_Christian Guardian_, the _Wesleyan Advocate_, and the _Church_. A paper
in the German language was published at Berlin, in the Gore Settlement,
for the use of the German settlers. Lower Canadian and American
newspapers were also circulated in great numbers. She deprecates the
abusive, narrow tone of the local papers, but at the same time admits--a
valuable admission from one far from prepossessed in favour of
Canadians--that, on the whole, the press did good in the absence and
scarcity of books. In some of the provincial papers she 'had seen
articles written with considerable talent;' among other things, 'a
series of letters, signed Evans, on the subject of an education fitted
for an agricultural people, and written with infinite good sense and
kindly feeling.' At this time the number of newspapers circulated
through the post-office in Upper Canada, and paying postage, was:
Provincial papers, 178,065; United States and other foreign papers,
149,502. Adding 100,000 papers stamped, or free, there were some 427,567
papers circulated yearly among a population of 370,000, 'of whom perhaps
one in fifty could read.' The narrow-mindedness of the country journals
generally would probably strike an English _litterateur_ like Mrs.
Jameson with much force; little else was to be expected in a country,
situated as Canada was then, with a small population, no generally
diffused education, and imperfect facilities of communication with the
great world beyond. In this comparatively isolated position, journalists
might too often mistake

'The rustic murmur of their burgh
For the great wave that echoes round the world.'


Yet despite its defects, the journalism of Upper Canada was confessedly
doing an important work in those backward days of Canadian development.