The manufactures of Canada, thought daily increasing, are still very limited in their number and extent. Pre vious to its conquest by the British, and during several years after that event, the inhabitants easily provided, by their own industry, the few necessary articles, which their simple mode of living required; and every family then prepared for their own use, druggets, coarse linens, stockings, worsted caps, hats, bonnets of straw, Scc. As their wants increased, they imported, chiefly from Great Britain and the United States, a great variety of articles for domestic purposes; but the greater part of those they have of late years begun to manufacture for them selves. Among their principal manufactures for the purpose of exportation may' he mentioned the conver sion of their wheat into flour and biscuit, which gives employment to a great number of hands; the building of ships, which is peculiarly useful in the country, as it is almost the only occupation, which can he followed, dur ing the six months of winter; bar-iron, stoves, cooking utensils, fur which titer:: are two considerable iron forges in the province, one near Three Rivers, which was es tablished by the French king, and another near St Arms, on the road from Quebec to Montreal, with others of less importance. Potash, of which the country could easily supply any quantity, though the inhabitants pre pare little inure than what is necessary for the manu facture of the soap, which they make in every family Soap, candles, and ifnuff, fur the mantifacture of which last article Canada has long been celebrated, and the use of which is remarkably common among the females of the country, of all ranks and ages ; while the uteri, and et en boys, on the other hand, are seldom without a tobacco pipe in their mouths, from the moment that they awaken in the morning till they return to bed at night. Amon; the articles, which they prepare for their own consump tion, may be particularly mentioned, hats, of which, how ever, the bodies, as they are called, are still chiefly im ported from England, where they can be procured at a cheaper rate, than they can be made in Canada; leather, for the preparation of which several considerable tan works are lately established; and sugar from the maple tree, of which so much is made as nearly equals two thirds of the whole consumption of that article in the country, and which might be prepared for trade and ex portation, if the West India sugars were not so abundant and cheap in the province. In March and April, when the sap begins to rise, those, who wish to make sugar, provide themselves with the proper apparatus ; make an excursion into the woods, where maple trees abound; collect the sap from incisions made in the trunk; erect their boilers on the spot, and return in a few days with sugar ready for use, which, when properly purified, is of an excellent quality. There is a large distillery established at Quebec, and several breweries in the lower province, which export considerable quantities of ale.
In addition to the principal products of agriculture, which have been already particularly noticed, in a pre ceding paragraph, it may here be mentioned, that various other kinds of grain and pulse are raised in Canada, es pecially rye and beans ; the last of which are of a small. cr size than the European, and arc much used by the Indians, who eat them when boiled, as an accompani ment to bear's grease and lard. Gourds, and water melons, are cultivated as field crops ; and are used, as bread, by many of the native tribes. The orchards and gardens, especially in the neighbourhood of Montreal, abound in a great variety of fruits and vegetables of the finest quality. The apples are particularly good, and yield an excellent cider. Peaches, plums, goosberries,
raspberries, and currants, are found in the greatest per fection and abundance; and, with the protection of glass, grapes may be raised for the table equal to any in Portu gal. The natural and indigenous productions of the country are remarkably numerous; and many of them arc of considerable value.
The forests abound with an immense variety of trees, of the different kinds of which even the names are not yet known. Of oak there are various sorts: the black, white, red, yellow, grey, according to the colour of the wood, when cut by the saw ; the swamp oak, which grows only in a moist gravelly soil, has a smaller leaf and smoother bark, than the other kinds, and is so re markably tough, as to be frequently used in place of whale bone ; and the -cheviot oak, the leaf of which re sembles that of the chesnut, and which is neither so tough as the last mentioned, nor so strong as the other sorts, but is peculiarly suited for being split, and for enduring a long time, in pallisades and fences : all the oaks in this country grow so straight, that, in ship build• . _ ing, the knee-timbers arc generally made of the roots of pine.—Ofpines, there arc the white and red in great abundance, the former of which, 'chiefly, grows to an amazing height, and yields excellent turpentine.—The firs are perhaps the most numerous class, one of which called the white prickly fir, yields a kind of turpentine called Canadian balsam, which holds a place in the ma teria medica of most countries.—The cedars arc distin guished into white and red, the former of which has its fragrance in the leaf instead of the wood, but is a dif ferent tree from the white cedar of the United States, the cupressus disticha.—Of maples, the harder kind, which grows on hilly grounds, yields a richer juice, but in smaller quantity than the soft, and its wood, which is finely veined and clouded, is peculiarly valuable for making tables, gun-stocks, &c.—Of ash, the most re markable sort is the yellow, found only in the south-west districts, and growing to an amazing height ; the outer bark of which is eight inches thick, indented with fur rows, six inches deep, while the inner is of a fine yellow colour, which leaves a lasting stain upon the fingers, and is supposed useful in dyeing. Besides beech, birch, elm, poplar, and other kinds of timber, resembling the European, there are the hemlock tree, an evergreen of very large growth, with leaves like the yew, but is of no use whatever ;* the bass, or white wood, remarkably white and soft, light as cork, and much used in making bowls, trenchers, &c.; wickopic, or suckwick, a species of wood, the bark of which when pounded, and moistened with a little water, becomes a kind of oily and adhesive glue, with which the Indians cover the seams of their canoes. In addition to the walnut , chesnut, hazle, hickory, &c. the forests of Canada produce the butter, or oil-nut tree, which grows in rich meadow grounds, bears a large and well flavoured nut, capable of yielding a very pure oil.
In a natural state are found the crab apple tree,t bear ing a fruit of better size and flavour than that of Europe ; the plum-tree, green, and purple, both greatly relished by the natives ; the cherry tree, black, red, and sandy coloured, but the first, only, bears a fruit pleasant to the taste ; the mulberry, red and white, resembling those of France and Italy ; sweet gum tree, yielding a kind of bal sam, which the Indians highly value as a salve and febri fuge ; vines, which are very common, and sonic of which bear excellent grapes ; besides gooseberries, currants, raspberries, strawberries, juniper Gerrie s, Cranberries, bear berries, &c. in the utmost abundance.