MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
Books by S. Macnaughtan 
 
 SELAH HARRISON. 
 
 THE FORTUNE OF CHRISTINA McNAB. 
 
 THE GIFT. 
 
 A LAME DOG'S DIARY. 
 
 THE EXPENSIVE MISS DU CANE. 
 
 THREE MISS GRAEMES. 
 
 US FOUR. 
 
 THE ANDERSONS. 
 
 PETER AND JANE. 
 
 FOUR CHIMNEYS. 
 
 SNOW UPON THE DESERT. 
 
 A GREEN ENGLISHMAN. 
 
 THEY WHO QUESTION. 
 
 SOME ELDERLY PEOPLE AND THEIR 
 YOUNG FRIENDS. 
 
 A WOMAN'S DIARY OF THE WAR. 
 
 MY WAR EXPERIENCES IN TWO CON- 
 TINENTS. 
 
• ■ 
 • ••*«• t » r f't 
 
 t e « € t 
 
MY CANADIAN 
 MEMORIES 
 
 BY 
 
 S. MACNAUGHTAN 
 
 AUTHOR OF 
 A LAME DOG'S DIARY, 
 
 THE EXPENSIVE MISS DO CANE, 
 ETC., ETC. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 CHAPMAN AND HALL, LTD. 
 
 1920 
 
**« 
 
 
 •''.:^-iv: : .;.v.:'; 
 
 * 
 
PREFACE 
 
 MISS MACNAUGHTAN had visited 
 Canada just before the Great War, and 
 was busily engaged upon writing her 
 experiences in the new country, which had im- 
 pressed her so much, when the cataclysm of the war 
 burst upon Europe. She at once volunteered for 
 service, though she was not young and was far 
 from strong. With the heroic little band of English 
 nurses at Antwerp, and in the battered corner of 
 Belgium which continued to hold out against the 
 Germans, she laboured devotedly till June, 1915, 
 when she came home to lecture on the war to the 
 munition workers. In October of that year she left 
 for Russia with an ambulance party, her keen 
 sympathy having been aroused by the news that 
 the Russian wounded were getting no nurses. The 
 little unit got as far as Persia, where Miss Mac- 
 naughtan was taken seriously ill. She struggled 
 back, how no one ever really knew, all the long way 
 from Teheran to her own home in Norfolk Street, 
 where she lingered through some summer days, till 
 she passed away on July 24, 19 16. 
 
 I had had the privilege of knowing Miss Mac- 
 naughtan intimately, and when the unfinished book 
 was found among her MSS., I was asked to edit it, 
 having previously written a short history of Canada 
 and being interested in everything Canadian. The 
 work is substantially as the author left it, for it was 
 
 5010 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 thought better to leave things somewhat unfinished 
 rather than spoil the atmosphere of the book. 
 Miss Macnaughtan always put her own stamp upon 
 her writing, investing it with her own personality 
 in a very marked degree. She had evidently in- 
 tended to have written other chapters, notably one 
 on the emigrants, but the notes were too frag- 
 mentary to be used. It is hoped that this book, 
 the outcome of a much-enjoyed visit to Canada, 
 will stimulate the same enthusiastic love for one of 
 Great Britain's daughter nations, with which the 
 author was inspired. 
 
 BEATRICE HOME. 
 
 London, 1920. 
 
 V* 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 
 Preface 
 
 PAGE 
 
 V 
 
 CHAPTER 
 I. 
 
 On Board the C.P.R 
 
 I 
 
 II. 
 
 From Toronto to Montreal 
 
 25 
 
 III. 
 
 Concerning Quebec .... 
 
 . 40 
 
 IV. 
 
 Story of the C.P.R 
 
 57 
 
 V. 
 
 Lord Strathcona : A Sketch 
 
 80 
 
 VI. 
 
 Sir William van Horne . 
 
 96 
 
 VII. 
 
 Story of the Canadian Northern 
 
 116 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Sir William Mackenzie . 
 
 125 
 
 IX. 
 
 Sir Donald Mann 
 
 136 
 
 X. 
 
 
 152 
 
 XI. 
 
 Shipping 
 
 174 
 
 XII. 
 
 Reciprocity 
 
 195 
 
 XIII. 
 
 The Royal North- West Mounted Police 
 
 215 
 
 Vll 
 
3\dy Canadian {Memories 
 
 Chapter I On Board the C.P.R. 
 
 WHEN Lord Strathcona went to Canada 
 in the year 1838 he sailed in a clipper 
 ship of eight hundred tons, and the 
 voyage occupied fifty days. In 191 3 he made the 
 same voyage, spent three days in Canada, and 
 returned to England, the whole expedition having 
 occupied fifteen days. 
 
 We know the futility of gaping with astonishment 
 at figures such as these, but it would not be difficult 
 to show that our astonishment is largely due to the 
 fact that we are hardly able to grasp intelligently 
 and all at once the story of Canada's progress and 
 the rapidity of its development, and our amazement 
 increases when we realise that this land of broad 
 rivers and streams, with its latent wealth, its beautiful 
 scenery and its rich soil, remained so long practically 
 undiscovered. 
 
 The whole of the earliest history of the country 
 might almost be described as that of animals with 
 hairy covering being sought and killed by those who 
 have none. Fur was the word round which all 
 trades circled ; fur was the coin of the country ; 
 fur was the cause of many disputes. For the fur 
 trade Indians fought, and for the fur trade and all 
 that it meant men died. Fur came at last to have a 
 
 B 
 
V : • 
 
 MY -CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 political meaning, and fur became another name for 
 wealth. The herds of wild buffalo, meek-eyed and 
 immense, the shy, wild animals that peeped from 
 under the snow, and those who protect themselves 
 by faultless mimicry of their surroundings, were 
 hunted and tracked and speared by the early inhabi- 
 tants of Canadian soil, and were ultimately exter- 
 minated by them. There existed a perpetual 
 struggle between the fur covered population and the 
 hunter who went in need of covering. Both hunter 
 and hunted learnt something in those days, and the 
 race was to the swift, the keen-eyed and the patient. 
 No animal moved so stealthily but found that the 
 Indian moved more stealthily still. Physical endur- 
 ance was strong, and man, trained to hardihood, 
 not only in the chase but by voluntarily endured 
 torture, became fleet of foot, keen-eyed and ready. 
 
 When he began to exchange his skins for some- 
 thing else that he wanted it was necessary to develop 
 a new sort of intelligence. The trader had come, 
 with his gay-coloured cotton handkerchiefs and his 
 beads, and the Indians wanted beads and handker- 
 chiefs — wanted them badly, as did also his squaws, 
 and he was willing to give all that he had for them — 
 namely, his furs. 
 
 The barter thus begun has led by steps quite 
 easy to trace to the complicated system of national 
 economics which exists in Canada at the present 
 day. Lives have been ungrudgingly spent in its 
 development, battles have been fought for it, men 
 have given their lives to the study of it. 
 
 And at the back of it all is the primary instinct, 
 so often forgotten, of sheer love of sport. When the 
 hunter tracks his game it is not for mere love of 
 killing, but from an ineradicable instinct of competi- 
 tion. It is one man's sight opposed to another's ; 
 
ON BOARD THE C.P.R. 
 
 sharp hearing pitted against sharp ears, and fleet- 
 ness of foot measured relentlessly against another's 
 speed. In trading, the goal itself is often forgotten 
 in the enjoyment of the exercise involved in " get- 
 ting there," and in the keenness which develops in 
 every living thing that enters on a race. This fact 
 is often ignored by those who have dubbed the 
 British a nation of shopkeepers, but it is one of the 
 things that cannot be too strongly insisted upon 
 when we come to study the lives of those who, in 
 making a country, have made their own fortunes 
 too. The men who have made the greatest success 
 are often those who have but little regard for 
 money, and very few personal tastes which they 
 wish to gratify. And when it is urged, as is some- 
 times the case, that Canada is becoming American- 
 ised, and wholly given to the acquirement of material 
 advantages, it is well to remember that money- 
 getting does not always mean greed, and that there is 
 often a very heroic element about its attainment. 
 It has been said that money is the supreme test of 
 a man's character, and there is a good deal of truth 
 in the statement. Gold is not all dross, but fre- 
 quently has the king's image very plainly stamped 
 upon it. 
 
 But for trade, it would be very doubtful whether 
 one half of the world would ever have been dis- 
 covered by the other half, and there is much honour 
 due to the men who, in the face of personal danger 
 and personal sacrifices, pushed out far. 
 
