LEAVES THEY HAVE TOUCHED. 75 



■^eristic of tke respective writers, or, if not so to be described, cliarac- 

 teristic of the times, or indicative of the manners of the day. Here 

 and there my specimen may form, a test for a veiy brief dissertation 

 on some j^oint which it may suggest. Chronological succession or 

 contemporaneousness will, as I have already hinted, be the chief 

 principle of connection between the several parts of each of my 

 papers. 



I.— SOME CANADIAN AUTOGRAPHS AND NORTH AMERICAN 

 GENERALLY. 



I proceed, then j&rst, with my Canadian autographs. I have aimed, 

 at a catena of manuscript memorials of governors and others who 

 have been of note among us ; but I have been hitherto only partially 

 successful in securing specimens. The difficulty of recovering manu- 

 script relics of sixty or seventy years ago is not slight. Whenever 

 the only quotations I have it in my power . to give are somewhat 

 colourless, I trust to Canadian local feeling to clothe seemingly trivial 

 words with the needful modicum of interest. 



To make a beginning, I produce an autograph letter of the French 

 Duke de la Rochefoucauld-Liancourt. This nobleman visited Canada 

 in 1795. He remained for some time at Newark or Niagara, and 

 then passed down the lake to Kingston. In the account of his ti'avels 

 which he afterwards published, he gave an elaborate description of 

 Upper and Lower Canada, and commented in statesmanlike style on 

 the policy of the Governor-General of the day. Lord Doixjkester, and; 

 on that of the Lieutenant-Governor of the young western province^. 

 General Simcoe. The letter which I have expressly relates to this 

 his volume of Travels, which I need scarcely say has now become a 

 classic to the student of Canadian history. Soon ^ftev its publica- 

 tion on the continent of Evirope, it was translated into Englisbi and 

 published in London. It appears that the first sheet of the English 

 production, containing the Translator's Preface, had been sent over to 

 the duke, and he was shocked at some language which the translator 

 had therein employed in regard to himself. He found himself openly 

 charged with a breach of faith in proclaiming to the world certain 

 matters that had been made known to him in the confidence of 

 private conversation. The letter which ensues is the one which I 

 have in my collection. It is in French, and is addressed to Mr. 

 Neuman, the English translator. The duke says : " Monsieurj — 

 Une petite parUe de la traduction que vous publiez Ce mon Voyage 



