And here we may appropriately refer to the contributions made to Colonial literature by the eminent men who have assisted in giving Canada her present political and industrial status. The great speeches of Canadian statesmen must nearly all be sought in the old files of newspapers deposited in our libraries; but as a rule the chief interest that now attaches to these speeches is the light they throw on the history of the past. The opportunities which Canadian statesmen have had of making great oratorical efforts have not been frequent in dependencies where the questions have necessarily been for the most part of purely local importance and of a very practical character. Yet when subjects of large constitutional or national importance have come up for discussion, the debates prove that Canadian intellects display a comprehensiveness of knowledge and a power of argument worthy of a larger arena. Some of Sir Alexander Galt's speeches, in bringing down the Budget in old times, were characterized by that masterly arrangement of statistics which has made Mr. Gladstone so famous in the House of Commons. Sir John Macdonald's speech explaining the Washington Treaty, in 1872, was remarkable for its logical arrangement and its illustrations of the analytical power and the varied knowledge of that eminent statesman, who, in the intervals of leisure, has always been a student of general literature. Mr. Blake's speeches afford abundant evidence of the brilliant talent of a public man who is both a student of books as well as of politics, and who, were the tendency of Parliamentary oratory something higher than mere practical debate, could rise fully to the height of some great argument. But oratory, in the real sense of the art, cannot exist in our system of government in a Colonial dependency where practical results are immediately sought for. It consequently follows that the speeches which interest us to-day lose their attraction when the object has been gained. Both Mr. Howe and Mr. McGee were able to invest their great addresses with a charm which still clings to them when we take them up. The reason is, they were, like Gladstone and Disraeli, both _litterateurs_ who studied their subjects in the library, among the great masters of eloquence and statesmanship, and were thus able to throw around a great question the flowers of a highly cultivated mind. But even Mr. Howe's most memorable speeches of old times would perhaps be hardly appreciated in the cold practical arena in which our public business is now transacted. Yet it cannot be said that the Legislature is no field to display the highest qualities of intellectual activity because it is no longer possible to indulge in those nights of poetic fancy or those brilliant perorations which are now confined to the pulpit or lecture-hall. The intellectual strength of the country must be of no mean order when it can give us statesmen like Sir Charles Tupper and Mr.