No return was received from Gaspé, except for the schools of the Royal Institution.

These establishments are mainly supported as follows:

The schools of the Royal Institution, by an annual grant from the Legislature of about £.1,900, on an average, since 1818.

The colleges in the towns, by the revenues of the landed property appertaining to each of those establishments, and by the amount of the boarding and tuition of scholars.

The colleges in the country have all been founded by gentlemen of the clergy, and are mainly supported by them. The amount of boarding and tuition forms the remainder of their income.

Convents, by the revenues of landed property granted to them, and by the amount of boarding and tuition.

Gratuitous schools have all been established by voluntary subscription; seven of them receive, this year, aid from the Legislature.

Schools established in virtue of 4th Geo. IV., cap. 41, by one-fourth of the revenues of the fabriques, in virtue of the said Act; most of them by a further aid from the curates; the remainder by the price of tuition.

Of the schools of other descriptions, a large proportion of those in the country parts, and not a few in the towns, were established by the clergy; were, and are still, mainly supported by them, the price of tuition being insufficient for the support of the masters.-Old Quebec Gazette.

No. XII.

Extract from the First Report of the Committee of the House of Assembly respecting the Settlement of Crown Lands; printed on the 12th of February, 1821.

The Honourable James Cuthbert appeared before your Committee, and answered as follows to the questions put to him :

Q. Have you had any, and what means, of becoming acquainted with the nature and advantages of seigniorial tenure in this country, compared with the tenure of free and common soccage?

A. Being proprietor of the seigniory of Berthier, in the district of Montreal, and having resided upon it for twenty-four years, I have had occasion to bestow much consideration upon this subject, and acquire much experience respecting it.

Q. What, in your estimation, are the relative advantages or disadvantages of these two modes of tenure?

A. I hold a very great difference between the two modes of granting land. That under the feudal system, as it is, in my opinion, not accurately called, offers an easy, expeditious, certain, and economical mode of obtaining lands,

in the manner most congenial to the means, habits, wants, and usages of the nineteen-twentieths of the population of this province, and carries in its nature and consequences the only reasonable hope of a long and lasting connection with, and submission to the mother country. Whereas the grants in free and common soccage, after surmounting all difficulties and expense of procuring them, break in upon the habits, customs, manners, and prejudices of the Canadian grantees; the conditions of those grants not only deprive them of the ordinary resources they possess under the system en fief, but also bind them to the obligation of employing, in the first instance, at a time they are totally incompetent, an immense unproductive labour, which, if applied to a land en fief, would alone enable them to subsist their families, &c. &c.

Q. What are the causes which prevent the Canadians to settle upon lands in free and common soccage?

A. Grants in free and common soccage strike the great body of the people as a dereliction of all they hold dear; they view the system, and perhaps not without reason, as tending to subvert their institutions, civil and religious, by a slow but unerring progress; then the difficulty of obtaining the grant, the distance from their friends, their removal from the ordinary support and assistance they were accustomed to; and, above all, the immense tax of labour they incur, not only for their own lot, but also for the clergy and crown reserves, which are to be raised in value by the sweat of their brow: these, and many other objections, deter His Majesty's Canadian subjects from settling on free and common soccage grants. It has been said that American and European emigrants have a total aversion to settle upon lands en fief, &c. &c.; this is substantially and practically contradicted in the seigniories of Dautrai, Lanorai, Ramesay, d'Aillebout, and Terrebonne, under my own personal knowledge, and in many other seigniories throughout the province. It is principally on account of

the language, not of the tenure, that any difficulty has arisen.

With regard to settling the waste lands of the Crown en fief, it is within my conviction that, were I in possession of ungranted cultivable land, I could concede some hundred farms en roture, in the short space of twelve months, &c. &c, The Honourable Roderick M'Kenzie, seignior of Terrebonne, appeared before your Committee.

Q. Are there any, and what causes which, in your estimation, have retarded and continue to retard the settlement of the land in the old manors or lordships of this country?

