religion in the matter of education, and does not authorize any school to be atheistical, but demands of it to be Christian before it accords help. It does not provide that one church shall be helped rather than another. Full and entire liberty it demands, and from this comes perfect harmony among the people.” Religious liberty marches by the side of educational liberty. Each church supports itself; the state no longer takes cognizance of clergy or congregations, to protect them, to annoy them, or to persecute. They can, as the citizens, found a university, a college, or a school. Men such as Labelle and Racine have accomplished wonderful results in planting in the most barren regions, at the peril of their lives, strong and flourishing colonies. “Go west,” incessantly repeated Horace Greeley to young Americans. “Go north, French Canadians and Catholics,” said Father Labelle, with a prophetic foresight. Canadian literature only dates back to 1840. Before that time it was made up of songs. Such a literature was absolutely essential to the gay and sociable race who consoled itself, in all its troubles, with stanzas. There was a time when France held the government under control by her songs. Did any Canadian patriot attract attention by some great deed? At once a song was written. Was the question that of elections? They addressed themselves to some crude poet, and sharp, malign couplets soon overran the country. The festival of St. Jean Baptiste has furnished many a contribution to this list, and Sir George Cartier owes in great part his popularity to the fact that he composed one for the first banquet, in 1834. Often among the remote rural districts are found people possessing magnificent tenor voices, which would make the fortune of an impressario who would come from the other side of the water to look them up. “We are yet amateurs,” said one of their writers to me. Without endorsing this very modest judgment, one can but admit that up to the present time our American cousins have been more occupied with making history than with writing it. Action has absorbed thought. They have run, closely pressed on all sides, to the conquest of political liberties. The books which they published during their unsettled national history partook of the character of the times, as the great work of Garneau will show, which was a revelation to his countrymen, and was of more value to them than an army, since it assured them of a nation’s faith and the certainty of success. The greater part of the writers have been obliged to tax their ingenuity for a livelihood, and too often politics, that deceptive siren, keeps them from those severe studies which alone will bring talent to maturity.