CANADIAN NOMS-DE-PLUME IDENTIFIED. 345 



wisli for peace and quietness as the fruit of ignominious vassalage, 

 let them petition for the abolition of the Provincial Parliament, which 

 cannot exist without constantly reminding them of their degrada- 

 tion. There may be something noble in political slavery; but 

 political slavery with the forms of freedom is, to all intents and pur- 

 poses, wretched and utterly despicable." 



The lettei-s of Legion Avere from the pen of Rol^ert Baldwin Sulli- 

 van, afterwards one of the judges of the Queen's Bench, and pre- 

 viously a member of successive Governments before and after the 

 union of the Canadas. The author of the letters of Legion was 

 wont in his younger days to contribute papers of a humorous and 

 playful character to the literary periodicals of the day. In Sibbald's 

 Canadian Magazine, published at York (Toronto) in 1833, are to 

 be seen communications of his under the 7iom-cle-j)lume of " Cinna." 

 I select a passage from an amusing '•' Essay on Roads," by Cinna.* 

 " This being an introductf)ry essay," the writer says, " it is fit that I 

 explain that my remarks will not be confined to mere tei-restrial 

 roads ; they will, indeed, be principally directed to those mental high- 

 ways along which the glorious march of intellect is conducted, or 

 rather driven with such steam-engine impetuosity. The schoolmaster 

 is abroad, they say; and, indeed, for any use he is of, may so re- 

 main ; learning is acquired nowadays without his assistance. The 

 road to the temple of Fame has been levelled and macadamized; and 

 there are rumours of a railway and a canal. This last, to be sure, is 

 opposed by some old sober-sided fools, who think that the ancient 

 institutions at the top of the hill, and which have been erected v/ith 

 so much labour, will slide into the deep cut which would be necessary 

 to bring the canal down to ditch-water level ; but suppose they do, 

 who cares'? Is it not better to go on a iow-path over their ruins, 

 than be threatened with a hevipen one, into the other world, for try- 

 ing to undermine them *? When I was a little boy, my grandmother 

 thought me a youth of talents rare when I learned my letters ; and 

 to say the truth, my talons were often made to look as rare as an 

 Abyssinian beefsteak before I acquired so much learning. I then 

 stuck so long in orthography, that one would think I was spell- 

 bound. Oh ! if I had only waited till now, when grown up gentle- 

 men and ladies are taught writing in six short lessons. I might in a 



* Of a later date is the "Cinna" of Barker's Canadian Magazine and the Kingston British 

 Whig, understood to have been W. B. Wells, Esq., now County Judge of Kent. 



