One thing I observed in the province especially worthy of imitation--the old English practice of turning to the _left_ in driving, instead of to the _right_, as we do. Let me exhibit the merits of the respective systems by a brief diagram. By the English system they drive thus: [Illustration] The arrows represent the drivers, as well as the directions of the vehicles; of course when two vehicles, coming in opposite directions, pass each other on the road, each driver is nearest the point of contact, and can see readily, and provide against accidents. Now contrast our system with the former: [Illustration] no wonder we have so many collisions. "The rule of the road is a paradox quite, In driving your carriage along, If you keep to the left, you are sure to go right, If you keep to the right, you go wrong." It would be a good thing if our present senseless laws were reversed in this matter, and a few lives saved, and a few broken limbs prevented. When I took leave of my native country for a short sojourn in this province, the great question then before the public was the invasion of international law, by the British minister and a whole solar system of British consuls. I had the pleasure of being a fellow exile on the Canada with Mr. Crampton, Mr. Barclay, and Mr.----, Her British Majesty's representatives, and of course felt no little interest to know the fate of the _Foreign Legion_. Before I left Halifax, I learned some particulars of that famous flock of jail birds. All that we knew, at home, was that a number of recruits for the Crimea had been picked up in the streets and alleys of Columbia, and carried, at an enormous expense, to Halifax, there to be enrolled. And also, that as a mere cover to this infraction of the law of Neutrality, the men were engaged as laborers, to work upon the public improvements of Nova Scotia. The sequel of that enterprise remained to be told. A majority of these recruits were Irishmen--some of them not wanting in the mother wit of the race. So when they were gathered in the great province building at Halifax, and Sir John Gaspard le Marchant, in chapeau, feather and sword, came down to review his levies, with great spirit and military pomp, "Well, my men," said he, "you are here to enlist, eh, and serve Her Majesty?" To which the spokesman of the Foreign Legion, fully understanding the beauty of his position, replied, with a sly twinkle of the eye, "We didn't engage to 'list at all, at all, but to wurruk on the railroad." Upon which Sir John Gaspard, seeing that Her Majesty had been imposed upon, politely told the legion to go to----Dante's Inferno.