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1867.

66

The Dominion of Canada.

'Faintly as tolls the evening chime,

Our voices keep tune and our oars keep time.
Soon as the woods on the shore look dim,
We give to St. Ann our parting hymn.
Row, brothers, row! the stream runs fast,

The rapids are near, and daylight's past."

339

The growth of Canada has been affected by few political changes or little to disturb its peace. In 1791 Canada was divided into two provinces, called Upper and Lower Canada, and afterwards Ontario and Quebec. A governor was appointed for each by the English government, and each had its Representative Assembly. In 1840 the British Parliament passed an act uniting the two provinces under the name of the Province of Canada. On the 1st of July, 1867, Queen Victoria, by proclamation, declared the provinces of Ontario (Upper Canada), Quebec (Lower Canada), Nova Scotia (Acadia), and New Brunswick, to be united under one federal government, to be known as the DOMINION OF CANADA. Three other provinces, Prince Edward Island, British Columbia, and Manitoba, afterwards joined this confederation.

The Governor General of Canada is appointed by the sovereign of England, and represents the Crown. He resides at Ottawa, the capital of the Dominion. The viceroyal residence is known as Rideau Hall.

Ottawa, like Montreal, is beautiful in situation. On the west of the city is the cataract of the Ottawa or Chaudière Falls; and on the east are two cataracts, over which the rapid Rideau falls into the Ottawa. The city has a population of about twenty-two thousand.

CHAPTER XVII.

THE STORY OF SLAVERY.

SOON after the Revolution, several slave-owning States prohibited the importation of slaves. The Constitution provided that Congress might suppress the slave-trade after the lapse of twenty years. But for the resistance of South Carolina and Georgia the prohibition would have been immediate. At length, at the earliest moment when it was possible, Congress gave effect to the general sentiment by enacting "that no slaves be imported into any of the thirteen United Colonies."

And why had this not been done earlier? If the colonists were sincere in their desire to suppress this base traffic, why did they not suppress it? The reason is not difficult to find. England would not permit them. England forced the slavetrade upon the reluctant colonists. The English Parliament watched with paternal care over the interests of this hideous traffic. During the first half of the eighteenth century Parliament was continually legislating to this effect. Every restraint upon the largest development of the trade was removed with scrupulous care. Every thing that diplomacy could do to open new markets was done. When the colonists sought by imposing a tax to check the importation of slaves, that tax was repealed. Land was given free, in the West Indies, on condition that the settler should keep four negroes for every hundred acres. Forts were built on the African coast for the protection of the trade. So recently as the year 1749 an Act

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