 The story of commercial enterprise, with which 
 these pages are mostly concerned, will show, we 
 believe, not only the attainments which have been 
 brought about by acumen and intelligence, but 
 that other side of it so often overlooked, which 
 involves a character. It is notorious that it is the 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 men who have been able to touch money without 
 soiling their hands who have made the most steady 
 success in financial life. More than this, there are 
 qualities which alone can make financial success 
 possible, and, whatever a man may come to in after 
 life, there are few amongst those who have succeeded 
 who cannot look back upon a boyhood of strenuous 
 industry, youthful intelligence, punctuality and re- 
 source. These qualities are worth having, whether 
 the business does or does not succeed ; they will 
 carry a man far, and we who believe that no force 
 is wasted, have a comfortable sense of security that 
 initiative, patience, courage and enterprise will find 
 their goal some day, and that such qualities make 
 good men, and sometimes successful men — which 
 is a secondary consideration. 
 
 It is characteristic of Canada that she is pro- 
 ducing men of this stamp, and endowed with these 
 qualities . Possibly what some persons have forgotten 
 is that the development of the country requires not 
 only endurance but continuity of enterprise. As 
 we have begun in Canada so we must go on.| It is 
 no use stopping half-way. 
 
 Nansen, when he sailed for the North, had only 
 one purpose in view. To sail into the fog and freeze 
 in. It was a waiting game, and we know what the 
 results were. In Canada the simile would have to 
 be altered, and a more suitable one, both to the 
 country and to the people, might be found in the 
 analogy of shooting the rapids. Those who have 
 seen canoes racing through brawling waters, through 
 waves crested with foam, may have held their 
 breath both at the rapidity of the transit and the 
 splendid daring involved in it. There are only 
 two things that an onlooker is quite sure of ; one is 
 that there is no possibility of pausing or of turning 
 
 o 
 
ON BOARD THE C.P.R. 
 
 back, and the other is that the craft will arrive 
 safely. 
 
 It is absurd to talk of taking in sail — the boat has 
 to go on. 
 
 No one who has not been in Canada can guess at 
 its opportunities or have a just appreciation of its 
 hardly touched wealth. No one who knows any- 
 thing about this can have any doubts about the 
 future of Canada. Its record in the past justifies 
 that belief. 
 
 In 1903 the quantity of grain produced in the 
 country was 293 million bushels. In 19 14 the pro- 
 duction of grain was no less than 672 millions. In 
 1903 the value of exports was 225 million dollars, 
 while ten years later they had mounted to 425 
 million dollars. The mineral productions showed 
 the same increase in figures, and will probably go 
 on increasing very rapidly ; their developments 
 between the years 1901 to 191 2 show an increase of 
 68 million dollars. The machinery which has been 
 bought at so great expense will only now be able to 
 put forth its whole possible output. 
 
 The greatest machines in the world are its railways, 
 and foremost in the list of stories of enterprise and 
 resolve stands the great railway system of Canada. 
 
 Long ago it was said of this country that it was 
 to be a country of railways, and the saying is as true 
 to-day as it was then. We remember once standing 
 in the office of a great business house in Toronto, 
 and asking for permission to look at a map of 
 Canada. To us was pointed out a large white sheet 
 of paper with some irregular lines traced in red ink 
 across it. 
 
 Somewhat bewildered, we ventured to suggest that 
 what we required was a map of Canada, not merely 
 a blank space with some lines running across it. 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 To which the answer came : * That's Canada ! 
 Just a blank space with some lines running across 
 it." 
 
 These lines have grown in the very short period 
 of twelve years from 19,000 miles to 36,000 miles. 
 And in this period the total amount of capital spent 
 upon new lines and upon improving old ones has 
 reached the sum of £200,000,000 sterling. Their 
 effect upon the development of the country has been 
 extraordinary. The welfare of the country, almost 
 its discovery, has centred in them, and in the case 
 of one of them at least its history reads almost like 
 a personal narrative. It is impossible to dissociate 
 the name of the Canadian Pacific Railway from a 
 sense of something vital in its existence. It is not 
 merely a line of rails, but like some work of art it 
 shows the handiwork of those who made it, so that, 
 however many years have passed, there is always a 
 sense of living in the thing created. 
 
 Even a traveller (whose comments upon any coun- 
 try, it is noteworthy to observe once more, are not 
 of much consideration) may, as he stands on the 
 platform of a railway station on some autumn 
 morning, catch something of that sense of romance, 
 almost of poetry, which is conjured up at sight of 
 the great pioneer of Canada's roadway from ocean 
 to ocean. The song of engines and of steam, of 
 roaring factories and the harnessing of Nature's 
 forces has hardly been breathed yet. But the 
 rhythm of mechanical movement may yet prove to 
 be full of music, and the glint of burnished steel in 
 engine or machine may move us to admire not only 
 its strength but its grace. 
 
 The air is cool and crisp on the autumn morning, 
 and the maple trees are red. Overhead the sky is 
 blue, and there is a sense abroad of something 
 
 6 
 
ON BOARD THE C.P.R, 
 
 vigorous and strength-compelling in the air. Every 
 field and every river suggests abundance, and one is 
 reminded of those persons who, when they have 
 discovered some attractive spot in the world, say in 
 a whisper : " Don't tell anybody about it, or it will 
 get spoiled. " In Canada, however, there is room 
 for everybody. And the traveller, half moved to 
 envy, is inclined to ascribe to atmosphere the vitality 
 of a new nation, and to feel that, with clear skies 
 overhead, and a touch of early morning frost 
 melting in the bright sunshine, physical energy 
 might be an easily acquired thing, and life itself 
 prove to be not too strenuous. 
 
 Youthful Canada has grown up with the Canadian 
 Pacific Railway and is accustomed to it. Only the 
 stranger standing on the platform in the crisp early 
 air of autumn dares to inflict his comments upon it. 
 
 Almost like a well-directed stage entrance the 
 voice of a bell declares that the train is arriving and 
 the engine comes round a great curve in the clearing 
 of a forest, a brass bell like a toothless monster 
 rollicking at its head. The train has travelled far 
 since the great engines took in their first supply of 
 water at Vancouver. The lake was misty and 
 shrouded that morning, but the mountain had a 
 gleam of sunlight on it like a crown. Black pine 
 trees, the remnants of a once glorious army, stood 
 erect at its base, or seemed like marching soldiers 
 still to be climbing the mountain side. The army 
 was cut down very ruthlessly once, or burned to 
 make a clearing for a new town, and the black 
 fir trees that remain stand regretfully at the moun- 
 tain's base. 
 
 But Canada has little time for regret, and none at 
 all for resignation. " If a thing is wrong I am 
 going to put it right," it says, with the strong voice 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 of youth : " if a thing is done and it is wrong I am 
 going to do it over again." 
 
 There is plenty of time, plenty of opportunity. 
 The country is a new one and it is a vigorous and 
 a joyous thing. 
 
 The train leaves behind it white banners of 
 farewell in a long cloud of silver steam as it swings 
 out of the mist which wraps the lake and into the 
 sunshine again, and through the large rich land that 
 lies between Vancouver and the mountains. And 
 ever as it journeys on the sleepless train is travelling 
 through the land of romance. Dawn finds it amongst 
 the snows, and where Rogers found his famous 
 pass, and Donald Mann, riding into the virgin 
 beauty of the heart of the mountains, exclaimed : 
 " Civilisation is murder," it thunders on with the 
 great brass bell at its head waking a thousand 
 echoes. 
 
 " There is a path which no fowl knoweth and 
 which the vulture's eye hath not seen." But here 
 in the Rocky Mountains we seem to be in the very 
 secret of the fastnesses of the hills. The inaccessible 
 peaks stand aloof from us, radiant as truth itself 
 and almost as serene, and the thundering gorges 
 seem to roar back defiance at the bending, circling 
 disturber of their ancient peace. The train laughs 
 at obstacles and shouts defiance at difficulties. The 
 birch trees — delicate white ladies — shiver slightly 
 as it thunders past them, while the slender pines, 
 whose tops are in the skies, seem to regard it disdain- 
 fully. Perhaps at night-time, when the road is 
 silent again, the mountain tops in solemn conclave 
 may give their deep-voiced disapproval to the 
 insolence of man ; meanwhile the stoker heaps 
 fresh fuel on his engine fires, and the train sings on 
 its way a new song which those who have ears to 
 
 8 
 
ON BOARD THE C.P.R. 
 
 hear may hear, and those who have not ears will 
 never hear. 
 
 The train has left the echoing passes now, and 
 has glided into a fertile valley where Indian braves 
 and their squaws lounge peacefully at the railway 
 station, and where the hills that stand sentinel 
 round about bear upon them a tenderer and kinder 
 aspect. Children, fearless of steam and power, 
 come to the doorways of homely wooden shacks 
 and wave their hands in greeting to the giant. 
 Streams babbling under the bridges that span them 
 accept its presence as merrily as the children do, 
 and the worker in pleasant fields hardly turns his 
 head as it passes. 
 
