QUEBEC, a Province of the Dominion of Canada, bounded on the north by Ungava district and the Labrador Peninsula, N.E.T.; on the east by the latter, Newfoundland and the Gulf of St. Lawrence; on the south by Baie des Chaleurs, New Brunswick and the State of Maine; on the south-east by the States of New Hampshire, Vermont and New York; and on the south-west by the River Ottawa, Keewatin district and the Province of Ontario. Length, from Lake Temiscamingue to Anse au Blanc Sablon, in the Straits of Belle Isle, about 1,000 miles on a due east and west course, and from the above-named lake to Cape Gaspe, about 700 miles; breadth (lon. 75° W.), about 500 miles. The total territorial superficies comprises, land and inland waters, 218,723,687 acres, or 351,873 square miles. The surface of the country is varied and grand, consisting of boundless forests, magnificent rivers and lakes, extensive prairies, bold, rocky heights and foaming cataracts, diversified by cultivated fields, pretty villages and settlements, some stretching up along mountains, fertile islands, rich pastures and well fed flocks. The principal mountain ranges stretch from south-west to north-east, and lie nearly parallel to each other. They consist of the Notre Dame or Green Mountains, so called from the fine forests that cover their slopes, which, from the latitude of the City of Quebec, follow nearly the whole course of the St. Lawrence, on the south side of which they are situated, and terminate on the Gulf of the same name, between Baie des Chaleurs and Gaspe Point. On the north side of the river is the Laurentian range, which forms undulating ridges of about 1,000 feet in elevation, the Mealy Mountains stretching from about lat. 75° W. to Sandwich Bay, computed to be about 1,500 feet high, and always covered with snow; and the Wotchish Mountains, a short range, of crescent form, between the Gulf of St. Lawrence and Hudson Bay. The rocky masses connected with the mountain chains that line the St. Lawrence advance in many places close to the stream, forming precipitous cliffs, frequently 200 and 300 feet high. The banks of the St. Lawrence are in many places composed of schist, in a decaying or mouldering condition, and in every quarter granite is found, more or less inclined to, but never parallel with, the horizon. In the Gaspe district numerous and beautiful specimens of quartz have been obtained; indications of coal have also been traced. The limestone formation extends over 30,000 square miles; the dip is moderate, and the strata of limestone generally undisturbed. Along the shores of the estuary and Gulf of St. Lawrence horizontal banks of shells appear at various heights from 10 to 100 feet above high water mark, and inland beaches of sand and shingle, with similar shells; as also elevated limestone rocks, scooped out by the waves, and showing lines of lithodomous perforations—all indicating the successive unheaving of the land since the sea was inhabited by the existing species of testacea. Earthquakes have been frequent in the Province, and some of them of considerable violence. The Province of Quebec is comparatively well endowed with mines of gold, copper, iron and other ores. Gold is found chiefly on the banks of the Chaudiere. Copper is found in large quantities in the Eastern Townships. Iron is found almost everywhere, and is of superior quality. Lead, silver, zinc, platinum, etc., also occur in various sections. The yield of silver in the Province in the year 1902 was 42,500 oz., value $22,168; the gold yield, in the same year, was valued at $8,073. The great River St. Lawrence flows through the Province. Just above Montreal it receives from the north-west the Ottawa, a river 800 miles long, and in no degree inferior to it in interest. Below Montreal it receives, on the right, the Richelieu River, having its source in Lake Champlain; the St. Francis, rising in Lake Memphremagog; and the Chaudiere, the outlet of Lake Megantic; and, on the left, the St. Maurice, the Batiscan and the Saguenay Rivers, from 200 to 400 miles in length. The latter is the outlet of the large and beautiful Lake St. John. The chief lakes of the Province lie mainly north of the height of land, embracing Lake Melville on the Labrador coast, practically part of Hamilton Inlet (area, 415,360 acres), Mistassini (624,000 acres), Mistassinis (132,000 acres), Ashuanipi (204,000 acres), Attikonak (212,000 acres), Evans (147,840 acres), and Lake St. John (224,000 acres). The climate of Quebec, though similar to that of Ontario, is colder in winter and warmer in summer. Spring bursts forth in great beauty, and vegetation is rapid. In winter the cold is generally steady; and the atmosphere is clear and bracing, which renders the sleighing very agreeable and pleasant. Winter generally commences at the latter end of November and lasts until the end of March. During the winter months the trees are oftentimes covered with frost. Nothing can be imagined more beautiful and brilliant than the effect of sunshine on a calm day on the frozen boughs, where every particle of the icy crystals sparkles, and nature seems decked in diamonds. The soil is generally rich and adapted to the growth of cereals, hay and green crops. Apples and plums grow in abundance. The greater portion of the Province is covered by forests, consisting chiefly of white and red pine. Large quantities of this timber are annually sent to England. The other kinds of timber are ash, birch, beech, elm. hickory, black walnut, maple, cherry, butternut, basswood, spruce, fir, etc. The lumber regions of Canada must, under judicious management, long remain a fruitful source of revenue to the Provinces of Quebec and Ontario. The augmenting demand in Great Britain and the United States, the West Indies and South America, for rough and manufactured timber, has given au enormous value within the last decade to timber limits; and as a natural result, explorations nave been pushed far into the interior, and regions long neglected have acquired a commercial value. The railways of the Province, of which, in 1903, there was a total mileage of 3,492 miles, are:

