CANADIAN NOMS-DE-PLUME IDENTIFIED. 263 



subjects more or less identical with those just envimerated, we have 

 Roseharp, Cinna, Isidore, Plinius Secundus, Claud Halcro, Zadig. 



I exclude with regret, from, a kind of necessity, Lower Canadian 

 French noms-de-plume, not having convenient access to the early 

 joui-nals and other publications which from time to time have 

 appeared in what is now the Province of Quebec ; but I know there 

 are several which are duly honoured by literary men there. I 

 also exclude the writings of Mr. Samuel Slick, the famous clock- 

 maker of Slickville, the decease of their author having occurred 

 before his native province, ISTova Scotia, was comprised within the 

 Canadian boundaries. 



I begin with the pi-ose writers ; and of these I dispose first of those 

 whom I have classed as miscellaneous. 



In the periodicals of 1833 and of several successive years, pub- 

 lished at Toronto, appeared many communications on miscellaneous 

 subjects, signed Guy Pollock. They attracted general attention, 

 being marked by an elevation of thought and culture beyond the 

 ordinary, and by a good style. I give a passage from a description 

 of the Falls of Niagara, by Guy Pollock, in the Canadian Literary) 

 Magazine for April, 1833, in which he offers some strictures on the 

 great catai-act thus : " Were I to wiite a criticism on nature — which, 

 by the way, would be something like presumption — I would say," Guy 

 Pollock writes, " that for producing a grand emotion, the cascade is 

 too low when compared with its extent across the river. The architec- 

 tural proportions, as builders express the idea, are not preserved, the 

 river even grows broader immediately above the Falls — a circum- 

 stance which gives the cascade too much the appearance of an 

 immense mill dam — an appearance which excites a very ordinary, 

 although, no doubt, a very useful idea. The Falls of Niagara are 

 great," he continues, "and therefore in some measure grand; but, 

 unless for their magnitude, which in that respect gives them a 

 decided superiority, they are, in respect of sublimity of aspect and 

 grandeur of surrounding scenery, far inferior to the Falls of Clyde, 

 rotmd which the jackdaws are screaming, above the goshawks are 

 soaring, and under the overhanging groves the bat flies at noon. 

 Compared with the Falls of Clyde, those of Niagara have a lifeless 

 appearance." 



The following is from a chapter on craiiiology in the same periodi- 

 cal, by the same writer, under the same signature : ''The common 



