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making implements of agriculture and articles of convenience, form the leading occupation of the men.

Fishing is rather an amusement than a laborious pursuit. Spear fishing with torch light in calm summer nights, along the shores of the rivers, conveys something peculiarly striking to the observer. The light canoes that bear the torches and the spearmen over the surface of the smooth limpid waters follow in succession, each exhibiting a beautiful bright light.

The Americans who navigate the Durham boats are very different beings from the Canadian boatmen who man the bateaux. The former are generally tall, lank fellows, seldom without an immense quid of tobacco in their mouths; grave-tempered schemers, yet vulgar, and seldom cheerful; "grinning horribly" when they venture an attempt to laugh.

The Canadian boatman, or voyageur, is naturally polite, and always cheerful; fond enough of money when he once possesses it, but altogether unacquainted with overreaching; and if he attempts to cheat, he knows not how. He sings, smokes, and enjoys whatever comes in his way, thanking " Le bon Dieu, la Vierge, et les Saints" for every thing. The voyageurs know every channel, rapid, rock, and shoal, in the rivers they navigate; and, never pretending to question their leader or bourgeois, fearlessly expose themselves to the greatest hardships and the most frightful dangers. When singing their

work, and such other knowledge as rendered the girls eminently useful in domestic management were taught. The Canadian women, therefore, owe their superior intelligence to the good Sisters of the Congregation.

celebrated boat-songs, two usually begin, two others response, and then all join in full chorus. These songs make them forget their labour, and enliven their long and perilous voyages. Nothing can be more imposing than a fleet of canoes, and the voyageurs all singing "cheerily," while paddling over the bosom of a lake, or along the sylvan shores of the St. Lawrence or Ottawa.

The inhabitants of Normandy, - from which part of France, and from Picardy, the ancestry of the Canadian habitans chiefly emigrated, - are those whom the latter resemble most in their morals, customs, and dwellings. But the peasantry of Normandy and Picardy have changed many of their habits and customs, while the Canadians have retained them.

Crimes are very rare among the habitans. Honesty, chastity, piety, and superstition, -the latter not more common, however, than in Scotland and Ireland, - are prominent in the Canadian character. Perhaps no population on earth possess more happiness in their circumstances, joined to so much virtue in their lives.

CHAP. XXIV.

STATISTICS OF LOWER CANADA.

THE statistics of Lower Canada, according to the census taken during the year 1831, under the provincial act, are more accurate and full than those of any other colony. The following is abstracted from the returns published by the provincial parliament:

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The statistical abstract from the returns made in 1765 to the Board of Trade, given in the Historical Sketch of Canada in this work, will exhibit the condition of Canada 67 years ago, in contradistinction to its state at the present time; and by adopting the most correct returns and calculations, the natural increase of Canadians of French race will appear as follows:

In 1763, according to General Murray's report, the whole Canadian population in the province of Quebec (including Detroit), was

68,575

In 1803, forty years afterwards, the population of this race nearly quadrupled, as the returns for the

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In 1831, the number, per census, (which is con

sidered under-rated), and deducting the Irish

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