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to retard the prosperity of our British North American provinces, than the system of making large grants of land to individuals, who had no intention to settle upon them. This practice is said to have prevailed to a ruinous extent. One of the most remarkable instances of the evils resulting from these profuse grants of land is to be found in Prince Edward's Island, nearly the whole of which, (about 1,400,000 acres) was alienated in one day by enormous grants, chiefly to absentees, and upon conditions which have never been regarded, and which government still neglects to enforce. The great bulk of the island is possessed by a few absentees, who act as if they considered it as a sort of reversionary interest, at present unproductive, and not requiring attention, but capable of becoming valuable at a future period. In the mean time, the inhabitants are, of course, great sufferers. The absent proprietors neither improve the land themselves, nor permit others to do so. It remains a wilderness, though most advantageously situated for the supply of the surrounding colonies and fisheries, and possessing a soil peculiarly adapted to the production of grain. It enjoys, moreover, from its insular situation a more genial climate than even more southern parts of the adjacent continent. Had its natural advantages been turned to account, it might have been the granary of the British colonies, instead of barely supporting a poor and unenterprising population of 40,000. Of the whole 1,400,000 acres, only 10,000 are said to be unfit for the plough, and only 100,000 are under cultivation.

The present condition of these

western colonies presents a disheartening contrast when viewed in comparison with the United States. Their scanty population exhibits in most portions an aspect of poverty, backwardness, and stagnation. In a great part of Nova Scotia, half the tenements are described as being abandoned and falling into decay. The people of Prince Edward's Island are reported to be in the practice of permitting Americans to take out of their hands all their valuable fisheries, from sheer want of capital. And these provinces, among the longest settled on that continent, and containing nearly 30,000,000 acres, exhibit a population of no more than 365,000 souls, giving but one inhabitant for every eighty acres. In New Brunswick, there is less than one inhabitant for 100 acres of cultivated land. Meanwhile their adventurous neighbours settle on their best lands, and enjoy their fisheries. And this, moreover, they do with British capital, which it is found, may be advanced more profitably to citizens of the United States, than to the unenterprising and inanimate denizens of our own north eastern colonies. But the superiority of the condition of our republican neighbours is not confined to the provinces now under consideration, it is perceivable throughout the whole of our North American territory. Even the ancient city of Montreal will not bear comparison with Buffalo, a creation of yesterday. There is but one railroad in all British North America, and that (between Lake Champlain and the St. Lawrence) only fifteen miles in extent. The people on the frontier are poor and scattered, separated by vast forests, without towns or markets, and

almost destitute of roads, living in mean houses, and without apparent means of improving their condition. "On the American side," writes Lord Durham, "all is activity and bustle. The forest has been widely cleared; every year numerous settlements are formed, and thousand of farms created out of the waste. The country is intersected by common roads; canals and rail-roads are finished, or in course of formation. The observer is surprised at the number of harbours on the lakes, and the multitude of vessels they contain; while bridges, artificial landing places, and commodious wharfs are formed in all directions, as soon as required. Good houses, mills, inns, warehouses, villages, towns and even great cities, are almost seen to spring out of the desert. Every village has its school-house and place of public worship; every town has many of both, with its township buildings, its book-stores, and probably one or two banks and newspapers; and the cities with their fine churches, their great hotels, their exchanges, court-houses, and municipal halls of stone and marble, so new and fresh as to mark the recent existence of the forest where they now stand, would be admired in any part of the world."