 Towns come out to meet it, throwing their wel- 
 come far and wide, flinging, like a visible token of 
 their prosperity, high towers which send forth 
 their tribute of golden grain, while the train passes 
 through a new civilisation into the great clanging 
 station of a western city. 
 
 It has been a fine run of throbbing engines and 
 hot axles. The engine driver wipes his blackened 
 hands with a wad of cotton waste, and eyes his 
 boilers with a look such as a sailor gives his ship 
 that has made a fast voyage. 
 
 The pause at the western township is made in a 
 vast and echoing station, filled with hurrying 
 troops of men and women, all carrying portable 
 luggage and bags. Outside, the insistent tramway 
 cars travel ceaselessly with a sharp ting of bells, 
 there are sky signs, and great stores blocking the 
 sky. Here also are busy streets with their Pente- 
 costal crowd of English, Germans, Galicians, Rus- 
 sians, and amongst them a sprinkling of Indians, 
 still-faced, and with high cheek bones and long 
 narrow eyes. This is one of the places for which 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 Canadians have only one expression, " It has gone 
 ahead in leaps and bounds," and a drive round the 
 town and its environments provokes such startling 
 figures and advance in prices that it leaves, as it is 
 meant to do, the humbled traveller open-mouthed ! 
 
 This is where only ten years ago a little shack 
 stood, owned by Andrew Maclean, or Jock Campbell, 
 who came out from Scotland with a few pounds in 
 their pockets, and now the new Bank buildings or the 
 Post Office with their handsome stone fronts occupy 
 the spot, and, moreover, had to pay four thousand 
 dollars per foot frontage for it ! This untidy piece 
 of ground, productive only of waste tin cans and 
 rank weeds, is the corner lot which old Brown is 
 holding on to, meaning to get even a higher price 
 than that ; and this store, with its gleaming glass 
 windows, its Paris fashions, its modern furniture 
 and " Beauty Parlours " is the place where not so 
 very long ago a store-keeper sold his goods in a 
 tent and had a pallisade built round it to protect 
 him from the Indians. This is where two soldiers, 
 one of whom is still alive, sent out to survey the 
 land, stuck their two sticks in the ground to mark 
 the spot by a river's bank to which they had come, 
 and Colonel Irvine, turning to his old friend, 
 Colonel Macleod, demanded what they should call 
 the place. 
 
 " We might call it Calgary," he said, " it is the 
 Gaelic for clear running water." 
 
 There are Real Estate offices in every street, and 
 the cry still is " Canada will boom in the long run." 
 If some reverses come no one knows better than she 
 how pluckily to take them. " Go on, the more you 
 give her the more she is going to give you." It 
 is the shout triumphant of a people who have deter- 
 mined that their children shall be well fed and their 
 
 10 
 
ON BOARD THE C.P.R. 
 
 men and women shall be housed in decency and in 
 comfort, and that education shall go forward. 
 
 Even when the cry becomes vain-glorious it has 
 a fine sound about it ! 
 
 The western town is edged with a pretty fringe 
 of white houses having balconies where women sit 
 all day, and pleasant little unfenced gardens giving 
 on to the road ; and there is generally some favourite 
 residential quarter, built on a height (whose price 
 per foot is quoted), and from whence successful 
 merchants can survey the town which has given them 
 wealth. Half the fabulous stories of quick fortune- 
 making belong to the inhabitants of these houses 
 with their pleasant balconies. One man, we hear, 
 bought a swamp for a few dollars and drained it, 
 and now a street of houses stands there. Another 
 bought an old race-course which no one wanted 
 and turned it to good account, and young Smith, 
 the fool of the family, who was sent out from England, 
 happed upon a few fields which is now a town 
 centre — and Smith, mind you, was a fellow who 
 could not add two and two together. Fortunes, 
 they would like you to believe, are forced upon 
 people in Canada ! 
 
 The sadder side of the stories takes the wail of 
 " What might have been," and is generally voiced 
 in such words as, " If I had had the capital in 18 — 
 
 I " Sites once inglorious and now measured 
 
 out by inches are pointed out, and it is not possible 
 to escape the story of the man who was offered the 
 land where the modern city of Chicago now stands 
 for a pair of old boots. Sufficient pause is given for 
 the traveller's obvious rejoinder, and the story 
 ends with the man's reply, " No, I did not buy it, 
 for I had not a pair of old boots." 
 
 The lack of the pair of old boots at a critical 
 
 II 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 moment still rankles in the minds of many rich men, 
 who, nevertheless, take pleasure in the thought of 
 how much richer they might have been. 
 
 A millionaire once remarked in the presence of 
 the traveller that he never liked keeping trains 
 waiting. The traveller, being a humble individual 
 for whom trains are not likely to wait, now proposes 
 continuing his journey. There is a fresh engine, 
 and the black porter is making up beds for the night 
 in a long corridor, where behind green curtains 
 travellers roast like St. Laurence on his grid, and 
 the thick air echoes with snores. The romance of 
 Western railway travelling does not lie in its 
 corridor system combined with the exigencies of a 
 common toilet, which once experienced, is not as a 
 rule attempted a second time. The traveller stepping 
 over bare feet thrust into the passage way and hearing 
 various noisy slumbers, is reminded of the story in 
 which one more than usually offensive passenger 
 paused for a moment in his noisy sleep, and in the 
 silence which followed a voice in thankful piety 
 was heard to murmur, " Thank God, he's dead." 
 
 Morning finds the train, like some racer, settling 
 down into its stride over a* long stretch of level 
 plain. The beauty of yellow grain with the wind 
 rippling across it and the blue sky overhead brings 
 with it almost a sense of laughter so imminent is the 
 joy of it. The boundlessness of the plains, with 
 their ripening harvest, conveys a sense of plenty 
 which not all the gold of the world can give. Fatu- 
 ously the traveller asks, " Is it possible that everyone 
 in the world has not enough to eat ? " Rippling 
 wheat in ever-widening circles from the train covers 
 the land which" lies like the sea with the sunshine full 
 upon it. The beat of the railway engines with their 
 tireless punctuation produces in the mind something 
 
 12 
 
ON BOARD THE C.P.R. 
 
 trance-like and dreamy. The sense of pleasure is 
 still abroad, but with it has come a strange sense of 
 unreality. After hours of journeying the landscape 
 is still the same, and after a night of sleep we are 
 still travelling through wheat. The wind stirs their 
 feathery heads gently, and from a shallow lagoon 
 by the side of the railway a flight of duck gets up, 
 snowing like a long necklace of black dots against the 
 sky. That was before we went to lunch, and after 
 lunch there is again a still pool by the side of the 
 railway and a dotted line of duck across the sky, and 
 miles of feathered wheat with the wind blowing 
 gently across it. 
 
 This is the harvest field of Canada, and it is 
 worth going far to see. No view of it seems to be 
 big enough ; one wants to " drink all the sea," 
 and a glimpse from a railway carriage window of the 
 yellow prairie, whose utmost edge meets the sky, is 
 like dipping a cup into the ocean. 
 
 The observation car is full of babies, those in- 
 variable accompaniments of travelling in the West, 
 where nurseries and nurses are but little known, but 
 outside on the platform is a group of chairs, where 
 men sit and smoke and quote very high figures. 
 Here, too, is a little group who, upon a very slight 
 introduction, have courteously made the traveller 
 one of their own circle. Their very names are 
 unknown as yet, but we find that one of them, a 
 man in a soft grey hat, who looks fifty years of age, 
 but who had already confessed to being nearly 
 eighty, is always addressed as " Old Timer." He 
 never fails to get out at each station where the train 
 stops, and is always known to at least half the men 
 standing about on the platform, who invariably 
 slap him on the back. He seems depressed about 
 Canada. The second in the group is a lady of 
 
 *3 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 delightful manners, a well-bred Englishwoman, 
 who allows us to know that she dresses for dinner 
 every night, even in the wilds, and who (perhaps 
 rightly) associates the practice with empire-making, 
 and a Canadian gentleman, whom mentally we call 
 " Mr. P.," never having got further than that with 
 his name, while envying the talent, possessed to 
 a mysterious degree by Americans and Canadians, 
 of picking up one's name at once and being able to 
 address one correctly at first sight. 
 
 Far away on the horizon, where blue sky and yellow 
 grain meet, we see the roof of a little farmhouse, and 
 wonder who lives there, and whether the woman 
 finds the days very long. Mr. P. tells us that the 
 loneliness of prairie farming is minimised since the 
 installation of the telephone, and that the old trage- 
 dies of long ago, when women died untended, and 
 there was no doctor for the children, are happily 
 for the most part over. 
 
