and 45 was
under drill, and the country was fully prepared and fully expecting
to undertake the invaders without outside assistance, but Great
Britain being in no danger now in Europe, despatched 12,000 men to
Canada, and with her recovered prestige was enabled to remonstrate
forcibly with the Washington Government concerning American
connivance. The British remonstrances had the desired effect, for
the American authorities promptly arrested the leaders of the "army
of deliverance," though by so doing they aroused the animosity of
many of their own supporters. The "army" then speedily fell away
and all danger was over. Of course the benefit to Canada of having
had the national feeling so deeply stirred was incalculable, for
all classes of men in all the provinces had been animated by the
profoundest sentiments and the strongest determination possible,
and it was the opinion of leading military men of the time that the
Canadians under arms, though outnumbered trebly by the intending
invaders, would have held their own gallantly and have come off
victorious.

The excitement aroused by these stirring occurrences began to quiet
down towards the approaching Fall, when the Canadian ship of state
was again under full sail, heading for the waters of prosperity.
Since then our political history has been so intimately connected
with great inventions and discoveries, that a narration of one
without a description of the other is scarcely possible.

II.

"For miracles are ceased;
"And therefore we must needs admit the means
"How things are perfected."
--Henry V, Act I.

It was well understood by the Romans in their palmy days that a
great empire could not be held together without means of easy
communication between distant provinces, and their fine hard roads
ramifying from Rome to the remote corners of Gaul or Dacia, testify
to their wisdom and enterprise in this respect. When Great Britain
in the eighteenth century, full of inventive skill, reared men who
by means of improved roads, well-bred horses and fine vehicles
raised the rate of travel to ten miles an hour from end to end of
the kingdom, a great deal of complacent satisfaction was indulged
in over the advantages likely to result from such rapid travelling.
This great speed, however, was made to appear quite slow in the
first half of the nineteenth century when locomotives were invented
capable of covering sixty miles an hour. Nowa