The Sun.
London, England, 1865-09-14 00:00:00

extent of such additional markets as 750,000 custo-
mers might afford—a number inferior to that of the
population of New York city alone.
" Whether from poverty, lack of public spirit, or
ignorance, Canada lags behind in the race of im-
provement, and allows Massachusetts and New York
to divert from the natural channel of the St. Law-
rence the immense and yearly-increasing trade of the
States that border on the great lakes. The St. Law-
rence and Welland Canals, which up to the year 1862
had cost the sum of $15,000,000, are not wide
enough for the traffic that New York diverts to the
Hudson River through the Erie Canal, and yield no
revenue, although the public accounts, from the im-
perfect arrangement of the tables,would seem to indi-
cate that some small sum is received over and above
the expenses. This deficiency is in striking contrast
with the great canal system of the State of New
York in connexion with the grain growing and ex-
porting West, which in 1862 showed a gross profit
of $5,000,000. The State of New York is con-
tinually improving its canals,'while Canada remains
content to do nothing. During the past 10 years
the New York canals have been deepened and en-
larged so Can to admit barges of 210 tons, where
barges of 84 tons only could previously navigate, an
improvement which has so reduced the rate of
freights in conjunction with the lower freights from
New York to Europe that it costs less to transport
a cargo of flour from Chicago to Liverpool via the
Hudson than it costs to transport it through the
Lakes and the St. Lawrence, via Montreal and
Quebec. Some improvements have, it is true, been
made in the St. Lawrence Canals, but these are of
no avail as long as the Welland Canal—the key of
the whole navigation—is left with locks of only 26ft.
6in. in width. The consequence of this all but culp-
able inertia—which is never sought to be justified
by anybody, except on the plea of poverty—has
been that the St. Lawrence only receives about nine
per cent. of the immense corn and provision trade
that bursts rather than flows into New York and
Boston—partly for the supply of the wealthy eastern
States of the Union, and partly for the supply of
Europe. The New York system of canals has re-
ceived its utmost development. It is impossible to
widen or deepen them any more, or by any outlay,
however prodigal, to enable a sea-going vessel
to sail from Oswego or Buffalo to Europe by
way of the Hudson River. The Erie Canal has
an enormous traffic, and although immense quan-
tities of provision and flour positively rot in
the granaries of the West for want of tran-
sportation, or are burnt for fuel in default of
other means of making them of utility, the Erie
Canal has no means of providing additional trans-
port. Yet the St. Lawrence route, which, if the
canals were enlarged, could convey the whole quan-
tity were it doubled or trebled, languishes for want
of traffic. The trade of the Lakes, for which Canada
from her admirable position ought to have played,
has thus passed into the hands of a foreign rival, by
no means so well placed by nature to secure it, and
is for the present lost, and may never be regained.
In losing it the many expensive though insufficient
works which she constructed, with the fatal omis-
sion to make them continuous, remain in Canadian
hands, worse than unproductive, because they not
only yield no returns, but cost large sams to pre-
vent them from falling into disrepair. Had the
Welland Canal been doubled in width, and deepened
to a little more than half the capacity of the channel
through Lake St. Peter, which admits ocean vessels
drawing 20 feet of water to come direct to the
wharves of Montreal, the St. Lawrence route would
have been superior to that of the Erie Canal, inas-
much as vessels of 800 tons (and not of 210 only)
could have proceeded from Chicago, Oswego, and
other Lake ports direct to the ocean without trans-
shipment. Although these improvements and many
others have been urged by the Canadian depart-
ment of Public Works in every report it has made
since 1848, as well as by Mr. Young, both as a
Minister and a private citizen, and by some of the
most eminent merchants of the country, yet nothing
effectual has been done. The plea always put for-
ward has been want of funds. Yet, although six or
eight millions of dollars at thexamost would have
sufficed—there has been no *eat difficulty in pro-
curing or becoming indebted for, at least half the
amount for the useless Parliamentary and other
public buildings at Ottawa. Even the purchase of
the North-Western territory from the Hudson's
Bay Company, for five millions of dollars, utterly
unnecessary as the purchase is, has failed to alarm
the Administration, and it has recommended it to
the Canadian peopie with the sanction of the
Crown."

In these statements are epitomised the opinions,
not only of many gentlemen engaged in the western
trade, but of many non-traders who recognise its
importance. The conclusion these gentlemen draw
from these facts and arguments is, that if Canada
formed a part of the American Union, American
capital and enterprise would undertake for the canal
system of the lakes and the St. Lawrence that ?Which
Canadian capital is insufficient to perform, And to
which British capital is not and will not be attracted
so long as the forcible annexation of Canada to the
United States is one of the possibilities of a not very
remote future. " I know," said one of them, whose
loyalty to the British Crown would not be suspected
if I were at liberty to mention his name, that it is
not agreeable to the majority of the Canadian people
to believe that, for weal or woe, the progress and
well-being of Canada are far more intimately linked
with the United States than with the mother country.
But as you have asked for my opinion I give it un-
reservedly. Canada is now a source of weakness to
England ; and situated as Canada is on this conti-
nent, exposed to the calamities of war, should any
difference unfortunately arise between Great Britain
and America, England is also a source of weakness
to Canada. The Canadians ought to have more
pride as a people than to continue a relationship to
Great Britain which Great Britain does not greatly
prize, if it prizes at all. They ought also to have
more self-reliance than to continue to walk on the
crutches supplied by the mother country, rather
than use the limbs which nature has given them.
There is no antagonism to Great Britain, or any
ill feeling towards her, in my mind, or I think in
that of any Canadian. Our fault is that we love
England too well, or rather, I should say, that we
love her too selfishly, and have not the true manli-
ness to look our true destiny fairly in the face. If
Confederation lead to independence, I am in its
favour ; if it lead to incorporation with the States,
lam also in its favour. At the same time I be-
lieve that Confederation cannot be carried out, and
that when annexation comes it will be in the shape
of a gradual absorption of the Provinces one at a
time—Canada first, and the maritime Provinces at
a later period."
I have thought it right to reproduce these opi-
nions in order that I might present to your readers
the views of a minority of English speaking colo-
nists and natives of the Provinces, who look upon
the question of Confederation in the light of their
material interests, real or supposed, and who, with
the true cosmopolitanism of the mercantile charac-
ter, are not much affected by so local a sentiment
as patriotism. If they love England much, they
love wealth and their adopted country still more.
At the same time it is necessary to state that they
know themselves to be on the unpopular side, and
rarely give expression to their sentiments, except in
the confidence of business or friendship. Public
opinion, divided as it is on the mere question of
Confederation, runs strongly in favour of the British
connection, and annexation to the States is not
mentioned in public life or in the newspapers, ex-
cept to be denounced as folly at the best, and as
treeason at the worst. So far as I have seen, only
two newspapers, and those of no particular note,
one published in London, Canada West, and the
the other at St. Catherine's, have ventured to re-
commend it.

The subject of canal improvement promises to
occupy for the future a much larger space in Cana-
dian politics than has hitherto been accorded to it.
Ministryprovided always
thewaysOpposition
that the money for
in
nThie present
tsfaTou
r, and are alike
the purpose can be raised by public loan or by pri-
vate speculation. On Thursday last Mr. Holton,
late Minister of Finance, who while in office was as
supine as his predecessors and successors, moved an
amendment, on going into committee of supply, in
favour of the immediate enlargement of the Wel-
land and the St. Lawrence Canals, as a means of