Grand Trunk: 484

Intercolonial: 489

C.P.R.: 1070

C.V.R.: 161

Quebec Central: 227

Philipsburg Ry: 7

Quebec Ry. Light & Power Co: 27

Quebec, Montreal & Southern and Napierville Jct. Rys: 177

Temiscouata: 113

Canadian Northern Quebec: 252

Carillon & Grenville: 12

Quebec & Lake St. John: 239

Maine Central: 53

Boston & Maine: 38

Atlantic, Quebec & Western: 117

Lotbiniere & Megantic: 30

Orford Mountain: 58

St. Maurice Valley: 21

St. Lawrence & Adirondack: 51

TOTAL: 3626

The Province, as regards civil matters, is divided into parishes, townships, counties and districts. Whenever a new district is sufficiently populous to form a parish, the Roman Catholic Diocesan Bishop, upon the requisition of the majority of the inhabitants, orders its canonical erection into a parish. By a proceeding somewhat analogous, the civil authorities order the civil erection of municipal corporations. The townships are of English origin. After the cession of Canada to Great Britain, the English land system of holding in free and common soccage was instituted for the feudal system upon all Crown lands, and then the township took the place of the seigniory. The regular limits of a township are ten miles square, or 100 superficial miles. Such townships as are not sub-divided into parishes preserve for all municipal or other purposes their legal limits. The counties were established for the purposes of representation, each county having the right to send 1 member to to the House of Commons every five years, and 1 to the Local Legislature every five years. In addition to this each county forms a registration division for registration of mortgages, etc. The parish and township municipalities comprised in a county form what is called a county municipality. The Province is divided into 65 electoral districts, viz.

Argenteuil: 16,461, Lachute.

Bagot: 16,291, St. Hugues.

Beauce: 43,129, St. Francois.

Beauharnois: 21,732, Beauharnois.

Bellechasse: 18,706, St. Michel.

Berthier: 18,982, Berthier.

Bonaventure: 24,495, New Carlisle.

Brome: 13,397, Knowlton.

Chambly-Vercheres: 24,318, Longueuil

Champlain: 35,159, Batiscan

Charlevoix: 19,334, St. Paul's Bay.

Chateauguay: 15,693, St. Martine.

Chicoutimi and Saguenay: 48,291, Chicoutimi.

Compton: 26,460, Cookshire.

Deux Montagues: 14,438, L'Annonciation.

Dorchester: 21,007, St. Henedine.

Drummond and Arthabaska: 44,481, Arthabaskaville.

Gaspe: 30,683, Perce.

Hochelaga: 56,919, Montreal.

