VIEW OF ENGLISH POLITICS. 69

be induced to visit the colonies during the Parliamentary
 recess?
It is perhaps worth while to illustrate the result
of information by reference to an actual occurrence.
The authors heard the subject discussed at some
length by a party of farmers. One of their number
had immigrated from England some twenty years
before. He was addressing an audience of men of
all nationalities who were living prosperously and
comfortably by cultivating their own land. He
described to them in graphic language life in an
English village. He told them of shopping on
Saturday night and expenditure calculated in half
cents. He spoke of tea by the farthing’s worth,
the lack of any luxuries, the poverty of the squalid
cottages. He mentioned the scraping and saving
of the rent—an unknown item in the Canadian
farmer's budget. His audience listened in astonished
interest, and, as the Englishman talked on, punctuated
 his remarks with expressions of wonder.
When he had finished, they stated with violent
emphasis that if the English voted for a tax on
their food for the Canadian farmers’ sake, they
would be “damned fools,” and the man who persuaded
 them to do it would be a scoundrel. “But
they are being told that the tax will not increase
 the price of food,” we said. A moment's
silence, and then amid general acclamation, “ Well,
they had better not risk it.”’ «Tell them we don’t
want it, either.” And this came from men who,
earlier in the evening, had been asking us “how