“The city is represented in the Provincial Parliament by four Members, the East and West Wards into which it is divided, returning two each. The period of service in the House of Assembly is four years.
“Under the Corporation the city and suburbs were distributed into eight wards, for the more convenient arrangement and dispatch of business. These are East and West Wards, the Wards of St. Ann, St. Joseph, St. Antoine, St. Lawrence, St. Louis, and St. Mary. Another division of the city may be called the Military, according to which the battalions of militia, which are six in number, are collected from the portion of the city or suburbs in which they reside.”
Speaking of the appearance of the town in 1839, Bosworth remarks:
“Montreal, the second city in political dignity, but the first in magnitude and commercial importance, in British America, is situated in Latitude 45° 31' North, and Longitude 73° 34' West. Including the suburbs it covers about 1,020 acres, although within the fortifications the area did not much exceed 100 acres. Its local advantages for the purposes of trade, giving it a decided superiority over every other place in the Province, and its climate, though severe, is more genial than that of Quebec. On approaching it either on the river from below, or in descending from La Prairie, the tall and elegant steeple of the English Church, the massive grandeur of the French Cathedral, the spires of other churches and chapels, the spreading mass of habitations in the suburbs, and the well built and lofty stores in Commissioner Street, the stranger will be impressed with a very favourable idea of the city he is about to enter. If the entrance be by the Lachine road, a fine view of the city is presented just before descending the hill near the Tanneries, or the village of St. Henry; and another on coming along the road from Mile-end, north west of the city. * * * In the commencement of towns and villages, when no specific plan has been previously arranged, houses and other buildings will be erected where land can be obtained or convenience may dictate, without much regard to regularity or order; and hence in towns of any considerable standing, we generally find that the earliest streets are crooked and irregular. This may be seen in St. Paul Street in this city, which by its contiguity to the river, presents great facilities for trade, and, with the space between it and the wharf, would be occupied in preference by men of business.
“It contains many excellent houses, which would be seen to more advantage, had the street been wider. It reminds one of some of the central streets in London, but without their fog and smoke. From St. Paul Street, downwards to the river, was formerly called the lower town, and the rest of the city the upper; but though in some of the cross streets there is an evident rising in the ground, in others it is scarcely perceptible. The principal streets are airy, and the new ones particularly of a commodious width; some of them running the whole length of the town, nearly parallel to the river, are intersected by others generally at right angles.
“An Englishman when he enters the city, and in his perambulations through nearly the extent of it, is struck with the French names by which nearly the whole formerly, and the greater part now, of the streets are distinguished; the names of Catholic Saints, or eminent Frenchmen, will meet his eye in abundance.
“The Rue Notre Dame, extending from the Quebec to the Recollet Suburbs, is 1,344 yards in length and thirty feet broad. It is in general a handsome street, and contains many of the public buildings. St. James Street, Craig Street and McGill Street, are of still greater width, and when the yet empty spaces in each are filled up with elegant houses, they will be ornaments to the town. * * * The spirit of local improvement has long been in active and efficient operation and betrays no symptoms of langour or decline. Beside a multitude of new and elegant houses in almost every part of the city and suburbs, large spaces and several streets have been considerably improved.
“The covering of the creek, or rather ditch, an offensive and dangerous nuisance, in Craig Street; the levelling of McGill Street; the improvements in Dalhousie Place, in the French Square, and Notre Dame Street, and of that part of St. Ann Suburbs called Griffin Town, by which a large portion of swampy land has been raised and made available for building, may be adduced as specimens. The recent houses are almost universally built of the grayish limestone which the vicinity of the mountain affords in abundance; the fronts of the same material, hewn and squared; even the new stores and warehouses are finished in the same manner.
“Many of the houses are large, handsome, and in modern style, and some of them display great taste in design.