 " Those were the good old days," said the Old 
 Timer, " when men learnt to do without." 
 
 " And when Canada," said a Canadian lady, " was 
 not known as a place where there are all luxuries 
 and no necessities." 
 
 " There were men then," said the Old Timer, 
 " who struggled and failed, and they were followed 
 by men who struggled and succeeded, and now there 
 are the men who fail without a struggle." 
 
 A waiter announces the first call to supper, and 
 the young men, who quote large figures, now stopped 
 smoking for the brief interval which they devote 
 to eating. They sway down the long corridors of 
 the train to order for themselves " individual domes- 
 tic duck " and other quaint items in the menu of 
 the " piebox." Each one seems to know the Old 
 Timer, and is unable to part with him without the 
 
 H 
 
ON BOARD THE C.P.R, 
 
 salutation which by right seems to belong to him. 
 As they leave the car they pat him on the shoulder, 
 and some of them remind him that he is not dead 
 yet. 
 
 " The girls are not equal to their mothers either/ ' 
 the Old Timer goes on. 
 
 " They never are," said Mr. P., laughing. " I 
 guess the blood is the same, but the chances are 
 not equal. They go to school, where they learn a 
 lot of nonsense, and where they have far too much 
 money to spend. And in the holidays there is 
 nothing but spoiling and thinking about dress, where 
 their mothers used to be thinking about cooking 
 and washing." 
 
 " They could cook and wash yet if they were put 
 to it," said the Canadian gentleman. 
 
 11 They have not the physique for it, poor bits 
 of things," said the Old Timer. 
 
 (" His daughters are the best educated women in 
 Canada," said the Canadian lady in an aside.) 
 
 " May I tell you the story of a young English 
 girl I know personally ? " said the Englishwoman, 
 " and who, acting upon the sheer need of doing and 
 being, left a very luxurious home in England, and 
 came out to Canada as a farm help, where she learnt 
 all the drudgery of quite menial tasks. She soon got 
 what is called her chance, and became manageress of 
 the Western Hotel. She began to save her money, 
 and invested it to such good account in various 
 schemes for the development of the country that 
 she has a very comfortable income of her own now, 
 and is married most happily." 
 
 " Now I'll tell you about a Canadian girl," said 
 the Old Timer, " and the story is true." 
 
 " My story is also true," murmured the English- 
 woman. 
 
 *5 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 " There was a neighbour of mine with whom 
 everything had gone crooked for years, and the turn 
 of his luck came with a girl. They were selling 
 everything they could lay hands on at the farm then, 
 and the girl used to take eggs and other bits of things 
 into he nearest town and sell them for what she 
 co uL. get. It was a twelve mile walk, and the land 
 was very much like this that we are passing through 
 now. You bet it was heavy work walking, and the 
 basket was full of eggs. My friend's girl, who had 
 a quick eye as most people have on the prairies, 
 noticed a flight of duck such as we might see to-day. 
 Ya-as ! I do think she was cute. She watched that 
 flight of duck and got a track of their nests. I guess 
 she was cute and it did not take her more than a 
 li'l time to empty her own basket of eggs into the 
 nests and to take every darned egg that she found 
 there. Ya'as, sir, she went right on into that li'l 
 town and sold the ducks' eggs, and in course of time 
 she made tracks again for the lagoon — a pretty 
 place just such as we have seen to-day, and she soon 
 had a splendid brood of chickens hatched out by the 
 ducks. Wa'al — I do believe that that farm is one of 
 the most prosperous to-day that I know of. You 
 will believe me, it is still famous for its chickens." 
 
 " But those girls had a poor time of it," said the 
 Canadian gentleman, " and the girls who are living 
 now don't know what their mothers had to put up 
 with." 
 
 " I don't know about that," said the Old Timer. 
 
 With twilight has come a reminiscent turn to the 
 conversation, and one is reminded that it is always at 
 the end of man's little day that he tells best his old 
 stories. 
 
 " But I will tell you the story of the prettiest girl 
 in Canada. She married a young fellow, and rode 
 
 16 ' 
 
ON BOARD THE C.P.R, 
 
 sixty miles with him into the forest, where they built 
 their new house and set about housekeeping as happy 
 as birds. The young man got typhoid fever before 
 the house was nearly completed, and that young 
 thing, who was only eighteen years old, nursed him 
 day and night, and never could leave* him even to go 
 for a doctor. In the end she dug his grave with her 
 own hands and rode back sixty miles through the 
 forest, and that was all." 
 
 There was a pause for a little while. The Old 
 Timer told his stories with a simplicity and power of 
 expression of which he himself seemed unconscious. 
 In imagination one saw the little widow of eighteen 
 riding back alone through the forest. 
 
 " Girls are made like that," said the Canadian 
 gentleman quietly, " I don't care who they are." 
 
 They say that Canada has too little history, that 
 her rivers have never run with blood, that she has 
 not been shaken by great deeds of violence, that 
 she has never suffered persecution nor known the 
 fires of Smithfield nor the high hung gibbet on 
 Tower Hill. They say that her early struggles 
 against Indians were like border raids of long ago, 
 and that, with the exception of these raids and the 
 long struggle with France, she is unworthy of that 
 place in history which is occupied by nations who 
 have imperilled fortunes and sacrificed their lives 
 for great causes. 
 
 Early pioneers of Canada may have had little but 
 climate to contend with, and it is a truism to observe 
 that strong men are quite capable of roughing it. 
 But, just because the settlement was a peaceful one, 
 there is honour due where it is not always bestowed. 
 It was the women who came out with those early 
 settlers who peacefully conquered Canada, suffered 
 uncomplainingly, and died unsung. 
 
 C 17 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 Sometimes we are reminded of these gentle 
 warriors when we meet to-day the women of Canada, 
 the simplicity of whose lives is matched by the gentle- 
 ness of their tempers, and who may truthfully be 
 called the great ladies of Canada. The inheritance 
 which their mothers and grandmothers won has 
 passed to the sons : their own possessions are not 
 to be measured by acres of soil, but a certain 
 courage is theirs by right of heredity, and a wis- 
 dom which we believe will one day be used for 
 great ends. 
 
 " People wonder,' ' said the Old Timer fiercely, 
 " why Britain spread so far, and what is the secret 
 which she possesses of colonising. Do you know 
 why it is ? Wa'al, it's because with other nations 
 the women wait till its comfortable before they 
 follow the men, but Englishwomen go with them 
 from the start and before it is comfortable. I'm 
 talking of ladies, mind you, who perhaps never did 
 a hand's turn of work in their lives before they left 
 home." 
 
 " I knew Catherine Blake," the Canadian lady 
 said. " She used to tell me that when her first 
 child was born she lay in bed and looked up through 
 the roof, which had great gaps in it, that she saw the 
 stars shining overhead, and with a romantic fancy 
 she believed that one in particular beamed down upon 
 the child, and she thought this a good omen for 
 him. He has gone down to history as Edward 
 Blake, 1 one of Canada's great men." 
 
 " I remember that, too," said her husband, " and 
 the story she used to tell about her longing for 
 fresh meat, till at last one day her husband rode 
 away twenty-six miles for it, and came home with a 
 
 1 Edward Blake was a very eminent lawyer and leader of the 
 Liberal Party in Ontario. 
 
 18 
 
ON BOARD THE C.P.R 
 
 great piece of sheep carcase hung to his saddle, 
 but the wolves got scent of it, and followed him too 
 closely, and at last he had to drop his burden and 
 ride home without it." 
 
 " I sometimes laugh," says a man at the edge of 
 the group — one who has done good work in Canada 
 — " when I hear men talking of an eight hours day. 
 Edward Blake was a man who used to work all day 
 and all night too, and his wife, descending to the 
 library at six o'clock in the morning, used to find 
 him still writing. 
 
 " ■ If I must sleep/ he told her, * I lay my head 
 on my arms for an hour.' " 
 
 The train meanwhile rolls on with the rhythmic 
 beat of its engines ; there are low-lying woods now 
 on either side of the line, and quiet lakes with the 
 evening sun turning them into gold. 
 
 "It is the old trail," says the man of nearly 
 eighty who looks as if he were fifty, and he speaks 
 with a voice of exaggerated hardness, which deceives 
 no one. " I used to pike it long before a railway was 
 dreamed of. First Indians, then missionaries, and 
 mind you, they may say what they like about 
 missionaries, but they were the first good things 
 that Canada had. Ya'as, and life was none too easy 
 for them, nor for the men who came after them. I 
 knew Michael Fawcett, the Methodist. He had an 
 enormous district to visit, and only one horse on 
 which to make his journeys. Wa'al, he sold that 
 horse for £20, and walked for years afterwards, 
 although he was an elderly man, in order to give the 
 money to a Methodist college that was being built. 
 Do you find men like that out here now ? No ; they 
 boast when they can do their jobs with white kid 
 gloves on, and they boast when they don't do a job 
 at all." 
 