Huntingdon: 13,979, Huntingdon.

Jacques Cartier: 25,168, Pointe Claire.

Joliette: 22,255, Joliette.

Kamouraska: 19,099, Kamouraska.

Labelle: 30,931, Papineauville.

Laprairie and Napierville , 17,523: Laprairie.

L'Assomption: 14,9__3, L'Assomption.

Laval: 19,743, Ste. Rose.

Levis: 26,210, Levis.

L'Islet: 14,439, St. Jean Port Joli.

Lotbiniere: 20,039, Lotbiniere.

Maisonneuve: 65,178, Montreal.

Maskinonge: 15,813, Riviere du Loup.

Megantic: 23,621, Leeds.

Missisquoi: 18,482, Frelighsburg.

Montcalm: 13,001, St. Julienne.

Montmagny: 14,757, St. Thomas.

Montmorency: 12,311, Chateau Richer.

Montreal: Ste. Anne, 23,368, -

Montreal: St. Antoine, 47,653, -

St. Jacques: 42,618, -

St. Laurent: 48,808, -

Ste. Marie: 40,631, Becancour.

Nicolet: 26,590, Bryson.

Pontiac: 25,722, Cap Sante.

Portneuf: 27,159, -

Quebec Centre: 20,366, Quebec.

Quebec, East: 39,325, -

Quebec, West: 9,149, -

Quebec, County, 22,101, Charlesbourg.

Richelieu: 18,576, Sorel.

Richmond & Wolfe: 34,137, Richmond.

Rimouski: 40,157, Rimouski.

Rouville: 15,990, Marieville.

St. Hyacinthe: 21,543, St. Hyacinthe.

St. Jean & Iberville: 19,536, St. Johns.

Shefford: 23,628, Waterloo.

Sherbrooke: 18,426, Sherbrooke.

Soulanges: 9,928, Coteau Landing.

Stanstead: 18,998, Stanstead.

Temiscouata: 29,185, Isle Verte.

Terrebonne: 26,816, St. Jerome.

Trois Rivieres and St. Maurice: 26,167, Three Rivers.

Vaudreuil: 10,445, Vaudreuil.

Wright: 44,800, Hull.

Yamaska: 16,204, St. Francois du Lac.

Unorganized Districts:

Abitibi

Ashuanipi, 2,405

Mistassini

Total Pop. (1901): 1,648,898

Total area of the above counties, 218,723,687 acres. For judicial purposes the Province is divided into 29 districts, each judicial district having ample and equal jurisdiction in all matters, except as to revision and appeal. The Superior Court sits in revision only at Montreal and Quebec; the Court of Appeal also sits only at Montreal and Quebec. There is 1 chief justice of the Queens Bench and 5 puisne judges, as well as 1 chief justice of the Superior Court and 29 puisne judges.

Public instruction is under the control of the Superintendent of Education, who is assisted by a Deputy and a Council of 35 members, divided into committees for the management of the Roman Catholic and the Protestant schools, respectively. The schools are maintained by local taxation and a government grant, and are controlled by local boards or by the local clergy. In 1902-03 there were 4,445 Roman Catholic elementary schools under control of municipalities, and 47 independent of control, as well as 884 controlled and 3 independent Protestant schools. These were conducted by 6,301 teachers, chiefly female, and had a total average attendance of 143,044 pupils. There were, besides, 555 model schools, with 2,423 teachers, and an average attendance of 66,327, and 178 academies, with 1,829 teachers and an average attendance of 33,752. In municipalities where there are different religious denominations the school commissioners of the majority govern. The schools of the minority are called dissentient schools, whose trustees are invested with the same authority as the commissioners of schools of the majority. In the cities of Montreal and Quebec there are separate boards of commissioners for the Protestant and Roman Catholic schools. Teachers are trained in 11 Normal schools supported at the expense of the Province. There were 4 universities and 19 classical colleges in Quebec in 1903, besides schools of art and design, schools for the deaf, dumb and blind, and night schools. The Protestant Universities are McGill College, at Montreal, founded in 1827, and Bishop's College, Lennoxville, founded in 1843. The Roman Catholic University of Laval was founded by the Quebec Seminary in 1852. The prevailing religion is that of the Church of Rome. The Roman Catholic Dioceses are eleven in number, viz.: the Archdioceses of Quebec, Montreal and Ottawa and the Dioceses of Three Rivers, St. Hyacinthe, Sherbrooke, Rimouski, Chicoutimi, Pontiac, Nicolet and Valleyfield. The Protestant Dioceses are two in number: Montreal and Quebec. According to the census of 1901, the religious denominations in the Province were as follows:

