race.

vilege" of Canada is solid ice, which does not move wheels but locks them up. A country like Lower Canada, with neither iron nor coal, gains nothing by cheap labor. In the poorest part of Scotland, Ireland, and Wales, where labor is lowpriced, but where there are no coals-manufactures, although tried, have never succeeded, but they flourish where labor is high and coal abundant. Some deduction, too, must be made for Manufactures in Lower Canada, with lowpriced wages, supposes Gallican laborers ;-artisans of the age of Louis XIII., and Frenchmen of any age, have not as yet been found successful competitors with men of the Anglo-Saxon race, in any great branch of national industry, even on a fair and equal field, which Lower Canada, compared with Pennsylvania, is not. In so far as manufactures are concerned, what the Canadians would acquire would be the privilege of buying dear manufactures, and what they would lose that of purchasing cheap ones.

Let us, however, suppose a peaceable annexation of the Canadas to the Great Federal Republic, and glance at its probable results, as they would affect the different parties interested. It must be a peaceable one, brought about by a friendly negotiation. If not, England will assuredly fight, and whatever be the final issue, the other certain results will be much spilling of blood, and a mulct of not less than a hundred millions on each of the belligerents, with the conversion of Canada into a battle-field for several years, retarding its material prosperity for some quarter of a century. First, then, with respect to the Canadians. The long line of custom-houses on the present frontier will be removed; the productions, the capital, and the population of the Union will enter the Canadas freely; and the lumber of the Canadians (they have little else to exchange) will find a market in the Union without payment of any duty, but in competition with the timber of the present less cultivated States, while they will lose all advantage in the English market-indeed, the English market altogether, for with inferior timber, and a longer carriage, they cannot compete in an equal market with the nations of the north of Europe.

The authors of the Manifesto state that the public service of the United States would be open to them by annexation. But the civil and military services of England are also open to them, for there is not an office under the crown that a Canadian may not now hold. No doubt the Canadas would have the additional privilege, under annexation, of sending representatives to the two houses of the American Legislature; but the professors of ultra loyalism, the leaders of the present movement, could hardly expect to be the choice of democratic constituencies, to represent their country in a republican government.

Next for the advantages of annexation to the

United States. We are disposed to think they will be smaller than to either of the other parties. Upper Canada will be a valuable acquisition, and so will the complete navigation of the lakes and the St. Lawrence. But already over-burthened with territory, "the masters of the fairest and most wealthy climates of the world" (new) will be apt, we should fancy, "to turn with contempt" from the frozen regions of Canada, as Gibbon says the Romans did from the mountains of Caledonia. The greatest gain to America, but it is one which England will equally share in, will con sist in the removal of the only cause of hostile collision, a conterminous territory, that can exist between her and the only nation in the world that can do her harm; the nation of all others, that by community of blood, language, laws, and interests, it is most for her honor and advantage to live with in harmony.

As to England, in our humble opinion, she will be the greatest gainer of the three by annexation. She will be relieved at once from the heavy load of responsibility with which she is now burthened in her impossible attempts, at the distance of 4,000 miles, to govern wisely a free people whom her statesmen never see, and of whom they know nothing beyond what they find recorded in sheets of foolscap. Further, England will be relieved of the whole military, naval, and ordnance charge of the Canadas, all paid from the Imperial Treasury, and the amount of which, we believe, will not be overstated at a million per annum, contingencies included. Then, with a peaceful settlement, she will be repaid for the great sums which she has lent for the construction of canals and other public works. Neither will her commerce in any respect suffer, but on the contrary gain, as it did under more unfavorable auspices, after the separation of the old colonies. One of our contemporaries says that the agitation of annexation by the Canadians would have been looked on "in the good old times" as "high treason;" but "the good old times," if that were so, were very foolish old times, and in our opinion Lord Elgin has acted with perfect wisdom in throwing no impediment in the way of a fair discussion of the question.

