. P. Brodeur went to Paris to
negotiate directly a commercial treaty with the French Government.
During the years from 1904 to 1907 the British Government gradually
withdrew all the troops and warships which had been stationed in the
Dominion. Canada assumed control of the fortifications of Halifax and
Esquimalt in July, 1905, and the replacing of British by Canadian
soldiers was complete by February, 1906. The naval dockyard at Halifax
was handed over to the Canadian Government authorities in January,
1907; and from end to end of the Dominion Canada is now in complete and
undivided control of her own territory.

[1] The boundaries of the new provinces were finally settled by an Act
of Parliament passed in 1908--an Act which also greatly enlarged the
boundaries of Manitoba, Ontario, and Quebec.

{434}

XXIX.

FRENCH CANADA.

As this story commenced with a survey from the heights of Quebec of the
Dominion of Canada from ocean to ocean, so now may it fitly close with
a review of the condition of the French Canadian people who still
inhabit the valley of the St. Lawrence, and whose history is
contemporaneous with that of the ancient city whose picturesque walls
and buildings recall the designs of French ambition on this continent.

[Illustration: Quebec in 1896.]

Though the fortifications of Louisbourg and Ticonderoga, of Niagara,
Frontenac, and other historic places of the French regime in America
have been razed to the ground, and the French flag is never seen in the
valley of the St. Lawrence, except on some holiday in company with
other national colours, nevertheless on the continent where she once
thought to reign supreme, France has been able to leave a permanent
impress. But this impress is not in the valley of the Mississippi. It
is true that a number of French still live on the banks of the great
river, that many a little village where a French {436} patois is spoken
lies hidden in the sequestered bayous of the South, and that no part of
the old city of New Orleans possesses so much interest for the European
stranger as the French or Creole quarter, with its quaint balconied
houses and luxuriant gardens; but despite all this, it is generally
admitted that the time is not far distant when the French language will
disappear from Louisiana, and few evidences will be found of the days
of the French occupancy of that beautiful State of the Union. On the
banks of the St. Lawrence, however, Franc