The Sun.
London, England, 1837-12-28 00:00:00

PIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNALS.

It cannot be too much impressed on the British public
at the contest in Lower Canada is really between the
en of French and the men of British descent. The
rench wish to have Lower Canada exclusively to them-
,: dyes; and were they to become independent of this coun-
'..y, by not merely beating the Queen's army but the Eng-
.' AI part of the population, which no sane man can sup-
, ee possible, they would strip the English of their grants,
ad impose such restrictions on the navigation of the St.
Lawrence as would of necessity compel the inhabitants of
ipper Canada to throw themselves into the arms of the
United States. But so sensible are the British inhabitants
•.f Lower and Upper Canada of the injury they would
istain from French ascendancy, that if the Government were
) remain idle, they would not, and a fierce civil w?r
ould be carried on which would probably end m
e men of British blood driving their opponents from
i
I;anada. We have already said that there s no
• aalogy between the present contest and that be-
. .een this country and the United States. One
. eat point of difference is that the British Colo-
, 'ats of the United States not only occupied an enor-
Jetts territory, but were scattered over the face of it,
tst as the English are scattered in Lower and Upper
,
.at.ada now. But the French are crowded along the
:*eanks of the St. Lawrence, and the rivers running into t ,as
the Richelieu, for instance, the scene of the recent opera-
tions, and the moment the moment the navigation is open
their villages would be at the mercy of armed vessels with
troops. To understand why the French adopt so different
a mode of colonization from the English, it is only neces-
sary to attend to this peculiarity of the Catholic religion,
that its members must be in constant communication with
their priests, and a Catholic will never, if he can help it,
live at any distance from a chapel, lest the greatest of all
calamities to him should occur—dying without rcceising the
consolations of religion. The Protestant is his own priest,
and with the Bible in his pocket moves wherever he
pleases. The Catholic Irish in the United States are
often in great distress from their not proceeding up the
euntry like the English and Scotch, but crowding the
towns, where they are often unable to obtain employment.
But he this as it may, the fact is well known and has been ex-
retiat.td on by every traveller in Canada. The French crowd
togeher in villages along the banks of the rivers, while
the English are either in the great towns or scattered in
what is celled the bush "I' he English every where hem
in t e French, end though they are cc mparativcly small
turn rite in Lower Canada, yet, from their living so widely
asunder, and being scattered over a large surface, the
French cannot act with much effect against them. To enter
the Lush for the purpose of attacking tile English settlers
in the rigorous season would he impracticable. But should
the rebellicr. not be put down immediately, but linger on
till the Spring, if the Government act with vigour against
the reLe:s the English settlers will harrass them in their
rear. Another analogy has been foolishly pretended be-
tween the present contest and that with the United States.
The Government of this country chimed a right to tax
tier Americans through the British Parliament. The
Americans stood on the Constituticnsl principle—that
Representation ought always to go with taxation.
Tee very title of Dr. Johnson's fatuous Pamphlet,
of—" Taxation no Tyranny," speaks volumes as to
the monstrous pretensions of the obstinate King who
then ruled ver this couatry, and the subservient
Padiameet which drove the Arneic.:ns to the option he-
tweea urtnirig for their censtitutional car Lecomirg
s!at es. They steed out against an innovatic,n. Their
an,c:tio a had for the sal-_c of liberty re:num:ed. tie com-
forts of a sett'ed (tour:try, and hi:taken thcinsek es to the
oiids, and they had ti 1 just before the American war been
1: ft in the enjoymeet of their liberty. But in an evil hour
the Government of this country advanced the unconstitu-
tit nal claim of taxing them without their consent, through
rapr, sauta ices chosen by themselves, and they were com-
pelled to resort to arms to avoid becoming slaves. But the
British Government claims no salt to tax the Canadians
till:Argil an Eng' sh House of Commons. They hardly
Icasaw, indeed, what taxation is. They have their own
Paeliaenent, and enjoy the right of voting supplies. But
;hey are dissatisfied with the Comnitution of the Second
1)k-se—the Legislatiee Council—a bad copy, indeed, of
cot douse of Peers (there being no aristocracy in Canada),
and reign to have an elective LegisLtive Council as well
as en elective House of Ass( mbly. Were the Legis-
lative Council elective as well as the House of Assem-
bly, the French of Loiter Canada, being everywhere
the rnajorhy, except, perhaps, in one or two towns,
soalel be complete!), independent of Great Britain,
and in a condition to do what they pleased in the
Lower Province. Because, however, the Government would
not change the Constitution according to their fancy, the
lase the French Canadians have made of their pow, r over
alle supplies was to refuse to appropriate money for the
payment of the Judges and other functionaries, who for
