CHAPTER X.
THE CHICAGO VOLUNTEERS--A NOBLE BAND OF PATRIOTS RETURN HOME TO DEFEND THEIR NATIVE LAND--A STRIKING EXAMPLE OF CANADIAN PATRIOTISM.
No matter where you find a true Canadian, he holds in the depths of his heart a love and reverence for his native land and its flag which cannot be uprooted.

He may "roam 'neath alien skies" or tread a foreign shore, but his heart ever beats true to his homeland, and when his services are required in defence of her shores he does not as a rule require to be summoned hence.

He acts on the impulse of the occasion, and quickly buckles on his armor to take the field for the honor of his country.
This national trait was never more spontaneously illustrated than during the perilous periods of the Fenian Raids.

Many of the stalwart sons of Canada were temporarily residing in the United States at these times, and had exceptional opportunities of noticing the constant preparations that were being made by the Fenian plotters to invade the land of their birth.

Oft-times, perhaps, they were reminded by their American and Fenian shopmates or fellow-employees, of the fact that they were aliens, who were only permitted to reside in the United States on sufferance, and insults and epithets would be hurled at them because they were "bloody Canucks." But the Canadian boys always kept a stiff upper lip, and when insolence became too intolerable they were not afraid to assert their manhood by the use of a little physical force, and teach their tormentors that a Canadian has rights which _all_ men are bound to respect.
Quite a colony of Canadians resided in the City of Chicago, Illinois, in 1866, many of them holding lucrative positions in employment where brains, energy and confidence were the chief essentials required.