27. THE FRENCH CANADIAN. Geo graphical Distribution.— In 1911, according to the last Dominion census, 2,055,000 inhabitants of Canada were of French origin, being over 28 per cent of the whole population, and showing an increase of 24 per cent since the census of 1901. Of these by far the greater part, 1,605, 000, were settled in the province of Quebec, forming 80 per cent of the total population of that province. But considerable numbers were located in some of the other provinces: 202,000 in Ontario, 98,000 in New Brunswick, 51,000 in Nova Scotia 13,000 in Prince Edward Island, 31,000 in Manitoba, 23,000 in Saskatchewan, 20,000 in Alberta, and 700 in the Yukon and the Northwest Territories. The French population of Canada has doubled every 27 years for the past 200 years. Then, according to the last Uni ted States census, there were, in 1910, through out the Union, over 400,000 Canadian-born French; and the total number of people of French Canadian extraction in the United States, if local statistics are to be credited, would exceed 1,000,000. From the point of view of physical and social geography, the French Canadian element in North America is made up as follows: (1) The main body, 1,800,000 strong, ex tends uninterruptedly over Quebec, eastern and northern Ontario and northern New Bruns wick. The nucleus of this main body is a com pact community of farmers occupying the banks of the Saint Lawrence and the valleys of its tributaries. On the outskirts of this central group, over the wooded and rocky highlands, north and south of the great river, but more especially throughout the plateaus of northern Quebec, northeastern Ontario and northern New Brunswick, fanning is largely supple mented by lumbering, and not infrequently by mining; while along the Gulf and sea-coast of Labrador, the Gaspe Peninsula, Chaleurs Bay and eastern New Brunswick it is more or less superseded by fishing.
(2) Then hardly separated from these, and from one another, we have, of the extreme eastern limit of this central group, the French speaking communities of fishermen of Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island; while, as a projection from the opposite extreme western border, in Ontario, we find, along the shores of the Saint Lawrence and the Great Lakes, a string of small settlements of French Canadian rivermen, boatmen and woodsmen, forming an almost continuous chain around that province and connecting, as it were, the two large French groups of Detroit River and Georgian Bay with the still larger one occupying the western bank of the Ottawa. Over one-third, namely, about
680,000 of the total French element composing this main body and its projections are congre gated in villages, towns or cities, where they make a living through physical labor, trading, the crafts and the liberal professions.
(3) As distinct outliers from the above main group, we have, in the first place, the many French-speaking communities of urban population, which, in very large, though fluctu ating numbers, are spread throughout the man ufacturing towns of the North Atlantic States of the Union, principally Massachusetts; in the second place, smaller and sparser groups of French-speaking farmers (at times woodsmen and miners as well), to be found in the Western country, in Manitoba, Alberta and in some States of the North Central division of the Union, especially Michigan, Wisconsin, Minne sota and Illinois; in the third place, still smaller and sparser groups of French Canadian pros pectors or miners, spread in the camps and towns of British Columbia, the Yukon and some of the States of the Western division of the Union, principally Montana and California. Lastly, French Canadian families orindividuals are to be found in every part of the Union, though in the States of the South Atlantic, South Central and Western divisions they ag gregate in most cases a few units or a few hundred only. About 40 per cent of the total French Canadian element in the United States are located in 160 principal cities.