Church of England: 81,563

Church of Rome: 1,429,260

Presbyterians: 58,013

Methodists: 42,014

Baptists: 8,480

Congregationalists: 5,173

Luterans: 1,642

Adventists: 3,079

Unitarians: 561

Brethren: 587

Salvation Army: 292

Quakers: 59

Miscellaneous Creeds: 5,231

Jews: 7,498

No creed stated: 5,446

Total: 1,648,898

There are eight cities in the Province: Montreal, population 434,000; Quebec, 70,000; Three Rivers, 9,981; St. Hyacinthe, 9,200; Sorel, 7,057; Levis, 7,783; Sherbrooke, 11,765. The principal manufactures are cloth, linen. furniture, leather, sawn lumber, flax, hardware, paper, chemicals, soap, boots and shoes, cotton and woollen goods, steam engines and locomotives, woodenware of all descriptions, agricultural implements, ships, etc. The facilities for manufacturing afforded by water power are excellent. The public affiairs of the Province are administered by a Lieutenant Governor, au Executive Council of 7 members, a Legislative council of 24 members, appointed for life, and a Legislative Assembly of 74 members. According to official returns the total value of the imports from all foreign countries in 1903 amounted to $93,183,449, and the exports to $105,841,034. The imports for Montreal alone amounted to $79,725,553 and exports to $65,643,393. The chief articles exported were pot and pearl ashes, flour, wheat, oats, barley, butter, cheese, copper, wool and lumber. The average yearly tonnage of ships of recent years at the ports of the Province was 3,000,000, and in 1903 it was 3,591,657. The revenue of the Province for the year ending June 30, 1903, was $4,699,773, and the expenditure for the same period was $4,496,061. The gross debt in 1903 amounted to $35,926,729, against which it had a total asset of $13,908,826. The commerce of the Province is greatly facilitated by several canals which avoid the most violent rapids of the St. Lawrence. These are the Lachine Canal, extending from Montreal to Lake St. Louis; the Beauharnois Canal and the Soulanges Canal, uniting Lakes St. Francis and St. Louis; the Chambly Canal uniting Lake Champlain with the Richelieu River, the Carillon and Grenville Canal, the St. Anne's Lock and Chute a Blondeau Canal. The value of the farm lands, implements, live stock and other animal and agricultural products of the Province, as per the census returns of 1901, were as follows: Value of lands, $248,236,361; buildings, $102,313,893; implements and machinery, $27,038,205: the value of horses in the Province at the same period was $24,164,149; milch cows, $20,757,611; other horned cattle. $6,629,784; sheep. $2,476,471; swine, $3,142,925; poultry. $1,166,314; field crops, $44,851,108; dairy products, $20,207,826; eggs $2,007,320; fruits and vegetables, $2,564,801. The provincial wool crop raised in 1901 was: fine wool, 1,196,597 lbs.; coarse wool, 1,576,297 lbs. The value of the mineral production of the Province of Quebec in 1902 was $3,743,636. The value of the yield of the provincial fisheries was in 1902 $2,059,175, the largest catch being of cod. The Province contains many grand and beautiful objects of interest to the tourist. The Ottawa and its tributaries abound in falls and rapids of an exceedingly picturesque character. A little above Rigaud are Carillon Falls, a series of rapids 12 miles in length. Near Ottawa City a branch, called the Rideau, pours its waters down a perpendicular bed of blue limestone, 50 feet, into the Ottawa. The Chaudiere Falls (the Indian name of which is Kanajo, ‘'the Boiling Pot,” in the same vicinity, are wild and grand. The Fall in no place exceeds 40 feet, but the rapids extend miles, and the water foams, tosses and tumbles among rocks of every shape, in perpetual variety, and in such a manner as never to weary the eye, appearing like a multitude of different streams “struggling for a passage.” An excellent view of the whole is had from a fine suspension bridge over the Ottawa. One portion of the river is separated from the main stream, and falls into a subterranean passage. When