hich the Assembly attached great
importance, and to which the Legislative Council felt a strong
repugnance, on account of its having in effect placed the juries
entirely in the hands of the French portion of the population. In order
to secure the renewal of this law, the Assembly coupled it in the same
bill by which it renewed the tolls of the Lachine Canal, calculating on
the Council not venturing to defeat a measure of so much importance to
the revenue as the latter by resisting the former. The council,
however, rejected the bill; and thus the canal remained toll-free for a
whole season, because the two Houses differed about a jury law."

So much for their attempts to subvert the constitution. Now let us
inquire how far these patriots were disinterested in their enactments.
First, as to grants for local improvements, how were they applied? His
lordship observes:--

The great business of the Assemblies is, literally, parish business; the
making parish roads and parish bridges. There are in none of these
provinces any local bodies possessing authority to impose local
assessments, for the management of local affairs. To do these things is
the business of the Assembly; and to induce the Assembly to attend to
the particular interests of each county, is the especial business of its
county member. The surplus revenue of the province is swelled to as
large an amount as possible, by cutting down the payment of public
services to as low a scale as possible; and the real duties of
government are, sometimes, insufficiently provided for, in order that
more may be left to be divided among the constituent bodies. `When we
want a bridge, we take a judge to build it,' was the quaint and forcible
way in which a member of a provincial legislature described the tendency
to retrench, in the most necessary departments of the public service, in
order to satisfy the demands for local works. This fund is voted by the
Assembly on the motion of its members; the necessity of obtaining the
previous consent of the Crown to money votes never having been adopted
by the Colonial Legislatures from the practice of the British House of
Commons. There is a perfect scramble among the whole body to get as
much as possible of this fund for their respective constituents; cabals
are formed, by which the different members mutually play into each
other's hands; general politics are made to bear on private business,
and private business on general pol