reasons which have been given Craig seems to have exaggerated any danger of the kind. Republican France, which attracted American sympathies, repelled those of the French Canadians. France under Napoleon, brought back to law and order and to at any rate the outward conventionalities of religion, became more attractive to the French Canadians, but at the same time, in view of the Napoleonic despotism, it became less attractive to the United States. But at no time probably was there any real intention on the part of the French Canadians to take any active step to overthrow British supremacy. Certainly at no time was there the slightest possibility of their changing their status except by becoming absorbed in the United States. They were as a whole an unthinking people, to whom representative institutions and a free press were a novelty; their leaders liked the words and phrases which they had learnt from English-speaking demagogues or imported from revolutionary France. Their priesthood was not loyal, because it claimed to be independent of the civil government, especially when it was the government of a Protestant Power. The general aim was to see to what uses the new privileges could be applied and how much latitude would be given. The elected representatives opposed the second chamber, the Legislative Council, as much as they opposed the governor; they played with edged tools, but it may be doubted whether at this early stage of the proceedings they meant much more than play. Under the circumstances, perhaps a fair judgement upon Sir James Craig’s administration would be that he took the Parliamentary situation in Lower Canada too seriously, and did not give sufficient rope to the local politicians. He reprimanded the Assembly when they acted unconstitutionally, and dissolved them when they did not do their work. The strong measures which he adopted, and the repeated dissolutions, were a bad precedent for the future: and the course which he recommended, viz. suspension of the constitution, would, if carried into effect, have been premature and unwise. But for the moment the steps which he took were effective. By his summary action in regard to the newspaper _Le Canadien_, he showed that he had the ultimate power and was not afraid to use it; and the result was that the very law which gave the Executive extraordinary powers was renewed by the Assembly which objected to those powers. Meanwhile Canada thrived, the governor was personally respected, and repeated elections did no one any harm. It was a time of danger from without and unrest within, but many countries with admirable constitutions have fared much worse than did Lower Canada under the rule of a strong soldier confronted by a recalcitrant Assembly.