that in its commencement the life of a poor settler in Northwest Canada is at the best a hard one? The winters are long, the cold intense; in spring the surface of the country is a vast sea of liquid mud, that sticks like glue; in summer he becomes a prey to flies and insects-graphically described by the Americans in "Martin Chuzzlewit" as "catawampous chawers in a small way, as graze on a human being pretty strong." These are, however, just the conditions on which lie enjoys possession of about the richest soil in the world for the growth of wheat and other products; and if he is industrious and persevering, he will in a few years certainly see himself surrounded with an amount of comfort and prosperity he never could hope for in the old country.

"A Year in Manitoba" should be carefully read by intending emigrants. What a contrast it is to a life in England! When they get there they find the "dwelling-house" a dilapidated shed, not lit for cattle; the cattle sheds, a collection of ruined buildings that might have been stables in happier clays, but at present were simply roofless piles of manure and rubbish. "Had the circumstances been any less serious, one would have regarded the matter as a ridiculous hoax, and entered somewhat into the joke. But to have been brought, with a family, some five thousand miles to be made the victims of such humour, was indeed a jest too grim for anything but the deepest indignation." The father had been a soldier, the mother a soldier's wife. They were not novices in the mode of life they had elected to pursue. But the author admits that'' under some circumstances it might well have proved Heart-breaking drudgery; but our business has been to settle our sons, cruel pecuniary losses