AROUND THE COUNTY COL.

Poor Canada. No one seems to take it seriously until it can be used. The British demonstrated this in two world wars. Now it may be the turn of the United States to take advantage of its neighbor.

Americans finally are realizing they might inherit huge chunks of Canada, the Atlantic Maritimes, if not some of Canada’s western provinces. It took a long time for the realization to sink in south of the border where they never heard of Meech Lake. A divided Canada, with an independent Quebec and the Maritimes attached to New England, would have an enormous impact on the United States. Uniquely linked with the Maritimes would be New England, sharing an economy based on lumber, potatoes and fish.

Canadian politics has a fairy-tale glitter when seen from afar. Old- fashioned rhetoric, shades of Empire and guardian red-coated Mounties were long conjured in song and legend. Voltaire called Canada “a few acres of ice and snow.”

Up close, there’s a rough Canadian underside of realism and ethnic bitterness.

Americans are just becoming aware of the Meech Lake Accord. The 1987 agreement came out of an obscure corner of Quebec, designed to make Quebec a partner in Canada’s 1982 constitution. The accord recognizes the French-speaking province as a “distinct society.” Meech Lake has stirred strong separatist yearnings which English Canada had hoped were dead.

The accord must be ratified by Canada’s 10 provinces by June 23, or die.

National ratification isn’t a safe bet. New Brunswick, Manitoba and Newfoundland are holding out.

After two days of stinging attacks, Newfoundland Premier Clyde Wells answered his detractors here this week, insisting his objections to Meech Lake were logical and rooted in Newfoundland history.

Speaking before a parliamentary committee, the Liberal premier gave no sign he would cave in to political pressure to drop objections so the accord could be passed.

“Neither political leaders nor ordinary citizens should be made to feel they are traitors to the nation because they express an opinion contrary,” Wells told the public hearing. “Failure to accept the Meech Lake Accord will not result in a constitutional impasse. It will lead eventually … to the strengthening of our nation.”

Wells rescinded Newfoundland’s approval of the accord last month, and repeated his objections before the local hearing. Wells has criticized the accord for supposedly blocking senate reform and entrenching regional disparities, particularly for Newfoundland, one of Canada’s poorest provinces.

“If I’m wrong, I’ll be the saddest Canadian in this country, because I can’t imagine a Canada without Quebec,” admitted Wells. “But we can’t go on with building the foundation of this country on: `You must accept this or else.”‘

“Intolerance, bitterness, lack of respect for the two cultures, this will have repercussions all over,” Richard Hatfield, former premier of New Brunswick, told the hearing.

Meanwhile, one has Quebec with a largely French-speaking population of 6 million, bound by language, religion and culture, as different from English Canada as night from day. Indeed, there are smaller and poorer nations in the world than Quebec.

Meech Lake could make or destroy Canada.

On second thought, it’s doubtful the accord through passage or defeat will do either. Passage probably will only delay Quebec’s self-propelled ouster and move to nationhood. Even if Meech Lake passes, one envisions Quebec politicians continuing to woo the national government successfully for special funds and favors, as the price of preventing a breakup, until, at last, one day the rest of the country is fed up and Quebec becomes independent anyway. An independent Quebec seems inevitable.

Defeat of Meech Lake probably won’t split the country right away. In the face of the accord’s defeat, one can’t imagine Quebec not sticking it out for a while, tapping Ottawa for all the spoils that can be mustered as the price of remaining in the union. A Meech Lake defeat, however, probably would hasten the day the world would see an independent Quebec.

No less a conservative than John Buchanan of Nova Scotia, Canada’s longest-serving premier, has said that with a separate Quebec, the best bet for Canada’s four Atlantic provinces would be to become part of the United States. Then there’s Jean Chretien, Canada’s leading Liberal leadership candidate. Even if Meech Lake dies, Quebec probably won’t separate from Canada, he believes. A legislative district sampling in Quebec showed residents more concerned with other issues, Chretien said recently.

A sovereignty-association referendum toward semi-independence was defeated in 1980, supported largely by students, unions and low-rung university leaders. But Quebec’s leading entrepreneurs and economists now say they no longer fear the economic cost of separation. A recent survey showed 54 percent of Quebecers believed the province soon would break free. Forty percent of Canadians agreed.

Financiers are holding their breath. New Brunswick seemed to be surviving U.S. investor nervousness; it was reported holding its strong credit rating of A-1 with Moody’s Investor Service of New York.

But tensions are running amok. Chretien’s leadership rival, John Nunziata, told a Nova Scotia leadership forum that Quebec separatists were “traitorous and no better than racists and bigots.” A Quebec MP said he wanted MP Nunziata condemned and forced by Canada’s Commons to apologize.