this part of Canada was an unbroken wilderness an enterprising American named Philemon Wright established himself at the falls, selecting the mouth or Hull side as his residence. He had his attention early attracted to the strange phenomenon of a considerable portion of the Chaudiere Falls descending into a rocky basin without any apparent outlet. Having built the first saw mill ever erected on the Ottawa River, at that part of the falls immediately above the lost channel, and being curious to know its outlet, he followed the course of the river downwards for sixty miles, examining the shore line on each side, but he was unable to discover the slightest trace of the saw dust or saw mill debris daily cast into the lost channel, and to this day the enigma has baffled curiosity and science, and the outlet is a mystery. At these and the other falls are timber slides constructed at great expense. Les Chats, another series of falls or rapids, 30 miles further up, are formed by the river breaking, at high water, over the rocks in 33 distinct shoots, spreading across the river to a width of 4 miles. Some of these separate shoots would in many places, be called large rivers, and are very remarkable falls, and well worthy the attention of the tourist. At Calumet there is another rapid of scarcely less interest; a fall of 120 feet in the Keepawa branch; besides, a number of inferior falls and rapids, studded with saw mills, and the banks in many places wild and rugged; while the river often expands into beautiful lakes. The well-known Falls of Montmorency, miles below Quebec, with a perpendicular descent of 240 feet; the Falls of the Chaudiere on the south side of the St. Lawrence, 10 miles above Quebec, with a perpendicular pitch of 125 feet down a deep chasm; the beautiful Falls of the St. Anne, on the north shore of the St. Lawrence, 22 miles below Quebec; and the Long Sault, Cedars and Lachine Rapids are all on the frequented route of tourists. But the grandest river scenery is to be seen on the Saguenay River, which enters the St. Lawrence about 120 miles below Quebec. The last sixty miles of its course are exceedingly sublime. The banks, varying in height from 500 to 1,500 feet, not only often perpendicular, but absolutely overhanging the dark, deep river below “as if to gaze at its own rugged features.” The precipitancy continues below as well as above the water, which has been found as deep within 5 feet of the shore as in the middle; and near its mouth a line of feet failed to reach the bottom. The depth in other parts varies from 100 to 1,000 feet. The upper part of the Saguenay abounds in falls and rapids. Excursions are made from Montreal and Quebec to this river in steamboats. The scenery on the north bank of the St. Lawrence alone is worth the trip. The Indian population of the Province of Quebec in 1903 was 11,066—Nipissings, Algonquins, Abenakis, Hurons, Amelicites, Micmacs, Montagnais and Nasquapees. The Province is said to have been discovered by Sebastian Cabot in 1497; but the first settlement made by Europeans was in 1541, near Quebec, by Jacques Cartier, a French navigator, who sailed up the St. Lawrence to which he gave its present name. In 1608, a permanent settlement was made by the French upon the present site of the City of Quebec. From this period till 1759 the French continued to occupy the country, though much harassed by various tribes of Indians, particularly the Iroquois; but in the year last named an English army, under General Wolfe, captured Quebec; and by September 8, 1760, all other places within the government of Canada were surrendered to the British, and the French power was dominated by the British. In 1792 the Province was divided into Upper and Lower Canada, but in 1840, after serious political dissensions, they were reunited under the name of the United Provinces of Canada. In 1867 they were again separated, and under the names respectively of Ontario and Quebec, they now form the two most important Provinces in the Dominion of Canada.