The Sun.
London, England, 1845-12-17 00:00:00

CANADA.

We have Canadian advices to the 26th ultimo.
The departure of Lord Metcalfe is thus an-
nounced in the Montreal Courier :

" His Excellency the Governor-General has, we
believe, decided on leaving Canada immediately. Lord
Metcalfe did not tender his resignation to her Majesty,
but we are informed that: the state of his Lordship's
health being known to the Home Government, they
very considerately offered to Lord Aletealfe to relieve
him of his onerous office. We have not heard who is to
be Lord Metcalfe's successor. The government will in
the interim be administered by the Earl of Cathcart.
For the sake of the colony we cannot but regret that we
are to be deprived of Lord Metcalfe's services, but
knowing as we do the state of bodily suffering under
which he has been labouring for some months, although
he has supported his afflictions with the most heroic for-
titude, we cannot but be pleased that for his Lordship's
sake the cares of an onerous office are no longer to be
added to the sufferings of a painful malady."
The Gazette writes—

" lle will depart with the fervent good wishes and
sympathy of all the loyal and right-thinking inhabit-
ants of Canada, and leave behind him a feeling of pro-
found regret for his loss ; and his departure will be at-
tended on the part of the inhabitants of this city by such
testimonials of their respect as harmonize with the pain-
ful occasion of his retirement, and with the obvious wish
on the part of the illustrious sufferer to escape the fa-
tigue and excitement of public leave-taking."
A meeting of the Montreal Town-Council, held on
the 26th ult., agreed upon and presented to Lord
Metcalfe an address, expressing the deep sympathy
which, "in common with our fellow-subjects through-
out this province, we feel fo, r the cause which has
necessitated your Lordships retirement from the
government of British America."
"The discussion of the Oregon question," says a Mon-
treal letter published in the New York journals, " and
the probabilities of a war between the United States and
Great Britain are the chief topics at present with'the
Te
nhde rtehcee n
frontier
orders
fortifications,from t h
men
dG ot
0-
mevCreaerncnardneaenwptrtoeonssee.sxatt several points on the St. Lawrence,
add not a little interest to the matter. The projected
improvements are on a magnificent scale, and, with all
the labour th.tt could be had, will take two or three years
to complete them. From this fact alone, in my view of
matters, there is a 'great cry and little wad.' The en-
largement of the locks on the canals is not yet finished ;
and from the gigantic size of the proposed ones (240 feet
long and 45 feet wide), it will take the whole of next
season to complete them. The improvements made this
season have already reached 2,000,000 dolls., and I am
informed by the engineers that there are at this time
about 7,000 labourers on the public works."

OREGON.
(From the Boston Atlas, of Nov. 22.)
The forbearance of the Whig press, in reference to
Oregon, has encouraged certain editors, who are dis-
posed "to go for the whole," to assert that a majority
of the people are in favour of that desperate course.
This forbearance has been commendable, inasmuch as it
indicates a willingness to let Government make the best
of its negotiation. But when circumstances show that
advantage is taken of this well-meant disposition, and
that a misconstruction of public sentiment may lead to
measures fatal to the public peace, it becomes proper to
break silence, and to speak loud, as the least of two
evils, although the enemy must overhear. If it were really
true that a majority of the people are in favour of persever-
ing, at all hazards, in the extent of our claim to Oregon, it
might still be pertinent to inquire, what portion of such
majority possesses the information which qualifies it
to decide upon the merits of a most grave and complicated
question of international law, which has occupied, for
forty years, the research of great jurists and statesmen,
with different results. Is it disrespectful to assert that
the number of five hundred persons is a liberal estimate,
of those who have in fact investigated the documentary
pt
nei o
title n
for
o
evidence on this subject ? And is it less liberal to pre-
sume that five thousand exceeds the number of those
themselves,wlio are
uponcompetent
a and
thoroughdisposed
iinvestigation
et
sot
ifgoar
tmi
na no or
It seems, then, to be impossible that any number of
persons, consieerable in reference to a majority of the
people, in the United States, are judges of the merits of
the claim, or can be ready, from their sober conviction,
to embark in " war to the knife, to maintain the say-so
of President Polk. If they push things to this extreme,
it must be upon advice of counsel, and not from their
own conscientious persuasion of the justice of our claim.
On such advice then, and such alone, it is to be feared that
many of our enlightened representatives are ready to
act, and will act. But it fortunately happens that,
while the great body of the people are, and must re-
main, ignorant of the merits of our claim, every man
of common understanding, is capable of estimating its