Page:The Under-Ground Railroad.djvu/160

140 the majority of cases, if they did, they would not have the means to pay for one. However, I may truly say, in some respects, and with the best of feeling for my brethren, "they have eyes to see and see not; and ears to hear and hear not." We need more schools and qualified teachers in Canada. And as the people advance in intelligence we must have more newspapers and editors. The schools are very irregularly attended, just as they attend to every thing else, in the most erratic manner imaginable. However, knowing as we do, the cause of it, we bear with greater fortitude their imperfections. Our hope for better things is from the rising generation, now entering on the great theatre of human existence, whose minds are still to be developed, and their characters to be moulded; and unless we are prepared with efficient facilities to meet these emergencies, they will still be intellectually infants. We believe the period will arrive, ere long, when they will be enlightened, virtuous, moral and intelligent; or, in other words, possess those qualities in a higher degree than they now do, and lavish their blessings among the various kingdoms of the earth as freely as they have lavished on them their chains and ignomy. Education, combined with Christian civilization will enlighten, refine, and elevate the down-trodden sons and daughters of Ham.

The hearty loyalty of the coloured population in