4. No augmentations to seigniories having been made since 1759, and of course not expected to be made hereafter, may be a principal cause for the delays observed in the settlement of some seigniorial lands. Proprietors expecting no increase as formerly, wait favourable opportunities to make the most of what they have.

Q. Is there any emigration from the said seigniory; and if so, is the same annual and regular, and whither is the same directed?

4. No emigration from the seigniory of Terrebonne.

Q. Do any of the inhabitants emigrate to the townships, granted in free and common soccage; and if not, to what causes do you attribute this circumstance?

A. The inhabitants of this country prefer seigniorial grants to any other. I conceive that system to be the best, since the people who live under it never complain, and seem the happiest in the world. If a settler, who can be recommended, apply to a seignior for a grant, he instantly becomes a proprietor at the trifling expense of five or six dollars to the surveyor or notary, for deeds of survey and concession. The censitaires, in the seigniories of Terrebonne, pay annually at the rate of half a bushel of wheat and twenty pence for every twenty acres. Some indeed pay less, but no one pays more. As wheat sells at present, this rent may amount to about two pence halfpenny per acre, &c. &c. The Rev. Mr. Demers, Superior of the Seminary of Quebec, answered as follows:

Q. Are the two modes of granting lands in this province, that is to say, that under the feudal system and that in free and common soccage, equally beneficial; and will you please to communicate to the Committee the reasons which induce you to give a preference to either?

A. I am fully persuaded the feudal system, confined within proper limits with regard to seigniorial and permanent rents, is the most advantageous mode of inducing His Majesty's Canadian subjects to become proprietors of the lands they clear, without being compelled to purchase them. These new proprietors are indeed charged with a permanent rent, but if the original grantees of the Crown enter fully into the spirit of the feudal system, all they can impose is very moderate seigniorial and permanent rents, and such as the new grantees will always be able easily to pay. If the Government adopted the feudal system in granting the Crown lands, their grants might regulate the rates of seigniorial rents for every square acre of ground. In this way, the rent in all these new concessions would be uniform, and nothing would remain discretionary. As to the proprietors of these new fiefs, the lods et ventes*, and other feudal dues, would afford them a compensation for the lowness of their rent, and even for the expenses they might incur the more speedily to bring their land into cultivation.

If the lands are conceded in free and common soccage, it will be quite otherwise. It may be presumed, that the greater part of these lands would shortly become the property of a few rich individuals, who would not fail to retain the best lots, in order to bring them into cultivation themselves, and who would then sell or lease them to the rest. How then shall the young Canadian farmers, whose only wealth is that love of labour of which the habit was formed under the paternal roof, settle upon those lands? Finding it impossible to acquire land sufficient for their future decent support, they will be compelled to take some of those lands on lease, or bail emphyteotique. But in that mode of settling, it is easily seen that they will not experience equal advantages as if the lands were granted them in the feudal manner. To be convinced of this, it suffices to know on what conditions the lots reserved in the several townships for the Crown and for support of the Protestant clergy are leased; every lot is of 200 acres, or 2354 arpents, or thereabouts, French So early as 1812, three hundred and sixty-three of these lots were

measure.

* Mutation fine paid to the seignior.

leased for twenty-one years, on the following terms, that is to say, "for the first seven years, twenty-five shillings, or eight bushels of wheat, per annum ; the second seven years, fifty shillings, or sixteen bushels of wheat; and for the remainder of the period, seventy-five shillings, or twenty-four bushels of wheat, per lot; the lessors having the option of requiring payment to be made in either of the modes stipulated."-Topographical Description of the Province of Lower Canada, p. 14

On an average, every lot of 2354 arpents is charged with an annual rent of fifty shillings, or sixteen bushels of wheat, at the option of the lessor. Estimating the bushel of wheat at four shillings only, these 235 arpents will therefore be charged on an average with a yearly rent of sixty-four shillings. This rent is certainly higher than it ought to be, if an equal lot of ground were granted in feudal tenure. Let us suppose this rent to be precisely the same, and that two young Canadian farmers each take one of these lots of land; that one of them take his on lease, the other under a feudal grant: at the close of the twenty-one years, will the situation of both these farmers be alike? One of them will have become the actual proprietor of the land he has cleared, while the other, with equal care, anxiety, and toil, unattended by any superior advantage during the twenty-one years, will only retain the uncheering recollection of having, under the sweat of his brow, cleared a land not belonging to himself.

