CHAPTER XXII
MONTREAL
I
The Prince had had a brief but lively experience of Montreal earlier in his tour. It was but a hint of what was to happen when he returned on Monday, October 27th. It was not merely that Montreal as the biggest and richest city in Canada had set itself the task of winding up the trip in befitting manner; there was that about the quality of its entertainment which made it both startling and charming.
Even before the train reached Windsor Station the Prince was receiving a welcome from all the smaller towns that make up outlying Montreal. At these places the habitant Frenchmen and women crowded about the observation platform of the train to cry their friendliness in French, where English was unknown. And the friendliness was not all on the side of the habitants.
"They tole me," said one old habitant in workingman overalls, "they tole me I could not shake 'is han'. So I walk t'ro' them, Oui. An' 'e see me. A' 'e put out 'is 'an', an' 'e laf—so. I tell you 'e's a real feller, de kin' that shake han' wis men lak me."
Montreal itself met the Prince in a maze of confetti and snow. Montreal was showing its essential self by a happy accident. It was the Montreal of old France, gay and vivacious and full of colour mated to the stern stuff of Canada.
It is true there was not very much snow, merely a fleck of it in the air, that starred the wind-screens of the long line of automobiles that formed the procession; but Canada and Montreal are not all snow, either. It was as though the native spirit of the place was impressing upon us the feeling that underneath the gaiety we were encountering there was all the sternness of the pioneers that had made this fine town the splendid place it is.
There was certainly gaiety in the air on that day. The Prince drove out from the station into a city of cheering. Mighty crowds were about the station. Mighty crowds lined the great squares and the long streets through which he rode, and crowds filled the windows of sky-climbing stores. It was an animated crowd. It expressed itself with the unaided throat, as well as on whistles and with eerie noises on striped paper horns. It used rattles and it used sirens.