ware have been left in a state of destitution ; and because
in a else of extremity the British Parliament. stept in, not
to overturn the Canadian Constitution, but to say, you
shall not so exercise your power as to !brow the colony into
inn Ircliy, because the British Gos ernment will not change
the Constitution so as to fashion it after your wish, the
I'apineau party have had recourse to arms. The Bri-
tish Government *imposed no new taxes on the Cana-
dians, but in a case of extremity it ventured temporarily
to appropriate money lying in the Treasury which the
Mouse of Assembly factiously refused to devote to the
purposes for which such funds had always before been em-
ployed. And why do the English Ministers and
Pal Lament refuse to consent to the indapendence of
Great Britain demanded by the French Canadians ? Be-
cause Lower Canada is not exclusively French, but in-
habited also by men of British descent, who have receiired
grsnts of land in the province front the Crown, and be-
cause the river which flows through Lower Canada belongs
also to the immense territory of the Upper Province. The
French have always wished not only to exclude British
settlers from Lower Canada, and to set aside the grants of
lands which have been made to them, but they have further
claimed a right to tax Upper Canada, by imposing a duty
on emigrants, &e. They will not allow the river to be
common to all the lands for which it is the outlet, but
v wild act the part which Holland has always acted with
re: and to the Rhine, and against which the various Go-
vernments on the banks of that noble river have so long
protested. The Love Canadians wish to tax their
neighbours, and refuse to contribute anything from the
duties levied by them to the improvement wanted to
make the St. Lawrence beneficial to the Upper Cana-
dians. To understand why the French Canadians arc
so anxious to strip their English neighbours of the
lands held by them under Crown grants, we must advert
to the peculiarity of the Catholic religion which keeps
Catholics together. The French Canadians wished to
have themselves considered a separate nation, " La nation
Canadienne," and to have all the lands considered as be.
longing to that nation," to remain waste till required by
the " nation" in its progressive and connected develop-
ment. But the occupation of wastes in the rear of the
French " habitans" is in the teeth of this plan, for it com-
pels the French either to remain where they are now set-
tled, or to scatter themselves among the British settlers,
an idea quite abhorrent to them. The Americans of the
United States never claimed a right to waste lands, and,
indeed, never complained of the mode in which the Eng-
lish Government exercised its rights. Indeed, many of the
most intelligent Americans, as Mr. Maclure, for instance,
have eulogised the system of the English Government with
regard to waste lands. In this respect the Americans and the
French Canadians have nothing in common. Independence
of Great Britain means, therefore, really the sacrificing the
men of British descent in Lower Canada to this pet scheme
of the French Canadians to keep all the lands for their
own use in all time to come. Mr. Roebuck does not hesi-
tate telling us that the bribe to the Americans to enter
Canada would be lands, and Sir William Molesworth
po:nted to the fat meadows of Beauharnais a prize to be
contended for. This independence would next be the
placing the British inhabitants of Upper Canada, now be-
tween four and five hundred thousand, and occupying a
noble territory, admitting of immense increase of numbers,
in a state of dependence on the agitators of Lower Canada,
who, by taxing them and obstructing the navigation of the
St. Lawrence, would compel them to throw themselves
into the arms of the United States. Such, then, would
be the consequences of yielding to the French Canadians.
It is not a question of constitutional liberty ; but a ques-
tion between narrow notions, bigotry, and monopolies of
the worst sort, and a liberal system of Government—be-
tween justice to British citizens and confiscation of their
. lands and goods.—Morning Chronicle.
The dispatches from Sir John Colborne, received at an
early hour on Tuesday morning, but not published before
ten o'clock the same night, have gone a very little way to-
wards any clear exposition of the real state of the contest,
or the hopes that might be reasonably entertained of
bringing it to a speedy termination. The public were al-
ready aware, from the unofficial, but authentic, narratives
communicated through this journal, that the British troops
(four companies, under Colonel Gore) had been roughly
handled at St. Denis, while at St. Charles Colonel We-
therall, commanding six companies and a couple of' guns,
had united skill with courage, and had completely suc-
ceeded. The dispatches of this gallant officer make it evi-
dent, howeaa r, that he commanded no more of the country
than wils occupied by the troops immediately with him. Ile
at first determined, as it appears, to advance from St.
Charles to St. Denis, and by the destruction of that post,
which so effectually sheltered the insurgents, repair the mis-
fortune which had befallen Colonel Gore. But this move-
m mt Col. Wetherell was not permitted to accomplish. The
rebels were swarming between him and Chambly in his
roar, with the avowed purpose of cutting off the retreat of
his &team:rest by that route to Montreal. There being