 19 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 " Swank,' ' said the Canadian lady, " is the noise 
 a man makes when he knows himself to be an 
 inferior." 
 
 " Their idea of independence is to say * I quit,' 
 and to say it as offensively as possible." 
 
 14 George," said the Canadian gentleman, " you 
 want your dinner." 
 
 His wife suggested that we might go on talking 
 stories, but the train had reached the head of a great 
 lake, and had come to a stop at a town where fortunes 
 are made and where steel plant and wood pulp 
 dominate growing industries. 
 
 " You don't want stories, you want facts," said 
 the Old Timer, " and all those busy young fellows 
 who are taking three little boxes at a time on one 
 little hand truck, their Trade Unionism not allowing 
 them to walk quicker than that lounge with which 
 they are stolling down the quay. What are those 
 onions going to cost the consumer with men paid 
 three dollars a day to do a baby's work ? What is 
 to become of their muscles, anyway ? " 
 
 The traveller remarked tentatively that there 
 certainly seemed no hurry on the part of the dock 
 labourers. 
 
 " The two children of Trade Unionism," said 
 the Old Timer, " are enforced idleness and enforced 
 inefficiency. No one is allowed to excel, and no one 
 is allowed to be industrious. You must be as bad 
 as the worst workman in the gang, and you must 
 dawdle, or else the job won't carry enough hands." 
 
 " Yet Trade Unionism," said the Canadian 
 gentleman, who seems to be well informed, " if 
 we trace it to its origin, was simply the outcome of 
 artisans requiring their fellow-workmen to have 
 certificates to show that they had served their 
 apprenticeship before offering themselves as work- 
 
 20 
 
ON BOARD THE C.P.R 
 
 men. In its earliest days it was simply an organisa- 
 tion to keep out the bad worker." 
 
 " And now it's an organisation to keep out the 
 good workman.' ' 
 
 " There were industrial evils " began the 
 
 Canadian gentleman. 
 
 "Yes," said the Old Timer, "and Trade 
 Unionism was the most unmoral, artificial and 
 dishonest attempt to put things right. Its one cry : 
 * We will be employed, but we won't work.' " 
 
 " People say," said the Englishwoman, " that 
 working women are foolish not to combine and 
 join Trade Unionism ; they are far too wise to do 
 so." 
 
 " They know something of thrift, at least they 
 ought to, for most of them have had a small purse 
 all their lives, and a good deal to do with it ! At any 
 rate they would not tax time and tax energy and 
 build up a tariff wall against their own skilled 
 labourers. Skilled labour ! Skilled labour is going 
 to be taxed out of existence, just as most other 
 things are taxed." 
 
 Some young men returning from dinner, and 
 instantly busying themselves with tobacco, were so 
 evidently impatient to join the argument that it 
 seemed almost like cruelty not to allow them to do 
 so. 
 
 One said : " I am a traveller in hair dye, and I 
 guess there is more of that sold in New York to 
 elderly men than anywhere else in the world. A 
 man of fifty or sixty need hardly seek work. Well, we 
 fake them up to look young, and that is my trade, 
 sir, and a trade of which I may say I am proud." 
 
 " Do all who are weak and all who are old go 
 to the wall|?j" someone asked, to which the young 
 man replied cheerfully, M That's so." 
 
 21 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 " Economic conditions will always show a certain 
 equation," said the Canadian gentleman, " and 
 whether we have a minimum wage or not, the fact 
 remains that a certain justice prevails, we may say 
 automatically, where employment is concerned. 
 A man may demand high wages, but he cannot 
 demand impossible wages." 
 
 " And what sort of service are they going to give 
 for their pay ? " said the Old Timer. " And what 
 sort of men is Trade Unionism going to produce ? 
 Are they to be men leaning on their tools and smoking 
 cigarettes, or are they to be men using their tools 
 in the way a man loves to use them, with energy 
 and with skill ? To limit output is rotten. A man 
 once said to me : * If I am to do my work well I 
 must work at my own speed. Now I can lay twenty 
 per cent more bricks than I am allowed to lay. But 
 I ain't allowed to finish my work and go, I must 
 dawdle ! Well, sir, I can't do my best work when I 
 dawdle, it seems to give me the fidgets.' " 
 
 The purveyor of hair dye said that he believed 
 in the present system, and another young man, also 
 smoking, backed him up warmly. 
 
 " We mean to have high wages and short hours," 
 he said. " We mean to get home at five o'clock 
 in the afternoon." 
 
 " Your poor wives ! " murmured the English- 
 woman. 
 
 " I believe," said the Canadian gentleman, " in 
 a man demanding what wages he likes — that is a 
 matter which will always settle itself." 
 
 " Share and share alike," murmured the Old 
 Timer, " and as much for the man who works the 
 machine as for the man who invented it. Fools 
 always think that the work of brains is easily 
 done." 
 
 22 
 
ON BOARD THE C.P.R. 
 
 " If a man won't give me what I want for turning 
 the handle of a machine,' ' said one of the younger 
 men, " I quit." 
 
 " You don't call a man a working-man unless he 
 turns a handle or heaves muck ! " flashed the Old 
 Timer. 
 
 " I approve of strikes," said a youth who had not 
 yet spoken, " and the mistake we make in Canada 
 is that we are obliged to submit things to arbitration 
 before we strike. In London, England, I was on 
 picket duty for a time ; it was bully ! " 
 
 " Strikes are a pleasant remedy, and like all 
 pleasant remedies you may be sure they are danger- 
 ous." 
 
 " You spoke just now," said the Canadian gentle- 
 man, " of the moral effect on a man of not being 
 allowed to do good work, and I am with you there ; 
 but what of the moral effect on an employer who 
 does not permit himself to give just wages ? " 
 
 " Just wages," said the old man, his eyes blazing, 
 " for good work and a fair day's work." 
 
 " I go further than you all," said the fat young 
 gentleman. " I think that employees should not 
 only state what their wages should be, but who is 
 
 to be employed. Now mark you " he began to 
 
 saw the air with his hands 
 
 " If I make a business," said the Old Timer, " I 
 shall conduct that business. If I make mistakes I 
 shall no doubt suffer for those mistakes, but I 
 shall learn to do better because of them. Nothing 
 was ever learned by interference." 
 
 " I approve of liberty ! " said two young men 
 at once. 
 
 " For yourselves ! And for no one else ! Do you 
 know what liberty means, and do you know what 
 law means ? Liberty means responsibility, and those 
 
 23 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 who talk most glibly about it are least aware of the 
 problems involved in it." 
 
 11 Liberty," said one of the young men, hotly, 
 " is the right of every individual that lives." 
 
 " And law," snapped the old man, " is a direct 
 interference with the rights of individuals. But 
 there never was liberty without law, and that is 
 what youth has still to learn. Fine words do not help 
 a man much, and men may shout Liberty, Equality, 
 and Fraternity until they are hoarse without getting 
 a whit nearer the truth of things . Liberty means law , 
 and independence is only faintly understood, except 
 in communities, and fraternity can be no more 
 imposed upon people than love can be imposed 
 upon them." 
 
 " Everyone," said the Canadian lady, " starts 
 with the idea that liberty means doing as one likes ; 
 it is an extraordinary view of the subject." 
 
 " But more particularly it means doing as badly 
 as he likes," was the quick reply. 
 
 " Whereas of course," went on the lady, " liberty 
 can only mean freedom to do one's best." 
 
 " I guess I'm going to do as I like, and I don't 
 see who's going to prevent me," the fat young 
 man said. 
 
 " No, I don't see who is to prevent it," said the 
 Old Timer quietly. 
 
 " When you come calm, George " said the 
 
 Canadian gentleman 
 
 A waiter in a white coat opened the door and 
 announced the second call for supper. 
 
 It was a well staged entrance, and probably just 
 in time. 
 
 24 
 
Chapter II From Toronto to Montreal 
 
 THE traveller journeys away from Western 
 Canada with a sense of regret at not having 
 discovered why it should be called the 
 " wild and woolly West," but the train rolls on 
 irresistibly carrying him into a new country which, 
 to his surprise, is not even marked by a different 
 colour on the map. Yet the differences are very 
 obvious and full of interest. 
 
