The next day a surprise awaited us. A dumb stove had replaced the mere stove-pipe, and while holding our sides from laughter we heard this speech: "Gentlemen, we are very indulgent, considering your noisy meetings--we are not very particular when rent-day arrives--and if you _so shivered_ in your room, it would have been better to have said so privately, than to have complained of it in the newspapers." (Laughter.) Poor Mrs. Tessier, our landlady--she was not well acquainted with figures of speech, but she has been the Providence of many of the destitute, and more than one who hears me now can say as I do, that no better or more obliging heart ever beat in a more pitiful bosom towards purseless youth. And who knows, it is perhaps due to this sympathetic feeling of its population towards literary men and writers that this city of Quebec has seen such an array of talent within her bosom, such a succession of Pleiades of distinguished litterateurs, who have glorified her name and that of their country. For the last fifty years, men eminent in all branches of literature have made a gorgeous and resplendent aureole around the city of Quebec. In the generation immediately preceding us, we see Petitclerc, Parent, Soulard, Chauveau, Garneau, L'Ecuyer, Ferland, Barthe and Réal Angers, these grand pioneers of intellect, who in history, poetry, drama and romance, made such a wide opening for the generation which followed them. Then we have l'Abbé Laverdière, l'Abbé Casgrain, LeMoine, Fiset, Taché, Plamondon, LaRue, and the first among all Octave Crémazie, who coming at different times bravely and constantly continued the labours of their predecessors, until we reach the brilliant phalanx of contemporary writers, Lemay, Fabre, l'Abbé Begin, Routhier, Oscar Dunn, Faucher de St. Maurice, Buies, Marmette and Legendre, all charged with the glorious task of preserving for Quebec her legitimate title of the Athens of Canada. And how could it be otherwise? Is not Quebec the cradle of our nationality--the spot whereon is engraved the most illustrious pages of our history--heroic annals, touching souvenirs, all combining with the marvels of nature to speak here the soul of the historian and of the poet. What a flourishing field for the historian and poet is not the tale of that handful of Breton heroes, who, three centuries ago, planted on the rock of Quebec the flag of Christianity and civilization! What innumerable sources of inspiration can we not find in our majestic river, our gigantic lakes, our grand cascades, our lofty mountains, our impenetrable forests and in all that grand and wild nature, which will ever be the characteristic feature of our dear Canada. Oh! our history, gentlemen! Oh, the picturesque beauties of our country! Two