The Canadian Commonwealth | Page 5

debenture stock, the Dominion railways have a capital of $1,369,992,574; and the country that had not a foot of railroads, when the patriots fought the Family Compact, to-day possesses twenty-nine thousand miles of trackage,[2] three transcontinental systems of railroads and threescore lines touching the boundary.[3] Five times more tonnage passes through the Canadian Soo Canal than is expected for Panama or has passed through Suez; but consider the burden of this development on a people whose farmers were scarcely clearing one hundred dollars a year. It is putting it mildly to say that during these dark days property depreciated two-thirds in value. Land companies that had loaned up to two-thirds the value of farm property found themselves saddled with farms which could not be sold for half they had advanced on the loan.
Three times within the memory of the living generation Canadian delegates sought trade concessions in Washington; and three times they came back rebuffed, with but a grimmer determination to work out Canada's own destiny. Is it any wonder, when the fourth time came and Canada was offered reciprocity that she voted it down?
During the twenty dark years Canada lost to the United States one-fourth her native population.[4] During the last ten years she has drawn back to her home acres not only many of her expatriated native born but almost two million Americans. In ten years her population has almost doubled. Uncle Sam has boasted his four billion yearly foreign trade from Atlantic ports. Canada with a population only one-twelfth Uncle Sam's to-day has a foreign trade of almost a billion.
V
Take another look at Canada's area! All of Germany and Austria spread over Eastern Canada would still leave an area uncovered in the East bigger than the German Empire. England spread out flat would just cover the maritime provinces. Quebec stands a third bigger than Germany, Ontario a third bigger than France; and you still have a western world as large again as the East. Spread the British Isles flat, they would barely cover Manitoba. France and Germany would not equal Saskatchewan and Alberta; and two Germanies would not cover British Columbia--leaving undefined Yukon and MacKenzie River and Peace River and the hinterland of Hudson Bay, an area equal to European Russia. If areas in Canada had the same population as areas in Europe, the Dominion would be supporting four hundred million people.
It would be assuming too much stoicism to say that Canadians are not conscious of a great destiny. For years they stuck so closely to their nation-building that they had no time to stand back and view the size of the edifice of their own structure, but all that is different to-day. When four hundred thousand people a year flock to the Dominion to cast in their lot with Canadians, there is testimony of worth. Canadians know their destiny is upon them, whatever it may be; and they are meeting the challenge half-way with faces to the front. In the words of Sir Wilfred Laurier, they know that "the Twentieth Century is Canada's." What will they do with it? What are their aims and desires as a people? Will the same ideals light the path to the fore as have illumined the long hard way in the past? Will Canada absorb into her national life the people who are coming to her, or will they absorb her?
[1] Canada's area is 3,750,000 square miles. The area of Europe is 3,797,410 square miles.
[2] Canada's railway mileage at the end of 1913 was 29,303.53. The land grants to Canadian railroads, Dominion and provincial, stand 55,256,429 acres. Cash subsidies to railroads in Canada up to June 30, 1913, stand thus: from the Dominion, $163,251,469.42; from the provinces, $36,500,015.16; from the municipalities, $18,078,673.60.
[3] The tonnage through both Canadian and U. S. canals at the "Soo" in 1913 was 72,472,676, of which 39,664,874 went through the Canadian canal.
[4] The U. S. Census reports place the number of Canadians in the United States at one and a quarter million; but this is obviously far below the mark. Canada's loss of people shows that. For instance, from 1898 to 1908, Canada was receiving immigrants at a rate exceeding 200,000 a year, yet the census for this decade showed a gain of only a million. It was not till 1914 her census showed a gain of two million for ten years. Her immigrants either went back or drifted over the line. Port figures show that few went back to Europe.
CHAPTER II
FOUNDATION FOR HOPE
I
Canada at the opening of the twentieth century has the same population as the United States at the opening of the nineteenth century.[1] Has the Dominion any material justification for her high hopes of a world destiny? Switzerland possesses national consciousness to an acute degree. Yet Switzerland remains a little people. What ground