The Canadian Commonwealth | Page 5

and Montreal with Halifax, and
Ottawa with Detroit, and the Great Lakes with the sea. The story is too
long to be related in detail, but on canals alone Canada has spent a
hundred millions. Including stocks, bonds, funded debt and 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