 Eastern Canada received its first large influx of 
 British Colonists when the American Loyalists, 
 who had fought under the British flag during the 
 War of Independence, were forced to emigrate 
 to Canada when the Treaty of Versailles in 1783 
 separated the United States from English rule. 
 There are many people who, when they allude to 
 Canada as being a new country and its inhabitants 
 as new people, seem to forget that there are names 
 to-day in the Provinces of Ontario and Quebec 
 which belong to very early ages of English history. 
 These Loyalists were not men of mushroom growth, 
 but could boast a long descent ; they had lived on 
 their own property and had enjoyed stately and 
 luxurious homes. They proved themselves willing 
 to give up everything rather than be disloyal to the 
 mother country, and the traveller, arriving at some 
 of the large and beautiful towns in Eastern Canada 
 to-day, is immediately impressed, not only by their 
 magnificent buildings and by their intellectualism, 
 but by the fact that this is not a country of yesterday. 
 
 25 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 In Montreal there are collections of pictures 
 which would compare favourably with many of 
 those in the villas of Roman nobles of long ago, 
 and which exceed in actual commercial value most 
 of the private collections. Its best hotel compares 
 very favourably with those of London, Paris or 
 New York, and the chief hospital both here and in 
 Toronto are believed to be the finest equipped in 
 the world. In Ottawa the Parliament Buildings 
 and their grand positions above the river are unique, 
 while the schools in these towns and throughout 
 Canada give the traveller much to think about 
 and still more to praise. 
 
 The amazing part of it is that though the country 
 itself is old, its recent developments have been made 
 with such extraordinary rapidity. In England, 
 Charles I began to collect pictures for a National 
 Gallery, and during three hundred years pictures 
 have been slowly collected to adorn its walls. The 
 same monarch was the first to introduce the Italian 
 Opera into this country, and the old house still 
 stands on Chelsea Embankment where the first 
 performance was given, and where amongst the 
 audience was the king's favourite, Nell Gwynn. In 
 Canada it is decided to-day that there is to be a 
 National Gallery and to-morrow the pictures arrive. 
 No want is long felt " — what Canada wants 
 she gets quickly. Two years ago she required 
 Italian Opera, and probably she cabled to Italy 
 for singers and players. A University springs up 
 almost in a night, fully equipped, fire-proof, 
 hygienic. Her hospitals grow with the same rapidity, 
 and huge buildings (if they are not pulled down 
 before they are finished because the land site has 
 increased in value so rapidly, that to sell it for a 
 Government School or a Bank or a. Public Library 
 
 26 
 
FROM TORONTO TO MONTREAL 
 
 will prove a very desirable deal) fling steel frames 
 skyward, and almost before there is time to ask 
 what is going to happen, typists and telephone 
 clerks are busy in echoing chambers of some great 
 new office. 
 
 It is interesting to read the reminiscences of such a 
 writer as Mrs. Susanna Moodie, who arrived in 
 Eastern Canada in the year 1832. Her long sea 
 voyage of nine weeks being ended, she finds herself 
 amongst a rabble of rough emigrants, of whom she 
 writes that these " vicious uneducated barbarians, 
 who form the surplus of over-populous European 
 countries, are far behind the wild man in delicacy 
 of feeling or natural courtesy. You would think 
 they were incarnate devils, singing, drinking, danc- 
 ing, shouting, and cutting antics that would surprise 
 the leader of a circus. They have no shame — are 
 under no restraint — nobody knows them here, and 
 they think they can speak and act as they please. * ' 
 
 Cholera was raging at the time, and small wonder 
 that it should be so when we read of the condition 
 in which the emigrants lived. Strangers newly 
 landed were singularly liable to its attacks, and the 
 story of sick people sleeping in sheds and the 
 impossibility of obtaining good food or medical 
 aid forms a chapter of suffering of which it is very 
 pathetic to read. 
 
 Beautiful Montreal, with the mountain guarding it 
 like a lion, was at that period not only dirty and ill- 
 paved, but its drainage was of the most primitive 
 order of things. Hundreds of emigrants were 
 dying daily, all day long there was a solemn tolling 
 of the death bell, and to add to the general gloom 
 scores of coffins piled high were exposed in the 
 undertakers' windows. Everywhere might be seen 
 groups of sick emigrants seated by the roadside 
 
 27 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 beside their little belongings, wondering what to do 
 next. In the poor hotels of the place no one spoke 
 of the scourge because everyone knew that week by 
 week every bedroom was giving up its quota of 
 victims of the disease, and that the only possible 
 means of escape from the contaminated city was 
 in an overcrowded slow-moving stage coach, some- 
 times with but partially recovered invalids amongst 
 its passengers. 
 
 It is worth while following Mrs. Moodie's voyage 
 throughout the pages of her delightful book, with 
 its account of her arrival at her new home in deluges 
 of rain, where, in a little clearing, she saw what she 
 first supposed to be a shed, then occupied by five 
 cows who were sheltering from the rain ] in the 
 principal sitting-room. 
 
 To-day the traveller arrives at Toronto, at that 
 declared impossibility, a beautiful railway station, 
 and here the little company, who have become very 
 friendly together, exchange cards as hostages, and 
 hope for their redemption in the near future. 
 
 The friendly spirit in Canada is one of the most 
 delightful things about it. It is hardly invidious to 
 say that it probably comes from a Scottish ancestry, 
 with its open doors and its generosity. Be that as 
 it may, to a Scot the Canadian welcome is always a 
 warm one. 
 
 The Old Timer draws the traveller aside at parting. 
 " Look here, I have something to tell you," he 
 says. " Those boys are good boys ; you may have 
 thought them a little quarrelsome on the train " — 
 we were able conscientiously to say that we had not 
 thought so — " their manners aren't always good, 
 but that's surface, you know, that's surface. They 
 are going ahead, and Canada's going ahead with 
 them." 
 
 28 
 
FROM TORONTO TO MONTREAL 
 
 " I am afraid our friend may have thought 
 Canada was going back/' said the Canadian lady. 
 
 " There now," said the Old Timer, " that's the 
 way conversations get twisted. Canada's all right, 
 I tell you, she's all right, and if anyone says anything 
 to the contrary you send them along to me." 
 
 We thanked him for his old stories. 
 
 " They're all being forgotten," he said, " no one 
 cares about Canada's old stories now. But I'll tell 
 you the man who'll give you all you want and give it 
 far better than I'm able to do. We call him * The 
 Boss ' at Montreal." 
 
 " Only some people," said the Canadian lady, 
 " call him the kindest man in Canada." 
 
 Montreal became a pleasant place to which to look 
 forward to visiting. But Toronto, with the moon 
 shining upon the lake, its University and its pleasant 
 old streets with their borders of gardens and pleasant 
 houses, is a place at which it is well to pause. It 
 is not only the prosperity of the great cities of Eastern 
 Canada that call for comment. We have travelled 
 on very muddy lanes to little towns, tree-shadowed, 
 and with quiet streets, which have about them a 
 charm and a sense of mellow age which sends 
 memory back a long way and suggests a delightful 
 mood of reminiscence. 
 
 Here is a little house with big trees about it and 
 a view of the big lake from the windows and small 
 rooms filled with treasures of long ago. Things the 
 like of which we remember in our grandmothers' 
 houses or which we perhaps too readily threw away 
 in the days of drastic refurnishings, are still here, 
 very pleasantly and fragrantly recalling past days. 
 There are cabinets full of delicate china and little 
 beadwork things and shell boxes. The old furniture 
 was brought out to Canada perhaps two hundred 
 
 29 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 years ago. Its surface is smooth and polished and the 
 pictures and prints upon the walls are hung side by 
 side with old swords and cutlasses, while by a window 
 whence the sun streams in, turning the old parch- 
 ment to a deeper yellow, hangs framed the pardon 
 which the old lady's father received after being 
 condemned to be hanged in the Rebellion. 
 
 The Rebellion 1 opens a floodgate of memories 
 on our gentle hostess's part. We hear about the 
 " family compact," and about Attorney- General 
 Robinson, Lount and Mackenzie almost as if they 
 were living still. Almost it seems as if the old 
 vendetta was dying hard, and indeed when one 
 hears the stories of those times it seems as if there 
 were a certain dignity in not forgetting too readily ! 
 
 " My father wrote from prison that the first and 
 second generation must suffer for the good that 
 would accrue to the third. The suffering was not 
 light, and I remember my mother telling us when 
 we were children that she sent her pearl necklace 
 to the baker to buy bread for us. He refused, as she 
 was a rebel, and only the kindness of neighbours, 
 who secretly gave the little creatures food, saved 
 their lives." 
 
