Aylmer has only a population of 1100 inhabitants, but they are not idle.  The house of Mr. E. does business with the lumberers to the tune of 200,000l. annually, and supplies them with 15,000 lb. of tea every year.  Grog-shops are at a discount in these parts.  The increasing prosperity of this neighbourhood is mainly owing to the energy and enterprise of Mr. Egan and his friend M. Aumond.  It was by these two gentlemen that the steam-boats were put on the lakes, and the rail made across the island.  Everybody feels how much the facility of conveyance has increased the prosperity of this locality; and the value of Mr. E.’s services is honourably recognised, by his unopposed election as the representative of the district.  Having had a good night’s rest, and taken in a substantial breakfast, we started off on our return to Bytown, which city may he considered as the headquarters of the lumberers.

The ground upon which the greater part of Bytown stands was offered some years since to a servant, as payment for a debt of 70l.; he found the bargain so bad, that he tried to get out of it.  The value of the same land is now estimated at 200,000l.!!!  As late as 1826, there was not one stone put upon another; now the population is 10,000, and steadily increasing.  Nothing can exceed the beauty of the panoramic view from the verge of the Barrack Hill, which is a dark, frowning, perpendicular rock several hundred feet high.  To the west are the Chaudiere Falls, 200 feet broad and 60 feet high, irregular in shape, and broken here and there by rocks, around which the rapids leap in unceasing frenzy, ere they take their last plunge into the maddened gulf below, thence rolling their dark waters beneath your feet.  Below the falls the river is spanned by a very light and beautiful suspension-bridge.  This part of the scene is enlivened by the continual descent of timber-rafts rushing down the slides, skilfully guided by their hardy and experienced navigators.  Around you is a splendid expanse of waving field and sombre forest, far as the eye can stretch, and bounded towards the north by mountains looming and half lost in distance, whence comes the mighty Gatineau—­a watery highway for forest treasure, threading its course like a stream of liquid silver as the sun’s rays dance upon its bosom,—­the whole forming one of the most beautiful panoramas imaginable.

No place was ever better calculated for the capital of a great country.  Bordering upon Upper and Lower Canada, only twelve hours from Montreal, easily capable of defence, with a trade increasing in value as rapidly as the source thereof is inexhaustible, at the confluence of two rivers whose banks are alike rich in timber and arable land—­requiring but nineteen miles of lockage to unite the St. Lawrence, the Ottawa, and the Gatineau with the boundless inland lakes of America—­possessing the magnificent Rideau Canal, which affords a ready transport down to Kingston on Lake Ontario—­rich with scenery, unsurpassed in beauty and grandeur, and enjoying a climate as healthy as any the world can produce,—­Nature seems to have marked out Bytown as the site for a Canadian metropolis.  In short, were I a prophet instead of a traveller, I should boldly predict that such it must be some day, if Canada remain united and independent.