28 FINE FUTURE OF NOVA SCOTIA. 



the wliole of the space which the valley now occupies. 

 And if the Annapolis dyked lands are less rich than those 

 of Cornwallis, it is because the waters of the Bay of 

 Fundy, coming in from the Atlantic, are less loaded with 

 enriching matter as they enter the Gut of Digby than 

 they are after they round Cape Blomedon ; and because 

 the discharge of fresh water into the west end of the 

 valley is less, and the streams come through geological 

 formations that yield their materials less largely to the 

 waters which pass over them. 



Annapolis is a quiet clean town, with considerable 

 shipping capabilities, but little traffic. The drought, the 

 potato failure, and other causes, had made the farmers 

 poor ; the home trade was therefore dull, and the good 

 people of Annapolis in consequence discontented. As they 

 could not think the cause of their interrupted prosperity 

 was in any way to be traced to themselves, they were 

 inclined to believe, with the Canadians, that it must be 

 the fault of the Home Government, and that the certain 

 cure was to shake themselves free of the mother country. 

 I had not had much time to become initiated in local 

 politics, but I was certainly pleased in listening to some 

 of the warmer Annapolis politicians, to find them so very 

 unsuccessful in making for this province anything ap- 

 proaching to a reasonable grievance against the Colonial 

 Office. I pictured to myself Upper Canada in the charac- 

 ter of one London jarvie saying to Nova Scotia in the 

 guise of another, " What, no raw? " and thus exciting the 

 ambition of his brother chip to discover or establish one. 

 My present impression of Nova Scotia is, that it has a 

 fine future before it. The friends of humanity will regret 

 if its local rulers — its inhabitants, that is — shall suffer mi- 

 croscopic or imaginary evils to retard the discovery and de- 

 velopment of its many natural resources, on which the rapid 

 and sure realisation of that fine future so much depends. 



On my arrival at Annapolis, I found that the steamer 