But it will be said, will not the lods et ventes due to the seignior on every mutation prevent the young farmer from taking lands by feudal grant? By no means; because the young farmer well knows he will have no lods et ventes to pay while he remains in possession of his lands, and that such of his descendants as hold it after him will be equally exempt as long as they acquire by descent. Though the due of lods et ventes may appear onerous to the purchaser, I am not the less persuaded that this due has an excellent effect on domestic society; for it is generally a powerful motive for retaining hereditary lands. This is not one of those vague assertions which are inconsiderately hazarded, but a matter of fact, readily confirmed by numerous instances afforded by such parts of our country as have been longest settled, such as the Côte de Beaupré. It is no rare thing to find in that place families who, at this day, possess the same lands which were granted to their ancestors almost immediately after the earliest settlements effected in this country. Such are the reasons which induce me to think the feudal system more beneficial, relatively to the cultivation of the ungranted lands of the Crown, than the mode hitherto followed in granting the lands.

Q. What are the causes which have prevented His Majesty's Canadian subjects from settling on the lands in free and common soccage?

A. One of the principal causes is the want of pecuniary means of purchasing lands, and afterwards clearing them. I do not think there is now to be procured in the townships a tract, adequate to the support of a family, for less than £.100. Very few young Canadian farmers have such a sum, and those who have, will ever prefer purchasing land already in part cultivated, or applying their money to the clearing of lands taken under a feudal grant,

and costing them nothing. As to those who have no pecuniary means, or scarcely any, they will never be reconciled to taking on lease, or bail emphythéotique, a tract of wood land, remote from the place of their nativity, nor will they more readily take such land on rente constituée, from apprehension of ultimate inability to pay that rent, and thereby becoming liable to ejection from lands which they have in part cleared; unless they can settle in some other way, they will prefer remaining labourers all their lives. I think I know the inhabitants of the country parts sufficiently to feel assured that, in this opinion, I am under no error.

To this cause, which is inherent in the system itself, which has been invariably pursued in granting the Crown lands since 1795, others may be added: as the want of ready means of intercourse between the settlements in the townships and the Canadian settlements; ignorance of the language of those among whom the young farmers of our parts would be placed; and, above all, the remoteness of religious aid. This alone, I am persuaded, would have prevented the sounder portion of our Canadian youth from availing themselves of the advantages which new settlements might offer in all other respects; nor would the substantial farmers of our country, sincerely attached as they are to their religious principles, ever consent to the departure of their children, to settle in places where they might suspect their faith or salvation to be in danger.

It is easy, with a little attention, to see that these various causes would cease almost instantaneously, if our young farmers had the same facility of settling on the Crown lands as on the unconceded lands in the old seigniories; because they might, by agreement among themselves, depart in sufficient numbers, and take lands at the same place, indulging a most reasonable hope that other young farmers would not fail shortly to join them, &c. &c.

J. T. Tachereau, esq., a Member of the House of Assembly, appeared before your Committee:

Q. What causes do you think have prevented the settling of lands in your part of the country?

4. The causes which have prevented the settling of lands beyond the seigniories of La Nouvelle Beauce, are a want of roads; a want of grants by the Crown in the ungranted townships, and in those which are conceded a want of roads; the lofs for the Crown and those for the clergy, and also the very considerable expenses which the grantees are obliged to incur for opening roads, expenses of survey and other expenses, with respect to which they are unable to obtain reimbursement of a portion of the interest, whereby they are put under the necessity of selling their lands at a very high price, and the interest of the consideration for the sale is equivalent to a rente which the farmer could not pay; which would not be the case, if, in conceding those lands at a moderate annual rent, the grantees of the Crown could hope hereafter to be indemnified in some other way.

Mr. Dumont, one of the Members of the House of Assembly, appeared before your Committee, and stated as follows:

It is impossible that lands, as they are now granted, can suit the native

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