In Newfoundland the state of things is far from satisfactory; to the ordinary elements of discord between the colonial Legislature and their rulers, religious dissensions are here unfortunately super-added. A petition was presented to Parliament in December, 1837, by Mr. Hume, from the Roman Catholics of this island, signed by 3,217 persons, and alleging a long series of alleged oppressions, which had been inflicted upon

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themselves and their co-religionists. The petitioners complained that they had been deprived of all share in the civil employments of the colony, and that they had been treated with every species of indignity by the judges, and in particular by Chief Justice Boulton. In the course of the autumn of the same year, a deputation of three members of the House of Assembly was despatched to England for the purpose of communicating with government upon various important matters nected with the interests of the colony, and the removal of grievances. The articles, under the latter head, seem to be of the accustomed character, for example, the exorbitance of the public expenditure; official pluralities; the preference of strangers to natives in the appointment of government functionaries; the mal-administration of justice, &c. Mr. Boulton, the judge, of whom the above mentioned petition complains, was an object of especial unpopularity with the Roman Catholics. He came to England, during the year, for the purpose of meeting charges preferred against him by the House of Assembly; and it is said, we know not with what truth, that after his departure, the priests harangued their congregations from the altars, in the Irish fashion, calling upon them to return thanks to God for his re moval, and imprecating the vengeance of Heaven upon his head.

The affairs of this island are undoubtedly in a very lamentable condition; so much so, that early in the autumn, a memorial was addressed to the Colonial-office by merchants and others connected with it, in which it was stated, that to such a height had political

dissensions arisen there, that the memorialists were filled with the greatest alarm. They described themselves as being influenced by no political motives in their appeal, since they were of different and adverse opinions. Their urgent request was, that additional troops should be sent out immediately for the more effectual protection of life and property in the island. Threatening however as these dissensions, of which they complain, would seem to be, their exact nature is not very apparent. The House of Assembly, constituted, six or seven years ago, under a charter from the Crown, has evidently very high notions of parliamentary privilege, and not only sent certain parties to prison, with whom it had contrived to become embroiled, but actually went the length of ordering the judge of the Supreme Court and the High Sheriff, by whom the prisoners had been discharged, upon a writ of Habeas Corpus, to be taken into custody themselves. These broils are ascribed by the Protestants to Roman Catholic agitation, and to the sinister influence of the clergy of that persuasion. The condition of the island is in this respect said to be rapidly approaching that of Ireland, and in the emphatic language of a Newfoundland journalist, the colony is already "a transatlantic Tipperary."

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The character of the inhabitants of Newfoundland is said to be peculiar in this respect, that the mass of the population cannot be termed colonists, as they consist principally of adventurers from the south of Ireland, whom the pros pect of a couple of years' employment in the fishery, and its concomitant operations allure to those shores, on their passage to their ulterior destination, the United States. Under the new charter, it seems, that the elective franchise devolved upon men like these, And it is stated, with an appearance of probability, that the dominion of the priests has been the result. The Session of the Legis lature was closed, in October, by Captain Prescott, the Lieutenantgovernor, with a speech in which he called upon the Assembly to obliterate those unhappy political differences, which had of late years sprung up among them, and which were formerly unknown,

It should be mentioned, that the House of Assembly is said to be for the most part composed of persons of very mean condition, and that a menial servant might be found amongst its members last year. These persons it is stated, take the precaution of voting themselves good salaries in return for their legislative labours.

CHAPTER XVII.

