Canada and the Canadians, Vol. 2Bonnycastle, Richard Henry, Sir
History
Canada and the Canadians, Vol. 2
Bonnycastle, Richard Henry, Sir
Canada -- Description and travel; Ontario -- Description and travel
Canada 1,500,000 {Montreal 60,000
{Quebec 30,000
{Kingston 12,000
{Toronto 20,000
New Brunswick 200,000 {Fredericton 6,000
{St. John 31,000
Nova Scotia,} 250,000 {Halifax 16,000
including} {Sydney ------
Cape Breton}
Newfoundland 100,000 St. John's 20,000
Prince Edward's}
Island and the} 45,000 Charlotte Town ------
Magdalen Isles}
---------
Total Population 2,095,000.
A serviceable militia of 80,000 young men may, therefore, without
distressing the population, be easily raised in British North America,
with a reserve sufficient to keep an army of 40,000 able-bodied
soldiers in Canada always in the field; and, if necessary, 100,000
could be assembled at any point, for any given purpose.
The Great Gustavus said that he would not desire a larger military
force for defensive purposes than 40,000 men fit for actual service,
to accomplish any military object, as such a force would always enable
him to choose his positions. Two such armies of effective men could be
easily maintained in the two Canadas, and concentrated rapidly and
with certainty upon any given point, notwithstanding the extent of
frontier; and the Canadians are much more essentially soldiers than
the people of the United States, without any reference to valour or
contempt of danger: whilst they would be fighting for everything dear
to them, and the aggressors for mere extension of territory, and to
accomplish the fixed object of destroying all monarchical
institutions.
I have already said that there is no sympathy of the Irish settlers in
Canada with the native Americans, and the best proof of this is the
public demonstrations upon St. Patrick's day at Montreal, Kingston,
and Toronto, where the two parties, Protestant and Catholic, exhibited
no party emblems, no flags but loyal ones, and where the ancient
enmity between the rival houses of Capulet and Montague, the Green and
the Orange, appeared to have vanished before the approaching arrogant
demands of a newly-erected Imperium.
Independence may exist to a great extent in Canada. Gourlay figured
it, twenty years ago, by placing the word in capitals on the arch
formed by the prismatic hues of the cloud-spray of Niagara. He could
get no better ground than a fog-bank to hoist his flag upon, and the
vision and the visionary have alike been swallowed up in oblivion.
Canada does not hate democracy so very totally and unequivocally as my
excellent friend, Sir Francis Head, so tersely observed, but Canada
repudiates annexation.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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