THE Journal des Débats describes an important discovery, which occupies the attention of the French scientific world. It is a mechanical leech, celebrated for his useful discoveries. All the sciinvented by M. Alexander, a civil engineer already entific bodies, after satisfactory trials, have caused this leech to be adopted in all the hospitals; having proved not only the immense economy of its use, but, what is better, the decided advantage which it has over the natural leech, often so scarce, always repugnant to the patient, and sometimes lic has given orders for the supply of the apparatus dangerous. The president of the French Repubin every commune where it may be found serviceable to indigent patients.

1. Miss Pardoe's Francis the First, 2. Herman Melville's Redburn,

3. Hudson's Bay Territory,

4. Humboldt's Aspects of Nature,

Spectator,

แ

PROSPECTUS. This work is conducted in the spirit of Littell's Museum of Foreign Literature, (which was favorably received by the public for twenty years,) but as it is twice as large, and appears so often, we not only give spirit and freshness to it by many things which were excluded by a month's delay, but while thus extending our scope and gathering a greater and more attractive variety, are able so to increase the solid and substantial part of our literary, historical, and political harvest, as fully to satisfy the wants of the American reader.

The elaborate and stately Essays of the Edinburgh, Quarterly, and other Reviews; and Blackwood's noble criticisms on Poetry, his keen political Commentaries, highly wrought Tales, and vivid descriptions of rural and mountain Scenery; and the contributions to Literature, History, and Common Life, by the sagacious Spectator, the sparkling Examiner, the judicious Athenæum, the busy and industrious Literary Gazette, the sensible and comprehensive Britannia, the sober and respectable Christian Observer; these are intermixed with the Military and Naval reminiscences of the United Service, and with the best articles of the Dublin University, New Monthly, Fraser's, Tait's, Ainsworth's, Hood's, and Sporting Magazines, and of Chambers' admirable Journal. We do not consider it beneath our dignity to borrow wit and wisdom from Punch; and, when we think it good enough, make use of the thunder of The Times. We shall increase our variety by importations from the continent of Europe, and from the new growth of the British colonies.

The steamship has brought Europe, Asia and Africa, into our neighborhood; and will greatly multiply our connections, as Merchants, Travellers, and Politicians, with all parts of the world; so that much more than ever it

Mechanical Leech, 618.

now becomes every intelligent American to be informed of the condition and changes of foreign countries. And this not only because of their nearer connection with ourselves, but because the nations seem to be hastening, through a rapid process of change, to some new state of things, which the merely political prophet cannot compute or foresee.

Geographical Discoveries, the progress of Colonization, (which is extending over the whole world,) and Voyages and Travels, will be favorite matter for our selections; and, in general, we shall systematically and very fully acquaint our readers with the great department of Foreign affairs, without entirely neglecting our own.

While we aspire to make the Living Age desirable to all who wish to keep themselves informed of the rapid progress of the movement--to Statesmen, Divines, Lawyers, and Physicians-to men of business and men of leisure-it is still a stronger object to make it attractive and useful to their Wives and Children. We believe that we can thus do some good in our day and generation; and hope to make the work indispensable in every well-informed family. We say indispensable, because in this day of cheap literature it is not possible to guard against the influx of what is bad in taste and vicious in morals, in any other way than by furnishing a sufficient supply of a healthy character. The mental and moral appetite must be gratified.

We hope that, by "winnowing the wheat from the chaff," by providing abundantly for the imagination, and by a large collection of Biography, Voyages and Travels, History, and more solid matter, we may produce a work which shall be popular, while at the same time it will aspire to raise the standard of public taste.

Clubs, paying a year in advance, will be supplied as follows:

tion of this work--and for doing this a liberal commission will be allowed to gentlemen who will interest themselves in the business. And we will gladly correspond on this subject with any agent who will send us undoubted refer

ences.

Postage. When sent with the cover on, the Living Age consists of three sheets, and is rated as a pamphlet, at 44 cents. But when sent without the cover, it comes within the definition of a newspaper given in the law, and cannot legally be charged with more than newspaper postage, (1) cis.) We add the definition alluded to:

A newspaper is "any printed publication, issued in numbers, consisting of not more than two sheets, and published at short, stated intervals of not more than one month, conveying intelligence of passing events."

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WASHINGTON, 27 DEC., 1845.

J. Q. ADAMS.