savage and a half-civilized state, men should be found to revel in the common use of the most vicious enormities: But I am greatly surprised to hear, that a practice so vile and revolting to humanity,— so derogatory from the dignity of man, so far beneath what should be the ideas of creatures endowed with understanding, however obscured by the clouds of ignorance, is allowed to exist in England, that luminary of the moral world! In various American companies, when I have presumed to reprobate this cruel usage, to my no small confusion have I always been met with a plea of justification; and "England set us the example!" has invariably been the sweeping stroke to level all my arguments. To such an extent is this method of boxing carried in the Southern States of America, that when the people of New England or those of Canada observe a man who has only one eye, and the place where the other is not, they commonly say that he has received a Virginian brand.

LETTER XXVII.

MANNERS AND CUSTOMS OF THE UPPER PROVINCE → WANT OF

HOSPITALITY AMONG THE CANADIANS — THEIR WINTER VISITS →THEIR AVARICE, AND VARIOUS MODES OF GAINING MONEY— BARTER-DR. HOWISON'S TESTIMONY ON THESE TOPIcs.

DR. HOWISON says, that the Canadians are more than commonly hospitable to strangers. As I agree with this gentleman on most other subjects relating to Canada, which he has touched with his very able pen, I am really sorry that what I conceive to be the truth compels me to disagree with him in this particular,-especially, because it may seem invidious in me, to persons who are not acquainted with the country, and are always for placing the best possible construction on the motives and actions of their fellow-creatures. You will excuse me, however, when you recollect that I promised to give you my own opinions concerning every thing which I observed, and not the opinions of other men. It is possible, that Dr. Howison, and your correspondent, may differ respecting the import of the term HOSPITALITY; and it is more than proba

ble, since I prefer the Irish acceptation of the word, that I have mistaken its true and legitimate meaning. We Hibernians may, for aught I know, be liable, for the misapplication of terms, to the same objection as the French, who, according to the English sailor, call a horse a shovel; but terms, in the question before us, are of so little consequence, that I am inclined to think "roast meat by any other name would taste as sweet." Be this as it may, I am very sure, that if "the essence of hospitality be prodigality, and the name of stranger the only requisite passport to its favour," this rare virtue has no existence in Upper Canada.

I call hospitality A VIRTUE, and I hope you will. not consider the word a misnomer. It is, in my opinion, a virtue of a very high order, enjoined by the Saviour of man, and strongly recommended by all his immediate followers. Although I might find some difficulty in telling you exactly what it is, I certainly can find none in telling you what it is not.—To ask a stranger, who enters at your door, to partake of the good things on your table, to shelter himself in your cabin, and to repose upon your bed,—and, when he rises in the morning and bids you God speed!, to receive from his hands a full pecuniary remuneration for all your kindness;—this is not hospitality. Nor can I give the appellation to those reciprocal interchanges of entertainment which are common in all decently organized societies, and the exercise of which among the lowest orders proves man to be a social animal,

No hospitality is of a much higher & character ; and I feel some pride in being a native of almost the only country on earth, whose inhabitants can justly boast of inheriting this virtue from the ear liest ages, and of having delivered it unimpaired to their sons and daughters up to the present hour. That cheerful and polite attention which the Irish occupant of a mud-walled cabin uniformly shews to the stranger who honours his threshold with a visit, that fond solicitude which the humblest of Hibernia's sons displays for the comfort of his guest, those looks of liberality which shew, that, while the hand is extended to administer to your convenience, the heart is in it, such marked traits of genuine hospitality are no where to be witnessed in the more comfortable habitations of Upper Canada.

True it is, that if you enter the house of a Canadian while he is at any of his meals, he will invite you to eat, but it will be in such a cold and heartless manner, that, if you were not sorely pressed by hunger, you could not think of accepting his invitation. Sit by," or "Take a seat," is the most cordial solicitation you will hear; and this, I must confess, I have always thus interpreted: " It is "the custom of our country to ask you to eat, if you appear at the door when provisions are "upon the table: We therefore invite you to take a seat; but, if it would not put you to an incon"venience, the staying of your appetite for the "present would oblige us much more!" Intravelling through various parts of America, I have

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been frequently compelled to accept this sort of invitation; but, whenever it so happened, I always asked, on my departure, the customary question, "What have I to pay?," and with only one exception which I now recollect, the universal reply was, "Whatever you please to give." In such cases, it was my uniform custom to hand over the 'sum I should have paid at any respectable tavern if similarly entertained, and, with the excep tion I have mentioned, it was invariably received without even a simple "I thank you!"

In these remarks, you must bear in mind, that I always speak of the great mass of the Canadians, unless› I particularize the FIRST CLASS,—a class,› which in Upper Canada bears nearly the same proportion to the aggregate population of the country, as the inmates of a single dwelling do to the inha-: bitants of a large city.

son;

The manners of a people," says Dr. John

"are not to be found in the schools of learning, or the palaces of greatness, where the national character is obscured or obliterated by travel or instruction, by vanity or philosophy. Nor is public happiness to be estimated by the assemblies of the gay, or the banquets of the rich. The great mass of nations is neither rich nor gay: They whose aggregate constitutes THE PEOPLE, are found in the streets and villages, in the shops and farms; and from them, collectively considered, must the measure of general prosperity, [and, I will add, of manners and morals,] be taken." Regarding this as