5. _The Testimony of Mrs. Monk considered._--The only evidence against that fact is her mother. Now it is undeniable, that her mother is a totally incompetent witness. She is known in Montreal to be a woman of but little principle; and her oath in her daughter's favour would be injurious to her; for she is so habitually intemperate, that it is questionable whether she is ever truly competent to explain any matters which come under her notice. Truth requires this declaration, although Maria, with commendable filial feelings, did not hint at the fact. Besides, during a number of years past, she has exhibited a most unnatural aversion, or rather animosity, to her daughter; so that to her barbarous usage of Maria when a child, may be imputed the subsequent scenes through which she has passed. When appealed to respecting her daughter, her uniform language was such as this--"I do not care what becomes of her, or who takes her, or where she goes, or what is done to her, provided she keeps away from me." It is also testified by the most unexceptionable witnesses in Montreal, that when Maria Monk went to that city in August, 1835, and first made known her case, that Mrs. Monk repeatedly declared, that her daughter had been a Nun; and that she had been in the Nunneries at Montreal a large portion of her life. She also avowed, that the offer of bribery that had been made unto her, had been made, not by Protestants, to testify that her daughter Maria had been an inmate of the Hotel Dieu Nunnery; but by the Roman Priests, who had promised her one hundred dollars, if she would make an affidavit that Maria had not been in that nunnery at all; and would also swear to any other matters which they dictated. Now there is little room for doubt, that the affidavit to the truth of which she finally swore was thus obtained; for she has not capacity to compose such a narrative, nor has she been in a state of mind, for a number of years past, to understand the details which have thus craftily been imposed upon the public in her name. When she had no known inducement to falsify the fact in August, 1835, before the Priests became alarmed, then she constantly affirmed that her daughter had been a Nun; but after Lartigue and his companions were assured that her daughter's narrative would appear, then the mother was probably bribed, formally to swear to a wilful falsehood; for it is most probable, that she either did not see, or from intoxication could not comprehend, the contents of the paper to which her signature is affixed. Her habitual intemperance, her coarse impiety, her long-indulged hatred and cruelty towards her daughter, and her flat self-contradictions, with her repeated and public declarations, that she had been offered a large sum of money by the Montreal Priests, thus to depreciate her daughter's allegations, and to attest upon oath precisely the contrary to that which she had previously declared, to persons whose sole object was to ascertain the truth--all those things demonstrate that Mrs. Monk's evidence is of no worth; and yet that is all the opposite evidence which can be adduced.