A Dual Language Question

A DUAL LANGUAGE QUESTION. The Acadian society in the maritime provinces is supposed by some of the equal rights people farther west to have a mischevious tendency. On the contrary, it is an influence in favor of better education and a wider intellectual outlook. The leaders are the best instructed of the Acadian people and those who understand most the necessity that exists for their compatriots to keep up with the times. The orators of the reunions could not without grievous incon¬sistency, and certainly do not, urge the Acadian people to refrain from the use of the English language and confine themselves to French. Judge Landry, Senator Poirier, Dr. Leger, Father Richard, editors Landry and Robideau and local legislat¬ors and other men of prominence in the society have the complete use of the English language and know that such knowledge is indespensable to advancement in the professions, in politics, in the church, as well as in commerce. They are not so selfish as to seek to shut out their fellows from the way of progress and prosperity, or to deprive them of the enjoyment of social intercourse with the people among whom they are thrown. They only counsel that the Acadians in learning the English language and falling in with modern methods in most things, shall not forget the language they learned in their infancy or destroy the associations which are their inheritance. The letter from Archbishop O'Brien read at the Church Point convention did not in the least conflict with the aims of the Acadians society. Yet it urged upon the Acadians the necessity of seeing that their chil¬dren acquired a mastery of English, which is the language of commerce in this part of the world, and the speech of the people with whom all provincialists who go out in the world must mingle. But all who understand the aspiration of the Acadian people know that they do not need to be told of the necessity of bringing up their children to speak English. This necessity is impressed upon them every day by the circumstances in which they are placed, and they understand it at least as thoroughly as other people understand the need of having their children taught to read and write.