naturally the effect of making even the better class narrow-minded,
selfish, and at last careless of anything like refinement. Men who lived
for years without the means of frequent communication with their
fellow-men, without opportunities for social, instructive intercourse,
except what they might enjoy at rare intervals through the visit of some
intelligent clergyman or tourist, might well have little ambition except
to satisfy the grosser wants of their nature. The post office, the
school, and the church were only to be found, in the majority of cases,
at a great distance from their homes. Their children, as likely as not,
grew up in ignorance, even were educational facilities at hand; for in
those days the parent had absolute need of his son's assistance in the
avocations of pioneer life. Yet, with all these disadvantages, these men
displayed a spirit of manly independence and fortitude which was in some
measure a test of their capacity for better things. They helped to make
the country what it is, and to prepare the way for the larger population
which came into it under more favourable auspices after the Union of
1840. From that time Canada received a decided impulse in everything
that tends to make a country happy and prosperous. Cities, towns and
villages sprang up with remarkable activity all over the face of the
country, and vastly enlarged the opportunities for that social
intercourse which is always an important factor in the education of a
new country. At the same time, with the progress of the country in
population and wealth, there grew up a spirit of self-reliance which of
itself attested the mental vigour of the people. Whilst England was
still for many 'the old home,' rich in memories of the past, Canada
began to be a real entity, as it were, a something to be loved, and to
be proud of. The only reminiscences that very many had of the countries
of their origin were reminiscences of poverty and wretchedness, and this
class valued above all old national associations the comfort and
independence, if not wealth, they had been able to win in their Canadian