The Express.
London, England, 1861-12-12 00:00:00

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LONDON, THURSDAY, DRO. 12.

(:retest. Scow, who came Is &rope only •
few weeks ago fur the restoration of his health,
returns to America in order to aid the work of
peace by the weight of his character and t►e
sagacity of his commis. The General re-embarked
last night for New York in the steamer Arago.
4On Tuesday ho had a long interview with Prime
Naroison, and, if we are correctly informed, he
will carry to Mr. LINCOLN an expression of the
desire et the Euiperor of the FRENCH to do his
part, should an opportunity arias, towards bring-
ing the present disagreement to • favourable inns.

CANADA is truly a fine country. It is of im-
posing magnitude ; it is healthy ; it is fertile, its
wheat lands being unsurpassed in any British
colony. On the great alluvial plain of Western
Canada, stretching over 20,000 square miles, the
farmer clews hie purchase in a vast forest of
maple, beech, oak, ash, birch, cedar, pine, and other
useful timber trees, and hes even grown fifty
bushels of wheat to the acre on land where stumps
of trees still occupy the ground. The cosasay is
in many districts of striking grandeur, and Smoked
river is the most magnificent in the world.
Materially Canada is one of the finest fields for ook-
nization which invite the enterprise of Englishmen.
And yet the colony does not get on. We
have held it for more than a hundred yew,
and it has now only • population of 2,500,000.
It cannot be said that it. attractions are
not known in the mother country. The Cana-
dian Government is anxious to encourage immi-
gration. Land, well situated, is let eat in con-
venient lots and at • low price, and great pains
are taken to circulate here at home the information
likely to induce people to go out. The colony has
the prestige of British connexion. We smut
nu tribute ; but instead, as the Times reminds
us, we pay • tribute to the Colonial Go-
vernment in the shape of a 25 per cent duty
on' manufactures. Our influential journals land
the colony, though not mom than it deserves,
while they incessantly decry the United States,
its rival as an emigration field. And the
result is what we have just mien--• country
six times larger than England, with a popula-
tion smaller than that of Louden. " How,"
asks • writer in the Quarterly Rericie, "s the
" fact to be accounted for that during the maim
" of 1859 there arrived in Canada, as settlers, not
" more than 6,000 persons speaking the English
" language ; while in the mine season the United
" States received more than 45,000 natives of the
" United Kingdom as an increase to their indus-
" trial population." The question is, indeed, one
well worth asking. On one side of • political
frontier, a fever-haunted soil but yesterday • wilr
deniers becomes the home of a vast popuktion,
and throws up towns and cities with amazing raga-
dity ; while ou the other the most conspicuous
natural and artificial advantage. are neutralised by
some mysterious influence.
Neither the Colonial nor the Home Harem-
rnent has been an indifferent observer of this
comparative stagnation, and it was impossible
that they should differ as to its causes. Both
had the good sense to see that if Canada
was to become the rival of the United States
in prosperity, it must first be made their rival in
freedom. Our popular writers and declaimers
against self-government, which thsysituperateander
the name of democracy, are more royalist than
the ministers of the Crown, who since 1849 have
been most usefully employed in " Americanising
the institutions of Canada. They set religion
free, and promoted social tranquillity by sweeping
away the Church Eatablishment and applying the
Clergy Reserves to civil uses. They greatly ex-
tended the suffrage, they set up • system of muni-
cipal and district legislation, like that of the
States, and they abolished feudal tenures. All
:ILA was wisely done ; bat the character of a
colony is not to be changed on a sudden. Im-
portant as these improvements are, they have not
greatly raised the character of the Cabinda Go.
comment, nor have they attracted emigrants in
large numbers to the colony. The population has
grown up in habits of provincial dependency.
Every t.ody is looking op to somebody else. Them
is • general absence of initiative, except in asking
favours ; a general want of self-rshanes, which is
fatal in an unsettled country. Private enterprise
asks public aid, the municipalities look up to
the Government, and the colony looks up to
England. The mother country must send soldiers
to take can of them ; the mother country must
give them pocket-money for railroads, and in
return, they will send home any amount of en-
thusiasm suited to the occasion, and, if it is ac-
ceptable, some home made international law. It
is not in such an impoverished spirit as this, de-
bandied by a system of out-door relief, that great
states are built up.

Canada, it is often said, hes more " prao-
" tical freedom" than any country, in America ;
and as we bear a great deal about " practical
" freedom," it is well that we can see what it
does for a young country. Wlsok furlongs
of able articles against Democracy might be
saved if writers would remember the different
wants of people in a young and in an old country.
Freedom, soc La and political, is by no means so
indispensable in a settled country sa we some-
times please ourselves by thinking. The arts
of enjoyment, the distinctions of wealth,
material comfort, and a score of other advantages
to be found only in an old country, offer to minds
of a certain order abundant compensation for poli-
tical and social exclusiveness. A man may forego
fre-idoni without being much better or much worse