WEST INDIES. Renewal of the Anti-slavery agitation in Great Britain-Charges preferred against JAMAICA in particular-Bill for the Amendment of the Abolition of Slavery Act-Its main provisions-Working of the Apprenticeship system in BARBADOES and DOMINICA-Proceedings of the Legislature of Jamaica-Bill for granting absolute manumission in the ensuing August-Temper of the Assembly-Address to the Queen and protest-State of affairs immediately after the passing of the Act-The Act comes into operation-Conduct of the Negro population on the first of August -Progress of the disputes between the planters and the labourersLabourers ejected from houses and grounds-Construction of the clause of the Colonial Act giving them a right to three months notice to quil-Effect of the proclamation of the West India Prison Bill in Jamaica-The Assembly declare their resolution to suspend their legislative functions-Their address-DissolutionBehaviour of the Council-Constituency of Jamaica-New Assembly -Prorogued-Their violent conduct on that occasion- Increase of difficulties with respect to the arrangement of wages- General distrust-Mr. Burge's note to Lord Glenelg-Statement of the views and complaints of the Planters-Sir George Grey's reply-Sir Lionel Smith's vindication of himself- Remarks on Sir Lionel Smith's conduct.-BRITISH GUIANA.-Death of Sir J. C. Smyth, the Governor-Succeeded by Mr. Light-Proposal in the Council of policy for abolishing the apprenticeship-Ordinance passed to that effect-Ordinances for the maintenance of the aged and infirm; for excluding the late apprentices from the militia, and for a general registry, disallowed by the Colonial Office-Lord Glenelg's reasons-Behaviour of the Negroes on the day of their EmancipaMeasure attended with more favourable results than in Jamaica-General rate of wages-Mr. Light's tour through the province-Great demand for labour in Guiana-Consequences of a decrease of continuous labour-Resolutions of the Court of Policy for promoting emigration of Negroes from other West Indian Colonies at the public expense-Hill Coolies from India - Irregu larity of the free labourers-Satisfactory report from Mr. Light of the state of the Colony-Good conduct of the Negroes at Christmas -Emancipation general through the other West Indian Colonies

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Effects of the measure generally.-ST. LUCIA AND BARBADOES.Subsidiary enactments to the Emancipation Bills in the various Colonies-Orders in Council for the same purpose-Stipendiary magistrates continued-Repeal of existing laws regarding the militia suggested by Lord Glenelg Sir W. Colebrook's abortive plan for consolidating the Legislatures of the Leeward Islands.-EAST INDIAN DOMINIONS.-New Penal Code for British India-Dreadful famine-Death of the King of Oude-Disputed succession-Circumstances under which the reigning monarch was called to the throne-Death of the Great Mogul-Retirement of Sir Charles Metcalf from Agra-Revolution in the Burmese Empire-Character of the Usurper-Hostile attitude of the Nepaulese-Expedition to Afghanistan-Quarrel with the Chinese.-NEW SOUTH WALES.-Condition of the various Colonies-Progress of civilization in the Sand· wich Islands-Anti-Catholic proclamation of the King.

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N a former chapter (page 87) we have recorded the re-appearance of the anti-slavery agitation in Great Britain; we, at the same time, have furnished an outline of the proceedings in Parliament connected with that subject. The reader need not, therefore, be reminded that the conduct of the West Indian body, or, at least, of such of its members as resided in Jamaica, had become once more unhappily, a theme of public animadversion. Professing no particular admiration of the taste and judgment of those whose activity and zeal in these matters have rendered them conspicuous of late years, we cannot, nevertheless, dissemble our persuasion, that many of the charges recently preferred by them against the Jamaica planters, were not altogether without foundation. The Parliamentary papers on the subject certainly indicate the existence, on their part, of a spirit of contumacious opposition to the fair operation of the apprenticeship system, as manifested in a frequent violation of the new law at the expense of the negro. In some quarters, at least, there seems to have prevailed a regular system of defraud

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ing and harrassing the apprentices, while the stipendiary magistrates, their especial protectors, had become, in several instances, the objects of persevering hostility. doubt great exaggerations were current concerning the exact nature and amount of these delinquencies, but it would be difficult to rise from a perusal of the voluminous mass of documents, connected with this subject, which have been presented to Parliament, without feeling that they established a strong case of misconduct against many resident proprietors and managers of estates in Jamaica. Great allowance is unquestionably due to many of those persons. The crimes of a system had been visited upon themselves individually, and notwithstanding the grant, so much vaunted, of the twenty millions, they had no great reason to be in good humour with the new order of things, nor were the planters, by habit or temperament, well calculated to endure with a wise patience the childish petulance, and and the wayward courses of the half liberated slave, or always competent to restrain themselves within the legal bounds of chastisement, when their anger

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