The People Were Talking Largely Of Railways And Steamers, Yet I
Travelled By The Mail To Truro And Pictou In A Conveyance That Would
Scarcely Have Been Tolerated In England Two Centuries Ago.
The people of
Halifax possess the finest harbour in North America, yet they have no
docks, and scarcely any shipping.
The Nova-Scotians, it is known, have
iron, coal, slate, limestone, and freestone, and their shores swarm with
fish, yet they spend their time in talking about railways, docks, and the
House of Assembly, and end by walking about doing nothing."
"Yes," chimed in a Boston sea-captain, who had been our fellow-passenger
from Europe, and prided himself upon being a "thorough-going down-easter,"
"it takes as long for a Blue Nose to put on his hat as for one of our free
and enlightened citizens to go from Bosting to New Orleens. If we don't
whip all creation it's a pity! Why, stranger, if you were to go to
Connecticut, and tell 'em what you've been telling this ere child, they'd
guess you'd been with Colonel Crockett."
"Well, I proceeded, in answer to another question from the New-
Brunswicker," if you wish to go to the north of your own province, you
require to go round Nova Scotia by sea. I understand that a railway to the
Bay of Chaleur has been talked about, but I suppose it has ended where it
began; and, for want of a railway to Halifax, even the Canadian traffic
has been diverted to Portland."
"We want to invest some of our surplus revenue," said the captain.
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