college-mates who are now foreign consuls of the United States Government, M.C’s, senators, and others who occupy high positions in the army and navy of that Government. In drawing the comparison between them and himself it is quite natural for him to ask himself why his college associates so signally succeeded. The answer must be because success could be obtained in their own country, and such success led to preferments worth striving for, to the contra-distinction of our own lot as Canadians, where there is no career open to us.
That we all love Canada, and are all satisfied with our form of government, goes without saying, yet somehow we are not developing a national spirit in any wise whatever. It appears to me that we can and ought to develop a spirit of patriotic pride among us, and I see nothing incompatible with our position as provinces to hinder fostering such a spirit. One great difficulty is that our flag and that of Britain are exactly alike. Go away from home, and meet a Canadian vessel up in the Mediterranean, for instance, and I defy you to tell if she be not an ordinary British ship. The same ensign is at the peak, and there is really nothing outwardly visible to make a Canadian’s heart swell with pride on beholding a Canadian ship away from home. It seems to me that we might have a flag of our own, not incompatible with the Union Jack, which would cause us to cling to it and feel that it was really our own.
In the way of a national ode there positively is nothing at all. Moore’s boat song is the best thing we have by far, and is really a gem. But gem as it is, recollect it was written by an Irishman, and is mainly about boat life on our great river. Perhaps we are not old enough yet to produce a genius capable of giving us a national ode, and yet we have had some very good poems by Canadians, and I wish quickly to see the day when some of our poets will give us a national ode which shall be a gem for us to rally round. Let those who possess the proper poetic genius ponder on this subject.
Ask a Canadian young lady who sits down to the piano in Britain before a drawing-room full of Britons of both sexes to play something Canadian, as I have heard asked there. Now just let our young lady musicians think the matter over and make up their minds what they would play and sing under such conditions. If our young ladies go over there, they must know they will be asked for such songs, and I really hope, for the credit of our country, they will not be compelled to fall back upon American songs to represent Canada. Such songs may represent America, but the part Canada plays on this continent will in such songs be sadly deficient.
CHAPTER XXIV.
A retrospect—Canada’s heroes—The places of their deeds should be marked—Canada a young sleeping giant—Abundance of our resources—Pulpwood for the world—Nickel—History of our early days will be valued.