I Presume That
The Scenery Of The Saguenay Is The Finest In Canada.
During the
summer steamers run down the St. Lawrence and up the Saguenay, but
I was too late for them.
An offer was made to us through the
kindness of Sir Edmund Head, who was then the Governor-General, of
the use of a steam-tug belonging to a gentleman who carries on a
large commercial enterprise at Chicoutimi, far up the Saguenay; but
an acceptance of this offer would have entailed some delay at
Quebec, and, as we were anxious to get into the Northwestern States
before the winter commenced, we were obliged with great regret to
decline the journey.
I feel bound to say that a stranger, regarding Quebec merely as a
town, finds very much of which he cannot but complain. The
footpaths through the streets are almost entirely of wood, as
indeed seems to be general throughout Canada. Wood is, of course,
the cheapest material; and, though it may not be altogether good
for such a purpose, it would not create animadversion if it were
kept in tolerable order. But in Quebec the paths are intolerably
bad. They are full of holes. The boards are rotten, and worn in
some places to dirt. The nails have gone, and the broken planks go
up and down under the feet, and in the dark they are absolutely
dangerous. But if the paths are bad, the road-ways are worse. The
street through the lower town along the quays is, I think, the most
disgraceful thoroughfare I ever saw in any town. I believe the
whole of it, or at any rate a great portion, has been paved with
wood; but the boards have been worked into mud, and the ground
under the boards has been worked into holes, till the street is
more like the bottom of a filthy ditch than a road-way through one
of the most thickly populated parts of a city. Had Quebec in
Wolfe's time been as it is now, Wolfe would have stuck in the mud
between the river and the rock before he reached the point which he
desired to climb. In the upper town the roads are not as bad as
they are below, but still they are very bad. I was told that this
arose from disputes among the municipal corporations. Everything
in Canada relating to roads, and a very great deal affecting the
internal government of the people, is done by these municipalities.
It is made a subject of great boast in Canada that the communal
authorities do carry on so large a part of the public business, and
that they do it generally so well and at so cheap a rate. I have
nothing to say against this, and, as a whole, believe that the
boast is true. I must protest, however, that the streets of the
greater cities - for Montreal is nearly as bad as Quebec - prove the
rule by a very sad exception.
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