Montreal
merchants in 1808 took up the ideas of Alexander Hamilton and
after several vain attempts founded the Bank of Montreal in 1817,
with those features of government charter, branch banks, and
restrictions as to the proportion of debts to capital and the
holding of real property which had marked Hamilton's plan. But
while Canadian banks, one after another, were founded on the same
model and throughout adhered to an asset-secured currency basis,
Hamilton's own country abandoned his ideas, usually for the
worse.
In the social life of the cities the influence of the official
classes and, in Halifax and Quebec, of the British redcoats
stationed there was all pervading. In the country the pioneers
took what diversions a hard life permitted. There were "bees" and
"frolics," ranging from strenuous barn raisings, with heavy
drinking and fighting, to mild apple parings or quilt patchings.
There were the visits of the Yankee peddler with his "notions,"
his welcome pack, and his gossip. Churches grew, thanks in part
to grants of government land or old endowments or gifts from
missionary societies overseas, but more to the zeal of lay
preachers and circuit riders. Schools fared worse. In Lower
Canada there was an excellent system of classical schools for the
priests and professional classes, and there were numerous
convents which taught the girls, but the habitants were for the
most part quite untouched by book learning.
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