 The gossip of a departed day is often worth much 
 more than mere historical evidence, and records 
 which are lightly called " old wives' tales " have 
 often far more of truth in them and of interest 
 
 1 This was the Rebellion of 1837 headed in Upper Canada 
 by William Lyon Mackenzie, and by Louis Papineau in Lower 
 Canada. Both leaders had started their careers with compara- 
 tively mild ideas of reform, but were gradually led into open 
 rebellion. From a military point of view the rebellion was a 
 fiasco, only a small section of the people being roused to action. 
 Mackenzie and Papineau escaped and were ultimately pardoned, 
 but Lount and Matthews, who perished on the scaffold, are 
 remembered by many Canadians as patriots. 
 
 30 
 
FROM TORONTO TO MONTREAL 
 
 too ! The old lady's cheeks flush a little as she says, 
 " Beverly Robinson had the pardons of Lount and 
 Matthews in his pocket the day they were hanged, 
 but he withheld them till the evening when their 
 bodies swung from the gibbet." 
 
 The old house, with the flickering shadows of 
 trees upon its walls, contains in one of the beautiful 
 old cabinets a treasure of these past times, in the 
 shape of a box, beautifully carved, which Joseph 
 Milbourne made when he was in prison. 
 
 We believe it is worth while recording rather a 
 strange circumstance in connection with the death 
 of the brother, ninety years of age, who lived with 
 our old friend. In his youth he had been a great 
 singer, gifted with an unusually fine tenor voice. 
 For years, for perhaps forty years, he had not sung, 
 and his speaking voice was extraordinarily low and 
 weak even for a man of his great age. He had lain 
 in bed during his last illness silent, inarticulate, 
 hardly conscious for many days until, one early 
 morning as his friends waited about him for the 
 end, he suddenly raised himself upon his pillows, 
 and in a voice of extraordinary sweetness and 
 power, he sang, from beginning to end, one of 
 his beautiful tenor songs of long ago, and then sank 
 back dead. 
 
 His surviving relatives have been good enough to 
 allow us to give this short account of an incident 
 which is evidence of a spirit's strength at the end of 
 life, and which seems to us one of the most remark- 
 able we have ever heard. 
 
 Already Eastern Canada has that sense of age 
 about it which makes story-telling possible, and 
 Ontario teems with recollections and reminiscences 
 of long ago. 
 
 Bishop Cronin, the first Bishop of Huron, who 
 
 3i 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 came out in 1832, followed the Indian trail between 
 Niagara and Detroit River, toiling with his delicate 
 wife and two little children many a weary mile in a 
 rough timber waggon. He was bound for the town- 
 ship of Adelaide, which had been represented to him 
 as a place where there were many settlers, requiring 
 an ordained minister. 
 
 It seems, however, that the imagination of the 
 inhabitants had run ahead of them a little, because 
 the difficulty was to find the town of Adelaide at all. 
 It existed in imagination and on maps, but otherwise 
 it had not materialised, and the Bishop turned to 
 the village of the Forks, putting up at a little inn 
 called the " Mansion House," where a room was 
 obtainable. The Forks is now London, Ontario — 
 a place of pleasant gardens, broad streets and a 
 comfortable air of opulence about it, but it then 
 contained only four hundred inhabitants, many 
 of whom had fled to the woods in dread of contagion 
 from cholera which was raging there. 
 
 On the Monday after his first service he was 
 waited on by a deputy of the congregation asking 
 him to remain as their pastor, while entreaties 
 reached him from many couples in the neighbour- 
 hood to be married, for neither minister nor parson 
 had been there to tie the knot. So mounting his 
 horse, Mr. Cronin rode here and there in every 
 direction to visit the settlers' shanties, in many 
 cases having to perform the marriage ceremony 
 for the young couples and to read the Baptismal 
 Service over their children as well. The Bishop 
 almost lived in the saddle in those days, never 
 failing in his ministrations to the people. He often 
 carried meat on a pole to outlying districts where 
 none could be obtained, risking the great danger of 
 being attacked by wolves on the way. 
 
 32 
 
FROM TORONTO TO MONTREAL 
 
 The Bishop's kindness of heart was shown as 
 much to the Indians as to those of his own race. 
 Indeed, there was no lack of opportunity for his 
 ministrations. During the Rebellion when prisons 
 were overcrowded and a man's sentence too often 
 was one of hanging, it was this good man who 
 attended the condemned prisoners in their last 
 hours and accompanied them to the gallows. 
 
 It is round the history of the Rebellion, that brief 
 but stormy episode of 1837, that most of the later 
 stories of Eastern Canada gather, not all of them 
 being connected with sadness. Indeed we hear a good 
 deal about the gaiety and amusement which used 
 to follow, for instance, the arrival of a garrison or 
 even a picket of soldiers, quartered upon the inhabi- 
 tants of some dull little town. Dances were given 
 in those days, and ballads were written in praise of 
 the " Red Coats." Suppers were plentifully spread, 
 and those whom the tragedy of the situation did not 
 touch, seem to have seen a certain merit in a rebel- 
 lion which could only be put down by young men in 
 uniform. But the privations and difficulties which 
 went side by side with these occasional gay doings 
 made life for the early settlers and their wives far 
 from easy. It is a little difficult to realise that 
 almost the only mode of transit was in a slow-moving 
 wagon and that even this was not always procurable. 
 Nearly all journeys were made on foot, often in deep 
 snow, and whatever was wanted in the house had 
 to be made by the hands of those who lived there. 
 There were no tailors or shoemakers or mechanics 
 of any kind, and a man who could get a coat made 
 by a tailor or a pair of shoes made by a shoemaker 
 was looked upon as a dandy. Most men had their 
 feet bound about with bark and deer skins. The 
 women carded the wool, spun it, and knitted it, 
 
 D 33 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 while here and there would be found a hand-loom 
 weaver who was able to produce a piece of cloth 
 from the hand-spun wool brought to him. Justice 
 was roughly administered or not administered at 
 all, but there was a fine spirit of helpfulness between 
 the settlers themselves, and simple crafts were soon 
 learned amongst them. 
 
 We could wish that more of the old stories were 
 kept alive in Canada, for it seems to us that already 
 many of them are forgotten. However, we had the 
 good fortune to come across those, who, busy men 
 though they were, found the time to spin some 
 excellent yarns. At Montreal we met the man who 
 is affectionately known as " the Boss " by hundreds 
 of those who like to call him their friend. 
 
 It is always a pleasure to write of one who, 
 unaided and from small beginnings, has come to a 
 good position, and at the same time has never lost 
 a friend nor made an enemy. The Boss is one 
 of those who loves to speak of old days. He began 
 life as a very poor boy, and his mother died when he 
 was quite a little chap. " But," as he himself tells 
 one, everyone adopted me." More particularly 
 there was some Scottish friend at Kingston, of 
 whom he talks to-day with deepest affection, liking 
 to tell the story of the first invitation he had to dine 
 on Christmas Day where the lady of the house was 
 very pretty, which no doubt accentuated the honour ! 
 At Kingston he went to school, and after he had 
 learned telegraphy, was sent as assistant to the 
 telegraph clerk, who was also the local dentist. 
 His teeth, poor boy, were sadly out of order, owing 
 to the fact that no one had looked after them pro- 
 
 f>erly, so the dental telegraphist offered to take a 
 ook at them for him. At the time he was earning 
 twenty dollars a month, and feeling sublimely rich, 
 
 34 
 
FROM TORONTO TO MONTREAL 
 
 his mind filled with all that he meant to do with it. 
 But the dentist, having " fixed " his teeth deducted 
 ten dollars from his salary, and sent him away with 
 teeth mended but heart broken. 
 
 These and other disappointments which occurred 
 constantly to him have, no doubt, been instrumental 
 in making him show consideration even to those who 
 have no right to appeal to him. He had frequently 
 been urged not to answer what are called " begging 
 letters, but he always replies, 
 
 " I never forget what it used to be like to call and 
 call again at some village post office hoping for a 
 reply to some letter which I had written and which 
 never came/ ' 
 
 The stories of his telegraph days do not lack 
 humour. One of them concerns a well-known 
 applicant, always in need of favours, who requested 
 one of the Directors of the Canadian Pacific Railway 
 to send him a free travelling pass. The application 
 was made by telegram, and ended, " If I don't get 
 it I'll have to walk." His application was forwarded 
 through the office to headquarters in the words, 
 
 " has applied for free pass and states that 
 
 without it he will have to walk. Are we to give it 
 to him? Reply." 
 
 Back came the reply, " Don't let him walk," and 
 the needy individual started with his free pass and 
 arrived in safety and comfort before it was dis- 
 covered that the punctuation of the return telegram 
 had been faulty and should have read, " Don't, 
 (i.e. don't give him a Pass). Let him walk." 
 
