Picturesque Quebec, By James Macpherson Le Moine










































































































































 -  The extraordinary donation
    of James I. of a large portion of North America to Sir William
    Alexander was not long - Page 65
Picturesque Quebec, By James Macpherson Le Moine - Page 65 of 864 - First - Home

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The Extraordinary Donation Of James I. Of A Large Portion Of North America To Sir William Alexander Was Not Long Since Brought Before The Public By The Claims Of His Descendants.

Large tracts of land were given away by Louis XIII., Louis XIV.

And other French kings, by Oliver Cromwell and the Stuarts, and the same extravagant system of entailing unmanageable wealth on companies and individuals was continued after the conquest.

"It would be interesting to know what was the kind of literary fare on which the intellect of Canada subsisted in those days. It cannot be supposed that the people spent all their time in business and social pleasure. There must have been readers as well as cariolers and dancers, and the literature of England and France was by no means scanty. Great writers on every subject have flourished since that time, but some of the greatest that ever lived, some of those whose productions are still read with the highest pleasure, were the offspring of the two centuries which preceded the conquest. No one will be surprised to find, then, that in the year 1783, a circulating library in Quebec numbered nearly 2,000 volumes. Nor is the enquirer left in the dark as to its probable contents. In the Quebec Gazette of the 4th of December, a list of books is given which 'remained unsold at M. Jacques Perrault's, very elegantly bound' - and books were bound substantially as well as elegantly in those days. In this list are found 'Johnson's Dictionary,' then regarded as one of the wonders of the literary world, 'Chesterfield's Letters,' long the vade-mecum of every young gentleman beginning life, and which, even in our own days (and perhaps still), were frequently bound along with spelling and reading books, the 'Pilgrim's Progress', which it is not necessary to characterize, Young's 'Night Thoughts,' the 'Spectator and 'Guardian,' Rapin's 'English History,' 'Cook's Voyages,' Rousseau's 'Eloise,' 'Telemaque,' 'Histoire Chinoise,' 'Esprit des Croissades,' 'Lettres de Fernand Cortes,' 'Histoire Ancienne' par Rollin, 'Grammaire Anglaise et Francaise,' 'Dictionnaire par l'Academie,' 'Dictionnaire de Commerce,' 'Dictionary of the Arts and Sciences,' 'Smith's Housewife,' 'The Devil on Sticks,' 'Voltaire's Essay on Universal History,' 'Dictionnaire de Cuisine' and several others on various subjects, 'Oeuvres de Rabelais,' 'American Gazetteer,' etc.

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