VANCOUVER'S ISLAND.
Belfast, 24th March 1858. Sut—Now that we have a new and enlightened Colonial Minister it is a good time to ask what is to be done with Vancouver's Island.
We have enough of Colonies. It is unreasonable and absurd to ask Go. vernment to found more : but where colonization is proceeding sponta- neously, it is the clear duty of the Colonial Office to provide such colonies with the means of civilized administration. It is certain that it will be ne- cessary before vety long to provide Vancouver's Island with a permanent government. So convinced was Earl Grey of the truth that we need no more colonies, that he leased Vancouver's Island to the Hudson's Bay Dm. pany. This arrangement was but provisional at the best; it has not worked well, and must now be discontinued. But must we therefore constitute Vancouver's Island as one more dependency of the British crown ? I think there is a much better solution of the question. Let us make it a present to Canada, together with the neighbouring continental territory between the-Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. The annexation to Canada of the Hudson's Bay Company's territory must now be regarded as inevit- able at least from the present Canadian frontier to the Rocky Mountains: the hooky Mountains, however, are a very trifling barrier, and there is no good reason why we should stop short of the Pacific Ocean. The right and statesmanlike policy is to make all British America, from the Atlantic to the Pacific, into an independent constitutional kingdom under the British crown. The inconvenience of governing Vancouver's Island from Ottawa (if that is really to be the capital of Canada) would not be greater than of governing California from Washington. The consolidation of all British America under one government would greatly tend to accelerate the execution of one of the most magnificent and moat desirable projects now before the world—the construction of a railway from the Atlantic to the Pacific through British territory. The funds for the enterprise should be derived, according to the American method, from the sale of the lands along the railway, to which the railway will give value.
Canada would scarcely be qualified to govern possessions on the Pacific, without being .a naval power : and this is perhaps impossible to Canada, without the incorporation of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. This, however will be attained, and perhaps soon : and certainly its attainment would be promoted by an announcement of the project of making all British
into nto one great state.
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