of discussing politics, a gossip with
his fellows at the church door after service, a visit now and then to
the county town, and he will be happy. It does not take much to amuse
him, while he is quite satisfied that his spiritual safety is secured
as long as he is within sound of the church bells, goes regularly to
confession, and observes all the _fetes d'obligation_. If he or one of
his family can only get a little office in the municipality, or in the
"government," then his happiness is nearly perfect. Indeed, if he were
not a bureaucrat, he would very much belie his French origin. Take him
all in all, however, Jean-Baptiste, as he is familiarly known, from the
patron saint of French Canada, has many excellent qualities. He is
naturally polite, steady in his habits, and conservative in his
instincts. He is excitable and troublesome only when his political
passions are thoroughly aroused, or his religious principles are at
stake; and then it is impossible to say to what extreme he will go.
Like the people from whom he is descended--many of whose
characteristics he has never lost since his residence of centuries on
the American continent--he is greatly influenced by matters of feeling
and sentiment, and the skilful master of rhetoric has it constantly in
his power to sway him to an extent which is not possible in the case of
the stronger, less impulsive Saxon race, with whom reason and argument
prevail to a large degree.

{448}

In the present, as in the past, the Church makes every effort to
supervise with a zealous care the mental food that is offered for the
nourishment of the people in the rural districts, where it exercises
the greatest influence. Agnosticism is a word practically unknown in
the vocabulary of the French Canadian _habitant_, who is quite ready to
adhere without wavering to the old belief which his forefathers
professed. Whilst the French Canadians doubtless lose little by
refusing to listen to the teachings which would destroy all
old-established and venerable institutions, and lead them into an
unknown country of useless speculation, they do not, as a rule, allow
their minds sufficient scope and expansion. It is true that a new
generation is growing up with a larger desire for philosophic inquiry
and speculation. But whilst the priests continue to control the public
school system of the province, they have a powerful means of
maintaining the current of popular thought in that conserva