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diff --git a/38858-0.txt b/38858-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..8b0a73f --- /dev/null +++ b/38858-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4493 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Pictures of Canadian Life, by J. Ewing Ritchie + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Pictures of Canadian Life + A Record of Actual Experiences + + +Author: J. Ewing Ritchie + + + +Release Date: February 13, 2012 [eBook #38858] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PICTURES OF CANADIAN LIFE*** + + +Transcribed from the 1886 T. Fisher Unwin edition by David Price, email +ccx074@pglaf.org + + NOTE TO PAGE 56. + +Sir Charles Tupper tells me that I was totally misinformed. I am sorry +to have been led astray, and have pleasure in making the correction, +which was received, unfortunately, after the chapter had been worked off. + + [Picture: Dr. Barnardo’s Distributing Home for Children, Peterborough, + Ontario] + + + + + + PICTURES + OF + CANADIAN LIFE + + + * * * * * + + A Record of Actual Experiences + + * * * * * + + BY + J. EWING RITCHIE + + AUTHOR OF ‘EAST ANGLIA,’ ‘BRITISH SENATORS,’ ‘ON THE + TRACK OF THE PILGRIM FATHERS,’ ETC., ETC. + + * * * * * + + _WITH TWELVE ILLUSTRATIONS_ + + * * * * * + + London + T. FISHER UNWIN + 26, PATERNOSTER SQUARE + 1886. + + + + +CONTENTS. + +CHAPTER PAGE + I. Introductory.—Canadian Territory and 1 + Population + II. Off With The Emigrants—The Voyage Out—The 16 + ‘Sarnia’—The Cod-Fishery + III. Arrival at Quebec 33 + IV. At Montreal, and on to Ottawa—Interviewing and 45 + Interviewed + V. Toronto—The Town—The People—Canadian 74 + Authors—The Leader of the Opposition + VI. Off to the North-West—Niagara—Lake 104 + Superior—The Canadian Pacific Railway—At + Winnipeg + VII. Life on the Prairie 148 + VIII. Amongst the Cow-Boys 174 + IX. In the Rockies—Holt City—Life in the Camp—A 194 + Rough Ride—The Kicking Horse Lake—British + Columbia + X. Dangers of the Rockies—Prairie Fires—The 225 + Return—Port Arthur—Emigrants + XI. Back to England—Canadian Hospitality—The 245 + ‘Assyrian Monarch’—Home + XII. Colonization in Canada 255 + +LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. + + PAGE +Dr. Barnardo’s Distributing Home for Children, _Frontispiece_ +Peterborough, Ontario +Falls of Montmorenci—Quebec—Junction of the River 48 +Ottawa and St. Lawrence, Montreal +King Street, Toronto 78 +Second Year on a Prairie Farm, Canadian North-West 134 +Calico Island, Saskatchewan River, Canadian 135 +North-West +Hunting Scene on the Souris River 145 +Souris Valley, Manitoba 147 +Pioneer Store at Brandon in 1882 162 +Harvesting on the Bell Farm—Indian Head, N.W.T. 172 +Mount Stephen in the Rocky Mountains, On the Line 197 +of the Canadian Pacific Railway +Thunder Bay, Lake Superior 242 + + + + +CHAPTER I. + + +INTRODUCTORY.—CANADIAN TERRITORY AND POPULATION. + +Lunching one day in Toronto with one of the aldermen of that thriving +city (I may as well frankly state that we had turtle-soup on the +occasion), he remarked that he had been in London the previous summer, +and that he was perfectly astonished at the idea Englishmen seemed to +have about Canada. He was particularly indignant at the way in which it +was coolly assumed that the Canadians were a barbarous people, planted in +a wilderness, ignorant of civilization, deficient in manners and +customs—a well-meaning people, of whom in the course of ages something +might be made, but at present in a very nebulous and unsatisfactory +state. It seems my worthy friend had gone to hear a popular Q.C.—a +gentleman of Liberal proclivities, very anxious to write M.P. after his +name—deliver a lecture to the young men of the Christian Association in +Exeter Hall on Canada. Never was a man more mortified in all his life +than was the alderman in question. All the time the lecture was being +delivered, he said, he held down his head in shame. ‘I felt,’ said he, +rising to a climax, ‘as if I must squirm!’ What ‘squirming’ implies the +writer candidly admits that he has no idea. Of course, it means +something very bad. All he can say is, that it is his hope and prayer +that in the following pages he may set no Canadian squirming. He went +out to see the nakedness, or the reverse, of the land, to ask the +emigrants how they were getting on, to judge for himself whether it was +worth any Englishman’s while to leave home and friends to cross the +Atlantic and plant himself on the vast extent of prairie stretching +between Winnipeg and the Rocky Mountains. What he heard and saw is +contained in the following pages, originally published in the _Christian +World_, and now reproduced as a small contribution to a question which +rises in importance with the increase of population and the growing +difficulty of getting a living at home. + +As a rule, the English know little more of Canada than that it belongs to +us—that it is very cold there in winter and very hot in summer. I +happened to be on board the _Worcester_ training-ship on the last +occasion of the prizes being given away, and was not surprised to find +that Canada was especially referred to as illustrating the defective +geographical knowledge of the young cadets. In the _London Citizen_ a +few weeks later there was still grosser display of ignorance on the part +of a writer who had gone to Montreal to attend the meetings of the +British Association there, and who complained bitterly of the lack of +garden-parties and champagne lunches. This victim of misplaced +confidence owned that he had to put up with tea and coffee and +non-intoxicating beverages when he did so far condescend as to accept +Canadian hospitality. Yet the writer of that letter was a barrister, at +this very time a candidate for Parliament. Had he an atom of +common-sense, he might have known—this distinguished barrister and +ornament of the British Association for the Advancement of Science—that +Canada is a young country; that its wealth is still undeveloped; that the +greater part of it is prairie; that the settler—in his heroic efforts to +subdue Nature, to make the wilderness to rejoice and blossom as the rose, +to build up a grand nation in that quarter of the globe, to spread in a +region larger than the United States the Anglo-Saxon laws and +civilization and tongue—has to renounce luxury, to scorn delights, to +live laborious days. Canada is not the place for members of the British +Association who long for the flesh-pots of Egypt or the champagne-cup. +In Canada one has to live simply and to work hard. He who does so work, +though in England he may die a pauper, there becomes a man. Canada +offers to all independence, a fertile soil, a bracing air. At present +there is little chance of the majority of its people being enervated by +luxury or demoralized by wealth. + +Canada is a country, however, with room and scope for millions who must +starve and die in Europe. Its area is 3,470,392 square miles, and its +most southern point reaches the 42nd parallel of latitude. It possesses +thousands of square miles of the finest forests on the continent, widely +spread coal fields, extensive and productive fisheries, and rivers and +lakes of unequalled extent. The country is divided into eight provinces, +as follows: Nova Scotia, containing 20,907 square miles; New Brunswick, +27,174; Prince Edward Island, 2,133; Quebec, 188,688; Ontario, 101,733; +Manitoba, 123,200; the North West, 2,665,252; British Columbia, 341,305. +Newfoundland lies outside the Dominion, for reasons best known to itself. + +According to the census taken in 1881, the population at that time +numbered 4,324,810, distributed as follows: Nova Scotia, 440,572; New +Brunswick, 321,233; Prince Edward Island, 108,891; Quebec, 1,359,027; +Ontario, 1,923,228; Manitoba, 65,954; the North West, 56,446; British +Columbia, 49,459. These figures must be much added to if we would get an +idea of the growth of population, especially in the North West, which has +increased by leaps and bounds. Up to 1870 it was as it had been since +the charter of Charles II.—the happy hunting-ground of the Hudson Bay +Company. As late as 1870 it had no railway communication, no towns or +villages, few post-offices, and no telegraph. There must be a million of +people settled there by this time, and yet it is a wilderness almost +untrod by man. The origins of the populations are returned as follows: +891,248 English and Welsh; 957,408 Irish; 699,863 Scotch; 1,298,929 +French; 254,319 Germans. The balance is made up of Dutch, Scandinavians, +and Italians. A large number of persons who were born in the United +States are to be found in Canada—and why not? They have in Canada a +government quite as free as in the United States, though the Canadians +prefer to have a holiday on the Queen’s birthday rather than the 4th of +July, and an English Viceroy—who at any rate is a gentleman—to an +American President. Anywhere in Canada the Englishman is at home. The +people have an English look. Directly you pass the border into the +States you see the difference. There is an astonishing contrast between +the healthy Canadian and the lean and yellow Yankee. + +Canadian history is one record of toil and struggle—of the advance of the +whites, of the retreat of the native races. Foremost in suffering were +the French. In 1608 the first permanent settlement in Canada was made by +Champlain, who founded Quebec, and afterwards discovered the lake which +still bears his name. It was he who taught the Iroquois to stand in awe +of gunpowder; but, alas! familiarity bred contempt, and the Red Indian +was more than once on the point of exterminating the white man. It was +only by the intercession of the Saints that the feeble colony was +preserved. At Montreal, for instance, the advanced guard of the +settlements, some two hundred Iroquois fell upon twenty-six Frenchmen. +The Christians were out-matched eight to one, but, says the Chronicle, +‘the Queen of Heaven was on their side, and the Son of Mary refuses +nothing to His holy Mother. Through her intercession the Iroquois shot +so wildly, that at their first fire every bullet missed its mark, and +they met with a bloody defeat.’ No wonder the French were animated with +renewed zeal. Father Le Mercier writes: ‘On the day of Visitation of the +Holy Virgin, the chief Aontarisati, so regretted by the Iroquois, was +taken prisoner by our Indians, instructed by our fathers, and baptized; +and on the same day, being put to death, I doubt not he thanked the +Virgin for his misfortune and the blessing that followed, and he prayed +to God for his countrymen.’ + +It was no common faith that led the French monks to seek to make Canada +theirs. Their sufferings from cold, from starvation, from the savages, +from want of all the comforts of life, seem to have been as much as +mortal men could bear. But they made many converts. On one occasion, +when the French Chaumont had delivered an address, his Indian auditors +declared that if he had spoken all day they should not have had enough of +it. ‘The Dutch,’ said they, ‘have neither brains nor tongues; they never +tell us about paradise or hell. On the contrary, they lead us into bad +ways.’ Nothing could daunt the Jesuits—not the loss of all they had, nor +protracted suffering, nor cruel death. ‘The blood of the martyrs is the +seed of the Church,’ said one of them; ‘and if we die by the fires of the +Iroquois, we shall have won eternal life by snatching souls from the +fires of hell.’ + +Let us listen to Chaumont again, as he stands before his savage +hearers—he and his companions having first, with clasped hands, sung the +‘Veni Creator’: ‘It is not trade that brings us here. Do you think that +your beaver-skins can pay us for all our toil and dangers? Keep them, if +you like; or, if any fall into our hands, we shall use them only for your +service. We seek not the things that perish. It is for the faith that +we have left our homes, to live in your hovels of bark and eat food which +the beasts of our country would scarcely touch. We are the messengers +whom God has sent to tell you that His Son became a man for the love of +you; that this man, the Son of God, is the Prince and Master of men; that +He has prepared in heaven eternal joys for those who obey Him, and +kindled the fires of hell for those who will not receive His Word. If +you reject it, whoever you are—Onondaga, Seneca, Mohawk, Cayuga, or +Oneida—know that Jesus Christ, who inspires my heart and my voice, will +one day plunge you into hell. Be not the authors of your own +destruction. Accept the truth; listen to the voice of the Omnipotent!’ + +Wonderful miracles sustained and renewed this ardent faith. In the +autumn of 1657, there was a truce with the Iroquois, under cover of which +three or four of them came to the Montreal settlement. Nicholas Godé and +Jean Pière were on the roof of their house, laying thatch, when one of +his visitors aimed his arquebuse at Saint Pière, and brought him to the +ground like a wild turkey from a tree. The assassins, having cut off his +head and carried it home to their village, were amazed to hear it speak +to them in good Iroquois, scold them for their perfidy, and threaten them +with the vengeance of heaven; and we are told they continued to hear its +voice of admonition even after scalping it and throwing away the skull. + +During a great part of this period, the French population was less than +three thousand. How was it they were not destroyed? Mr. Parkman tells +us for two reasons. In the first place, the settlements were grouped +around three fortified posts—Quebec, Three Rivers, and Montreal—which, in +time of danger, gave an asylum to the fugitive inhabitants; and secondly, +their assailants were distracted by other wars. It was their aim to +balance the rival settlements of the Hudson and the St. Lawrence. It was +well for Canada when France lost hold of her. In 1666, Louis the Great +handed her over, bound hand and foot, to a company of merchants—the +Company of the West, as it was called. As, according to the edict, the +chief object in view was the glory of God, the Company was required to +supply its possessions with a sufficient number of priests, and +diligently exclude all teachers of false doctrine. It was empowered to +build forts and war-ships, cast cannon, wage war, make peace, establish +courts, appoint judges, and otherwise to act as sovereign within its own +dominions. A monopoly of trade was granted it for forty years, and +Canada was the chief sufferer; but at any rate the peopling of Canada was +due to the king. Colbert did the work and the king paid for it. +Protestants were objected to. Girls, to be wives to the emigrants, were +sent out from Dieppe and Rochelle. In time, girls of indifferent virtue, +under the care of duennas, emigrated to meet the growing demand for +wives. ‘I am told,’ writes La Houtan, ‘that the plumpest were taken +first, because it was thought, being less active, they were more likely +to keep at home, and that they could resist the winter cold still +better.’ Further, such was the paternal care of the king for Canada, +that he attempted to found a colonial noblesse, and offered bounties for +children. The noblesse were a doubtful boon: industrious peasants were +much more to be desired. Leading lazy lives, many of the gentilhommes +soon drifted into the direst poverty. The Canadians had one +advantage—their morals were well looked after by the priests, who kindly +took charge of their education as well. Compared with the New England +man, the habitant had very much the advantage. He was a skilful +woodsman, able to steer his canoe, a soldier and a hunter. Nevertheless, +when Wolfe’s army had scaled the heights of Abraham, and won Canada for +the British, it was the beginning of a new life. + +‘England,’ writes Mr. Parkman, ‘imposed by the sword on reluctant Canada +the boon of rational and ordered liberty. A happier calamity never +befell a people than the conquest of Canada by the British arms.’ But it +was not till the American Revolution had broken out, and the royalists +left the States to found in Canada a strong colony attached to the +British Crown, that Canada may be really said to have been a part and +parcel of the Empire, bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh. It was +necessary to move many of the French Canadians elsewhere; and those who +remained, still for long looked with an unfriendly eye on England and her +rule. + + + + +CHAPTER II. + + +OFF WITH THE EMIGRANTS—THE VOYAGE OUT—THE ‘SARNIA’ THE COD-FISHERY. + +One Wednesday at the end of April, last year, St. Pancras Railway Station +was the scene of a display not often matched even in these demonstrative +days. Mr. J. J. Jones, of the Samaritan Mission, had arranged to take +out a party of five hundred emigrants to Canada—the first party of the +season. The event seemed to create no little excitement in philanthropic +circles. The Lord Mayor had promised to be there, but he was detained in +the City, possibly in defence of the ancient Corporation of which he has +become the champion; but he sent a cordial letter, as did many other +distinguished people, to express sympathy and goodwill. + +In the absence of the Lord Mayor, the Earl of Shaftesbury, after the +emigrants had been got together in a waiting-room, presided at a farewell +meeting, which ought to have sent the emigrants in the best of spirits to +the new homes they expect to find on the other side of the Atlantic. +They would, said his lordship, still be under the reign of our Queen. +They would confer a great blessing on the country whither they were +going, and they would show what they could do as good citizens in +subduing and replenishing the earth, and in spreading over the world the +Anglo-Saxon race. He hoped that the young men present would come back to +England for wives, and ended with his best wishes for all in the way of a +safe voyage and temporal and spiritual good. + +The Earl of Carnarvon, who next spoke, had this advantage over the noble +chairman, in that he had made a trip to Canada himself. The emigrants, +he said, would encounter difficulties. They were not going to a +paradise, but they would find that they had a better chance of getting a +living in the New World; especially if they avoided bad company and the +crowded towns, and got into the country, and underwent a certain +preparatory training. As to Canada, it was a country in which a man +would succeed who had health and strength and industry, and a good head +and a good heart, and the fear of God to teach him that honesty was the +best policy. + +Sir Henry Tyler, M.P., the chairman of the Grand Trunk Railway, followed +in a similar strain. The people were not crowded up in Canada as they +were here. It was a grand country for honest, hard-working men and +well-behaved women; but he recommended them at first to seek good honest +people to work with, rather than high wages. Turning to the young women, +he assured them they would find good husbands in Canada—a remark which +seemed to give them much satisfaction; and he hoped that they would have +large families when they married, as large families were a blessing out +there. + +Then came forward Mr. Clare Sewell Read, M.P., who, as a countryman, said +he saw some country bumpkins in the party, and he could assure them, as +he had been in Canada, its soil was unrivalled for fertility. + +Lord Napier of Magdala followed, and then came the Hon. Donald A. Smith, +one of the directors of the Canadian Pacific Railway, to tell how people +prospered in Canada who behaved well and worked hard. The Rev. Oswald +Dykes and the Rev. Burman Cassin also addressed the audience; and there +were others, such as the Earl of Aberdeen, the Rev. W. Tyler, and the +Rev. Styleman Herring, who were ready to say a few words had time +permitted; but the train had to be packed up with passengers and luggage, +and there was no time to spare. + +In a few minutes they were off, amidst tears and cheers, while Mr. Jones +and I, with Mr. Alexander Begg, of the Canadian Pacific Railway, and the +remainder of the emigrants, followed. A little after five we arrived at +Liverpool, and then Mr. Jones had to work like a horse. + +Meanwhile, I, with a couple of artistic friends, who are to sketch us, +all took our ease in our inn, from which comfortable quarters I felt +sadly indisposed to stir; but I had to see the emigrants off, and my +heart sank into my shoes as, looking at the hundreds swarming the +platform, and the pyramids of luggage, and then at the _Sarnia_ moored in +mid-stream, the thought suggested itself, How on earth can they all be +stowed away?—a query which, however, was soon settled, as, at a later +hour, I found myself on board the _Sarnia_, leaving smoky Liverpool +behind, and with the ship’s head turned to the sunset ‘and the baths of +all the Western stars.’ + +The _Sarnia_, it may be as well to inform my readers, is one of the +screw-steamers running between Quebec and Liverpool, by the Dominion +Line, which line commenced its gay career in 1870. I ought to be very +happy on board, since I learn, from the attentive perusal of documents +lying in the cabin, that, owing to the lines in the model, the rolling of +the ship is to a great extent, not destroyed, but reduced, making a +considerable decrease in sea-sickness, and that in the book of rules and +regulations compiled for the guidance of the Dominion Line officers, they +must run no risk which might by any possibility result in accident to the +ship, and that they are further requested to bear in mind that the safety +of the lives and property entrusted to their care is the ruling principle +that should govern them in the management of their ships. I almost fancy +I must have thrown away my money in insuring my life against loss and my +person against accidents. What have I to fear, if the rules and +regulations of the company be observed? I am very glad, as it is, I did +not insure for a larger sum, though the agent, who, of course, had his +eye on the extra commission, was kind enough to suggest it were well to +insure for the larger sum, _in case the ship went down_!—a thing not to +be dreamed of. + +I have consulted that oracle of our fathers—Francis Moore. In his ‘Vox +Stellarum’ he tells me, to my comfort and satisfaction, that after the +25th of April the winds will be light. Francis Moore, you may tell me, +is not weatherwise. Are the scientific meteorologists, with their +forecasts, wiser? It is hard to say. + +It is a comfort to think that the emigrants are well off for literature. +The _Graphic_ company—whose last dividend, I learn, was a good deal over +a hundred per cent.—have sent a tremendous packet of _Graphics_. The +Bible Society sent Testaments. The Religious Tract Society have placed +at Mr. Jones’s disposal tracts and books. The Rev. Newman Hall has sent +250 books, while a goodly packet of the ‘Family Circle Edition’ of the +_Christian World_ will, I dare say, be in much request—quite as much as +the five hundred sheets of hymns which the Earl of Aberdeen brought with +him on Wednesday to St. Pancras as his contribution to the common stock. +Yes, indeed, as my Welsh friends would say, the lines for us are cast in +pleasant places, and we have a goodly heritage. It is to be hoped it may +be so. + +I never saw a more tidy lot of emigrants—some of them evidently the right +class to get on. I had an amusing chat with one, who told me what +inquiries he had made before he would entrust Mr. J. J. Jones with ‘Cæsar +and his fortunes.’ If the emigrants are all like him, the Yankees, if +there be such in Canada, will find it rather difficult to take them in. +We swarm with children and babies. I fear some of us will wish, before +we reach the St. Lawrence, that good King Herod was on board. Of course, +these are not my sentiments. I suppose most of us were babies once—there +is every reason to believe that I was; nevertheless, the most gushing +mother will admit that there are times when even the sweetest of babes +ceases to charm. My companions in the smoking-room the first night were, +however, by no means babes. I had not been there half-an-hour before I +was offered 34,000 acres of land—abounding with fish and game, and all +that the carnal heart could desire—a decided bargain. I did not close +with the offer. Perhaps I ought to have done so. But such earthly +grandeur is beyond my dreams. + +Nothing can be drearier or more monotonous than a trip to Canada in the +early season of the year. After you leave Ireland, you see no +ships—nothing but the sea, grey and dull as the heaven above. Now and +then a whale comes up to blow, and that is all; and when the wind blows +hard, you get nothing but big, lumpy waves, which set the ship rolling, +and add only to the discomforts. And then you are on the Newfoundland +banks, where you may spend dull days and duller nights—now going at +half-speed, now stopping altogether, while the fog-horn blows dismally +every few minutes, and whence you can see scarcely the length of the ship +ahead. + +Like Oscar Wilde, I own that I am very much disappointed with the +Atlantic. The icebergs are monotonous—when you have seen one, that is +enough. In the saloon, we are a sad, dull party; even in the +smoking-room, one can scarcely get up a decent laugh. I pity the poor +emigrants in the steerage, whom a clever young Irish journalist on board, +with the instinct of his race, has failed to excite into a proper state +of indignation on account of the discomforts of the voyage, and the +hardness of the potatoes—always a matter of complaint in all the ships +that I have ever been on board of. + +The raw, cold, damp fog has taken all the starch out of the steerage +passengers, always the first to grumble on sea, as they are on shore; yet +on one occasion they did go so far as to send a deputation to the +captain, and what, think you, was their grievance?—that they had no sauce +to their fish!—a grievance of little account, when one thinks of the +sauce we had served up in the saloon. + +As a rule, the steerage passengers are a difficult body to deal with; +they seem so helpless, and require so much looking after. Mr. Jones has +enough to do to look after his. If they lose anything, however paltry, +he is appealed to. If they require anything not provided in the bill of +fare, he is sent for. It is very clear to me that his party have great +advantages. He has taken down all their occupations, and when we arrive +at Quebec they will all, if possible, be provided with employment, and +will be at once forwarded to their destination, without loss of time or +expenditure of cash. Many of them are also assisted by his Society with +small sums of money, and in every way they are helped as few other +emigrants are. + +We have on board a party of fifty-one lads, sent out by Dr. Bowman +Stephenson, who has a depôt somewhere near Hamilton, and a helper is on +board to take care of them. Some of them are of very juvenile years, +and, it is to be believed, in Canada will find a far more favourable lot +than they ever could in the streets and slums of the East End. + +‘What are you going to do?’ said I to one of them the other morning. + +‘Please, sir, I am going to be adopted,’ was the reply; and adopted he +will be by some worthy couple who, having no children of their own, are +ready to give the little outcast a home such as he never could have found +in the old country. + +We have also an agent on board, who, for a certain sum, agrees to take +young fellows out and to find them suitable situations. That is a course +I should not recommend. A young fellow had far better keep that extra +cash in his pocket, get out as far into the North-west as he can, there +hire himself to some settler, who at this time of year is sure to be in +need of his services, and then in a year or two he will be able to get a +grant of land on his own account, on which, after three years of real +hard work, he will be able to live in peace and comfort, and to achieve +an independence of which he has no chance on our side of the Atlantic. + +It quite grieves me to think of the poor farmers I have known at home, +wasting their time and capital and strength in a hopeless effort to make +both ends meet, who might be doing well out here, with the certainty that +their families will be left in a comfortable position as far as this +world’s goods are concerned. One thing, however, I must strongly impress +upon the emigrant, and that is, the necessity of coming out in the +spring. + +It is madness to cross the Atlantic in the autumn; when he lands at +Quebec, he will find nothing to do, and must live on his capital, or +starve till next spring; and if I might recommend a ship, it certainly +would be the _Sarnia_, on which I now write. She is slow but sure. Her +commander, Captain Gibson, is all that a captain should be—not a +brilliant conversationalist, not one of those men who set the table in a +roar; but cautious, skilful, fully alive to the responsibilities of his +position and the dangers of his calling. As to the dangers, it is +impossible to exaggerate them. There are more than a thousand of us on +board, and were anything to happen, not more than three hundred of us +could, I should think, be crowded into the boats, provided that the sea +were quite calm, and that we had plenty of time to leave the ship; and in +a panic and in bad weather, it is clear that even such boats as the +_Sarnia_ is supplied with would be of little avail. Safety seems to me a +mere matter of chance. You hit on an iceberg, and down goes the ship +with all on board, leaving no record behind. + +As a matter of fact, I believe these big steamers often, on a dark night, +run down the vessels engaged in fishing off the Newfoundland banks. When +we passed, the season had scarcely commenced. It is in May, towards the +end of the month, that the fishing commences. The chief fishermen are +the French, who mostly hail from St. Malo, and who have in the Gulf of +Newfoundland two small islands, which they use for fish-curing. You get +an idea of the extent of these fisheries, when I tell you that the total +value of them amounts to three millions a year, and that the supply seems +inexhaustible. Romanists and High Churchmen who indulge in salt cod in +Lent have little cause to fear that that aid to true religion will +cease—at any rate, in our time. The fishing season lasts until November, +when the shoals pass on to their winter quarters in deeper waters. + +The delicate and the consumptive have many reasons for thankfulness in +connection with this fishery. What they would do without the cod-liver +oil, which has saved and lengthened many a valuable life, it were hard to +say. It is to England that almost all the cod-liver oil comes. The cod +roe, pickled and barrelled, is exported almost entirely to France, where +it is in great demand, as ground-bait for the sardine fishery. How great +that demand is, the reader will at once perceive when I tell him that no +fewer than 13,000 boats on the coast of Brittany are engaged in the +sardine fishery alone. + +I ought to say that these Quebec steamers are, as regards saloon +accommodation, and the class of people you meet with on board, not quite +on a par with those which ply between Liverpool and New York. Perhaps +the latter are fitted up almost too splendidly. ‘When the stormy winds +do blow’—when everyone is ill—when you are in that happy state of mind +when man delights you not, or woman either—the gilded saloons, the velvet +cushions, the plate glass and ornamented panels, seem quite out of place; +to say nothing of the luxurious dinners, which not everyone is able to +enjoy. Such things are better fitted for summer seas and summer skies. + + + + +CHAPTER III. + + +ARRIVAL AT QUEBEC. + +Once more I am on _terra firma_, and on Canadian soil, where I breathe a +balmier air and rejoice in a clearer atmosphere than you in England can +have any idea of. After all, we were in twenty-four hours before the +mail steamer, the _Sarmatian_, which you must own is a feather in the cap +of the _Sarnia_. One hears much of the St. Lawrence, but it is hard to +exaggerate its beauties. When you are fairly in it, after having escaped +the fog of the Newfoundland Banks and the icebergs of the Gulf, on you +sail all day and night amidst islands, and past mountains, their tops +covered with snow, stretching far away into the interior, guarding lands +yet waiting to be tilled, and primeval forests yet ignorant of the +woodcutter’s axe. A hardy people, mostly of French extraction, inhabit +that part of the province of Quebec; but as you reach nearer to the +capital, the land becomes flatter, and the signs of human settlement more +frequent in the shape of wooden houses, each with its plot of ground, +where the rustics carry on the daily work of the farm, or in the shape of +villages, inhabited by ship-wrecked fishermen, who have intermarried with +the French, and whose children, if they bear the commonest of English +names, are at the same time utterly ignorant, not only of the tongue that +Shakespeare spake, but of the faith and morals Milton held. They are a +lazy people, living chiefly on the harvest of the sea, and doing little +when that harvest is over. Men are wanted to cut down timber, and they +come in gangs of two or three hundred, and spend a week in riotous +debauchery before they can be got to work. Few English settlers go into +that region, yet they can easily make a living there if they are inclined +to rough it in the bush, and are not afraid of coarse living and hard +work. Villages, churches, hotels, are all built of wood on a stone +foundation, and, painted as the houses are, they remind one not a little +of Zaandam, and the little wooden cottages you may see in that old +quarter of the world. But the original colonists are a poor people, +living frugally and with little desire for the comforts and luxuries of +life. It is the same in Quebec, where the poor all talk French, and +where the Protestants are in a very small minority. In Quebec there is +little to attract the stranger. It looks its best at it stands on its +picturesque rock rising out of the St. Lawrence. You see the French +University, founded as far back as 1663 by that De Laval whose name is so +deeply interwoven with the French history of the province. It is thus +that his contemporaries describe him. ‘He began,’ writes Mother +Juchiereau de Saint Denis, Superior of the Hôtel Dieu, ‘in his tenderest +years the study of perfection, and we have reason to believe he reached +it, since every virtue which St. Paul demands in a bishop was seen and +admired in him.’ Mother Marie, Superior of the Ursulines, wrote: ‘I will +not say that he is a saint, but I may say with truth that he lives like a +saint and an apostle. We have ample evidence of the austerity of his +life. His servant, a lay-brother, testified after his death that he +slept on a hard bed, and would not suffer it to be changed, even when it +became full of fleas. So great was his charity that he gave fifteen +hundred or two thousand francs to the poor every year.’ ‘I have seen +him,’ writes Houssart, ‘keep cooked meat five or six, seven or eight +days, in the heat of summer, and when it was all mouldy and wormy, he +washed it in warm water, and ate it, and told me it was very good. I +determined to keep everything I could that had belonged to his holy +person, and after his death to soak bits of linen in his blood when his +body was opened, and take a few bones and cartilages from his breast, cut +off his hair, and keep his clothes and such things to serve as most +precious relics.’ + +Then you see the spire of the English Cathedral, a very plain building, +and higher up still, the modern Parliament House, but recently erected. +Further on, you see the Dufferin Promenade, which is a lasting record to +the most popular of English Governors-General; and higher up still is the +citadel, and beyond that are the plains of Abraham, where Wolfe fell in +the hour of victory. + +The Presbyterians and Wesleyans have good congregations, but the Baptists +are not strong, in spite of the wonderful vitality of the aged pastor, +Mr. Marsh, who, octogenarian as he is, seemed much more able to climb the +heights than the writer, who perhaps was a little out of condition on +account of the laziness of sea life. One of the buildings with which I +was most pleased was that of the Young Men’s Christian Association (built +partly by the munificence of Mr. George Williams, of London, the founder +of the Young Men’s Christian Associations all the world over), which is +quite a credit to the place, and from the top of which you get a +magnificent view of the quaint old city, with its gates and narrow +streets, and the pleasant suburbs, and the far-away plains and hills, +amongst which the St. Lawrence or the river Charles, which runs into it +here, urges on its wild career. + +‘In a city where we have to contend,’ says the last Report of the +Association, ‘against great disadvantages, where the Protestant +population seems to be gradually diminishing, and the young men seeking +other fields of enterprise, it is a matter of sincere thankfulness that +we have not to record a retrograde movement.’ It was with regret that I +saw that the Independent church, which is a fine one, has had to close +its doors. Another disadvantage resulting from this decay of +Protestantism is, that the Protestants have to bear more than their fair +share of taxation, as the Roman Catholic churches and convents and +nunneries, which are wealthy, are exempt from taxation altogether. I +fancy, also, that the men employed at the extensive wharves are doing all +they can to drive the trade away, as they impose such regulations as to +the number of men to be employed in loading or unloading ships, that now +many of them load lower down the river. However, the place is busy +enough, especially on the other side of the river, where the steamers +land their passengers, and where Miss Richardson has established a +comfortable home for girls and young women—which I inspected—free of +expense, as they arrive from England, and seeks to plant them out where +their services may be required. + + [Picture: Falls of Montmorenci, Quebec] + +One of our latest lady writers is very enthusiastic on the subject of +Quebec. I am sorry to say I cannot share in that enthusiasm, and I was +by no means disconsolate that I could not stay to attend a convivial +meeting to which I was invited by a French colonist, one of our +fellow-passengers. I was soon tired of its dusty and narrows streets, +and its pavements all made of boards, and its priests and nuns. There +are no shops to look at worth speaking of, and the idea of riding in one +of the _caleches_ was quite out of the question. Nothing more rickety in +the shape of a riding machine was ever invented. It seemed to me that +they were sure to turn over as soon as you turned the corner. The +_caleche_ is simply a little sledge on wheels. As a sledge I fancy it is +delightful, though by no means up to the sledges I have driven on the +Elbe in hard winters in days long long departed; but as a carriage, drawn +by a broken-down horse, with a driver almost as wild as the original +Indian, the _caleche_, I own, finds little favour in my eyes. Up the +town there does not seem much life. There is plenty of it, however, in +the shipping district, where a great deal of building is going on. + +Of one thing I must complain in connection with emigration, and that is +the pity the emigrants land at Quebec at all. The steamers all go up to +Montreal after they have shot down their helpless crowd of emigrants on +the wharf, where they have to spend a dreary day waiting to get their +luggage. How much more pleasant it would be to take them right on to +Montreal, which, at any rate, is the destination of ninety-nine out of a +hundred at the very least. As it is, they are taken on by a special +train, which starts no one knows when, and which arrives at Montreal at +what hour it suits the railway authorities. In that respect, it seems to +me, there is room for great improvement; but on this head I speak +diffidently, as, perhaps, the steamship owners and the railway companies +know their own business better than I do. The trip is a picturesque one, +and can be enjoyed in these short nights better on the deck of a steamer +than in a railway-car. [I am glad to hear since writing the above that +this state of things will not further exist, and that every arrangement +is now being made by the Canadian Pacific Railway authorities for the +speedy transfer from the steamer to the train.] The more I see of +matters, the clearer it seems to me that large parties of emigrants +should not be sent out by themselves, but that they should be under the +care of some one who knows the country and the railway officials. + +I am sorry to say, as regards some of the better class of emigrants, the +long delay at Quebec gave them an opportunity of getting drunk, of which +they seemed gladly to have availed themselves. The future of some of +these young fellows it is not difficult to predict. In a little while +they will have exhausted their resources, and will return home disgusted +with Canada, and swearing that it is impossible to get a living there. +There was no need for them to go to an hotel at all. In the yard there +was a capital shed fitted up for refreshments. I had there a plate of +good ham, bread-and-butter and jam, and as much good tea as I wanted—all +for a shilling. It was a boon indeed to the emigrants we had landed from +the _Sarnia_ to find such a place at their disposal. + +As to myself, I need not assure you I was glad enough to find myself in a +Pullman car, bound for Montreal. I shed no tears as we left Quebec far +behind, and glided on under a cloudless, moonlit sky, serenaded by those +Canadian nightingales, the frogs. At first I felt a little difficulty in +retiring to rest. As a modest man, I was inclined to object to the +presence of so many ladies, although we had been on the best of terms +during our voyage out. It is true that they had their husbands with +them, but nevertheless I felt uncomfortable, and vowed I would retreat to +the smoking-room. However, I was over-persuaded, and lay down with the +rest; though more than once that eventful night I was awoke by awful +sounds, reminding me rather of the hoarse roar of the Atlantic in a storm +than of the peaceful slumbers of a Pullman car. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. + + +AT MONTREAL, AND ON TO OTTAWA—INTERVIEWING AND INTERVIEWED. + +One discovery I have made since I have been here is that Canada has its +clouded skies and its rainy days, and that a Canadian spring may be quite +as ungenial as an English one. Yet it is, I still see, the country for a +working man. And I write this in full knowledge of the fact that here at +Montreal the charitable, on whom the poor depend—for there is no poor-law +in this country, and let us hope, seeing what mischief has been done by +poor-laws, there may never be one—have been sorely exercised this winter +how to feed the hungry, and to clothe the naked, and to find the outcast +a home. But, mind you, I only recommend the place for the poor +agricultural labourer or artisan; and already I find the larger portion +of such who have come out with me are in full work, and are thankful that +they have come, but they had to take anything that was offered. It is +clear this is not the country for clerks and shop-lads, and the secretary +of the Young Men’s Christian Association—which I find here to be a +flourishing institution—writes: + +‘Young men are coming by each steamer. Many of them are introduced to us +with excellent recommendations, and have occupied good positions in +England. Some have left their situations on the representation of +railway and steamboat agents as to the opportunities in this country. We +find it absolutely impossible to secure employment for them in many +cases, business in every department has been so dull. Almost all the +houses have been employing hands that they could dispense with. Reports +from the West show the market glutted as bad as in Montreal.’ And I fear +things have not improved since. + +It is cruel to get such young men out of England. They are worse off +here than they would be at home. It is curious to note, in connection +with emigration, the evident desire of the educated mechanic to keep his +rivals out. ‘By all means bid them stop at home,’ he cries, ‘or wages +will be lower in the colonies.’ Already I have been interviewed by a +working-class official here, and that is his cry. And I give it for what +it may be worth, merely remarking that such illustrations as he gave in +support of his views turned out to be the merest moonshine. + + [Picture: Junction of the River Ottawa and St. Lawrence, Montreal] + +Now let me speak of Montreal, which I entered with pleasure, and leave +with regret. It is the chief city of Canada, and is built on the +northern bank of the St. Lawrence, where the muddy Ottawa, after a course +of 600 miles, debouches into it. You arrive by a grand railway bridge, +which is one of the wonders of this part of the world. The population is +nearly 200,000, of which two-thirds are French or Irish, and Roman +Catholic. It abounds with every sign of prosperity, and, as a city, +would be a credit to the old country. The river front is lined with +steamers loading for England. The principal thoroughfares contain lofty +buildings, and shops as spacious as any of our best, whilst its hotels +altogether throw ours into the shade; and then, in the suburbs the +merchants live in palaces, whilst handsome churches attest the wealth, if +not the piety, of all classes of the population. I fear Mammon worship +is the prevailing form of idolatry, yet I cannot shut my eyes to the fact +that the early settlement of the place was the result of religious +enthusiasm, and that it was an attempt to found in America a veritable +kingdom of God as understood by the Roman Catholics; but all that is +past, and the chief topics of interest are the prices of pork, or the +state of the market as regards butter and cheese. Let me remind you that +such is the goodness of the cheese of Canada, all made in factories, that +nearly as much cheese finds its way into the English market from Montreal +as from New York. + +One thing especially strikes me, and that is the muscular character of +the young men. Montreal is a great place for athletes. Montreal has +hundreds of such, as it is not only a centre of commerce, but the most +important manufacturing city in the Dominion—3,000 hands are employed in +the manufacture of boots and shoes. Then there are here the largest +sugar refineries and cotton mills and silk and cloth factories in Canada, +and the result is that, as these factories are nursed by Protection, the +towns are unnaturally crowded, and the people all over the country have +to pay high prices for inferior articles, and the Canadians, who ought to +be making cheese and butter, and growing corn for the artisans of +Lancashire, are doing all they can to reduce their best and most natural +customers to a state of starvation. ‘It is a shame,’ said a Canadian +manufacturer to me, only in language a little more emphatic, ‘that +England allows any of her colonies to put prohibitory duties on British +products.’ And I quite agree with my friend that it is a shame. +However, as long as the present Canadian Government are in power, there +is no chance of Free Trade. It was the Protection cry that placed the +Conservatives in power. With so many French as there are in Canada, +vainly dreaming of a restoration of French rule, it is idle to talk of +the interests of the mother country. Nor does Great Britain deserve very +well of the Canadians. Up to almost the present time it has held them to +be of little account, and, as we all know, it is not so very long since +it suffered Brother Jonathan to annex that part of Maine in which +Portland is situated, and thus to deprive Canada of its only winter +harbour. + +For one thing Montreal is to be highly commended, and that is on account +of its hotels. The Windsor Hotel, in Dominion Square, is one of the +finest hotels in America, and as you enter you are quite bewildered at +the magnificence of the entrance-hall. A curious thing happened to me +there. Mr. Hoyle and Mr. Barker, of the U.K. Alliance, had come there +after a pilgrimage in the States, and it was determined to give them a +reception. I had a ticket, and went for about an hour, chatting +pleasantly with readers, who had known me by repute, and were glad to +shake hands with me. Imagine my horror when, in the next morning’s +paper, I read that the reception had been got up by Temperance friends +for me, as well as Messrs. Hoyle and Barker, and that my humble name +figured first on the list. Perhaps this was meant as a consolation to +me. I had been interviewed on the previous day, and the papers had +spoken of me in such complimentary terms that I felt almost a lion. + +Alas! in America interviewing is quite a common-place affair, and it +gives no _éclat_ to be interviewed. People sat smoking in the hall as I +passed, utterly unconscious of the fact. Yet the reporters did their +best. One of them called after I was gone to bed. He said he was not +going to be scooped out by the other fellow, whatever that may mean. +Virtue in his case was not rewarded. I kept to my bed, and left the +enterprising reporter to do the best he could. + +I ought to say a word of the hotel at which I stopped—the Lawrence Hall, +in James’s Street—which I strongly recommend to all, especially to such +of my friends as may be contemplating a visit to Montreal. The bedrooms +are beautifully clean, the cooking is excellent, and the service is +admirable. It enjoys a tremendous amount of support. I was there just +forty-eight hours, and I counted as many as two hundred names of arrivals +after me, and yet, in spite of the crowd, there was ample accommodation +for all, and I and my friends dined as comfortably and quietly as if we +had been at home. The proprietor, Mr. Hogan, is a gentleman with whom it +is a pleasure to converse. Nor are his charges high. + +It is a sight to sit in the hall and watch the ever-shifting crowd, or to +stray into the shaving apartment, where a dozen barbers are always hard +at work. I own I became a victim, and paid a shilling for a performance +which in London only costs me sixpence; but in London I simply have my +hair cut, here I was under the care of a ‘professional artist.’ I quote +his card: ‘Physiognomical hairdresser, facial operator, cranium +manipulator, and capillary abridger.’ I could not think of offering so +distinguished a professor less than a shilling. But the fact is, you +can’t travel cheaply either in Canada or the United States. + +It goes sadly against the grain to pay fivepence for having one’s boots +blacked, and the way in which your change is doled out to you is not +pleasant, and adds materially to the difficulties of the situation. For +instance, I had a certain American coin the other day pressed into my +reluctant hands on the express understanding that it was to go for ten +cents. I paid it to a ferryman, who said it was only worth eight, and +then, on that supposition, he managed to cheat me; and I had to appeal to +a friend of mine, who told me that I had not the right change, before I +could get the man to give me my due; directly, however, the mistake was +pointed out he rectified it, thus acknowledging, in the most barefaced +manner, his attempt to cheat; and the beauty of it was, I was with a +great man of the place, who witnessed the whole transaction, and never +said a word, apparently looking upon it as a matter of course. + +I fear there is a good deal of villainy in the world, and that it is not +confined to America. Travellers are bound to be victimised, and the best +thing you can do is to laugh. I own I did so at Liverpool the other day, +as I was waiting for the tugboat to take me off to the _Sarnia_. I knew +that I had not made a mistake, I knew that the tug was sure to come; yet +four big hulking fellows with brazen faces would have made me believe +that I was too late for the tug, and that my only chance of getting on +board was for me to let them row me out. In that case the attempt was +the more rascally, as from a small row-boat I could never have boarded +the _Sarnia_ had I tried. Yet there they stood—sullen and expectant—for +a quarter of an hour, taking me, possibly, for a bigger fool even than I +look. + +‘It is a pity,’ said a Canadian lady to me, ‘that Queen Victoria’—for +whom all Canada prays that long may she reign over us, happy and +glorious—‘fixed upon Ottawa as the site of the Government.’ + +I am very much inclined to a similar feeling. At Montreal the change of +water affected me very disagreeably. At Ottawa I was completely floored. +It is a curious fact that almost everyone who goes to Ottawa is taken +ill. I was complaining of my first terrible night to Sir Leonard Tilley, +the Finance Minister, and he said that when he first came to Ottawa it +was the same with him. + +A lady told me that Lady Tupper, who has just left the Colony for +England, where, it is said, her lord and master hopes to find a seat in +the Imperial Parliament—a consummation devoutly to be wished, as to my +mind it is clear that all our colonies should have representatives in +Parliament—made a similar complaint as to the effect of the place on her +children, and I have it on the best authority that scarcely a session +passes but an M.P. pays the penalty of a residence in Ottawa. + +In my case I was preserved, as the man in the ‘Arabian Nights’ says, for +the greater misfortunes yet to befall me by the use of Dr. Browne’s +far-famed ‘Chlorodyne’—an indispensable requisite, I am bound to say, +when an emigrant takes his trial trip to Canada. I know not who is the +inventor—I believe it is what we call a patent medicine—that is, a +medicine not sanctioned by the faculty—but, as has been observed of the +Pickwick pen, it is indeed a boon and a blessing to men. I used +‘Chlorodyne,’ and was soon all right. Sir Leonard Tilley told me he did +the same, and no one should go to Ottawa without having a small bottle of +it in his carpet-bag. + +Yet Ottawa is not without a certain freshness of beauty that one +associates _primâ facie_ with perfect health. The stately Government +buildings, all of grey stone, are placed on a hill, whence you have a +peerless view of river and country and distant hill, and far away forests +all around. A more picturesque site it would be assuredly most difficult +to find. As to the town itself, it is a curious compound—almost Irish in +that respect—of splendour and meanness. There are magnificent shops—and +then you come to wooden shanties, which in such a city ought long ere +this to have been improved off the face of the earth. If on a rainy day, +unless very careful, you attempt to cross the streets, you are in danger +of sticking in the mud, which no one seems to ever think of removing, and +in many parts there are disgraceful holes in the plank pavement on which +you walk, which are dangerous, especially to the aged and infirm. + +In Ottawa the contrasts are more violent than I have seen elsewhere. +Everyone comes to the place. It is the headquarters of the Dominion. I +met there statesmen, adventurers, wild men of the woods, or prairie, +deputies from Manitoba, lawyers from Quebec, sharpers and honest men, all +staying at one hotel; and it seemed strange to sit at dinner and see +great rough fellows, with the manners of ploughmen, quaffing their costly +champagne, and fancying themselves patterns of gentility and taste. In +one thing they disappointed me. Sir Charles Tupper was to leave for +England, and his admirers met outside the hotel to see him off. There +was a carriage and four to convey him to the station, and other carriages +followed. There was a military band in attendance, much to the disgust +of the Opposition journals—and yet, in spite of all, the cheers which +followed the departing statesman were so faint as to be perfectly +ridiculous to a British ear, and seemed quite out of proportion to all +the display that had been made. Certainly they seemed quite childish +compared with those which greeted a certain individual, whose name +delicacy forbids my mentioning, when, on the last night on board the +_Sarnia_, he ventured humbly to reply to the toast of the Press which had +been given in the smoking-room by a Quebec artist returning home from +study in Paris. + +In Ottawa, certainly, there is no demand for emigrants, unless it be good +female servants, who are wanted much more, and can have much more +comfortable living, at home. A lady asked me to send her a few good +servants from England. I replied that my wife wanted them as much as she +did, and that it was my duty to attend to her requirements first. + +It is curious the airs the raw servant-girls from Ireland give themselves +out here. One day, when I was at Peterborough, one of the head-quarters +of the lumber trade—which yesterday was a dense forest, and is now a town +of 8,000 people—I heard of the arrival of a lot of girls from Galway. +The drill-hall was set apart for their use, and there they were +respectfully waited on by the chief ladies of the district in need of +that rarest of created beings—a good maid-of-all-work. In this +particular case one of the arrivals was fixed on. + +‘What can you do?’ said the lady. + +The girl seemed uncertain on that point. + +‘Can you wash?’ + +‘Oh no!’ + +‘Can you cook?’ + +‘Oh no!’ + +‘Can you do housemaid’s work?’ + +Well, she thought she could. + +Then came the question of wages. + +‘Will you take eight dollars a month?’ + +No, she would not. Would she accept of nine? Oh no! Would she take +ten? Certainly not. + +‘What do you want?’ said the lady, beginning to be alarmed. + +‘They told me I was to have twelve dollars a month,’ said the girl, and +that put a stop to the negotiation. + +When I state that an English sovereign is worth at this time four dollars +and eighty-six cents, I think you will agree with me that this charming +daughter of Erin somewhat overrated the value of her services. The +Canadians are a well-to-do people, but they cannot afford twelve dollars +a month for a mere housemaid. I think it would be well if the +respectable young women—of whom there are thousands in England who do not +care for the pittance given to a governess, and who prefer the life of a +lady-help—were to come out. They would soon be appreciated. + +The average girl selected to be sent out to the colony, so far as I have +seen her, is not a model of loveliness or utility. Were I a Canadian +mother, I would sooner have a lady-help. Nor need the lady-help be +afraid of the roughness of her lot. In Ontario, all the difficulties of +the pioneers of civilization have long since disappeared. One hears +strange tales of what those brave men and delicately nurtured ladies had +to suffer. + +I have seen two—whom I had known when a boy—who were familiar with the +best of London literary society, who figured in all the annuals of the +season, who were famous in their day, whose sires came over with William +the Conqueror. They were sisters, and married two officers, who had land +allotted to them in Canada, and brought out these wellborn and delicately +nurtured women into what was then a waste, howling wilderness, where they +had to slave as no servant-girl slaves in England, and to fight with the +severity of the climate in a way of which the present generation of +Canadians have no idea. Only think, for instance, of your joint roasting +at the fire on one side and freezing on the other! In the settled parts +of Canada, such horrors are now amongst the pleasant reminiscences of the +past. + +But I must return to Ottawa, where the universal testimony of all the +heads of the Government was to the effect that Canada is the place for +the poor, hard-working man. There is an emigration-office in every town, +where the emigrant is sure to hear of work, if work is to be had. + +Canada is a charming place for the traveller. He sees friends +everywhere. Mr. John H. Pope, Minister of Agriculture, and Mr. John +Lowe, Secretary, were especially useful in aiding me. As I called on the +Minister of Finance, he insisted on my seeing the Premier—Sir John +Macdonald—who came out of a Council to give me a friendly chat for half +an hour, and who kindly asked me to call on him again on my return. In +Canada the Council sits almost daily, and the sitting generally lasts +from two till six, as all the business which is left in England to the +departments, in Canada is transacted in the Council. Sir John seemed to +think that a good deal of time was wasted in speeches in Parliament, +which were intended not for the House, but for the constituents outside: +in this respect the Canadian Parliament much resembles a more august +assembly nearer home. + +I had also the honour of an interview with the Marquis of Lansdowne at +the Government House, in a pretty park about a mile out of the town. His +lordship enjoys his residence at Ottawa very much, and said he should +leave it with regret. His idea seemed to be that now was the time for +English farmers with a little capital to come out to Ontario, as the old +farmers are selling off their farms and going further, to take up large +tracts of land in the North-West; and I think many English farmers would +be wise if they adopted some such plan. The Province is called the +Garden of Canada. + +At present I have seen no very superior land. There is a good deal of +sand where I have been and wheat-growing is out of the question; but the +barley is excellent, and is in great demand in the United States, and a +good deal of money is made by raising stock and horses. At any rate, no +farmer here is in danger of losing all his capital—most of them are well +off, and their sons and daughters prosper as well. + +Let me give a few further particulars respecting Sir John +Macdonald—perhaps the most abused, and the hardest working man, in all +Canada. He has good Scotch blood in his veins. In the thirteenth +century one of his ancestors looms up as Lord of South Kintyre and the +Island of Islay. When the emigration movement to Canada began, a +descendant of this Macdonald settled in Kingston, then the most important +town in Upper Canada, and, next to Halifax and Quebec, the strongest +fortress in British North America. He was accompanied by the future +Premier, then a lad of five years of age. The boy was placed at the +Royal Grammar School of Kingston, under the tuition of Dr. Wilson, a +fellow of the University of Oxford, and subsequently under that of Mr. +George Baxter. Meanwhile, his father moved to Quinté Bay, near the Lake +of the Mountain, a lonely, wild country, in which the future Canadian +statesman was often to be seen in the holiday time, with a fishing rod in +his hand, with other companions as gay-hearted as himself. At that time +he is described as having ‘a very intelligent and pleasing face, strange +furry-looking hair, that curled in a dark mass, and a striking nose.’ + +Indeed, Sir John’s admirers see in him a resemblance to the late Lord +Beaconsfield, and that there is a slight resemblance the most superficial +observer must admit. As a lad, Sir John seems to have specially +distinguished himself in mathematics. His master also, we are told, +frequently exhibited the clean-kept books of young Macdonald to some +careless student for emulation, and as often selected specimens of the +neat penmanship of the boy, to put to shame some of the slovenly writers +of his class. + +At sixteen young Macdonald commenced the study of law, to which he +devoted three years. The gentleman to whom he was articled speaks of him +as the most diligent student he had ever seen. Before he was twenty-one +years of age he was admitted to the Bar, opened an office at Kingston, +and at once began to practise his profession. ‘He was,’ says a +fellow-student, ‘an exemplary young man, and had the goodwill of +everybody. He remained closely at his business, never went about +spreeing, or losing his time, with the young men of his own age and +standing, did not drive fast horses, but was always to be found at his +post in his office, courteous, obliging, and prompt.’ When Sir John +commenced his legal career, the country was full of revolution, and every +county in Canada had its Radicals ready to take up muskets or pitchforks +against the oppressor. Sir John, though a Tory, was often the means of +doing good service to his friends of the opposite party. In defending a +rebel who was tried for murder, the future Premier gained his first legal +success. It was a time of intense excitement, and crowds thronged to see +the prisoners and hear the trials. Everyone was struck with the masterly +character of Sir John’s defence; and though they knew it was not within +the power of human tongue or brain to save the prisoner, they admired the +skill with which he marshalled his arguments, the tact he displayed in +his appeal to the judges, and, above all, the deep interest he displayed +in the cause of his unfortunate client. This was in 1838; from that date +Sir John was looked to as a rising man. In a little while afterwards he +commenced his stormy political career. + +In 1841 Kingston was made the seat of Government, and Sir John was +returned to Parliament, in place of a politician who had lost his +popularity. The assembly was an excited one, and everyone made furious +speeches, with the exception of the new member, who sat unmoved at his +desk while the fray went on, looking, says a gentleman who well remembers +him there, half contemptuous and half careless. In 1844, he commenced +his executive career by being appointed to the Standing Orders Committee. +His first speech was delivered with an easy air of confidence, as +captivating as it was rare. The time ripened rapidly. The old Tory +Compact Party was being swiftly broken up, and when Lord Elgin arrived in +Canada, a new Government was formed, with Sir John as Receiver-General. +In a little while he was moved to the Office of Crown Lands, then the +most important department in the public service, and one that in the past +had been most shamefully, if not most criminally abused, but he was soon +out of office, and a new Ministry came into force, pledged to a Bill for +the indemnification of parties in Lower Canada whose property had been +destroyed in the rebellion. There were awful riots. The Parliament +buildings in Montreal were burned, and it seemed as if the old feud +between Frenchman and Englishman had been roused, never more to die. + +Lord Elgin was ready to return to England The reformers were strong, but +Macdonald did not despair. The new Government, amongst other things, +were pledged to increased parliamentary representation, the abolition of +seignorial tenure, and the secularization of the Clergy Reserves. Of the +Government that attempted to do this, Sir John was a bitter opponent, on +the ground that they had hesitated about questions which had set the +country in a blaze. The Government had to retire, and in the +Liberal-Conservative Ministry which succeeded to office we find Mr. +Macdonald Attorney General, and he held office till he was defeated in +his Militia Bill. He returned to office, however, in time to carry a +confederation of the Colonies, and to become Premier, when Lord Monck was +Governor-General. + +Since he has been at the head of affairs the Hudson Bay Company has +handed over its gigantic territory in the North West to the Dominion. +That great work, the Canada Pacific Railway, has nearly been brought to a +successful termination, and Canada has taken a leap upwards and onwards +to matured life and independence, of which not yet have we seen the end. +It is a terrible scene of personal attack, political life in Canada. +Even since Parliamentary Government has been established, the fight +between the ins and the outs has been bitter and constant. No one can +understand it, unless he is a native of the country; and it says much for +Sir John that he has risen to the top, and kept himself there so long. +To have done so, he must have possessed more merit than his enemies give +him credit for. + + + + +CHAPTER V. + + +TORONTO—THE TOWN—THE PEOPLE—CANADIAN AUTHORS—THE LEADER OF THE +OPPOSITION. + +Toronto, or the Queen City of the West, as she loves to call herself, +stands upon the north shore of Lake Ontario, and has not only achieved a +great success, but may be said, in spite of all the moving to the +North-West of which we hear so much, to have a great future before it, on +account of its position with regard to railways, which alone in this +great country decide the fate of towns and cities. Immediately in front +is a broad bay, from which you get an imposing view of the city, while +its forest of spires and factory chimneys gives evidence of prosperous +and busy life. I have never been in a city where the Sabbath was more +strictly observed. The omnibus ceases to run on a Sunday, the cab is +locked up, and even the cigar-store is closed. At seven on Saturday +evening all the liquor-shops are shut, and in Toronto, as in all the +Province, no one can buy a drop of whisky, or wine, or beer, till a +decent hour on Monday morning. It is true, I was invited one Sunday to +go and have a glass of whisky and water—an offer which, it is needless to +say, I refused; but then, had I accepted the offer, I should have had to +go into a club of which my friend was a member. In Canada, as in +England, the club-member may indulge his taste, however strictly the +abstinence of his less fortunate brother may be enforced by law. But the +Sunday quiet of Toronto is remarkable. There are few people but +church-goers in the streets, and the churches of all religious +denominations are quite as numerous and quite as handsome as any we have +in England. They are all built on a larger scale, and are all +well-filled. On Sunday evening I had to light my way into the +Congregational church, of which Dr. Wild is the minister. He hails from +America, and is quite the sensation of the hour. There was no +standing-room anywhere, and as I made to the door I met many coming away. +However, I had made up my mind to hear the Doctor, and hear him I did. +It seems that the subscribers have a door to themselves; I made for it, +and luckily found a chair, which I wedged in under the platform. As I +entered, the Doctor was making the people laugh by answering questions +that had been sent to him in writing. Then we had quite a service of +song. The choir behind him performed, a lady sang a solo, the +congregation joined in a well-known English hymn. The Doctor prayed, and +then we had a sermon about Revelation, containing much that was very +effective, if not about his text, at any rate about that mysterious part +of Scripture from which the text was taken. The Doctor is now in the +prime of life, and his preaching powerful and effective. The audience +consisted chiefly of men; perhaps that may be considered in the Doctor’s +favour. One thing did surprise me, and that was to see seated at a table +right under the pulpit platform a reporter coolly taking notes. Our +English reporters in a place of worship on a Sunday are certainly more +modest, and prefer to blush unseen. + +Toronto rises up, with its grand public buildings, proudly from the +shore. The site of the city was very marshy, and at one time it was +known as Muddy York. Only yesterday a lady was telling me how her mother +was near losing her life in the mud of the chief street, leaving behind +her the English pattens of which she was so proud. The further from the +lake, the more the land rises, till you reach where, as Tom Moore wrote— + + ‘The blue hills of old Toronto shed + Their evening shadows o’er Ontario’s bed.’ + + [Picture: King Street, Toronto] + +In 1812 the population of the place was under 1,000. It is now, +including the suburbs, where some of the wealthiest citizens live in +houses as well-built and as luxuriously fitted up as any in London, about +116,000. King Street, the principal one, is built up with substantial +brick and stone buildings, many of which are equal to any on the American +Continent. Forty years since, it was completely composed of wooden +structures, and was barely passable to pedestrians. Now, it is adorned +with stately stores, where the latest novelties of the Old World and the +New are ostentatiously displayed. The public buildings are quite an +ornament to the place, and the offices of the leading newspaper, _The +Toronto Mail_, are one of the sights of the city. The yearly civic +income and expenditure is over 2,000,000 dollars, and the assessed value +of property last year was 61,942,581 dollars. The streets are spacious, +well laid out, and regularly built. The two main arteries of the city +are King and George Streets, which, crossing each other at right angles, +divide the city into four large sections. I don’t think house-rent is +cheap. I have been in one or two private houses, the rents of which +seemed to me certainly dearer than would be the rents of similar houses +in London. But, then, in Toronto—think of it, O respected +Paterfamilias!—the best cuts of meat are about eightpence a pound, and +prime butter is not much more, and—Sir Henry Thompson will rejoice to +hear this—there is a plentiful supply of fish. The city also boasts of +fine theatres, and halls, and colleges; while the Episcopalian Cathedral +in James Street possesses the celebrated chimney and illuminated clock +which took the first prize at the Vienna Exhibition, and which was +purchased by the citizens, and presented to the Dean and churchwardens of +the place on Christmas-eve, 1876. They tell me, however, that the +strongest body of Christians in the city is that of the Wesleyans. I am +staying at Walker House, the most comfortable place which I have +discovered thus far. Toronto itself offers few opportunities to the +emigrant, and the citizens are not enthusiastic in his favour. I met a +reverend gentleman from England here, who, the other night, at a meeting +of mechanics, vainly endeavoured to say a word in favour of emigration, +and had to desist under the threat that if he did not they would knock +off his head. The mechanics here are very much afraid that if more of +their own class come out, wages will be lowered. Nor are Irish emigrants +in much favour here, as they stop in the city instead of going into the +country in search of work, and have to be supported by the charitable and +humane. Only a few days since a large batch of Irish arrived. Work had +been found for them which they agreed to accept, and they were on the +point of being forwarded, when they were got at by the Irish already in +the city, and now they refuse to budge. + +The other day I met Dr. Barnardo’s agent, who has come out with some of +his trained boys to settle them in Peterborough, where Mr. G. A. Cox, the +Mayor of the place, has kindly given a commodious house for their use. +Already, I believe, the Doctor has sent out 780 boys and about 470 girls, +who have all been planted out. Mr. W. Williams, of the _Chichester_ and +_Arethusa_, has sent many more, and so have others, of whom I hope to +hear tidings in the course of my travel. The manager of Dr. Barnardo’s +home at Peterborough, in answer to inquiries from the farmers and others, +writes that boys from seven to twelve years of age are usually sent out +on terms of _adoption_, to be treated in every respect as children of the +household, and to receive, on attaining their twenty-first birthday, a +sum of not less than one hundred and fifty dollars. Boys of thirteen and +over are hired as ‘helps,’ at wages varying from thirty-five to +ninety-five dollars per annum, with lodging, food, and medical +attendance. Girls are sent out at ages ranging from four to sixteen +years. Those of eleven and under are usually _adopted_ into families; +while those of twelve and upwards are hired at wages from two dollars to +nine dollars a month, with board, lodging, washing, and medical +attendance. The utmost care is taken that these children should be +placed in good hands. The applicant for a child has to get his letter +recommended by a clergyman or magistrate; then he has to give his +Christian name and surname in full, his address, his occupation; to say +if he hires his farm, or if it is his own; whether he is a member of a +Christian Church; what work the child will have to perform; on what terms +the child comes into the family; what length of engagement is desired; +what church the child will attend; and so on. + +Moreover, Dr. Barnardo’s system provides for the regular and frequent +visitation of every young emigrant at his or her place of employment; the +girls by a lady of great experience, the boys by a gentleman. By this +means the children are never lost sight of, and trustworthy reports of +their progress and whereabouts are periodically furnished to the heads of +the institution in England. + +Now, I call attention to this plan, not merely to increase confidence in +the labours of philanthropists who are sending out children to Canada, +but in order to raise the question, why it is only the children of the +destitute and the wild arabs of the street that are to have this +advantage. There must be many poor people in England who have sons, +perhaps a little too plucky for home, who could pay to send out their +lads, and would be glad to do so, if they saw a chance of their being +placed in good hands. There are many boys who would be glad to leave the +somewhat overcrowded house, and who would rejoice to fight the battle of +life in the New World under such advantageous conditions. Why should +they not have a chance? Why should the destitute only be looked after? +Why should not some one in the same way lend a helping hand to the honest +son of the honest working man? It may be that his father may be too old +to emigrate. It may be that he is doing fairly well at home, and that it +is not worth his while to emigrate. But why should not his son have a +chance, and be sent out under a system as excellent as that to which I +have referred? Assuredly that is a question to be asked by others. + +But Dr. Barnardo says in his magazine, _Night and Day_, that much injury +to the work of emigration has been effected by supposing that boys who +have committed grave moral faults can do well, if only shipped off to +Canada. He contends that a number of young fellows of _that_ sort sent +to Canada, would seriously prejudice the prospects of emigration +generally; and he urges in very strong terms that none but boys and girls +of thoroughly good physique, industrious, honest, and of good general +character, should be encouraged to emigrate upon any pretext whatever. + +Previous to my leaving Toronto I had the pleasure of an interview with +the Hon. Edward Blake, the head of the Opposition, whose utterances are +watched and waited for by all parties in the State with breathless +interest. Travelling from Winnipeg, I had listened to a conversation on +that gentleman’s merits by two young gentlemen—who were a little +incoherent in their language, owing to the quantity of refreshment they +had on board—which certainly somewhat raised my expectations. Nor was I +disappointed on my personal interview with the subject of their praise. + +The Hon. Edward Blake is a man in the prime of life, of fresh complexion, +of more than average height and build, with a keen and intellectual face. +He was born in Canada, was educated at the University, followed his +father in the profession of the bar, and as a cross-examiner, especially +of an unwilling witness, and in the art of turning a man inside out, may +claim to have no equal in Canada at the present time. He has visited +Europe more than once—at one time in an official capacity—has mixed with +our public men as well as with those of the Continent, has been in +office, and, it is believed, will soon be in office again. He received +me with great courtesy, and talked on things in general in a lively and +interesting manner. On the Province of Ontario as a home for the British +farmer he had much to say. + +Taking me to the map hanging up in his office, and pointing to the +district between Toronto and Detroit, he affirmed that there was no finer +land to be found anywhere in the United States. His first constituency +was a very poor one—consisting of English settlers and others who had +gone there with very little, if any, money, and they had all done well, +and their children were now mostly wealthy men. He did not approve of +the Government plan of emigration; but he did think there was a fine +field in Canada for the British farmer and his men. As to mechanics, he +thought the look-out was poor. The mechanic in that part of the world +leads a very migratory life. Such was the facility offered by railways, +which ran in all directions, that a slight rise in the rate of wages +would send him wherever that rise was to be found. At the present time +there was a depression of trade in the United States, and wages were low. +In Canada the wages were a little higher, and he looked to an emigration +from the United States; and then the wages in Canada would go down. + +The British mechanic would thus have to face a double difficulty—the +competition of the Canadian and the American mechanic alike. I must add, +however, that this was not the view of an English mechanic who had been +settled in Toronto some years, and with whom, subsequently, I had some +chat. His opinion was that any first-class English mechanic who came out +would do well, while he frankly admitted that an inferior hand would have +no chance whatever. + +But to return to Mr. Blake. It is evident, though he and his party are +supposed to be in favour of Free Trade—and it is a matter of fact that +they were driven from place and power by a Protectionist outcry—that he +does not consider the question of Free Trade from an English standpoint +at all. It will be long ere Canada will lift up her voice in favour of +Free Trade. In Canada there is no such thing as direct taxation, and as +money has to be raised for the support of Government, it is felt it is +easier to do that by means of a duty on foreign manufactures than by +taking it directly out of the pockets of the people. + +Just now there is a feeling growing up in favour of Free Trade with +America; but that will not aid the British manufacturer one jot. The +system of duties between Canada and America is an enormous nuisance, when +one thinks of the daily personal and commercial intercourse between the +two countries. For instance, I lost by changing English money into +Canadian dollars; and then again, when I had to change Canadian dollars +into American greenbacks, I had to submit to a further loss. This was +not pleasant, especially when you remember that every time you cross the +frontier—and people are doing it daily—you have to submit to a +disagreeable examination on the part of Custom House officers. Surely +Canada and America will before long have to come to a better +understanding than that which at present exists. Of course, I write +under correction. I am an outsider. + +‘Can you tell me,’ I said to the Hon. E. Blake, ‘how I am to get to a +knowledge of Canadian politics?’ + +His reply, and it was delivered with a smile, was: + +‘By living in the country some five or six years.’ + +Under such circumstances I feel, with the poet, that ‘where ignorance is +bliss ’tis folly to be wise.’ + +On one thing Mr. Blake was silent—nor did I allude to it: that was the +question of Canadian independence. It is raised in many quarters, it is +almost daily discussed in the Canadian newspapers. People are waiting to +hear what Mr. Blake has to say on it. At present the oracle is dumb. +When the question is settled you may be sure sentiment will have little +to do with it; on this side of the Atlantic, at any rate, that sort of +thing goes a very little way when the almighty dollar is at stake. But +the question to be asked is, How long Canadian independence will stand +the cry for annexation with the United States that will then be raised? + +One of the pleasures attending my visit to Toronto was the finding out +Mrs. Moodie—whose ‘Roughing It in the Bush’ did so much to help English +people to understand the hardships of Canadian life some forty years ago. +She was the youngest sister of Agnes Strickland; and, like her, wrote +books for children, and tales and poems for the annuals, then the rage. +She then married a Major Moodie, and went out to Canada, and I had not +seen her since I was a raw lad; but of her kindness and her talent I had +a distinct impression, and it was with real pleasure that I found her +living at an advanced age—but in peace and comfort—at her son’s, a +gentleman connected with the Inter-Colonial Railway. The sprightly lady +of 1834, eager and enthusiastic, had become an elderly one in 1884; yet +time had dealt gently with her, and her youth seemed to me to revive as +she talked of her old Suffolk home, and of men and women long since gone +over to the majority. + +I was glad to find that she had made her mark in Canadian literature. An +intelligent Canadian critic, Mr. J. E. Collins, whose acquaintance I was +privileged to make—as well as that of his friend, Mr. Charles Robins, a +poet of whom Canada may well be proud—writes of Mrs. Moodie: ‘So perfect +a picture is Mrs. Moodie’s book of the struggles, the hopes, the dark +days, and the sun-spots of that obscure life that fell to her lot in the +forest depths, that its whisperings form a delightful music to the +memory. The style is limpid as a running brook, picturesque, and +abounding with touches that show a keen insight into character, and an +accurate observation of external things. There is no padding or fustian +in the book, and no word is squandered, Mrs. Moodie regarding the mission +of language to be to convey thought, not to put on a useless parade.’ + +Mrs. Moodie has been living in Canada now fifty years, and loves to talk +of the old country, especially of the people with whom she associated +when, as Susannah Strickland, she used to stay in London with Pringle, +the Secretary of the Anti-Slavery Society, whose beautiful poem, ‘Afar in +the desert I love to ride,’ is still a favourite with the English public. +But she has no wish to come back to England—her family are all well +settled in Canada. She lives with one of her sons, and her daughter, +Mrs. Chamberlain, of Ottawa, has won deserved fame by her beautiful +illustrations of Canadian flowers and lichens. + +English readers who may remember Mrs. Moodie as one of the gifted +Strickland sisters will be glad to learn that she is regarded as one of +the pioneers of Canadian literature, and although born near the beginning +of the present century, possesses a mental vigour and active memory rare +in one so aged. She told me anecdotes of myself when a boy that I had +quite forgotten, and retains in old age the enthusiasm for which she was +remarkable when young. Some of her ghost-stories were capital. For +instance, one night, when her sister Agnes was lying sick, in the old +hall at Reydon, Suffolk, and was being nursed by her sister Jane, there +came to them a tall, stately figure in white, with long garments trailing +behind her. Of course, Agnes and her sister were very much frightened at +the apparition, which stood at the door, pointed her finger at Agnes, +hissed at her, and then disappeared. Other stories followed, equally +interesting, in which Mrs. Moodie, it was evident, firmly believed. + +It was during her long and lonely residence in the woods that Mrs. Moodie +performed most of her literary work. While her husband was away crushing +the Rebellion, she wrote her ‘Roughing It in the Bush,’ which did more to +establish her fame in Canada and in England than any of her previous +productions. It is probably the best picture we have of Canadian life at +that time, and written in a style of composition charming, if only on +account of its ease. Undisturbed by household cares, she wrote no less +than fifteen books for children; a larger work, ‘Life in the Clearings,’ +and in addition contributed a mass of matter to the old Canadian +_Literary Garland_, sufficient to fill several large volumes. ‘I +remember seeing Carlyle once,’ she said, ‘but he was such a +crabbed-looking man that I did not care to make his acquaintance. In +fact, his appearance was quite the reverse of pleasing, but he was an +honest, close-fisted man, I dare say.’ She had a good deal to say of +Cruikshank, who lived next door to Pringle. ‘I went to hear Dan +O’Connell,’ she continued, ‘on the Anti-Slavery question. He was +completely dressed in green—green coat, green vest, green +pants—everything green but his boots. I was greatly amused at his +opening remark, “Ladies and gentlemen,” he began, “England reminds me in +this great question of a large lion that has been sleeping a good many +years, commencing to rouse itself, stretch, yawn, and wag its tail.” For +days after, that lion, with its wagging tail, came visibly before me.’ +She also remembered Shiel, who began his speech in Exeter Hall, then +quite a new building, by saying that he was afraid he would not be able +to make himself heard, and then roared so that he might have been heard +at Somerset House. She saw the man in armour proclaim King William in +Cheapside, and it touched her to tears when all the people cried: ‘God +save the King!’ ‘At one time,’ she said, ‘I helped Pringle to edit one +of his annuals. Proctor sent in his poem on “The Sea, the Sea,” and +after reading it I recommended it for publication, but Pringle rejected +it. However, afterwards he found out his mistake when the poem, +published in another channel, brought fame to its author.’ + +Mrs. Moodie seemed to think that it was a great privilege to have been in +London while the Catholic Emancipation Act and the Reform Bills were +carried, and still in her comfortable house in Toronto loves to talk of +the bustle and excitement of the time. I was privileged twice to see +her, and then we parted, never more to meet—in this world, at least. + +Near Peterborough, about a hundred and fifty miles from Toronto, I found +another far-famed Canadian authoress, Mrs. Traill, whose ‘Backwoods of +Canada,’ published when I was a lad by the Society for the Diffusion of +Useful and Entertaining Knowledge, and now, I believe, by Messrs. +Routledge and Sons, was a delight to me in my young days. I remember her +well as a young woman, tall and stately, with a wonderful flow of +talk—enthusiastic as a worshipper of nature—ever ready to write of +Suffolk lanes, with all their richness of floral and animal life; of +Suffolk copses, where the birds sang, and the partridge and the pheasant +and the timid hare found shelter; of farmers, then merry, and of +peasants, then contented with their humble lot. + +In person she was attractive, the most so, to my mind, of all the +Strickland family, and she was very stately in manner, for was not her +maiden name Katherine Parr Strickland, and had she not some of the blood +of that family allied to royalty in her veins? The Stricklands came of +an ancient and honoured line, and besides that, there is a great deal in +names, as the reader of ‘Tristram Shandy’ and ‘Kenelm Chillingly’ +perfectly understands. What could you expect of a Katherine Parr +Strickland but queenly manner, as assuredly the young lady who bore that +name had? + +When I was a lad, she married a Major Traill, and accompanied her sister, +Mrs. Moodie, to Canada. I cannot think how ladies thus tenderly nursed +could have done anything of the kind—or, having done it, how they could +have survived the hardships they were called to endure. The lot in their +case was by no means cast in pleasant places. Mrs. Moodie, in her +delightful book, ‘Roughing It in the Bush,’ says: ‘A large number of the +immigrants were officers of the army and navy, with their families—a +class perfectly unfitted by their previous habits and standing in society +for contending with the stern realities of emigrant life in the +backwoods. A class formed mainly from the younger scions of great +families, naturally proud, and not only accustomed to command, but to +receive implicit obedience from the people under them, are not men +adapted to the hard toil of the woodman’s life.’ + +Yet it was to such a life Major Traill took his handsome and accomplished +wife; but Mrs. Traill in her backwoods settlement was not forgetful of +the literary vocation to which she had dedicated her early youth. I have +already referred to her ‘Backwoods of Canada’; that was in due time +followed by a volume equally worthy of public favour, under the title of +‘Ramblings in a Canadian Forest.’ Indeed, she and her sister may claim +to have been the pioneers of Canadian literature; and their brother, +Lieutenant-Colonel Strickland, may also claim to be placed in that +category by his work, ‘Twenty-seven Years in Canada West,’ a record of +his own experiences, abounding with numerous realistic touches. He +settled his family near his sister; and at Lakefield, near Peterborough, +the residence of Mrs. Traill, there is quite a colony of Stricklands, who +have all done well, so people tell me, at the lumber trade. + +I am glad I paid Mrs. Traill a visit. It was a long and wearisome ride, +but I was well repaid by a short interview with one with whom I was +familiar half a century back. Lakefield is a charming spot, and Mrs. +Traill’s wooden but picturesque cottage overlooks a lovely scene of trees +and hills, and water and grass. At any rate, in the early spring it has +a neat little garden; in new countries neat little gardens are rare. + +Mrs. Traill has seen great changes in her time. When she came there, +there were only one or two houses in Peterborough; all was forest, and +now it has a mayor and a town-hall, and is one of the nicest towns in +that part of Canada. Mrs. Traill’s cottage is fitted up with English +comfort and taste. She has around her books and photographs of loving +relatives. She showed me a book of hers recently published by Messrs. +Nelson and Sons. As a Canadian authoress, she has done much to +commemorate the beauty of Canadian forests, and writes of their floral +charms with all the tenderness and grace with which I remember her +sketches of East Anglian rural life were richly adorned. She is now hard +at work with a new volume on Canadian lichens and flowers. + +As we stood talking at the window—the sunbeams played gaily on the blue +waters of the lake or river beneath (in Canada there are so many rivers +and lakes that you can scarcely tell which is which, or where the one +ends or the other begins)—fairy flowers were beginning to gem her lawn; +and the American robin redbreast, a far larger bird than ours, and other +birds, still more graceful, flew among the trees—I felt how, in such a +spot, one weary of the world could lead a tranquil life. + +Mrs. Traill must be an advanced octogenarian—she is older than Mrs. +Moodie, and Mrs. Moodie claims to be far over eighty. Yet Mrs. Traill +retains her conversational power intact, and is full as ever of ‘the lore +that nature brings,’ and is as enthusiastic as ever in its pursuit. As +much as ever her manners are queenlike. They have never left her, in +spite of all the hardships she has had to undergo as wife and mother in +the wilderness, and her face still retains something of the freshness and +fairness of her youth. She is a wonderful old lady, and Canada must be a +wonderful country for such. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. + + +OFF TO THE NORTH-WEST—NIAGARA—LAKE SUPERIOR—THE CANADIAN PACIFIC +RAILWAY—AT WINNIPEG. + +As in duty bound, I have reached Niagara Falls, and from motives equally +conscientious forbear to trouble you with either poetry or prose on the +scene that now meets my eye. In seeing them I have an advantage—that in +this early season of the year I am alone and free from the crowd of +visitors that sometimes infest the spot. As it is, there is quite enough +of modern civilization there to disturb the poetry of the place; and the +scream of the steam-engine sadly interferes with the enjoyment of that +everlasting roar which rises as the vast body of waters tumbles over the +falls—raising up majestic mountains of mist—and then sweeps grandly to +the rapids, in the raging whirlpools of which poor Captain Webb lost his +life, or, in plainer words, committed suicide. Then there are the +cabmen, who will not give you a moment’s peace, and affect not to +understand you when you intimate that you prefer to walk rather than to +ride; and a grand walk it is, about a mile from the station on the +Canadian side. Far, far below is the river—a chasm in a mass of old dark +rock—into which you peer with wondering eyes till the brain is almost +dizzy. Words fail to convey the impressions, as passing cloud and +fleeting sunshine add to the marvellous beauty of the spot. I scrambled +down to where the ferry-boat is, and drank in all the charm of the place, +not caring to be ferried across, quite satisfied with watching the +eternal fall of water as I sat there—a mere human speck in that +mysterious grandeur. The white man has come and made the place his own. +He has now thrown three bridges across it, and on the American side has +built a brewery, whose ‘Niagara ales’ are famous all over the American +Continent. I am glad to say that it is only on the Canadian side that +you have a good view of the Falls; but on neither side is there what +there ought to be, a wilderness. On each side there are houses and +hotels, and churches, all the way; and I was offered Guinness’s Dublin +Stout and Bass’s Pale Ale, just as if I were dining in a Fleet Street +restaurant. On my return I met a funeral procession. Death had come +into one of the wooden houses on the side, and the friends and relatives +had ridden in their buggies and country carts to pay the last tribute of +respect to the deceased. Yes; death is lord of life—in the New World as +well as in the Old. + +I went then by way of Hamilton, through a district as fertile and as +well-farmed as any in England, looking far more civilized than any part I +have yet seen. There are no stumps of trees in the ground, as there are +elsewhere, and the houses look as if they had been built long enough to +allow of home comforts; and, as Hamilton is the place to which many of +our poor lads are sent, I was glad to feel that in such a district they +would have few hardships to encounter, and would have every chance of +getting on. Here at one time there were bears and wolves; but they have +long since disappeared before the march of their master, man. It is not +so long since there was quail shooting on the very site of the city of +Toronto, and hawks would carry off the chickens the earlier emigrants +were attempting painfully to rear, and the Indians were also unwelcome +guests. I have heard of an old Scotch settler who, as his last resort, +invoked the aid of bagpipes, wherewith to frighten his unwelcome guests; +but even that did not frighten the Indians, who carried off the contents +of his potato ground, undisturbed by a musical performance which would +have struck terror into the stoutest English heart. Well, all that wild +forest region is now the home of peace and plenty, and distant be the day +when Professor Goldwin Smith’s idea will be realized, and it has been +peacefully annexed by the United States. Out in Canada that idea finds +little favour. Why should it? It is a favourite boast with Americans +that Canada will ultimately be theirs. I am sure that is not a favourite +idea of the Canadians themselves. Great Britain, it is to be hoped, will +be as loyal to Canada as Canada is to her. + +The thing is not to be settled quite so easily as Professor Goldwin Smith +anticipates. In Quebec Province we have a million of French Canadians, +who make no secret of their preference to a French rather than an English +alliance, and who are quite prepared to act accordingly, as soon as +British authority shall have become relaxed. Then we have the Acadians +of Nova Scotia, who would probably follow the lead of French Canada; nor +could the few Britishers of New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island escape +the same fate. France is quite prepared to increase her influence in +this part of the world. Indeed, at the present moment there is talk of +her buying the island of Anticosti, which, as you may be aware, though +almost uninhabited now—save in the summer, when the fishermen go +there—makes a very respectable appearance in the river St. Lawrence. +Then we come to Ontario, which, placed as she is, could not withstand an +attack from the United States. + +Once upon a time the Yankees did make an attempt of the kind—that was in +1837—an attempt which the loyal men of Canada helped Sir Francis Head to +put down. Toronto escaped, though she had the enemy at her very gates. +I must say that all the Canadians with whom I have spoken have no wish to +become Americans. For one thing, they say they can’t afford it. +Government is more costly in America than in Canada. I admit as much as +anyone the right of the people to decide their fate. If the Canadians +prefer to live under the star-spangled banner, it is vain for us to +attempt to retain them. But the danger is the indifference of the +English public as to the value of such a colony as that of Canada, a +country bigger than all Europe, and at present with a sparse population +only equalling that of London. A few brief facts will show the +importance of the North-West to the English, not merely as a field for +emigration, but for other reasons as well. + +From Liverpool to Winnipeg, _viâ_ Hudson’s Bay, the distance is less by +1,100 miles than by way of the St. Lawrence, and they are now talking of +making a railway along that route. From Liverpool to China and Japan, +_viâ_ the northern route, the distance is 1,000 miles shorter than by any +other line. It is really 2,000 miles shorter than by San Francisco and +New York. How immense, then, will be the power which the possession of +Hudson’s Bay, and of the railway route through to the Pacific, must +confer upon Great Britain, so long as she holds it under safe +control!—and where is the nation that can prevent her so holding it, as +long as her fleets command the North Atlantic? It is utterly +inconceivable that English statesmen would be found so mad or so +unpatriotic as thus to throw away the key of the world’s commerce, by +neglecting or surrendering British interests in the North-West. Our +great cities would not sanction such a policy for an instant. England +could better afford to give up the Suez Canal, or be rid of her South +African colonies. The interests of the two countries are inseparable. +We require the North-West to send us grain. She requires us as her best +customer. Manitoba has her natural market in Great Britain, and in the +near future Great Britain will have her best customers in Manitoba and +the North-Western Provinces. + +It is to the credit of the Canadians—that is, if figures may be +trusted—that they spend less on drink, and more on education, than we do +in the Old Country. + +Party feeling runs high; but it is difficult to an outsider to understand +what is the line of separation between the ins and the outs. An English +writer tells us that she once asked a member of the Greek Opposition in +Parliament, what was the difference between them and the Government. +‘Why,’ was his reply, ‘it is this. If M. Tricoupi says we want +railroads, we say, “No; we want canals.” If he says a thing must be done +by horses, we say, “No; it must be done by oxen.”’ It is just the same +here. What one party proposes the other opposes. The present rulers +rode into power on the wings of Protection. They are Tories; but it is +to be feared the Liberals would have done the same, had they had a +chance. It is the fashion to use very bad language, and to imply the +worst of motives to your opponents; and it is in this easy way the +Canadian newspapers fill up their columns when they are not—and this +seems their great mission—quarrelling with one another. + +The country farmers, who are much keener men of business than their +fellow farmers in the Old Country, care little about politics. At the +last election a friend of mine said to a farmer, ‘Have you voted?’ ‘Oh +yes!’ was the reply. ‘Well, for which party?’ Ah, that was a question +he could not answer. He had voted as his neighbour told him; and he knew +that his neighbour was a real good man, and that he would not give him +bad advice. So long as voters are thus simple, elections will be a +mockery and a sham. + +I have left Toronto behind, and here I am on Lake Superior, the largest +body of fresh water in the world—so large is it, that if you immerse in +it Great Britain and Ireland, and add the Isle of Man and the Isle of +Wight, there would still be a respectable amount of water to +spare—enough, at any rate, to make a river as long as the Thames, which +we in England hold to be a very decent sort of river indeed. As I came +up the St. Lawrence, some of the Canadians, who are, as they may well be, +proud of their grand river, asked me what I thought of it. My reply was +that for a colony so young, it was a very tidy sort of river indeed; and +I may say the same of the enormous body of water on which I am now +floating. It is a big thing indeed—as might be expected, where both +Canada and the United States contribute to its bigness. We are in the +middle of the lake, having Michigan on one side. Already we have stopped +twice—once to take a pilot, and then again at Le Sault, where we had to +stay while we waited our turn to enter the canal which connects the +Georgian Bay to Lake Superior. There, indeed, we were made conscious of +the fact that we were within the United States, as the banner of the +stars and stripes floated proudly on each side of us, and there were a +few soldiers in blue regimentals standing on the wharf, to say nothing of +loafers, and boys and girls and half-breeds, to welcome our arrival. + +For one thing I felt proud of my country. The Americans have nothing +here equal to the _Algoma_, a crack steamer built on the Clyde for the +Canadian Pacific Railway, and to which, at this present moment, are +entrusted Cæsar and his fortunes. It is only the second trip the +_Algoma_ has made, as for the greater season of the year this immense +water-way, incredible as it seems to us, is a solid block of ice, and we +have it all around us still. I boarded the _Algoma_ on Saturday +afternoon, after a rapid run by rail from Toronto, which city we left in +the morning at half-past eleven, and I assure you I was glad the journey +was safely over, as once or twice it seemed to me, at one or two of the +curves, the cars were very near leaving the rails; and the boy—they are +all boys here—who had to attend to the brake, gave me a grin, as if he +thought that we had much to be thankful for that we kept the track at +all. I presume I shall get used to that sort of thing, but at present +the sensation experienced in rounding some of the curves is more novel +than agreeable. + +We are a very miscellaneous company on board, chiefly Toronto traders and +stalwart boys from Manitoba, who have been enjoying a holiday in Upper +Canada, and emigrants. Gloves are unknown, likewise hats and +shirt-collars are the exception rather than the rule. As to having one’s +boots blackened, that is rather an expensive luxury, when you recollect +the charge is fivepence a pair, and no one on board apparently has had +his boots blackened for the last week or two; and I question much whether +I shall require any of Day and Martin till I get back to Toronto again—an +event which will take place apparently about the time of the Greek +kalends. Hitherto I have managed the blacking difficulty most +effectively. As far as Toronto I travelled with my London friend, who, +aware of the custom of the country, had provided himself with the needful +materials for the fitting amount of polish, and who generously permitted +me to reap the benefit of his superior knowledge. My first attempt, I +fear, was a failure. In my bedroom at the hotel I set to work, and soon +acquired the requisite amount of polish; but, alas! I had forgotten the +effect of blacking on clean sheets, and to my horror I discovered the +bed-linen was, at any rate, as plentifully covered with blacking as ‘them +precious boots.’ However, I did not regret the catastrophe, as I hoped +it might teach the landlord it would be cheaper to get the boots of his +guests blackened in an efficient manner, than to leave such unskilful +amateurs as myself to do it on their own account. + +Life on board the _Algoma_ is as agreeable as can well be imagined. We +have three good meals a day. I am writing in a magnificent saloon, +nearly three hundred feet long, and if the nights are cold, as they +always are on the lakes, I have a cabin all to myself, and by heaping the +bed-clothes for two berths on my bed, and throwing a heavy great-coat +over them, I manage to keep myself warm for the night. The scenery by +day is magnificent, as we sail in and out among a thousand isles, all +richly wooded to the water’s edge, with here and there a little village, +or small settlement, where the woodmen ply their calling—the results of +which may be seen now in a raft being towed by a tug, to be shipped lower +down to Liverpool or Glasgow, or in stacks of planks along the shore. +Further behind is the mainland, with rock and wood in endless succession. +At Sault St. Marie, the river is celebrated for its fish, and as you pass +through the canal, you have plenty of Indian canoes paddling about, with +a man at the stern to seize the fish by a hand-net: the white fish of +Lake Superior is held to be a great delicacy. After a day and night, we +get into the open lake, out of sight of land, and then we land at Port +Arthur, whence we take the train to Winnipeg, where I hope to hear a +scrap of English news. + +I have but one complaint to make, and that is, on the Sunday we had no +service of any kind. I am not, nor ever was, a stickler for forms; but +there are times, especially as many now on board may be planted far away +from any religious observance, when it seems to me a simple service might +be the means of strengthening old impressions, and perhaps planting new +ones. One thinks of that fine old hymn of Andrew Marvel’s: + + ‘What can we do but sing His praise, + Who guides us through the watery maze?’ + +And an hour or so thus spent, surely may be quite as helpful to the +higher life we all dream of, at any rate, as the favourite occupation of +the majority—smoking and spitting, or the study of the maps of the +district to which we are all rapidly approaching. I had a queer chat +this morning with an old Canadian farmer who landed at Le Sault. He was +pleased to hear that I had been at Yarmouth in Norfolk. His mother was a +Clarke of Yarmouth. Did I know any of the Clarkes of Yarmouth? I +replied that I had not that pleasure, but that I knew many of the +Clarkes, and that they were a highly-respectable family indeed. + +Well, I have now done with Ontario, and you ask me what I think of it? I +reply that it is a beautiful country, and that it has room for any amount +of farm labourers and servant girls. I have been talking with a +gentleman this morning, who tells me that he pays his groom about £6 a +month, and that he boards him as well. He tells me of a Scotch labourer +who came out without £1 in his pocket, and who has just died worth +£12,000. + +At Ottawa I saw a large lumber-yard worth many thousand pounds, which was +the property of one who came from England as a working man. As to +mechanics, I fear the case is different. In Ontario, in all the towns, +the mechanics have strong unions, and they do all they can to keep out +emigrants of that class, fearing that their own wages will be reduced. +This dog-in-the-manger policy prevails everywhere, and many mechanics, +directly they land, are thus frightened by them, and want to get back to +England at once. There are two sides to every question. All I can say +is, that while a mechanic’s representative, at Montreal, was telling me +that there was no room for mechanics, and was doing all he could to +induce those who came out with me to return to England at once, I saw an +advertisement with my own eyes in a local paper (I am sorry I have +forgotten the name) for five hundred mechanics, who were immediately +wanted. A man who has got a good situation in England would be a fool to +give it up and come out; but I believe a mechanic who has a head on his +shoulders—who is young and in good health, and knows how to take +advantage of his situation—may find a living even in Ontario. This is my +deliberate conviction, after all I have seen and heard, and with the full +knowledge that in Montreal, and Ottawa, and Toronto, there is a pauper +class as badly off as any of the denizens of our London slums. The +people I most pity are the young fellows who in England have had the +training of gentlemen, and who are sadly out of place in Canada, and whom +the Canadian mothers dread, fearing that they may corrupt the native +youth. Many of them, however, are decent fellows; but nevertheless, +there is no room for them, unless they go out to Manitoba, and get some +farmer to give them board and lodging for their work. I parted with +quite a pang with one such on Friday, at Toronto. He was the nephew of a +well-known noble lord, and really seemed a very decent sort of fellow. +‘What can you do?’ I said to him. ‘Oh, I can row and play cricket,’ was +his reply. Unfortunately, Canada is not much of a country for +cricket—the summer season is too short; and I felt that my young friend, +unless he could turn his hand to something more useful or lucrative, had +better have remained at home. + +The pleasant steamship journey ended, I landed at Port Arthur—a town +situated in one of the loveliest bays I have yet seen, almost surrounded +by weird and fantastic rocks—with a view to run by the Canadian Pacific +as far as Winnipeg. As I landed a bill met my eye: ‘Wanted, a hundred +rock-men and fifty labourers;’ and that seemed to me an indication that +emigrants need not go begging for work in that particular locality. Port +Arthur, which stands near the ancient Hudson Bay Company’s station of +Fort William, was in a state of intense activity. Every one was building +wooden houses and shops who could do so. According to all appearances, +it is certainly a busy place; but architecturally I cannot say that it is +of much account. The main street opens on to the railway, along which +the engines, ringing a doleful bell in order to bid passengers keep out +of the way, pass every few minutes. Then there are wooden shops and +wooden hotels, and the usual concourse of rough, unwashed, half-dressed +loafers in the streets. Behind them is the forest and in front the bay, +with its waters almost as clear as those of the Baltic, and almost as +blue as those of Naples. Yet I certainly got very heartily tired of Port +Arthur, and so, I am sure, did all my travelling companions, who sat on +the planks or on the wooden pavement, which, being raised above the road, +made passable seats, or on the bits of rock which the railway builders +had been too busy to remove, wondering at what hour the train would +start. I pitied the poor emigrants, with their children, and their beds, +and their household furniture, as they sat there, hour after hour, in +that hot and sandy street. We landed at eleven, having made the whole +distance from Toronto—a run of about eight hundred miles—in exactly two +days and two nights—not quite so long as Jonah was in the whale’s belly, +but we certainly got over more ground than he did. When were we to +start? No one knew. It takes a long time to get out £4,000 worth of +freight and passengers’ luggage, and that is what the _Algoma_ had on +board. The worst of railway travelling in Canada is that there is no one +of whom you can ask a question. There may be a station-master, there may +be a whole herd of officials, there may be an army of porters, but +Canadians in one respect resemble the Americans—and that is, that they +think it inconsistent with their manly dignity to wear any kind of garb +which can in any possible way distinguish them from the crowd of +lookers-on, always to be met with in a railway station, so that the +railway traveller is always in a perplexity. When we got on shore we +were told that we should start in half an hour. Then came word that we +were to be off at half-past one, and so, as soon as the cars were made +up, we joyfully climbed into them—and the steps are in many cases so high +that it is hard work climbing into them; but still we were no further on +our way, and it was not till a little before four that, after many false +starts, we could fairly believe that we were off. Oh, it was wearisome +work, but then it may be asked, Whoever travels on a railway for +pleasure? It is true these big American cars have certain advantages +ours lack. You can change your position; you can talk without breaking a +blood-vessel; and you can see more of the country, especially as they do +not go the pace we are accustomed to at home; but there is such a +confusion of persons in them, that to one accustomed to the society to be +met with in an English first-class carriage, the result is anything but +pleasing. In the Canadian first-class carriage Jack and his master ride +side by side, unless the latter takes a berth in a sleeping car, for +which he has to pay extra. As I did not feel inclined to give three +dollars for a night’s unquiet rest, I took my chance with the first-class +car company, and I can assure you that by the time the dim grey of +morning glimmered on the horizon, I had heartily repented of my decision. +The night was so cold that everything in the way of ventilation was +stopped up. The car was quite full, and few of my fellow travellers +seemed to have had much regard for soap and water. It is true there was +a lavatory attached to the car, but there was neither water nor soap nor +towels, and the neatness of the lavatory in other respects only seemed to +me to make matters worse. I must say that the car, which was built in +Canada, was a remarkably handsome one, with its dark wood panels +beautifully carved, and its seats all lined with red velvet; yet when I +left it in the morning it was in a filthy state. I also found in it +agreeable society, but there were many who could not truthfully be +included in such a category—rough men and women with whom in England you +would not care to travel in a third-class carriage: but I am an +Englishman, and may be pardoned for not knowing any better. It is to the +same defect, perhaps, that I may trace the disappointment I felt at the +refreshment sheds, in which we were permitted to snatch a hasty meal, +waited on by a man in shirt-sleeves. Certainly we do that part of our +business better at home. The Canadian Pacific have a dining-room of +their own at Winnipeg, and there, if possible, the traveller should +endeavour to secure a meal. + +But oh, that ride! I shall never forget it. Burns tells us that Nature +tried her ’prentice hand on man + + ‘And then she made the lassies, oh!’ + +I think Nature must have made that part of Canada which lies between Port +Arthur and Winnipeg before she tried her hand on Great Britain and +Ireland. It is true some part of it has an exquisite combination of wood +and water and rock, but the greater part was either forest or gigantic +plains or valleys of stone—which seemed to shut all hope from the +spectator. In Canada—that is, along the railway lines—there is little +life in the forest, few flowers display their loveliness, and no +song-birds warble in the trees. All is still—or would be, were it not +for the peculiar croaking of the frogs, to be heard like so many hoarse +whistles from afar. You go miles and miles without seeing a farm or even +a log-hut. In one place I saw an Indian wigwam, much resembling a +gipsy’s tent, and a large canoe; but dwellings of any kind are the +exception, not the rule. The train every now and then stops, but you see +no station, and why we stop is only known to the engine-driver. We take +no passengers up, and we set none down, or hardly ever. The people who +get in at Port Arthur only want to be taken to Winnipeg. There is no +traffic along the line, because there are no inhabitants along the line, +and for the greater part of the way it is not only a solitary ride, but a +rough one as well. As you get nearer Winnipeg, the road is easier, and +the pace is more rapid. You leave behind you rocks and forests, and +reach an open plain on which you see, perhaps, a dozen cows, where +millions might fatten and feed. A good deal of this land, I am told, +belongs to the half-breeds. In time it is to be hoped that they may +utilize it more than they seem to do now. + +A great change is impending over this part of the world. Even that stony +district of which I wrote, and which seemed to me as the abomination of +desolation, is, I hear, full of mineral wealth, which will be brought to +light as soon as a certain boundary difficulty is settled—Ontario and +Manitoba at present are each contending for the prize—and the decision of +the question must shortly take place. + +Perhaps the one thing that has most struck me with admiration is the +pluck which has given birth to the Canadian Pacific Railway, by means of +which the emigrant is taken from his landing in Quebec to his destination +on the slopes of the Pacific, without ever leaving the Canadian soil. It +is a patriotic enterprise, for under the former system the emigrant who +intended to settle in Canada, and who, in reality, was wanted there, was +often tempted to change his mind and to settle in the United States. It +was a bold enterprise, for the cost was enormous, and Canada is not a +wealthy country. It was an enterprise which was made the subject of +party conflict. Appalling difficulties have had to be surmounted by the +engineers. Yet all have been vanquished, and in a few months this grand +scheme will be an accomplished fact, and you will be carried direct from +one side of this enormous continent to the other. I think Sir John +Macdonald is to be congratulated for the courage and tenacity he has +displayed on the subject, through good or bad report, and too much praise +cannot be awarded to Mr. George Stephens, who has been the ruling spirit +and life of the undertaking from the first, and I am sure that such +railway officials as those I have met, such as Mr. Van Horne, have proved +loyal coadjutors, evincing a similar wide grasp of mind and readiness of +resource for which Sir John himself is distinguished. + +In England they are well represented by Mr. Begg, who, as he knows the +district well, can speak of it with a confidence and certainty possessed +by no one else. It is to him the credit must be given of the Manitoba +farm in the Forestry Exhibition at Edinburgh last autumn, which was +visited with much interest by the Prince of Wales and Mr. Gladstone, and +to which I was glad to see, for I was there several days, the Scotch +farmers and agriculturists paid particular attention. Such men are an +honour to Canada, and may be ranked amongst its best friends. It is to +them that Canada owes her present proud position and ability to find +happy homes for the tens of thousands of England and the Continent, whom +she has rescued from starvation, and whom she has placed in the way to +insure wealth and health and happiness. I find even poor persecuted Jews +driven from Russia on this fertile land, who, under these favouring +skies, have learned to become prosperous farmers. One may well be proud +of Canada, and be proud to think Canada belongs to us. When Bret Harte +asks, + + ‘Is our civilization a failure, + Is the Caucasian played out?’ + +I answer in Canada with an emphatic No! Canada is redolent of industrial +success. The very air of the place is full of hope. + + [Picture: Second Year on a Prairie Farm, Canadian North-West] + +Not only has the Canadian Pacific Railway opened up the country, but it +has established experimental farms in different parts, in order to test +the capabilities of the soil and the advantages or disadvantages of the +climate. It is said, and extensively believed, that the soil between +Moose Jaw and Calgary is made up of desert and alkali lands, and entirely +unfit for cultivation. With a view to correct that idea, ten farms were +established at the following stations: 1, Secretan; 2, Rush Lake; 3, +Swift Current; 4, Gull Lake; 5, Maple Creek; 6, Forres; 7, Dunmore; 8, +Stair (these two being the nearest stations east and west of Medicine Hat +at the crossing of the Saskatchewan River); 9, Tilley, and 10, Gleichen, +the last being within view of the Rocky Mountains. The breaking +throughout was found to be easy, the soil in every case good and in most +instances excellent, ranking with the choicest lands in the Company’s +more eastern belt: wherever the rating of the soil is lowered, according +to the Company’s standard, owing to its being of a lighter grade, the +inferiority will be compensated for by the certainty of the grain +maturing more rapidly. + + [Picture: Calico Island, Saskatchewan River, Canadian North-West] + +In a pamphlet just issued it is stated that the average from all the +farms was as follows: + + ‘Wheat 21½ bushels; oats, 44¼; barley, 23¼; peas, 12½. + + ‘The above yields were ascertained by accurately chaining the ground + and weighing the grain, this work being done by a qualified Dominion + Land Surveyor, and the results, both favourable and otherwise, have + been fully given. + + ‘At each farm about one acre of spring wheat and oats were sown and + harrowed in in the fall when breaking was done. Much of this grain + germinated during the mild weather of November and December, at which + time it showed green above the ground, and as a consequence it was + nearly all killed during the winter, and the ground had to be resown + in spring. Some small pieces of wheat which were not entirely killed + out were left; and, though the straw showed a rank growth, with heads + and grain much larger than that sown in spring, the crop ripened very + unevenly and much later. Fall sowing of spring wheat, which has + proved successful in Manitoba, is not likely to be a success in the + western country, as the winter is much more mild and open, and the + grain liable to germinate and be killed. Fall wheat has not, as far + as we are aware, been tried, and there seems no reason why it should + not prove successful. + + ‘The results obtained, considering the manner in which the land was + treated, proved much more satisfactory than was anticipated, and + show— + + ‘1st—That for grain growing, the land in this section of country is + capable of giving as large a wheat yield per acre as the heavier + lands of Manitoba. + + ‘2nd—That a fair crop can be obtained the first year of settlement on + breaking. + + ‘3rd—That for fall seeding with spring grain on the western plains, a + satisfactory result cannot be looked for with any degree of + certainty. + + ‘4th—That cereals, roots, and garden produce can be successfully + raised at an elevation of 3,000 feet above the sea-level. + + ‘5th—That seeding can be done sufficiently early to allow of all the + crop being harvested before the first of September.’ + +And I hear of many who have done well—some of whom came out without a +rap—and who enjoy a robust health unknown to them at home. + +Perhaps nowhere has a village so suddenly sprung up into a city as at +Winnipeg, which first obtained notoriety by the advent of Lord Garnet +Wolseley, then a young man, who came to suppress the rebellion raised +there by a half-breed of the name of Riel, a daring young French +Canadian, wily as a savage, brilliant and energetic. In 1870 he appealed +to the prejudices and fears of the half-breeds, and in a few days had 400 +men at his back. Owing to the clemency—perhaps mistaken—of his captors, +Riel escaped the punishment due to his crimes. In 1873 he was enrolled +as a member of Parliament, notwithstanding that at one time a reward of +5,000 dollars had been offered for his apprehension as a murderer. + +The name of Winnipeg was then little known outside Manitoba. It was +built by traders, who wished to rival Fort Garrey, then the headquarters +of the Hudson’s Bay Company, and to carry on a free trade on their own +account. After the suppression of the rebellion, Manitoba had a local +Parliament, which met at Winnipeg, and also sent its representatives to +the Dominion Parliament. The place grew rapidly, though even at that +time Mr. Mackenzie, Sir John Macdonald’s political opponent, declared +that a cart track was good enough for Manitoba for many years to come. +In 1875 the total population was 3,031 assessed and 2,000 non-assessed, +which was a pretty respectable increase, considering that in 1869 there +were hardly a hundred settlers in the place. As late as 1876 the sport +of wolf-hunting was carried on by several of the inhabitants just outside +the city. Now it has churches, banks, schools, manufactures, and +mercantile men of great energy and high standing; and has become, +especially since the Pacific Railway Company has made it one of their +great stations, the gateway of the North-West. Settlers came crowding in +from all quarters, and in ten months, in 1878, 600,592 acres of land were +located. In 1879 Winnipeg boasted of a street extension of 83 miles, and +then came the bridge over the Red River to render the town easy of access +to all new-comers. Intoxicated with success, what the Americans call a +‘boom’ was created a year or two since, which seemed to have made +everyone lose his wits. There was no end to speculation in town lots; +merchants, tradesmen, professional men, could think of nothing else. The +bottom, however, soon fell out, and at this time Winnipeg is in rather a +depressed state; but it is clear, from its peculiar position, that this +depression can only be temporary. It is destined to be the great +distributing and railway centre of the vast North-West. The town has now +a population of 26,000, and three daily papers, besides weekly ones. Ten +years hence, it is predicted, she will be ten times her present size. +Her wharves will be lined with steamboats; her river-banks with +elevators; industries and manufactures will spring up in her midst, and +her streets will be fuller of life than they are to-day. + +Winnipeg stands low, and at certain seasons—that is, when the thaw +commences—it is liable to floods; but the air is singularly pure and +bracing—while I write the sky is an azure blue—and the hottest days are +followed by cool nights. The inhabitants all seem to be in the +possession of good health. Then the water was said to be bad, whereas I +find it to be quite the reverse. The supply of gas is poor, and it seems +rarely used. The one great drawback is Winnipeg mud. + +The streets, all of them, are as broad as Portland Place, only with +handsomer shops. I fear in wet weather they must be almost impassable. +As it is, the sides are now dried up, as if they were ploughed, and +carriages seem to make their way with considerable difficulty; but there +is a magnificent broad wooden side walk to all the streets, while in the +middle sufficient smoothness has been attained for the due working of +street railways, which seem to be in a satisfactory condition. I have +also been agreeably disappointed with the hotels, which I was told were +all bad and all tremendously dear. On the contrary, I have found in the +new Douglas Hotel, in the main street, as good accommodation as I +require, and at a very reasonable rate; while the proprietor—Mr. Bennett, +a worthy Scotchman—does all he can for the comfort of his guests, having +introduced into this far distant land all the latest improvements, such +as heating the place by steam and the use of electric bells. + +A walk in the city is amusing. Grand shops and well-built offices +everywhere attract the eye. Ladies in the latest fashion meet you one +minute, and the next you jostle a swarthy Indian, half civilized, and his +squaw, still less civilized than himself. Odd fur-skins are exposed for +sale, while a stuffed bear adorns the main street, up and down which run +all day long the newsboys with the latest telegrams from London, or +Paris, or New York. To-day I have seen a photograph of the original +fireman of the ‘Rocket,’ who lives here, and has made a large fortune by +contracts. Unfortunately, at this time he is absent from home, and I +fear I shall not have a chance of interviewing him. Religion flourishes +here. There are about fifteen churches and chapels in the city, and the +Young Men’s Christian Association is in a very successful condition. Of +Protestant bodies, the leading ones are the Presbyterians, the +Methodists, and the Episcopalians. In connection with the Cathedral of +St. Boniface, the oldest church in the city, it is interesting to note +that the bells came originally from Birmingham, by Hudson’s Bay, and that +after the destruction of the building the remains of the metal were +gathered up and sent to Birmingham, whence they have again come back +after an interval of three years. The city stands in the midst of a +fertile plain, adequate to the support of any amount of population. But +the land is far better further on. At Manitoba, for instance, the soil +is much finer. Manitoba is an Indian name denoting the Voice of God. It +seems that the rocks on the river are cavernous, and that at certain +seasons of the year the wind strikes them with such force as to produce a +singular reverberation, which the rude Indian, whose untutored mind +teaches him to see God in the cloud and hear Him in the wind, considered +to be no less than the utterance of the Deity Himself. + + [Picture: Hunting scene on the Souris River, Manitoba] + +Just now people are rather exercised with the Indians, who have been +placed in reserves where they cannot get a living, and who, besides, find +their location an unhealthy swamp. One of the Winnipeg journals is very +indignant, and says this is what may be expected from the Government. +From all I can learn, the Indians are sturdy maintainers of their rights, +and take care that the Government shall not easily overreach them; and +perhaps, on the whole, the Indians are better off under Canadian than +they would be under American government. Indeed, people say they are +very good fellows when uncorrupted by Englishmen. The emigrant in these +parts must not be surprised at the occasional appearance of an Indian; +and perhaps it is well that the farmer takes care of his horses. I am +sorry for the poor Indian, who is the original owner of the soil, and +whom, perhaps, one day Mr. Henry George may see fit to visit with a view +to the recovery of his rights and the redress of his wrongs. When that +is the case, the emigrant will have to pack up and return to his native +land. Till that is the case, however, he may safely cross the water, and +avail himself of the advantages offered him by the Dominion Government; +but to do that he must have at least £200, and then he can stock his farm +and keep himself till the return for his labours comes in. + + [Picture: Souris Valley, Manitoba] + +‘The worst of all our books on emigration,’ said the editor of one of the +dailies to me, ‘is that they give too glowing an estimate of the state of +affairs. They say a farmer will do well with £100. This is not +sufficient capital as a rule to start with. It is true there have been +instances where settlers have succeeded on this sum, but with such a sum +as £200, Manitoba offers the farmer advantages such as no other place +offers him.’ Here, also, the regular farm-hand is sure of his living. I +see an attempt is being made by a gentleman, now in Winnipeg, to plant +out a couple of hundred boys—and I hear there is room for them. But +there is little building going on in Winnipeg, and the mechanic need not +trouble himself to come here. All in this part are loud in condemnation +of emigration from the East-end of London. Those poor of the +East-end—alas! neither the Old World nor the New seems to know what to do +with them. Since this was written I see the Manitoba Mortgage and +Investment Company have declared a dividend of eight per cent., an +indication that at any rate in their part of the world money is being +made. + + + + +CHAPTER VII. + + +LIFE ON THE PRAIRIE. + +‘You will find Moose Jaw a very pretty place,’ said a gentleman to me as +I left Winnipeg; and certainly it is a pretty place, though not exactly +according to an Englishman’s idea of prettiness. + +It consists of a railway-station and an assemblage of wooden huts and +shops, which have all been called into existence within the last twelve +months. It boasts a weekly organ (such as it is), two or three places of +worship, one or two billiard-rooms, and a post-office—not a tent, as in +some parts of the country in which I have been, but a real wooden-house. +The shopkeepers seem to have nothing to do, and the pigs perambulate the +streets, evidently enjoying the fine freedom allowed them in this part of +the world. There are at this time about 700 or 800 settlers, some of the +farmers who came out last year having moved further west. + +I am writing in the railway-station, in the waiting-rooms of which are +many farmers, all on their way to Calgary—for which place, also, I am +bound, expecting to start at the very inconvenient hour of two p.m. + +The scene, as I sit, is not cheering. Far as the eye can reach there is +the prairie. It was the same all the way from Winnipeg. It will be the +same all the way to Calgary, some 400 or 500 miles hence. It is +intensely hot, and men and women sit in the open air, under such shade as +the wooden houses afford. It is intensely cold in the winter. Not a +tree is to be seen, or a hill, or a farmhouse; nothing to relieve the +monotony of the sea of grass land on every side, except here and there a +prairie fire—the first step to be taken before the farmer commences the +cultivation of the soil; and I must own a prairie fire by night is rather +a pretty sight. + +I parted last night with a General and his wife, who have come to settle +about forty miles off. At present he and his family have no fresh meat, +and he has to make an arrangement with a Brandon butcher, about a hundred +and fifty miles off, to supply him with a Sunday joint. Tinned meats his +family have tried, and he has got with him a fresh joint of meat, which +he purchased in Winnipeg; but there are prairie chickens always to be +had, and in some places, as we came along, we saw an abundance of wild +ducks on the Assiniboine River, and in swamps, over which we rushed in +the Pullman car. + +This luxury cannot be expected in Moose Jaw. Here there is no water at +all. Last year the farmers had no rain, and they fear they will have +none now. As it is, the prairie begins to look a little scorched. I +should be loth to spend the remainder of my days here; but a farmer may +make a living, and so may a farm-labourer. As to any other class of +people here, there is no opening at all. The town is full of +shopkeepers, barristers, auctioneers, and dealers. Mechanics who come +out will starve. When the land around is taken up they will have a +chance, but not till then. + +As I sit, a dark figure beckons me to come to him. He has a Jim Crow +hat, a blanket around his martial form, and a gayer one in front. He has +rings in his ears, bracelets on his arms, and a string of some kind of +beads around his neck. He offers me his hand, and I shake it. Then I +commence a conversation. ‘What you called?’ I say. He makes an +unintelligible reply. ‘You Smith, or Brown, or Jones, or Robinson?’ I +ask; and again he gives an unintelligent grunt. I offer him a cigar, and +he sits down on his haunches in the shade. He is one of the Black Bull +men, who have been chased from the States, in consequence of having made +that part of the world too hot for them. They are not natives of this +country, but have settled in the prairie two or three miles off. I tell +him to be a good boy, and I dare say he will obey my injunction as +literally as any other man in England or anywhere else. + +Again I look, and two red-coated warriors greet me. They are on the +look-out for contraband, and are as fine and clean and well-set fellows +as any I have seen anywhere. They belong to the mounted police, and live +chiefly in the saddle, as there are but five hundred of them to all this +gigantic North-West. I had already made their acquaintance. At the +first station we came to after leaving Manitoba, one of them came into +the car, gave a searching glance all round, and then walked out. ‘What +was that for?’ I asked the General. ‘Oh! he has come to see if we have +any whisky. They are very particular. I was coming this way once, when +a fellow traveller took out his pocket flask and began drinking. The +mounted policeman who saw him do it immediately took his flask from him, +and emptied it there and then.’ This strict prohibition is the result, +not of the prevalence of Temperance sentiment in the North-West, but +rather of fear of the Indians, who are better shots than the mounted +police, although not so well provided with fire-arms. The people seem to +anticipate that the law will be relaxed when the whites are more numerous +and the Indians fewer. The law has had good results, nevertheless. In +obedience to it the German gives up his lager-beer. And next to the +Scotch the Germans make the best emigrants. + +The General tells me such is the fineness of the climate that he finds he +can get on very well without his customary glass of grog. At Moose Jaw +the inhabitants take to Hop Bitters instead, and one of the institutions +of the place is the Hop Bitters Brewery. + +I believe you may keep whisky if you get a permit, and a permit is not +difficult, I understand, to get. + +I am sorry to say the General, in spite of the mounted police, offered me +a drop of whisky, and at a later period a friend, as we sat smoking, +asked me if I was ready for a ‘smile.’ Of course, in my ignorance, I +replied in the affirmative. Diving under his seat, he brought out a fine +bottle of real Scotch, and, mixing it with water, offered me a ‘smile.’ +You may be sure I indignantly refused. You cannot expect me to be a +party to the violation of the law. + +These Indians just now are creating a little apprehension, especially the +tribe under the renowned Yellow Calf, who it was hoped had taken to +farming, and who last year had a good crop, and bought a reaping machine; +but the Indians are very restless, and Yellow Calf has sent a messenger +to rouse the tribes, and a strong party of the mounted police are +detached to watch his movements. They are dying off the face of the +earth, and we may well suppose that they bear no love to the white man, +who has taken possession of the lands which they once knew to be their +own. Here the people evidently think that the sooner the Indians are +exterminated the better. The men do not work; all that is done by the +squaws—wretched women with long black hair, and little black eyes as +round as beads, and who rejoice in blankets quite as unromantic, but +quite as comfortable, as those of their lords and masters. Hitherto, I +have not made way with the dusky beauties, but I may be more successful +by-and-by. + +I believe the Indians have a real grievance against the Canadian +Government. It was agreed that they should be settled in reserves, and +that they should have a certain amount of food supplied. This compact +was fairly observed by the Canadian Government; but in an evil hour they +made this part of their duty over to contractors, and we know what +contractors are, all the world over. The Indians say faith has not been +kept with them, and it is to be feared that they have good reason for +saying so. Just now they are starving, as this is the close season, and +they are not permitted to hunt or fish. They say that there is no close +season as far as the stomach is concerned, and from personal experience I +may say I believe they are right. + +It is now noon on the prairie, and I am dying of the heat. Oh, for the +forest shade! Oh, for the crystal stream! Alas! the water here is not +good for the stranger, and I fear to touch it. At Toronto I managed +pretty well on Apollinaris water; but out here nothing of the kind is to +be had. What am I to do? The beef here is so tough that you can’t cut +it with a knife, and must have belonged to the oldest importation from my +native land; and I have to pay a price for which I can have a luxurious +repast in London. O Spiers and Pond! O Gordon and Co.! O respected +Ring and Brymer, under whose juicy joints and sparkling wines the ancient +Corporation of London renews its youth! How my soul longs for your +flesh-pots in this dry and thirsty land, where no water is! I have been +out on the prairie under the burning sun. It is cracked, and parched, +and bare, and the flowers refuse to bloom, and only the gigantic +grasshopper or the pretty but repulsive snake meets my eye. That dim +line, protracted to the horizon east and west, is the railroad. That +far-off collection of sheds is the rising town of Moose Jaw. That blue +line on the horizon, which makes me pant for the sea, is a mirage. Far +off are some white tents glistening in the sun. They are the wigwams of +the Indians. + +Like the Wandering Jew, again I urge on my wild career, and here I am +with noble savages—so hideous that words fail to tell their hideousness. +No wonder the squaws are bashful. They have little to be proud of, +though they have necklaces and rings and ornaments around their belts, +and gay shawls, which have come from some far away factory. Some of them +have put a streak of red paint where the black hair divides. Others are +painted as much as any Dowager of Mayfair, and have ear ornaments that +reach down to the middle. Not one is fairly passable. + +Rousseau and the sentimentalists, who talk of the savage, greatly err in +their estimate of that noble individual. He is lazy and filthy, +gluttonous, and would be a wine-bibber had he the chance. I looked into +his tent, and there he was sitting naked, whilst his squaw was cooking a +bit of a horse with the hair on for his dinner. He is unpleasant as a +neighbour for many reasons, and is indifferent how he gets a dollar, or +how his squaw earns it either. All along the prairie he seems to have +nothing to do but to rush to the nearest railway station, and sit there +all day in the hope that some passing traveller may give him tobacco or +cash, the only two things on earth he seems to care for. Apparently, the +mothers are fond of their young. The men are clever at stealing horses, +and the traveller must look after his horses by night, or he may find +them, as friends of my own did, gone in the morning. But to return to +the prairie, it is an awful place to travel in alone; it is so easy to +lose one’s way. I heard wonderful stories in this respect. Fancy being +lost on the prairie; nothing but the grass to eat; nothing but the sky to +look at; nothing in the shape of human speech to listen to. Out here by +myself, I felt more than once how appropriate the language of the poet +beloved by our grandmothers: + + ‘O Solitude, where are the charms + That sages have seen in thy face? + Better dwell in the midst of alarms, + Than reign in this horrible place.’ + +There is a good deal of hardship to be encountered by any who would +penetrate to the dim and mysterious region we denominate the North-West. +For instance, I left Moose Jaw at half-past two yesterday morning by a +train timed to arrive there at a quarter-past one; at which unreasonable +hour I had to leave my bed, just as I was getting into a sound sleep, and +to catch the train, which was so crowded that I could scarcely get a +seat, and the atmosphere of which was not redolent of the odours of Araby +the Blest. There I had to sit till the time I mention, as the engine +managed to get off the line. Deeply do I pity the poor emigrants tempted +into this part of the world by the delusive utterances of sham emigration +agents at home and local journals—which, when they are not abusing one +another, seem to delight in giving representations of the country by no +means literally to be depended on; the only thing to do is to go to the +fountain head—the Government office. People who make up their minds to +come into these parts must learn to put up with a good deal. Here is a +sad case, a very exceptional one, I admit, but I am bound to tell the +whole truth. I quote from a Winnipeg paper: ‘David Kirkpatrick, his +wife, and nine children, the eldest a girl of twelve, arrived from +Scotland on Wednesday. A part of the voyage was made on board the +_Algoma_. The cold was intense, and many of the passengers suffered +severely. Among these was Mrs. Kirkpatrick. The exposure, in her case, +brought on a kind of low fever, and the poor woman died yesterday +morning. The husband’s case is deplorable. With nine children on his +hands, what is he to do? He has a longing desire to get back to his +friends in Scotland, but has not the means. Will the public come to his +rescue? He and his helpless children are to be found in the immigrant +sheds.’ I fear such cases are far from uncommon. Imagine a poor woman +leaving her native land, crossing the restless Atlantic, perhaps feeble +with poor living, and worried with the care of nine helpless children, +perhaps scarce recovered from sea-sickness, put on board an emigrant +train, snatching hasty meals, or such accommodation as is provided at the +expense of Dominion Government (I do not blame them or the railway +authorities, they do all they can), travelling at uncertain hours, and +arriving at her destination utterly overcome by fatigue. What wonder is +it that a poor woman now and then sacrifices her life in the attempt to +build up a new home in this Promised Land? No wonder that now and then +death comes to such just as they reach Jordan and think that they are to +reap the fruit of all their weary toil. + + [Picture: Pioneer Store at Brandon in 1882] + +As I left Brandon on my way hither I saw by the side of one of the +stations quite a little village of tents. ‘What is that?’ said I to one +of the mounted police. ‘The emigrants,’ was his reply. ‘They do say,’ +said he slowly, ‘that there is some sickness amongst them.’ Whether the +rumour was founded on fact I had no time to inquire, but certainly, when +one thinks of the hardships of the emigrants’ lot, and the peculiar +unfitness of many of them to stand hardships, I should not be surprised +to learn that such was the case. The further I come out, the less demand +I find for emigrants. It is only ploughmen who are wanted here. The man +who will succeed is the farmer with a small capital. He has a splendid +chance. When the country is settled the mechanic may have his turn. + +But remember, after all has been said and done, this is the Great Lone +Land. Emigration here is but a drop in the ocean as regards results. I +am now some 850 miles to the north-west of Winnipeg. The country is an +unbroken level, and, with the exception of Brandon and Moose Jaw, you see +hardly a farmhouse, hardly any ploughed land, no sheep grazing on the +downs, no herds fattening in the prairie; not a single tree to hide one +from the snows of winter or the suns of summer. By day you melt in the +sun, by night you shiver with the cold. When we came to a swamp now and +then we saw a few wild ducks. Once in the course of the weary ride we +saw two or three deer. All the rest was a parched plain, with here and +there some lovely flowers, and with buffalo bones bleaching wherever you +turn your eye. In some parts the soil was strongly impregnated with +alkali, so much so, indeed, that it made the ground white, and left a +crust of what looked like ice on the lakes and ponds. Can that huge +region ever grow wheat and fatten flocks? The experience of the +experimental farms proves that it will. All I know is that ages must +elapse before Moose Jaw shall be a Manchester, or Brandon, in spite of +its many advantages, the headquarters of the agricultural interest, with +a corn market equalling that of Norwich or Ipswich. Yet there are parts +of Manitoba which contain undoubtedly as fine corn-growing country as any +in the world. + +This is especially true of the new tract of country opened up by the +Canadian Pacific in the south-west. As a rule, the further from the +railway the land is, the better it is. At the same time, it is to be +remembered that a farmer who has no railway access is at a great +disadvantage, and that in the winter it is no joke sending a man with a +team of oxen and a waggon-load of produce twenty or thirty miles across +the prairie, where a snowstorm, or ‘a blorrard’ at any time, may occur. + +This is the great drawback of Manitoba: it has no trees. In Ontario the +farmer has his crops protected by a belt of trees from the inclemency of +the weather. But, then, in Manitoba the farmer has this advantage, that +he has not to devote the greater part of his time and money to the +cutting down of his trees. He has only to plough the soil, and there is +an abundant harvest. If Manitoba lacks trees, it is expected to yield a +plentiful supply of coal. As I came along last night we saw a station +supplied with gas. It appears that in boring for water they discovered +gas, which they now utilize to light the station and to work a steam +engine. This was not, however, in Manitoba, but in Alberta, just after +we had left Medicine Hat, that pretty oasis in the desert, with the usual +supply of hotels, billiard-rooms, and stores, and where I came into +contact with the Cree Indians, a race even uglier than the Sioux Indian, +whom I found at Moose Jaw. They have higher cheekbones, and don’t plait +their hair, and some of the old men reminded me not a little in outline +of the late Lord Beaconsfield, whom the Canadians consider Sir John +Macdonald strongly resembles. + +It is curious to note how the buffalo has vanished from the region which +was formerly his happy hunting-ground. He has now forsaken the country; +you see only his bones and his track. Some people say that the railway +has done it, and others that the destruction is the work of the +Americans, who say, ‘Kill the buffalo and you get rid of the Indians.’ +These latter are to be met with everywhere, clad in flannel garments +radiant with all the hues of the rainbow. Chiefly they affect +blankets—red, blue, or green. At Calgary I came across more of them—this +time of the Blackfoot tribe. There is very little difference in any of +them. In one thing they all resemble each other, that is, they don’t +seem to care much about work. As English does not happen to be one of +their accomplishments, my intercourse with them has been of a somewhat +limited character. + +For the sake of intending emigrants let me dispel a couple of popular +errors. One that the heat is most enjoyable; another, that it is a cheap +country to come to. Neither assertion is exactly the truth. As I write +the heat is insufferable, and yet this is early spring. I saw snow +yesterday in a hollow of the hills not yet melted, and last night, +sleeping in a stuffy Pullman car full of people, I was awoke with the +cold. The other fallacy which I would expose is that this is a cheap +country. On the contrary, it is nothing of the kind. Paxton Hood, if I +remember aright, once gave a lecture on America under the title of the +‘Land of the Big Dollar.’ If I were to lecture on Canada I should call +it the ‘Land of the Little Dollar.’ A dollar here is of no account. +This morning I went into a shop and had a bottle of ginger-beer, and the +cost was one shilling; and this, too, after I had been administering a +little ‘soft sawder’ to the fair American damsel who waited on me (she +was from Michigan, and was remarkably wide awake), in the mistaken hope +that she would be a little reasonable in her charge. Everyone smokes +cigars all day long, and yet Canadian cigars are as costly as they are +atrocious. Fortunately one can’t spend money in drink, as that is +prohibited, and the chemists at Calgary have recently got into a scrape +for supplying customers with essence of lemon, by means of which they +manage to fuddle themselves. The price of fruit is prohibitory; +cucumbers, such as you in London would give three halfpence for, are here +at Calgary as much as a shilling. Eggs are four shillings a dozen; meat +and bacon and ham are as dear as in England, and not a quarter so good. +I am appalled as I see how the money goes; I fear to be stranded at the +foot of the Rockies. If I get back to the west I shall have to work my +passage back to England as fireman or stoker, or in some such ignoble +capacity. If I was younger I would turn gardener. I believe anyone who +would come out here with sufficient capital to plant a nursery ground or +to stock a good fruit garden would make a lot of money, as the farmers, +of course, do not think of such things, and the supply is quite unequal +to the demand. In Calgary they did not have three inches of frost all +last winter. It is true they have even now a sharp nip of frost; but I +hear of peas flourishing at a farmer’s close by, and the region abounds +with wild strawberries and raspberries and cherries. If they grow wild, +surely they will equally prosper under more careful culture. + +A Special Committee of the Dominion House of Commons which was appointed +last session to obtain evidence upon the agricultural industries of the +country, examined several witnesses as to the suitability of Canada, and +especially of the Canadian North-West, for the growth of forest and fruit +trees. The testimony given showed that there are many varieties of fruit +which thrive in Great Britain, Germany, Russia, and other European +countries, which would, if transplanted, be equally suited to the climate +of the North-West, it being stated that excellent fruit is grown in great +quantities in Europe at points where the temperature ranges considerably +lower than it does in Canada. It is urged that the example of the +Russian and German Governments should be followed in the establishment of +plantations of fruit trees and experimental farms in different parts of +the Dominion, to test the kind of trees and fruits best suited to the +different localities. + +Since my return the following paper has been put into my hands:—‘The +following is a reliable estimate of this season’s wheat crop in Manitoba +and the North-West Territories:—Estimated wheat acreage in Manitoba, +350,000; yield at 23 bushels per acre, 8,000,000; estimated wheat acreage +in North-West Territories, 65,000; yield at 23 bushels per acre, or +1,500,000 bushels—a total of 415,000 acres and 9,500,000 bushels. +Deducting 2,760,000 bushels for home consumption and seed, a surplus +remains of 6,740,000 bushels. Everything now points to a larger yield +per acre than that of 1883. + + [Picture: Harvesting on the Bell Farm, Indian Head, N.W.I.] + +‘Operations have been carried on very extensively this season at the Bell +Farm, in the Canadian North-West, which is said to be the largest farm in +the world. Though this is but the second year of cultivation, there are +already 8,000 acres under crop, 5,000 to 6,000 of which are under wheat, +and a portion of the remainder under flax. Last year 10,000 bushels were +exported from the farm, and the excellence of the grain secured for it a +good price in the market. The crop of this year is estimated to be 40 +per cent. better. Experts from Montana who have recently visited this +section of the Canadian North-West, state that they never saw any grain +in the United States to equal that on and around the Bell Farm.’ + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. + + +AMONGST THE COW-BOYS. + +I am writing from Calgary, a little but growing collection of huts and +wooden houses planted on a lovely plain with hills all around, a river at +my feet, on the banks of which some poplars flourish, and I can almost +fancy I am in Derbyshire itself. It is a gay place, this rising town, at +the foot, as it were, of the Rockies, and just now is unusually gay, as +the Queen’s birthday is being celebrated with athletic sports and a ball; +and, besides, a new clergyman has made his appearance, the Rev. Parks +Smith, from a Bermondsey parish, who is to preach in the new Assembly +Hall, which is to be set apart as a church on Sundays. I am going to +hear him, and already I feel somewhat of a Pharisee—I have on a clean +collar, which I religiously preserved for the occasion, and have had my +boots blackened. The sight is so novel that I have spent half an hour on +the prairie contemplating the effect of that operation. Already I feel +six inches higher. + +I can’t say that I think quite so much of Calgary as do the people who +live in it. In splendour, in wealth, in dignity, and importance, they +evidently anticipate it will be a second Babylon. Well, a good deal has +to be done first. The situation is pleasant, I admit. You incline to +think well of Calgary after the dreary ride across the prairie, and you +have quite a choice of hotels, and of shops, all well stocked; but then +these shops are little better than huts, and the hotels certainly don’t +throw the shops into the shade. + +For instance, I am in the leading hotel. It is too far from the railway, +but that is because the C.P.R. have moved their station a little further +on, where the new town of Calgary is springing up. We have an open room, +where I am writing—a dark dining-room on one side, and then, on the +other, a little row of closets, which they dignify by the name of +bedrooms. I am the proud possessor of one. It holds a bed, whereon, I +own, I slept soundly; a row of pegs, on which to hang one’s clothes; and +a little shelf, on which is placed a tiny wash-hand basin; while above +that is a glass, in which it is impossible to get a good view of +yourself—a matter of very small consequence, as the glass certainly +reflects very poorly the looker’s personal charms, whatever they may be. +I ought to have said there is a window; and as my bedroom is on the +ground floor (upper rooms are rare in these wooden houses in the +North-West), I am much exercised in my mind as to whether that window may +not be opened in the course of the night, and the roll of dollars I have +hidden under my pillow carried off. Then, just as I am getting into bed, +I discover somebody else’s boots. That is awkward—very. It is with a +sigh of relief I discover that they are not feminine. Suppose the owner +of those boots comes into my bedroom and claims to be the rightful owner? +Suppose he resorts to physical force? Suppose, in such a case, I got the +worst of it? + +Fortunately, before I can answer these questions satisfactorily to +myself, I am asleep, and yet they are not so irrelevant as you fancy. + +Last night, for instance, as I was sitting in the cool air, smoking one +of the peculiarly bad cigars in which the brave men of Canada greatly +rejoice, and for which they pay as heavily as if they were of the finest +brands, a half-drunken man came up, abusing me in every possible way, +threatening to smash every bone in my body, and altogether behaving +himself in a way the reverse of polite. Perhaps you say, Why did you not +knock him down? In novels heroes always do, and come clear off; but I am +not writing fiction, and in real life I have always found discretion to +be the better part of valour. The fact is, the fellow was a strapping +Hercules, and I could see in a moment, if the appeal were to force, what +the issue might be. Yet I had not done anything intentionally to offend +him. He had come galloping up to the hotel, as they all do here—the +horses are not trained to trot—and his horse had bucked him off. I +believe I did say something to a friend of a mildly critical nature, but +I question whether the rider heard it. The fact was, he was angry at +having been thrown, and seeing that I was a stranger, he evidently +thought he could pour the vials of his wrath on me. I must admit that in +a little while he came up and apologized, and there was an end of the +matter. But the worst part of it was that his friend remarked to me that +this drunken insulting ruffian was one of the best fellows in the place. +If so, Calgary has to be thankful for very small mercies indeed. + +You ask, How could the fellow be drunk, seeing that there is a +prohibitory liquor-law in existence? I have every reason to believe that +Calgary is a very drunken place, nevertheless. I have already referred +to one case of drunkenness. I may add that, in the afternoon of the same +day, I had seen another in the shape of an old gentleman who was going to +head a revolt which would cut off the North-West from the Dominion, and +which would make her a Crown colony. He was very drunk as he stood on +the bar opposite me declaiming all this bunkum. I remarked his state to +the landlord, who seemed to feel how unfair it was that men could get +drunk on the sly, and that a decent landlord, like himself, should be +deprived of the privilege of selling them decent liquor. I own it is +very hard on the publicans. At Moose Jaw one of them told me he would +give five hundred pounds for a liquor license. ‘They call this a free +country,’ said an indignant English settler to me, ‘and yet I can’t get a +drop of good liquor. Pretty freedom, ain’t it?’ Unfortunately, the +Government, while it prohibits the sale of liquor, does not exterminate +the desire for it—perhaps only increases it—as we always cry for what we +can’t get. Unfortunately, also, it is true that, as long as this demand +exists, the supply will be found somehow. + +In Montana there are a lot of blackguards and daredevils who will run the +thing in somehow. Liquor is also brought in by the railway as coal-oil, +oatmeal, flour, varnish, and then it is doctored up and sold at £1 the +bottle to the thirsty souls. Now, what is the consequence? Why, that, +as a local journal remarks, liquor is sold; the dealers are pests and +outlaws; they sell their poison for ten times the price of what people +who don’t belong to the Blue Ribbon Army call good liquor, and then +vanish with their ill-gotten money out of the country, excepting such as +they may leave behind them in the shape of fines, when found out. I do +think the hotel-keeper has much reason to complain of prohibition. It +presses hardly on him, and does not put drunkenness down. I mentioned +these facts to a Baptist minister from England, whom I met in Toronto. +He would not believe them; I gave him cuttings from newspapers to support +my view. His reply was that they were hoaxes. I have now been in +Calgary a day, and already I find that these hoaxes, as my friend calls +them, are veritable facts. + +I believe that many of my travelling companions were a little fresh last +night, from their soberness and dejection of manner this morning. They +were away down town, and had not returned when I retired to rest; and +this morning several of the householders complain of having had their +doors knocked at at most unseasonable hours. + +At meals I meet queer company. We have a Chinese cook. I have a faint +idea that he has murderous designs on us all, his smile is so childlike +and bland; yet I prefer his placid pleasant round face to those of his +female helps, sour and ill-looking, who earn wages such as an English +servant-girl never dreams of. His messes seem to be appreciated, and +little is left after meal-time. It is enough for me to see the men eat. +Every particle of food is conveyed into the mouth by means of the knife, +which is also freely used if sugar or salt be required. Our dining-room +is simply a shed, and a very dark one, having a canvas on one side and +unpainted deal on the other. Few houses at Calgary are painted, though a +painted house looks so much prettier than a deal one that I wonder +painting is not more resorted to, especially when you remember how paint +preserves the wood. Many of the houses here are brought all the way from +Ontario, and, perhaps, this accounts for their smallness. They chiefly +consist of two rooms, one a shop, the other a sitting and night-room; and +the larger number have been erected within the last few months. What we +call in England a gentleman’s house, I should say does not exist in the +whole district. A gentleman would find existence intolerable here, +though the air is fine, and the extent of the prairie is unbounded. +There are two newspapers in the town, and the professions are all well +represented. + +As to my companions, the less I say of them the better. They are young +and vigorous, and use language not generally tolerated in polite society. +Their talk is chiefly of horses and bets. They ride recklessly up and +down the dusty path which forms the main street, and would not break +their hearts if they knocked a fellow down; or they drive light waggons +on four wheels, creating the most overwhelming clouds of dust as they +rush by. As to their saddles, they are as unlike English ones as can +well be imagined, rising at each end, so as to give the rider a very safe +seat, while their stirrups are as long almost as the foot itself; but the +saddles have this advantage, that they never give the horses sore backs. +As to the horses, they are all branded, and turned loose on to the +prairie when not required. Most of the men are prospectors—people who go +round the country in search of mines; or cow-boys—that is, men employed +in the cattle ranches in the district. The cowboy is a fearful sight. +His hands and face are as brown as leather, he wears a straw hat—or one +of felt—with a very wide brim. His coat or jacket is, perhaps, decorated +with Indian work. Around his waist he wears a belt, which he makes +useful in many ways. Then he has brown leather leggings, ornamented down +the sides with leather fringes, and on his heels he puts a tremendous +pair of spurs. The men on the mountains have much the same style of +dress, and are fine specimens of muscular, rather than intellectual or +moral, development. On the whole, I am not unduly enamoured of these +pioneers of civilization; but, then, I was born in the old country, and +learned Dr. Watts’s hymns, and was taught to— + + ‘Thank the goodness and the grace + That on my birth has smiled, + And made me in these Christian days + A happy English child.’ + +I see a good deal more of Calgary than I wish to. I feel that I have +been made a fool of by the station-master. I am, as you may be aware, at +the foot of the Rocky Mountains. They are some 60 miles off, yet; +already I have seen their far-off peaks, glistening with snow, rising +into the summer sky. As I have got so far, I must see them. There are +trees up there, and the sight of a tree would be good for sore eyes; +there are cooling shades out there, and here, though it is but early +morning, it is too hot to stir. The scenery out there is the finest to +be seen in all the Canadian continent, and I would carry away with me, to +think of in after years, something of their beauty. I travelled all this +way for that purpose, and hoped to have been off before, and now find I +must wait, owing to a blunder on the part of the station-master. He +promised he would let me know if he sent a freight-train to the Rocky +Mountains. Well, he sent off a train at one o’clock this morning, and +never let me know anything about it, and the consequence is I must stay +two more days in this dreary spot, without conveniences such as I could +find in the meanest cottage in England, and at a cost which would enable +me to live in luxury and fare sumptuously at home. One lesson I have +learned, which I repeat for the benefit of my readers. Never depend upon +other people; hear all they say, and then act for yourself. Had I done +so, I should have been now in the Rocky Mountains. I trusted in others, +and I am, in consequence, the victim of misplaced confidence. + +I gather a few items of interest to intending emigrants. Crops raised in +the vicinity of Calgary during 1883 gave the following yields per +acre:—Wheat, 33 bushels; barley, 40 bushels; oats, 60 bushels. The +Government farm a few miles off, which I have visited, does well. The +country round offers especial advantages to sheep and dairy farmers, +cheese manufacturers, and hog raisers. My own impression is, and I have +mentioned it to several persons who all think it excellent, that any man +would easily make his fortune who set up a poultry farm. Eggs and fowls +are almost entirely unknown, and if the producer did not find a market +here, he could easily send his produce by the railway to where it was +wanted. Eggs and fowls help one as well as anything to keep body and +soul together. + +I am glad I went to church yesterday. My presence there gave quite a +tone to the place (said the head man to me this morning), and so far I +may presume I did good service. The congregation consisted chiefly of +men, and the collection amounted to nearly 16 dollars—pretty good, +considering (said the above mentioned gentleman) there are two or three +schism shops in the place. In the evening I went to the Wesleyan +Methodist schism shop, as he called it, and heard a sermon, which touched +me more than any sermon I have heard a long time. As I came out the +effect was startling. The sun was sinking in crimson glory just behind +the green hills by which Calgary is surrounded. Far off a dim splendour +of pink testified to the existence of a prairie fire, while before me +stood a gigantic Indian, with his big black head rising out of a pyramid +of gorgeous robes, really dazzling to behold. There is an Indian Mission +near here, but the Indians are not the only heathens out here. + +I have just had a ride in a buck-cart, which is the kind of vehicle the +colonists use. It is of boards on four wheels, on which is placed a seat +for a couple of persons, while the luggage is piled up behind. Some of +them have springs, as fortunately was the case with the one on which I +rode, or I should have had a very uncomfortable ride indeed. Perhaps I +ought not to be so angry with the station-master as I was when I +interviewed him this morning. I have just seen a man who got on to the +freight train, but he tells me it was so uncomfortable that he preferred +to wait, and got off after he had taken his passage. + +Money seems scarce. I have just been to the post-office to send a letter +to England. The postmaster could give me no change, and I had to take +post-cards instead. I suppose all the money goes to the smugglers. In +this small town 500 dollars are sent weekly to Winnipeg for liquor; so +much for prohibition in Calgary. + +As there is no bank here, people find it hard to get money. A young man +waiting here to make up a mining party for the Rockies, tells me he had +to telegraph to Toronto for 500 dollars, which were sent in the shape of +a post-office order. The postmaster charged him five dollars for cashing +the order. I have just heard of a loan of 300 dollars effected; the +borrower has agreed to pay, in the shape of interest, the moderate sum of +four dollars a month. + +Calgary, according to some, can have no enduring prosperity; if so, the +land-grabbers who have scattered themselves all over it will be deeply +disappointed. + +Edmonton, where they get gold out of the river sand, and where they have +already a kind of dredging machine employed for that purpose, it is said, +will shortly have a railway to itself, and the men from the mountains, +who are the mainstay of Calgary, will go that way. + +I fancy I hear some one exclaim: On those wide plains over which sweeps +the ice-laden air of the Rockies, what pleasant walks you must have! My +dear sir, you are quite mistaken. Perhaps, as you set out, there comes a +herd of wild horses—and then I remember how poor George Moore was knocked +down by one, and avoid the boundless prairie accordingly. + +Then there are the dogs, ‘their name is Legion,’ and they are big, and as +wild as they are big, and I am not partial to hydrophobia. No; it is +better to sit at the door of my tent and watch the flight of the horses, +the fights of the dogs, and the stream of dust a mile long which denotes +that some Jehu is at hand, who will pull up at the door, deeply drink +water, smoke a cigar, use a little strong language, and then mount again +and ride off into boundless space. + +Here and there a pedestrian may be seen making his way to his solitary +hut or shop, where at no time do you see any sign of life; and how the +people here make a living (with the exception of the hotel-keepers, who +are always busy) puzzles me. I meet good fellows, I own. They are +friendly in their way. As humour is a thing unknown in Canada and the +North-West, they generally grin when I make a remark, which I do at very +protracted intervals, fearing to be worn out before the long day is done. +Nevertheless, I begin to doubt whether I am not relapsing into the wild +life of those around me. Fortunately, I have not yet acquired the habit +of speaking through my nose, nor do I make that fearful sound—a hawking +in the throat—which is a signal that your neighbour is preparing to +expectorate, and which renders travelling, even in a first-class car, +almost insupportable; but my hands are tanned. I sit with my waistcoat +open, and occasionally in my shirt-sleeves. I care little to make any +effort to be polite; I am clean forgetting all my manners, and feel that +in a little while I shall be as rough as a cow-boy, or as the wild wolf +of the prairie. It is clear I must not tarry at Calgary too long. + + + + +CHAPTER IX. + + +IN THE ROCKIES—HOLT CITY—LIFE IN THE CAMP—A ROUGH RIDE—THE KICKING HORSE +LAKE—BRITISH COLUMBIA. + +I am writing from Holt City—so named after a famous contractor out +here—in the middle of the Rocky Mountains. Here the rail comes, but no +further, as yet, though some 2,000 men are at work a few miles ahead, and +making incredible speed in the construction of this gigantic +intercolonial undertaking—an undertaking which would have been completed +by this time had the late Sir Hugh Allan (the founder of the Allan line +of steamers) and Sir John Macdonald had their way. + +I left Calgary without shedding a tear—the train was only three hours +late—after remarking to the manager of the leading hotel that, much as I +had enjoyed myself under his humble but hospitable roof, I would give him +leave to charge me twenty dollars a day if ever he caught me within his +doors again. + +When the train arrived, of course there was no room. This is the working +season, and the C.P.R., as everyone calls it in Canada, is hurrying on +men to the front as fast as they can be got. + +However, I was permitted to get inside the mail van, in company with a +contractor, his wife, and a baby, which behaved itself as well as could +be expected under the circumstances; a lady who was going to visit her +husband, one of the contractors on the line; and an invalid from +Pennsylvania, who did not seem much to enjoy that rough mode of +travelling. We reached Holt City about eleven, when it was quite dark, +and the only bed I could find was a shelf in the van, on which I was glad +to lie down—but not, alas! to sleep. Had I got out, I should have been +lost, or run over by an engine—that is positive, as there is no road, +only divers rails, as, for instance, the Continental Hotel at Newhaven. +I am now writing in the post-office, which seems the great social centre +of the place, though the mail only leaves twice a week. It is a +decent-sized tent, with a desk and counter in the middle for the sale of +stamps and cigars and the delivery of letters. Behind it are a couple of +beds on which men are reposing in a way that I envy, and covered with +buffalo skins—the possession of which I envy them still more. In front +is a table, fitted up with old papers and a couple of uncommonly +uncomfortable benches, whereon are sitting various loafers, smoking and +talking, and warming themselves as best they can at the big stove—one of +which you now see in every Canadian house, and which but feebly keeps out +the raw cold of the morning. + + [Picture: Mount Stephen in the Rocky Mountains on the Line of the + Canadian Pacific Railway] + +Holt City is admirably located, to use an American phrase which I +heartily detest. It is a clearance in the forest, bordered by the Bow +River, which dashes foaming along. There is a shed, which does duty for +a railway station; a collection of tents, in which the _employés_ of the +company dwell, or which hold the large stores it collects here; a large +shed for meals, a railway car, in which Mr. John Ross, the able +administrator of the C.P.R. in these parts, resides with his accomplished +wife; and further off are other tents, which do duty as hotels, +billiard-rooms, and shops. Up here, I see little to remind me of the Old +Country, except bottles of Stephens’ inks, of Aldersgate Street, London, +which, says the head accountant, are the only inks on which they can +rely. + +We are in a valley—a valley high up among the mountains—as fair as that +in which Rasselas studied to be a virtuous prince, but of a character +common in the length and breadth of the Rockies. I have seen scores of +valleys as fair; and yet I own the exquisite loveliness of the spot—at +any rate, in summer time—is marvellous. Around me rise Alps on Alps, up +into the cloudless blue. Firs, all larch and pine, in all the freshness +of their new-found greenery, clothe their base; while the snow, in +wreaths like marble, glistens on their dark sides or crowns their rugged +peaks. It would seem as if there could be no world beyond. It is really +wonderful what pleasant nooks of this kind one sees everywhere. I +stopped at one such last night, a station called Canmore, which, however, +seemed to be the fairest of them all—and so the fish think, as the +station-master tells me he often catches speckled trout seven or eight +pounds in weight. Very near are valuable sulphur and other springs, and +when the railway shall be completed, I look forward to the time when +Pullman cars shall come here laden with health seekers from all parts of +the world, who are fond of fishing and fine air. + +I had a narrow escape from not coming here at all. When we stopped at +Canmore for our evening meal, I found I was utterly unable to climb back +into the mail van. I may be young in heart, but, alas! I have lost +somewhat of the agility of early youth. I mentioned this to the +station-master and guard, who both promised me repeatedly that they would +have the train drawn up for me. Knowing this, I listened unconcernedly +to the cry of ‘All on board!’ Judge, then, of my horror when I saw the +train gradually gliding past. + +‘Jump into the last car,’ cried the guard, as he saw me looking daggers +at him. + +Fortunately I succeeded in doing so: it is easier to get on to an +American car when in motion than on an English one, on account of its +peculiar construction. This is fortunate, as the railway passenger in +Canada has to trust entirely to himself. He is ignored by guards and +porters and station-master altogether. Unfortunately, I jumped on to the +car sacred to the person of Sir John McNeil, and I was requested by the +black cook to move off, which I declined doing till we reached the next +station, when I moved into another car, and created not a little laughter +as I told my story. It is to be trusted that Sir John enjoyed himself +all the more for having got rid of my vulgar presence. I hope Sir John +may enlighten his friends on his return; but I fear he will gain little +knowledge of the people or the country, travelling in such a way. +Perhaps he will learn as much about it as the Marquis of Lorne, or the +Earl of Carnarvon, who recommends the poor people of the East-end to come +to Canada, where the chances are they will be worse off than they are at +home. Canada requires hardy, muscular men—if with money in their pockets +so much the better—not the refuse of our towns. + +Again, I repeat, people in England ought to have fuller information about +Canada ere they go thither. It is a fortune for the strong man, but even +he has to run risks. Everywhere I hear of what is called mountain fever, +or Red River fever, or fever with some other name which stands for +typhoid disease. Grand and beautiful as is the country, fertile as is +the soil, people forget to observe sanitary laws at times and suffer in +consequence. But I must own that all the men I met in Holt City were +pictures of health and strength. For one thing, the company feeds them +well. I have just breakfasted in camp with the men. We had good coffee +and fried ham and other good things for breakfast, and good tins of +preserved fruits, to which everyone did justice. Everyone here has to +rough it. I washed this morning in the open air, having myself ladled +into a tin basin the water out of a cask in which still floated the +broken ice. + +Holt City is, I suppose, the head-quarters of the C.P.R. Yet it is a +place by itself. Nothing can be rougher than the rail from here to +Calgary, or finer than the view. It is an advantage that the trains are +so slow, as you have more time to enjoy the scenery, which has almost +shaken my attachment to the Hebrides, though one misses the purple +heather which lends such a charm to the grey hills of the North. But +comparisons are odious, and the Rockies, in all their charms, must be +seen to be appreciated. It was a wonderful view I had last night as I +sat on the steps of the last car, drinking in all the strange beauties of +the place. We were climbing hour by hour a wilderness of mountains. We +were hemmed in by them from afternoon till night came down upon the face +of the earth. Mostly they were black, with snowy variations; some were +bare, others clothed with verdure. Some raised their heads in the clear +blue sky as fortresses, others were peaks, others ragged and uneven, +shapeless masses of matter growing out of one another. Some seemed to +like good company, others stood solitary and apart. + +In the dells and shadows there are tales yet to be told. For instance, +here are some remains of the ancient road to British Columbia. Here, a +man tells me, last year there was a terrible tragedy. An English +gentleman and his son were camping near the spot. There came a forest +fire. Awful to relate, when the son had time to look around him, his +father was burnt to death. Fearful are some of the solitudes through +which the passenger plunges. The bear and the eagle have them entirely +to themselves. Few have explored them; fewer still have scaled the +mountain heights by which they are girdled. But nowadays one is in +search of silver or gold or coal, and has no time to think of mountain +grandeur. Cities rise and fall very quickly here. Silver City, for +instance, where we stopped last night, was all the rage a year or two +ago. It is now deserted. Yet people say silver is still to be found +there, and at Calgary, as an illustration of the fact, a ‘prospector’ +showed me a fine specimen of silver, at the same time asking me to come +and see the shaft. I replied I was as fond of silver as he was, but I +sought it in another way. + +But to return to the Rockies. I wonder not that in times past the +Indians saw in them the home of the gods, or that there the scientist +discovers in them the source of the whirlwind or the storm. + +I am again train-bound. No one knows when we may have a train from the +east, and till we have one it is impossible for me to get away. +Physically, perhaps, this is a good thing for me, as it enables me to +recuperate. Here I am, 5,000 or 6,000 feet above the level of the sea, +breathing mountain air, and luxuriating in mountain scenery. Last night +I slept in a caboose, and it was the best night’s rest I have had for a +long time. I went to bed at nine and was up again at five. Do my +readers know what a caboose is? It is a railway luggage-car on wheels. +Mine is rather a superior one, and has an upper and a lower chamber, and +has in the upper chamber a row of shelves, which do service as beds. I +had one of these to myself, and, as I was well provided with blankets, +did not much grieve at the absence of linen sheets. + +My dear old friend, Mrs. Moodie, wrote a capital book, called ‘Roughing +It in the Bush.’ Assuredly I may, one of these days, write one on +roughing it in the Rockies, though the keeper of the caboose, out of +respect for my age and infirmities, does all he can to make me +comfortable. Already I feel the better for the air. For the first time +since I have been in Canada I have felt hungry; for the first time, also, +since I have been in Canada I have not had to physic myself with +chlorodyne. A month up here in the Rockies would make a young man of me +or of anyone else. I must be off before I become as gay as a horse fed +on beans. This is, I take it, the real and sufficient reason of the +peculiar spirits of the mountaineers, who rather alarmed me with their +liveliness at Calgary. Their exuberance is due to air, and air alone. +As I sit, a long row of mules files past; a man is riding at the head, +the others follow with their burdens packed on their backs. He is a +‘prospector,’ and is on his way to the other side. Already as many as a +thousand such have gone the same road this summer. + +The mountains are full of wealth—in the shape of gold or silver, or coal +or slate, or other precious commodities. Hitherto the cost of conveyance +has kept people away. The opening of the C.P.R. will remove that +inconvenience. They will have a chance now of getting rid of their +minerals, when discovered, and of fetching up their stores from the East +at less expense. As it is, things are dear enough in Holt City. For +instance, if I send or receive a letter, I have to pay the postmaster a +few cents in addition to the usual postage-stamp. Calgary I thought bad +enough, but up here prices may be quoted as much higher. Yesterday I had +a ride over the mountains. It will be long before I take such a ride +again. No English coachman would drive such a road for five hundred a +year. No English carriage could stand it, nor English horses either. I +expected the buggy, as it was called, to be shattered into atoms every +minute—it looked so light and frail, and the horses—a handsome pair, the +property of Mr. Ross—to be ruined for life; yet we got safely to the +front—where the men are hard at work cutting down trees, removing earth, +tunnelling, and pushing on the work with all their might; and there, I +must say, there are openings for any number of men who like to come out. +Last year little was done in the winter, because the contractors believed +the climate would be against them. No one before then had wintered in +the Rockies, and everyone believed the climate to be much worse than it +really is. + +But to return to the ride. I yet feel it in every bone in my body, as +all the time I had to hold on to my seat like grim death. Sometimes the +coachman was high above me; sometimes I was at the top and he at the +bottom; now we were deep in the mud, the next moment high and dry on a +formidable boulder, bigger than a hogshead, and came down with a bang, +which sent me quivering all over. Here we were with the water up to the +floor; and then we came on a mudbank quite as deep. Not an inch of the +ground was level. It was all collar work or the reverse. Fortunately we +were shaded by the firs which climb all the mountains out here, or the +heat would have been unbearable. As to conversation, that was quite out +of the question, though the ‘boy’ who drove me came when a child from +Devonshire, and had a strong wish to see the old country again, of whose +lanes, yellow with primroses, and cottages bright with roses and +honeysuckles, and farmhouses green with ivy, he had a very vivid +recollection. He made a lot of money, he said. Indeed, he had more than +he knew what to do with. Last winter, for instance, he stopped a month +in Winnipeg, and spent there four hundred dollars. ‘How did it all go?’ +‘Oh! in treating the boys!’ was his answer. I rather intimated that was +a poor way of using his money. ‘Oh!’ said he, ‘they all do it. That is +the way of the boys in this country!’ I was glad to hear him say that he +thought of taking a farm soon, and was putting by the money for that +purpose. The Rocky Mountains cannot be a bad place for a ‘boy.’ One of +them yesterday told me how he had vainly written to his father to come +out, who was now in the old country breaking stones on the road. Here, +at any rate, he would have been better off. It is a long journey, I +know, for the British emigrant. We are more than 1,000 miles from +Winnipeg, and the ride is a dreary one till you reach the Rockies. The +run to Winnipeg from Toronto by Port Arthur and Owen Sound is a real +enjoyment. It took us two days and two nights to reach Port Arthur from +Toronto, and the trip from Port Arthur to Winnipeg is accomplished easily +in twenty hours. + +‘Any bears about here?’ said I to the ‘boy,’ in one of the few minutes +allowed for conversation in the course of our rough ride yesterday. + +‘Not many. I seed one near where we are passing. He was a black bear, +and stood up and looked at me, and then I looked at him. I wished I’d +had a gun, and then I would have shot him.’ + +Fortunately I saw no bear, black or brown, in the woods as we drove +amongst them; scarcely a bird—only one, an owl I think, on the top of a +tree, which never moved, though we were close upon it. ‘Do you make any +difference in work on Sunday?’ I asked of one of the men. ‘Oh no; Sunday +ain’t of much account here.’ This is to be regretted, if only for +physical considerations. Everyone can work all the better for a day of +rest. Again, I think the C.P.R. injures itself in this way, that it may +lose the services of useful men who like to keep the Sabbath, either from +physical or religious considerations. As a matter of fact, I found many +did take a rest on Sunday, and it was amusing to see how the morning was +devoted to haircutting and shaving and mending clothes in the open air. +A man, I know, can spend his Sunday at honest work better than in +drinking. But when we think of the wild life of the miners and navvies +in the ends of the earth—a life so wild that the C.P.R. has got a law +passed to forbid the sale of intoxicating drink, and people are appalled +when they read, in spite of the law, whisky is supplied to men who have a +large number of revolvers at their side—it seems that a little provision +might be made for the religious wants of the community. The philosopher +will laugh, I admit. My reply is: Men were lifted out of degradation by +the Christian religion in some form or other, and as we root that out we +may expect society to retrograde. These men to the front will pay for +looking after. They are fine fellows mostly. At any rate, they are the +pioneers of modern civilization, and should be reverenced as such. They +are to be honoured for their work’s sake. They plant, we gather the +fruit. They sow the seed, we reap the harvest, and their work remains a +monument of perseverance, of the benefits of the Union, of enterprise, +and capital and skill. That Canada has thus carried the railway and the +telegraph across the Rockies shows that England and America will have to +look to their industrial laurels. + + * * * * * + +I am alive, I am thankful to say; but it seems to me that I should have +left my bones on the Kicking Horse Lake, which lies on the slope of the +Rockies, situated in British Columbia, where the scenery becomes grander +and the air balmier as it comes up laden with the soft breeze of the +Pacific. You see that at once in the superior size of the trees which +clothe the sides of that part of the Rockies. + +As far as what the navvies call the front, I had the benefit of the +temporary railway by which Mr. Ross sends his labourers. It is then the +great difficulties of the work commence, as the rocks are tremendous, and +one of the tunnels making will be three-quarters of a mile long. + +This hot weather I can scarce imagine how the men and horses stand the +work; of the former, some were digging, others cutting down the trees, +others removing rocks, others filling up the swamps. Here the waggons +were being laden with stores to be sent further to the front; now and +then a long trail of mules sweeps by with miners and miners’ stores, and +I plunge into the forest, shaded from the fierce sun by the tall firs, +and as I struggle in the swamps caused by the melting snows, I can +realize something of the hardships of the early travellers—hardships of +which the tourist, when the rail is completed, will have no idea, though +he will be a little alarmed as the mountains drop away beneath his feet +for more than a hundred miles to the Columbia river, while the narrow +track of rails winds along its sides. In the winter this pass, when +covered with snow, is very dangerous, and many are the mules and horses +dashed to pieces over the precipice. + +The lake, when I reach it, is full of ice and snow, and all round the +mountains rear their snow-capped heads. One of the peculiarities of this +region is the abundance of water in some shape or other, and the shadows +on the lakes reflect as a mirror all the surrounding scene—the dark +forest at the base, the masses of slate-like rock above, the snow in all +its radiant white higher up, the unclouded azure that crowns and +glorifies all. + +Heated and tired, I throw myself on the moss, and realize, in all its +intensity, the appalling loneliness of forest life—I startle three wild +ducks, that is all. Down on my left comes the rushing torrent in a +series of picturesque waterfalls into the lake. I climb the mountain by +the side of them. The water sends to me an ice-laden air, which revives +me as I struggle upwards and onwards, watching the whirlpools and +cascades as the water angrily struggles to force its way through the iron +barriers by which it is hemmed in. I secure a fine specimen of petrified +moss from a stream close by. But I may not linger. Already I feel weak +as I plunge into the frozen snow, or sink where the sun has melted it +into morass, or stumble over an old moss-grown trunk, or climb the big +trunks which the axeman has already levelled, or pass the streams which +intersect the plain on logs off which I expect to slip every moment. +Then I come to the railway men, and avail myself of the imperfect and +unconnected track which they have formed; but now the sun beats fiercely +on me, and I can scarcely put one foot before another. The spirit is +willing, but the flesh is weak. Fortunately, I reach the tent of a good +Samaritan. I refresh myself with water from the crystal stream. I lunch +on bread and cheese, with tea kindly fetched from the company’s hut, but +I have to lie down three hours before I feel myself equal to urging on my +wild career again. + +British Columbia seems at present to be chiefly occupied by miners. No +other kind of emigrants are needed there. The country is mountainous—a +regular sea of mountains; but, writes an occasional correspondent of _The +Toronto Mail_, ‘there are beautiful valleys, far surpassing anything you +have in Ontario, and the mountains and hills furnish pasture. +Considering the climate, the rich soil, and the high price paid for all +farming produce, I believe there cannot be a more desirable place for the +farmer. I have no hesitation in saying that a farm of fifty acres is +worth more than a hundred in the East. All you have to do is to sow your +land with good seed and you are sure of a bountiful return. No weevil, +midge, wire-worm, potato bug, nor, in fact, any farmers’ pests, exist +here. There are no scorching hot days and sultry nights; no heavy frost +or deep snow to impede work; consequently you are not driven like a slave +for six months and frozen in for the other six, but have steady work all +the year round.’ + +Other writers bear a similar testimony. With all its advantages, +however, the country has one drawback—the scarcity and high price of +labour. It seems well looked after by the Episcopalians, who have a +Bishop here and several clergymen, and, as I may suppose the other +denominations are equally in earnest and equally active, it is clear +settlers may enjoy the advantages of the forms of religious life with +which they are familiar, and under which they have been reared. + +British Columbia, which entered the Canadian Confederation in 1871, is +the most westerly of the Canadian Provinces. It has a coast-line on the +Pacific Ocean of about 600 miles, that is, in a straight line. If its +almost innumerable indentations and bays were measured, the coast-line +would extend to several thousands of miles. + +The area of the Province, according to the Census measurement, is 341,305 +square miles. Its position on the American continent is one of great +commercial importance, and its resources are in keeping with its +position. If it were to be described from the characteristics of its +climate, its mineral wealth, and its natural commercial relations, it +might be said to be the Great Britain and California combined of the +Dominion of Canada. + +The Province is divided into two parts: the Islands, of which Vancouver +is the principal, and the Mainland. Vancouver is about 300 miles long, +with an average breadth of about sixty miles, containing an area of about +20,000 square miles. + +British Columbia has numerous harbours and rivers, some of which are of +importance, and all are remarkable for their bountiful, in fact +wonderful, supplies of fish. The scenery which it possesses is +magnificently beautiful. + +The climate on the coast is more equable and much milder in winter than +in any other part of Canada; but as the mountains are ascended, greater +cold prevails, with more snow, and the characteristics of greater dryness +of atmosphere which mark the climate of the interior of the continent are +found. + +The population of British Columbia, by the Census of 1881, did not exceed +49,459, of which 25,661 were Indians. This comparatively sparse +population is due to the hitherto isolated position of the Province; but +now that railway communication between the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans +through the Dominion of Canada is being rapidly pushed forward to +completion by a route which offers the easiest gradients and the most +important natural commercial advantages of any possible line across the +continent of America, the inducements the Province offers to settlers are +beginning to attract the attention, as well of the emigrating classes of +the Old World, as of the migrating classes of this continent; and +population is already beginning to flow rapidly in. It is beyond doubt +that the percentage of increase which will be shown at the next decennial +Census will be a statistical fact to excite men’s wonder. Its fisheries, +its forests, its mineral resources, will provide work for thousands who +are starving at home. And it will be easily reached when the Canadian +Pacific Railway is completed. + + * * * * * + +I have now reached the end of my journey, and I sum up my emigration +experiences. The emigrant, if strong and industrious, and ready to take +advantage of opportunities, and not averse to roughing it, will be sure +to find work; but he must be shy, if he has cash, of land schemers, and I +would advise him, if he thinks of settling, not to be in a hurry about +it, but to take time to look around. I have seen as fine farming country +as anywhere in the world. I have seen other parts where no one can get a +living. Amongst the emigrants I see many who must succeed anywhere, and +many who will go to the wall wherever they may be. + +Let me give you another illustration of the bursting of an emigration +scheme. The London dailies often have advertisements offering for a +certain bonus to provide young men with homes where farming in all its +branches is taught. The London (Ont.) papers tell how a number of young +fellows have been taken in in this way. They paid the advertisers sums +from thirty pounds upwards, in addition to their passage money, the +consideration being that on their arrival in Ontario they were to be +placed on farms and kept there at the agent’s expense. Of course, when +they reached their journey’s end, no farmers were to be found. If a +young Englishman wishes to try farming in Canada, he cannot do better +than hire himself to a farmer for a year or two and keep his money in his +pocket for the purchase of a farm. + +But even then he must not buy a farm till he knows something about it, +and he cannot be long out here before he will find out where the good +land is. A Canadian whom I met at Calgary, told me that he knew a farm +near Toronto which was regularly in the market every year. It is safe to +be bought by an Englishman, who tries it for a time, gives it up in +despair, and then it comes into the market again. + +‘Are there any stones on the farm?’ asked an Englishman, after he had +purchased his farm. + +‘I only saw one,’ was the encouraging reply: and it was a truthful one. +There was but one stone, but then it embraced the surface of the whole +farm. + +The English purchaser must have his wits about him. Here he is by many +regarded as a stranger, and they take him in. The poet tells us where +ignorance is bliss ’tis folly to be wise. Ignorance is not bliss in +Canada, emigrants really must have their wits about them or they will +suffer much. + +Near Moosomin there is some fine country where many English have settled. +Only last week an Englishman selected a farm in that locality for a +homestead. He at once proceeded there, having at considerable expense +hired a conveyance for his wife and four children. When he got there he +found the land already occupied. To add to his troubles, when he +returned to Moosomin one of his children died; the result is that the +wife has grown home-sick, the poor man disheartened; he wants to return +to England, but he has already exhausted his means. This want of harmony +between the land office and the guides, according to _The Manitoba Free +Press_, is said to be of frequent occurrence. The Dominion Government +ought to see to this. They are eager to promote emigration, but many +such cases will make English farmers naturally a little reluctant to come +out. + + + + +CHAPTER X. + + +DANGERS OF THE ROCKIES.—PRAIRIE FIRES.—THE RETURN.—PORT ARTHUR.—MIGRANTS. + +There is a great deal of snow in the Rockies. In June that snow begins +to melt. The result is, a violent body of water rushes down, which makes +the railway people very uncomfortable. + +On Sunday I met the engine-driver of the train by which I was to travel +east next morning. At Holt City it seems no one knows from what +particular spot the train will start. + +‘You won’t start without me?’ I said. + +‘No; I will look to see whether you are on board.’ + +‘But,’ said I, ‘you must leave at five, whether I am on board or not.’ + +‘Oh! as to that,’ he said, ‘no one can make me start before I am ready. +But,’ said he, ‘perhaps we may not get away at all. I don’t like the +look of the bridge, and there is a deal of water about.’ + +I smiled incredulously. Had not I seen, only an hour before, with my own +eyes, a special train arrive from the west filled with labourers and +freight? If that could cross in safety, surely our lighter train could +do the same. + +Thus reasoning, I lay down with a light heart in my caboose, having +invoked, not the saints, but every decent Christian I could find, to take +care that I might be aroused at four p.m., in order that I might have a +good wash before I started on my little run of 1,500 miles, as far as +Port Arthur. + +Just as I was falling into the arms of Morpheus, to speak poetically—a +habit to which I was much given in my earlier days—a fellow-traveller +came rushing into the caboose, saying timidly: + +‘You’d better get on board at once. The bridge has given way, and they +may go across at once,’ and so saying, he left me in the dark. + +However, I managed to jump out of my bed, collect my luggage, and +scramble down the plank, the only and somewhat perilous means of access +to my caboose, and stumble along the confusing lines of railway by which +Holt City is adorned, and climb up into a car, wondering much all the +while why we should start at all, when the bridge had partly given way, +or whether I had come all that distance merely to find a watery grave. +In the car I found a company as grotesque and rough as any I had yet seen +anywhere, discussing the situation with more or less earnestness. + +The bridge, I heard, was being repaired; that was a comfort. But still +no one knew when we should start. Now and then we moved a few feet +forward, or a few feet backward; but, in reality, I believe we remained +in the same position all night, and started at the usual hour next +morning. But the horror of that night was something inexpressible. +Sleep was quite out of the question. You can’t sleep in an American +railway-car unless you are a navvy or a contractor—who can sleep +anywhere. In England, even in a third-class carriage, the chances are +you can lie down at your full length and sleep. In Canada you can’t do +that, as the seats are too short. So there I sat, bolt upright, all +through that tedious night, watching for the light of day, while my +companions sat smoking and talking and expectorating. In a playful +moment one of them suggested that they should all take off their boots. +Fortunately the proposition did not meet with universal approval, and I +was saved that horror. + +In the Rockies life is not all beer and ’baccy. One day there was an +alarm of fire. It seems the woods are on fire all day long, and week +after week. In this way much valuable timber is destroyed, and no one +knows who does the mischief, or how it will terminate. Daily we saw the +smoke of a forest fire; one day the flames came so close to Holt City +that everyone was alarmed. If a spark or two reached the place where the +explosives were stored, Holt City and all its inhabitants might have been +blown to atoms. Down in the prairies fire does a vast amount of mischief +to the settler, who awakes in the night to find his tent or house reduced +to ashes, and all his worldly goods destroyed. Such cases are of +frequent occurrence, especially at this season of the year, when the +settler sets fire to the prairie before ploughing, or to insure a better +crop of grass. One dark night, in particular, I remember the prairie +fire lent quite a mournful grandeur to the scene. Then there came a day +I shall never forget as long as I live. A Canadian summer may have its +peculiar charms, but I candidly own, not being a salamander, it is far +too hot for me. On that particular day the heat was intense. It +affected everyone. Those who dared drank gallons of iced water, others +pulled off their coats and collars and lay down on the cushions with +which the sleeping-car is plentifully provided, and went off to sleep. +It was in vain one tried to pass away the time in smoking—it was too hot +for that. Newspapers and cheap novels were all neglected—conversation +was out of the question. Everyone seemed on the point of giving up the +ghost. Even the blackie, who invariably acts as conductor to the +sleeping-car—and who is about the only civil official (with the exception +of the steamboat attendants, who are models of good behaviour) one meets +in Canadian travel, seemed, thinly clad as he was, quite overcome. The +sun took all the colour out of his cheeks, and he became quite +pale—almost white. + +In the course of our return journey we stopped at Moose Jaw for supper, +and then I witnessed a new development of prairie life in the shape of a +thunder-storm, which seemed to me unusually vivid and protracted. The +lightning was grand as it swept over the wide sea of grass, making +everything as bright as noon-day, and then all was dark again. It +brought us a rain that had really healing in its wings. While the heat +lasted I was a martyr to prickly heat. It seemed to me that I was going +to have small-pox or measles. I had little pimples all over me, and as +to my wrists, they were really painful, and I could not keep from +scratching with a vivacity which a Scotchman might have envied. Was it +that vulgar disease to which, it is said, the gallant Scot is peculiarly +liable? I could not say. I had shaken hands with so many filthy +Indians, and it might be that, as I learn they are much afflicted in that +way. Happily the thunder-storm cooled the air, and I felt all the better +for it. When I got as far as Port Arthur, and inhaled the cool air of +Lake Superior, I suffered no more from unpleasant irritation of the skin. +It was with joy I embarked on the C.P.R.’s fine steamer, the _Alberta_, +for Owen Sound. But even travelling on Lake Superior has its +disadvantages. The water of the Lake is intensely cold, and when the sun +beats fiercely on it there is sure to be a fog. Such happened to be the +case on my return, and we ploughed slowly along for a while, seeing +hardly anything of the beauty of the scene, while every few minutes we +were cheered by the dismal notes of the fog-horn. Fortunately the fog +lifted, and then what a display we had of islands, green as emerald, on +the tranquil sea! I must add, also, I had good company everywhere, with +the exception of the great Sir John M’Neill, who had his meals apart from +us at a table all to himself, and an English clergyman from +Staffordshire, whom a Canadian gentleman described to me as ‘a regular +crank,’ whatever that may mean. The parson is going to write a book, so +he tells the people; but he shuns me, which is a pity, as I met a friend +at Calgary who told me they had great fun with the parson on their way up +from Winnipeg, telling him all sorts of cock-and-bull stories, which he +greedily entered in his note-book. + +I must give you one more sketch of a Canadian town as an illustration of +the enterprise and pluck which are the main characteristics of the +Canadian of to-day. If you look at the map, you will see Port Arthur is +situated in Thunder Bay, and Thunder Bay, when you pass the rocky barrier +by which it is encircled, opens out into Lake Superior. + +Thunder Bay is a sheet of water some 13 by 19 miles in area, sheltered +from the wild storms which sweep over the northern lakes by the Pie and +Welcome Islands and the Thunder Cape on one side, and by the terraced +bluffs of ever-green forest on the other; forming thus an unsurpassed +harbour for extent and accommodation, and having claim to be what its +admirers say it is, the prettiest of all the American Lakes. + +It is not an agricultural district that surrounds Port Arthur, though it +is a fact that there are vast stretches of rich lands within its borders, +including the Kamanistique and other valleys, on which at least 3,000 +families could settle and get a good living by agriculture. + +The timber resources of the surrounding country, which must find its +centre and point of collection in the quiet waters of the bay, comprise +thousands of square miles of spruce and other trees; while iron, copper, +zinc, and silver are to be found in the neighbouring rocks. Gold also is +said to be hidden in the bowels of the earth; though not yet discovered +in paying quantities. However this may be, one thing is clear, that from +Thunder Bay the whole agricultural exports of the countless fertile acres +of the Canadian North-West must find an outlet. Truly did the Marquis of +Lorne, when here, describe it as ‘The Silver Gate.’ + +Port Arthur—as it was termed when Sir Garnet Wolseley arrived here on his +way to suppress the Riel revolt in the North-West, out of compliment to +the Duke of Connaught—is in reality one of the few places in Canada that +have a history. As early as the beginning of the sixteenth century, some +of the French settlers had formed an idea that the great Lake Superior +was a highway to the vast fur-producing countries of the North-West, +although not till 1641 did any white man venture upon its waters. In +1678 a Frenchman built himself a house in the vicinity of Port Arthur, +and commenced trading with the surrounding Indians for their furs. + +In 1857 the attention of the Canadian Government was called to the spot, +and they sent out commissioners to explore, who, in 1859, published a +report which created quite a sensation all over Canada. In due time the +C.P.R., which is the great mainspring of all the North-West, took up Port +Arthur, had all their stores and men carted there, and now Port Arthur +has a grand future before it, of which it is impossible to predict the +whole extent. I have great faith in Port Arthur. It must in time be +another Montreal or Toronto. Moose Jaw is going down. It will be long +before Calgary will be much of a place. The Silver City is half +deserted; and at Winnipeg the boom has burst and bankruptcy prevails; but +Port Arthur is bound to go ahead. + +I spent there a night on my return, and saw a marvellous change—even +since my visit there a fortnight previously. Then people were hard at +work putting up wooden shops; now those shops are fitted up with glass +fronts, and already filled with merchandise from all quarters of the +earth, though in many cases the upper parts of the building are in an +incomplete state. Every day ships arrive from the American side; thus, +within a couple of days previous to my arrival, 20,000 tons of coal had +been landed. There are steamers of all sorts and sizes in the harbour, +constantly coming in or going out. On one side a new elevator has been +erected, on the other side is a great store of lumber and a saw-mill. + +Yesterday Port Arthur was a township, now it is incorporated as a city, +and rejoices in a mayor. The place is full of hotels, which charge high +prices, give very little for the money, and do a roaring trade. A very +handsome English church is being erected; just by, the Presbyterians are +building one equally handsome, only a little smaller. The Roman +Catholics make quite a grand show with their brick church and convent and +schools, while the Methodists have a very plain and ugly imitation of an +English church, with its steeple all in wood and painted white, which +attests, at any rate, if not their taste, their influence and wealth. I +visited the school-room, which was filled with bright and well-fed boys +and girls, where the children are taught free, as they are all over +Canada—where they have, by-the-bye, a compulsory law, which is never +enforced, as it is impossible to do so. And then I made my way to the +best-looking building in the town—the emigrants’ shed—where already 3,600 +emigrants have this season been lodged gratis by the Dominion Government +previous to their passing onwards to the North-West. + +People tell me there is no room for mechanics in Canada. In Port Arthur +I see them in constant demand. At one shop window I see a notice to the +effect that 10 carpenters are required, at another a demand for painters, +while a third shop window seeks to secure good tinsmiths. At the chief +draper’s shop there is a notice stating four good assistants are +required. What a pity the discontented men whom I left at Montreal, +because work was not offered them immediately they landed, did not come +thus far! As to rockmen and labourers, they are wanted by the hundred. +Surely, Port Arthur must be a good place for the working man and the +working girl. Even at Calgary they were paying the female helps at the +hotel—as sour a set as I ever saw—and who were constantly quarrelling +with John Smith, the Chinaman cook—as much as 40 dollars a month. But +even out here a man must have brains. + +‘I came out here seven years ago,’ said a gentleman to me as we sat on +one of the rocks which line Port Arthur, ‘and could find nothing to do. +I was brought up in a foundry, and had saved 1,100 dollars. I went all +round; no one could give me a job. Then I began buying a few hides; this +brought me into contact with a great fur merchant at Chicago—he employed +me as his agent at 80 dollars a month. Then I gave that up and turned +miller, and the year before last I traded to the extent of a quarter of a +million dollars. Last year I was too eager, and lost a lot of money; but +this year I hope to get it all back again.’ + +Why cannot an English emigrant be equally successful? Is it because we +do not send out the right sort of men? + +‘There is not one man in a hundred that comes out here from London who is +of any use,’ said an old Toronto trader—himself an Englishman—to me. ‘I +never call myself an Englishman,’ said he. ‘When I go to London I always +say I am a Canadian. I am ashamed of the name of Englishman. What would +Sir Garnet Wolseley have done when he was here had it not have been for +the Canadian Volunteers?’ + +I am glad to hear, however, that he had nothing but praise for the Scotch +settlers Lady Cathcart was sending out. She advances them money, and +they pay her back a good rate of interest. Why cannot other people do +the same? Another question, also, may be asked: Why cannot certain +Canadian land companies, who really offer purchasers a fair bargain, put +up a few houses on their separate farms? The settler has to build his +house under every disadvantage. I am sure they could build the houses by +contract at half the expense; and they could have a mortgage on the farm, +which would ensure them in every case against loss, and which might add +materially to their profits as well. + +If the crops this year turn out well in the North-West, and, according to +present prospects, there is every reason to suppose they will, the +farmers will pour into the country in a way which they have never done +before, and the prosperity of the North-West will be placed on a solid +basis. Be that as it may, there are bright days in store for Port +Arthur. + +On the green forest, rising up above the town and overlooking Thunder +Bay, it is intended to build a first-class summer hotel for the comfort +of holiday makers and health seekers. There the visitor will enjoy fine +cool air in the sultry heat of summer, while bathing in the lake will +invigorate his enfeebled frame. The waters abound with fish. Islands +and lakes and rivers tempt the yachtsman. If the workmen who squander +their hard-earned wages in reckless drunkenness would but learn to be +sober, few places on the Canadian lakes would be more enjoyable than Port +Arthur. + + [Picture: Thunder Bay, Lake Superior] + +I cannot leave Canada without speaking of its Grand Trunk Railway, which +meets the emigrant at Port Levi when he lands at Quebec, and which he +will undoubtedly often patronise if he tarries long in the land. It has +built the Victoria Bridge at Montreal, one of the wonders of Canada—a +tubular structure of magnificent proportions, which spans the St. +Lawrence, and gives uninterrupted communication to the western traffic +with that of the United States. Including the abutments, the bridge is +9,084 feet in length. The tubes rest on twenty-four piers, the main +tubes being sixty feet above the level of the river. It may well be +called the Grand Trunk Railway, as it operates under one management over +six thousand miles of first-class railway road. Having close connection +at Port Huron, Detroit and Chicago with the principal Western American +lines, it offers great advantages to emigrants to all parts of the +compass. At Montreal I had the pleasure of a long chat with Mr. Joseph +Hickson, the general manager, who takes a deep interest in the subject of +emigration, and Mr. W. Wainwright, the assistant-manager, to whom I am +indebted and grateful for many acts of kindness, especially welcome to +the stranger in a strange land. It is the Grand Trunk that takes the +traveller over Niagara Falls—on the International Suspension Bridge +connecting the Canadian Railways with those of the States. This +structure, which is 250 feet above the water, commands a fine view up to +the Falls. It is to be feared that as long as Canada and the United +States have separate tariffs there will be not a little smuggling along +this bridge. When I was there I heard of a Canadian judge, who with his +family had been stopping at one or other of the hotels on the Canadian +side. One fine morning some of the ladies of the party walked off to the +American side, and returned laden with bargains which had paid no duty. +In their innocence they boasted of the little transaction to the judge. +‘How can I,’ said he indignantly, ‘punish people for smuggling, if I find +my own family do it?’ and the ladies had to pay the duty, so the story +goes, after all. + + + + +CHAPTER XI. + + +BACK TO ENGLAND.—CANADIAN HOSPITALITY.—THE ASSYRIAN MONARCH.—HOME. + +My time was up, and I had to be off, after we got a look at pleasant +London in the wood, as my Canadian friends who have been to England call +it. I came back from Chicago to New York, and had again to encounter the +horrors of nights in a Pullman sleeping-car. Why cannot the railway +authorities separate the part of the car devoted to the gentlemen from +that part inhabited by the ladies? The way in which the sexes are mixed +up at night is, to say the least, unpleasant. I shall never forget my +last experience in a Pullman sleeping-car. An ancient dame with blue +spectacles, my _vis-à-vis_, as the shades of evening came on, gave me the +horrors. In my despair I began undressing, thinking that the outraged +female would rush away in disgust. Alas! she had stronger nerves than I +calculated, and there she sat gazing serenely with her tinted orbs till I +plunged myself behind my curtained berth, to encounter, early in the +morning, once more those eyes. + +New York and Boston are full of fairy forms. Why don’t they travel? The +change would be pleasant for sore eyes like mine. + +No wonder I sat all that night thinking of the great kindness I had +received in Canada, and regretting especially that I had refused an +invitation to dine that evening at the home of one of the leading +barristers of Toronto, to meet some clergymen there who were familiar +with my name, and who wished to meet me. + +Surely I did wrong to leave Toronto, with all its friendly faces and +kindly hearts. It will be long ere I cease to remember how the Canadians +made me at home, as I met them on the rail, or on the boat, or in the +hotel. + +Said a London Evangelist to me: ‘You will find the Canadians a cold +people, who will show you no hospitality. While I was there not one of +them invited me to have a cup of tea.’ + +All I can say is, I found the Canadians quite the reverse. But then my +friend went on a mission, and is a man of very serious views, while I +travelled merely to see a land of whose wonders I had heard much, to talk +to sinners as well as saints, and to learn from them what I could. + +I was a great reformer once myself, and had glorious visions which never +came to pass. In youth we have all such dreams. Now, as the days darken +round me and the years, I seek to put up with the shortcomings of my +brother-man, trusting that he in his Christian charity may extend a +similar forbearance to my own. + +I came back in the _Assyrian Monarch_. I was glad I did so. That fine +ship has a distinguished record. It has carried no end of theatricals to +New York; it did the same kind office for Jumbo: it carried troops and +horses to Egypt; and when we English undertook to punish Arabi, it was a +home for the refugees for a while. + +Perhaps we have no ship more noticeable than the _Assyrian Monarch_, +belonging to the Monarch Line, which runs weekly, I fancy, between New +York and London. + +It is a great treat in the fine weather to take that route. You are a +little longer at sea—you glide along the south coast till you reach the +Scilly Isles, and the ships of the company are all that can be desired. + +It is a great deal of trouble and expense to some to go with all their +goods and chattels to Liverpool, then unpack them, and get them down to +the landing-stage, and then repack them in one or other of the far-famed +steamers of that busy spot, and all this you save if you patronize the +ships of the Monarch Line, which carry chiefly cargo, with a few saloon +passengers as well. + +We had a very heavy cargo on board the _Assyrian Monarch_ as we came back +from New York. We carried 260 bullocks, besides cheese and grain, to +make glad the heart and fill the stomach, and thus one felt that if the +screw were to fail or the fog to hinder a rapid transit, there was corn +in Egypt, and that there was something to fall back on. Happily, we were +not driven to that alternative. We fared well in the saloon of the +_Assyrian Monarch_; so well, indeed, that a poor elderly lady, who seemed +at death’s door when we started, became quite vigorous, comparatively +speaking, by the time we ended our voyage. + +We had more freedom in the way of sitting up late and having lights than +is possible in a crowded passenger ship, and we came more into contact +with the captain of the ship and his merry men. + +In the case of the _Assyrian Monarch_ this was a great advantage, as +Captain Harrison is a good companion as well as an able navigator, and I +felt myself safe in his hands, that is, as far as anyone can be safe at +sea. + +Further, I felt that the chances were in my favour. The _Assyrian +Monarch_ had carried over the Atlantic, in stormy weather, the +highly-respected and ever-to-be-regretted by Londoners Jumbo; surely it +could be trusted to perform the same kind office for myself in the summer +season, when the air is still and the seas are calm; and so it did, +though every now and then we encountered that greatest of all dangers at +sea, fog, more or less dense, especially on the Banks of Newfoundland, +where the ice-laden waters of the Arctic come in contact with the warmer +waves of the Gulf Stream. As our course was very fortunately much to the +south, we had a good deal of the latter. + +That Gulf Stream was a revelation to me. When I took my morning bath it +seemed as if I were in warm water, and the new forms of life it fostered +and developed were particularly pleasant to a casual observer like +myself. There one could see the nautilus, or the Portugeuse man-of-war, +as it is familiarly termed, in the language of the poet, + + ‘Put out a tier of oars on either side, + Spread to the wafting breeze a twofold sail,’ + +and cruel, big-headed sharks, which, indeed, followed us almost all the +way to England (the fact is that now, when so many cattle are thrown +overboard, the Atlantic abounds with sharks), and lovely flying-fish like +streaks of silver flashing along the deep and boundless blue ocean. Of +these latter one flew on board. It met with a cruel fate. It was eaten +by the first officer of the _Assyrian Monarch_ for breakfast. It ought +to have choked him. It did nothing of the kind; he, hardened sinner that +he was, enjoyed it greatly, and said that it was as good as a whiting. + +In the Gulf Stream we found the usual number of whales and porpoises. +The latter would play around the bow or race along the side of the ship +in considerable quantities of all sorts of sizes. There were other fish +of which I know not the names to be seen occasionally leaping out of the +water as high and repeatedly as possible, as if a shark were in their +midst seeking whom he might devour. + +One sight I shall never forget in the Gulf Stream. It was that of a +tortoise. I was leaning over the ship’s side, when something big and +round seemed to be coming to the surface. I could not make out what it +was; then all at once the truth flashed upon me as he wobbled along, +paddling with his fins, his head erect, his little eyes peering at the +ship as if he wondered what the dickens it was, and what business it had +there. He seemed to be treading the water. + + ‘I saw him but a moment, + But methinks I see him now.’ + +The sight gave me quite an appetite, though my friend Sir Henry Thompson +will insist upon it that turtle soup is made of conger-eel, but in the +wide Atlantic one has time to think of such things; day by day passes and +you see nothing but the ocean—not even a distant sail, or the smoke of a +passing steamer. + +People complain of the uneventfulness of life on board a ship. That, +however, is a matter of great thankfulness. A collision or a shipwreck +are exciting, but they are disagreeable, nevertheless. It seems the +homeward voyage is always the pleasantest as far as the sea is concerned, +the wind being more frequently in the west than in any other quarter. +Perhaps that is one reason why the Americans are so ready to cross the +Atlantic. When I left New York, Cook’s office, in the Broadway, was full +of tourists, including Mrs. Langtry and other distinguished personages. +Mr. John Cook seems as popular in New York as he is elsewhere. Indeed, I +was confidentially informed that he was engaged in organizing a +personally-conducted tour for the relief of Gordon and the capture of the +Mahdi, and I hear from Egypt that he has a chance of being made Khedive, +a position which I am certain he would fill with credit to himself and +advantage to the people. Of course, there is a little exaggeration in +this, but the American tourist has good reason to revere the name of +Cook, and so have we all. As much as anyone he has promoted travel +between the Old World and the New, and has made us better friends. It is +to be hoped that every steamer that crosses the Atlantic does something +similar. + +I must own, however, that the nearer I approached England the more I felt +ashamed of my native land. The weather was villainous. It rained every +day, and the worst of it was, I had had the audacity to assure the +Americans on board that we had dry weather in England, that occasionally +we saw the sun, and that we were not a web-footed race. Fortunately, at +the time of writing this I have not yet encountered any of my American +friends, or I should feel, as they say, uncommonly mean. However, the +weather was fine enough to admit of a good look at Bishop’s Rock, the +name of the lighthouse at the Scilly Isles, where we got our first sight +of land; you can imagine how we all rushed on deck to see that. In fine +weather, I say, by all means return from America in one of the fine, +steady, well-built ships of the Monarch Line. The scenery is far finer +than that offered by Queenstown and Liverpool. You have the Scilly Isles +to look at, and the Land’s End, and the Lizards. At Portland Bill we +laid off till a pilot came on board, and we had a good look at the +establishment where so many smart men are sent for a season, and Weymouth +heading the distant bay; and then what a fine sweep you have up the +Channel—crowded with craft of all kinds, from the eight thousand ton +steamer to the frail and awkward fishing lugger—and round the Nore; +whilst old towns and castles, speaking not alone of the living present, +but of the dead and buried past, are to be seen. Even Americans, fond as +they are of modern life, feel the charm of that; whilst to the returning +traveller the landscape speaks of ‘home, sweet home.’ + + + + +CHAPTER XII. + + +COLONIZATION IN CANADA. + +I was glad to see, the other day, Mr. Morley’s letter advocating the +propriety of taking up land and settling on it some of the too numerous +class who drift into our great cities, finding no work to do in the +country, there to lead indifferent lives and come to an untimely end. + +It is a step I have repeatedly advocated. Land is cheap enough now; +there is no occasion to wait for an Act of Parliament. It is as easy to +buy an estate, and to split it up into small portions, of which each +shareholder will become in time the proprietor, as to form a building +society, and thus enable any man to become his own landlord. But there +are certain drawbacks. There is the parson to be dealt with, who will be +sure to claim his higher tithes; there are burdens on property, of which +the working man, who is told by Mr. Chamberlain that he is more heavily +taxed than any other class of the community (is not the reverse of this +the case?), has no idea; and last, and not least, there is the unfitness +for peasant proprietorship of the average English workman, who has no +idea of living on the scant fare of the peasant proprietor of Belgium or +France, or, I fear, of working as hard. Granting, however, that he does, +the great fact remains, that peasant proprietorship is no remedy for all +the ills of life, and that France has its surplus population quite as +badly off, and a great deal more difficult to deal with than our own. + +What is to be done to relieve the distress, the existence of which all +must own and deplore? I answer, Emigrate. + +Emigration is the natural means of relieving the poverty of a nation. +Every man is an emigrant. No one lives and dies in the village in which +he was born. He finds his way to the neighbouring town in search of +work; then to the great metropolis; then across the water to one or other +of our colonies. + +Greece and Rome realized the fact that under no conditions could a +certain tract of territory maintain more than a certain number of people, +and had their settled plans of emigration. In England, at any rate since +the days of the Pilgrim Fathers, we have too much left the matter to +chance, and an ordinary emigrant, with the ordinary want of backbone, it +seems to me, is just as likely to go to the dogs in New York, or Toronto, +or Melbourne, as in London. What we want is what is now being attempted +by the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, the leading members of +which have established a Church Colonization Land Society. Its object is +to assist, in a practicable, businesslike manner, on a remunerative +basis, the great and pressing work of emigration to the British colonies +in connection with the Church of England. + +This society, I learn from a proof of a circular just placed in my hands, +issued by Canon Prothero, the chairman, will, under proper safeguards, +render temporary pecuniary aid in such cases as approve themselves to the +council, take charge of the emigrants on the journey to the colony, +provide for their settlement on lands selected, from those acquired by +the society, provide temporary dwellings until the emigrants can put +together their own (the materials for which may be bought ready to hand, +or the society itself can erect dwellings for them), will break up the +land if desired, and secure for the emigrant religious services similar +to those enjoyed at home. + +The society have secured land in Manitoba, near the railway, which land +has been selected by a practical farmer, a Yorkshireman, who is to act as +local manager. The Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge have laid +particular stress in looking after the spiritual welfare of emigrants in +all our colonies; and in Liverpool, as some of my readers may be aware, +the society have placed the Rev. J. Bridger, of St. Nicholas Church, as +emigrants’ chaplain; chaplains have also been appointed at several other +ports, such as Plymouth, Glasgow, Cork, and Londonderry; but, as is +manifest, the great centre of emigration is Liverpool, and there Mr. +Bridger finds his hands full. + +No pains are spared to show every attention to emigrants going from or +arriving at Liverpool, and occasionally Mr. Bridger sails with the first +party of emigrants to their new homes. It seems to me that the idea of +the Church Colonization Society is the right one; but that it might be +further extended by sending out at the same time the schoolmaster, and +the doctor, and the storekeeper, and the shoemaker, and tailor, and +baker, and butcher, and thus forming a village community. + +It is at home impossible to realize the solitariness of the settler’s +life, far away from friends and the civilizing and elevating influences +of home. I met men in the North-West who seemed to have almost lost the +power of speech, so long had they been left on their homesteads alone. +Emigration in communities would do away with this state of things. At +present it is a serious sacrifice for a man with a family to emigrate +into a new country. It is not good for man to be alone. As a rule, he +degenerates on the prairie; civilization is the gift of towns to +humanity. A man does not live on bread alone. He needs that his heart +and head be stimulated by contact with his fellow-men; not, as in the old +country, in consequence of the extensive competition, by rivalry for the +crust of bread, but by mutual aid and companionship in the great work of +subduing the wilderness and making it to rejoice and blossom as the rose. + +In a month or two the emigration season will have commenced, and there is +no time to spare. Why cannot other denominations do what the Church of +England is now preparing to do? Canada can feed and fatten millions, who +in England will have to live as a burden on the community. There is many +a man who does ill here who would do well there. We are all more or less +the creatures of circumstances. In England the beershop has degraded the +community, and many a man finds it hard to get away from its foul +companionship: here, he declines into a criminal or a sot; there, not +only will he be neither the one nor the other, but he will develop all +the better tendencies of his character, and become a man. Make him a +peasant-proprietor at home, and the chances are the old Adam in him will +be too strong. Plant him in a colony, he feels in a new world, with a +new aim. Here, he is looked down on: there, he is hailed as a man and a +brother. We who are old must stop at home; but there is no reason why +our sons should do so. Why should a young man be a drudge because his +father was a mere hewer of wood and drawer of water, when in a colony +there are many ways of becoming well-off to a man who has good muscles +and brains, has the sense to avail himself of opportunity when it occurs, +and to keep his money in his pocket? I say Canada, because Canada is +easy to get at, and is yet almost in a virgin state. It is only recently +that it has been opened up by the Canadian Government and the Canadian +Pacific Railway. I say Canada, because Canada is English, and I am an +Englishman; because the Canadian Government does all it can to help the +emigrant; and because the Canadians are mostly healthy, honest men. +Englishmen thrive there better, at any rate, than they do in the United +States, or in South Africa. Arrangements for a colony can easily be +made. In London, the Canadian Pacific Railway have a fine office in +Cannon Street, where you can see for yourself what are the results of +farming in the North-West, and where you will find its courteous and +intelligent representative, Mr. Alexander Begg, whose only fault is that +he will persist in maintaining that the English climate is killing him, +and that he enjoys much better health in that frosty Canada, the cold of +which is a bugbear that has kept too many away. Go to him, and he will +tell you where to plant your colony. The money which is now squandered +in keeping paupers at home surely might be better spent in forming +village communities in the boundless plains of the North-West. Let +Dissenters imitate the Church. Let them have their communities as the +Church of England seek to have theirs. Some people say the Salvationists +are a nuisance in our crowded cities: let General Booth betake himself to +Manitoba; he will find few people to complain of his processions there. + +But this is no subject to trifle about; day by day the poor are becoming +poorer, and the middle-classes and the rich also. The leaders of the +coming democracy seem unwilling to recognise that fact, and are angry +when I tell them it is better to emigrate than to agitate in the old +country for the ruin of the capitalist, the destruction of our trade, the +abolition of the landlord, the advent of the working man’s candidate, and +the rights of man. Are they the friends of the poor who bid him stay +where he is to cheapen the labour market, already overstocked; to crowd +the cities with an unwholesome pauperism; to see his sons ripen into +thieves, and his daughters cast on the streets; and to look forward to +the workhouse as the refuge of his old age? Even if we had a revolution +as complete as that of France, what then? Over-population will breed +sorrow and sickness and want and despair all the same. In Canada, the +man who cares to work is sure of his reward; he has a future before him +and his. + +I am glad to find, since the above was written, there has been formed by +the Congregational Union a special emigration scheme, of which the Rev. +Andrew Mearns, of the Memorial Hall, Farringdon Street, is Secretary, and +that they have already sent out over a hundred qualified emigrants. The +outfit and passage money of each man costs £7, and it is proposed to give +each £2 when he arrives in Canada. The men to be selected are drawn from +the ranks of the unemployed who are brought together at the various +Mission Halls. The case of each applicant is fully examined, and the men +themselves are thoroughly tested as to their honest desire and ability to +work. The men having been approved and their record found satisfactory, +they are sent to the emigration agent of the colony, who also examines +into the cases of the various applicants. This acceptance having been +notified, the next and, perhaps, the greatest difficulty is to provide a +temporary home for them in the colony to which they are to be sent. As +the result of much labour, each man will be sent to the care of some +gentleman in the colony, who will see that he is properly provided for, +and started in a fair way to obtain work. They are thus going to various +towns in the Dominion, such as Kingston, Ontario, Ottawa, Hamilton, +London, Toronto, St. Thomas’s, Bellville, and Guelph. Among those to +whom introduction has been given are directors of railways, officers of +Christian Associations, gardeners, farmers, merchants, and various +ministers of influence. It is almost unnecessary to add that the +spiritual needs of the men have not been forgotten, and in the kit of +each one have been packed a Bible, supplied by the kindness of the Bible +Society—who have intimated their willingness to make a similar +presentation to every man the Union sends out—and an assortment of +suitable and practical religious literature. + +Thus far have I told the story of my Canadian experiences. Those who +wish to fully pursue the subject will do well to get ‘Picturesque +Canada,’ now being published by Messrs. Cassell and Co. + + * * * * * + + THE END. + + * * * * * + + BILLING AND SONS, PRINTERS, GUILDFORD, SURREY. + + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PICTURES OF CANADIAN LIFE*** + + +******* This file should be named 38858-0.txt or 38858-0.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/3/8/8/5/38858 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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