CANADA AND THE UNITED STATES. 65

confess we see no signs of the danger so often predicted
 as the result of it, namely, the danger of
political union or annexation. That this was a
very real danger in the past is undoubted, but
those were the days before Canada achieved Confederation
 and before she awoke to the sense of her
own nationality. At the present day we do not
believe that anything short of actual conquest will
make her a part of the Union. Nor, while we
adhere to our present Imperial principles, need
commercial union lead to political union between
Canada and the United States any more than it
does between the many other countries all over the
world between whom exist commercial treaties.
There exists in Canada at the present time no
desire either for annexation by the United States
or for Independence. In fact the fear of absorption
by the United States would seem to make any
desire to exist as an independent country more
than ever remote.