 A much more serious incident in connection with 
 telegraphy occurred to him when upon one occasion 
 he found himself in a railway accident, and not only 
 in the accident but amongst those who were 
 seriously injured. He was laid with some forty 
 
 35 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 others, some dying, and some, alas ! already dead, 
 and the local officials instantly began to telegraph for 
 doctors and nurses. The telegraph apparatus was 
 in a little office opening off the room where the in- 
 jured lay, and the Boss, with his senses keenly 
 alive to what was going on was able perfectly well 
 to understand the words as they were tapped out by 
 the clerk, and what the return message was also. 
 An urgent summons was sent, and the answer 
 came back that owing to some defect in the line, 
 help could not be immediately forthcoming. Upon 
 this the station-master entered the temporary hospital 
 and told everyone cheerfully that doctors and nurses 
 had started. Perhaps fortunately only Mr. Hosmer 
 knew of the pardonable deceit. Once more the 
 wire was set in motion urging in strenuous terms 
 that every effort would be made to come to the assist- 
 ance of the injured. Again the reply message 
 was not wholly satisfactory and again a cheerful 
 message was given to the invalids. Following on 
 that came press messages asking for an immediate 
 return of a list of the killed and injured, and the 
 clerk in charge began tapping out the names and the 
 extent of the injuries of those in the hospital. A 
 long list was given, and the Boss was able to interpret 
 first of all the names of the dead. As the list grew 
 longer his heart began to sink and he said to himself, 
 " If they give my name and say that I have died 
 I know that I shall die." Still the tapping went on, 
 and the young man lying on the floor with no medical 
 attendance, and without much knowledge of the 
 extent of his injuries, continued to listen until at 
 last he heard the name, Charles Hosmer. Then he 
 held his breath for a time thinking, " This will 
 settle it." The words which followed were, 
 " Seriously injured." 
 
 36 
 
FROM TORONTO TO MONTREAL 
 
 " I was able to bear that," the Boss said, " but 
 I did not want to hear that I was dead." 
 
 Most of his best stories concern railways and 
 telegraph offices. The telegraph is generally owned 
 by private or railway companies in Canada, and they 
 are built at the same time as the line. When a 
 station in some distant and isolated place is erected, 
 the telegraph clerk sleeps in an empty railway 
 carriage with a telephone at one end of it, and this 
 becomes the centre of news for the district and the 
 centre of some gossip also ! Probably the black 
 porter of the train is as good a hand at this as anyone 
 else, and there was an old negro, Jim French by 
 name, who used to be quite a character on the 
 Canadian Pacific Railway. Once when Lord Lome, 
 in his capacity as Governor of Canada, was going to 
 travel in the compartment in which Jim waited, 
 Mr. Hanna remarked to him that he must address 
 Lord Lome and H.R.H. the Princess Louise 
 respectfully and by their proper titles. 
 
 " I intend to do so, San," said Jim, " I will call 
 him ' Your Succulency ' and her * Miss Louise.' " 
 
 Here is another story which seems to us full of 
 dramatic interest, and which really belongs to the 
 wild and woolly West, although as a matter of fact 
 it was told as at Medicine Hat. It concerns the 
 old days when horse thieving was the commonest 
 form of crime, and when the newly-raised body of 
 North- West Mounted Police had their hands full 
 in capturing and bringing these men to justice. 
 
 A noted thief was known as " Crackerbox-Bill," 
 though the derivation of the name is lost in obscurity. 
 He was a fine man, whatever his trade was, and, 
 strangely enough, singularly honest according to 
 his lights. He had moments of repentance too — 
 when he thought he had bungled the theft of a 
 
 37 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 horse or the lifting of some cattle. But he paid his 
 way like a gentleman, and was generous with his 
 money. After all, he enjoyed every day of his 
 life and the adventure of it. And he never blamed 
 the man, but his own clumsiness (about which he 
 used much curious language), when he was caught 
 red-handed one day and handed over to justice. 
 Three men of the N.W.M.P. were told off to take 
 him to Regina to undergo a term of imprisonment. 
 
 On the way thither he was closely guarded and 
 handcuffed. But after breakfast one morning his 
 offers to show his guard the three-card trick were 
 too tempting to be refused. Crackerbox-Bill was 
 unhandcuffed, and with a greasy pack of cards and 
 the ground to play on, he began to show off his 
 extraordinary sleight of hand. There may have 
 been some betting on the skilfully played cards, 
 and each man's eyes were intently fixed on the play 
 in front of them. As they stooped over the cards, 
 Crackerbox-Bill suddenly drew the revolvers from 
 each man's hip pocket, held them up and became 
 master of the situation. It is said that he even 
 insisted upon one policeman putting on his own 
 handcuffs. He flung his leg across the horse, and, 
 with a revolver in each hand, marched the police- 
 men in front of him, but unluckily for him marched 
 them at last into the fold of a hill, where a picket of 
 their own men were camping out. The horse 
 thief seeing all was up with him, put spurs into his 
 horse and rode for the open. He was shot dead 
 with half a dozen bullets through him — he probably 
 preferred that to imprisonment. 
 
 It is said that people of Highland descent are 
 always merciful in their judgments of cattle lifters. 
 Be that as it may, we confess to feeling sorry for 
 Crackerbox-Bill, 
 
 38 
 
FROM TORONTO TO MONTREAL 
 
 Few things are so stirring as old stories, with 
 their blending of humour, pathos, the clash of arms, 
 and that curious sense of music which underlies 
 some of them. Their usefulness lies in emphasising 
 the fact that countries are made by individuals, and 
 that individuals will continue to make them. We 
 have often heard it said that what Canada wants 
 is a leader. In our humble opinion that is just what 
 she does not want. Individual effort has made her 
 trade and her commerce, just as individual effort 
 claimed the services and made the homes of the 
 first settlers. Their success has been misnamed 
 independence, for independence, we humbly submit, 
 can only result in non-productive isolation, whether 
 of individuals or of nations. It is better explained 
 by the old analogy of childhood and youth leading 
 up to that sense of responsibility which is neither 
 swagger nor independence, and which men and 
 women either accept or refuse as God made them, 
 but which can never be accepted lightly. The 
 future of Canada lies with each man and woman 
 who lives there. Its integrity lies with them, 
 and this is an important matter. Individual men 
 and women have made the country, and as they have 
 made it so they must hold it. Its success depends 
 exactly on the manner in which they accept this 
 responsibility or disregard it. 
 
 39 
 
Chapter HI Concerning Quebec 
 
 OUEBEC is the spot where Canada was 
 fought for and won, not once but many 
 times. Its story not only would fill, but 
 has filled, many volumes, and the interest of the 
 place is as fresh to-day as it was when Champlain 
 founded Canada by building his " abitacion on 
 the site of the Indian stronghold of Stadacona, ever 
 since famous as Quebec (an Indian word, meaning 
 the " narrows "). 
 
 The roar of civilisation and the quick happenings 
 of events in Canada have swept away westward 
 from the old city on the St. Lawrence, and many 
 tourists only pause there to see what they call 
 " the battlefield." As a matter of fact there are 
 five battlefields in Quebec, and there is a touch 
 of humour in the fact that lately subscriptions have 
 been raised to place an English church in memory 
 of " the victory," not on the site-of Wolfe's own 
 battlefield of Quebec, but in the centre of the totally 
 different battlefield of St. Foy. Now Wolfe's army, 
 victorious on the Plains of Abraham in 1759, was 
 defeated by Levis, Montcalm's successor at the 
 battle of St. Foy in 1760, and the very spot now 
 chosen for the Wolfe Memorial Church is actually 
 where the issue of St. Foy was decided and the 
 British forces under General Murray yielded to the 
 superior numbers of the French. 1 
 
 1 Pamphlet by Colonel Wood. 
 
 40 
 
CONCERNING QUEBEC 
 
 Stolid British inability to accept defeat has been a 
 very powerful factor in its history. We sympathise 
 with their exclusion of all battlefields in Quebec 
 save the one where Wolfe and Montcalm fell, but 
 much of the history and glory of the place is missed 
 by not telling of others also. 
 
 For it is round Quebec that almost the whole of 
 the heroic history of Canada centres. Here it was 
 that Jacques Cartier built his first fort in 1535. It 
 was a mere stockade to protect them from the Indians, 
 and here he and his handful of men spent a miserable 
 winter, their small numbers being greatly reduced 
 by a malignant scurvy which spread amongst them. 
 The following summer they returned home, leaving 
 a cross to mark the fact that France claimed Canada 
 as her own. As everyone knows, much of the early 
 history of Canada is French, and is principally 
 concerned with accounts of the extraordinary 
 privations which the Colonists endured and the 
 bravery which they exhibited in their raids against 
 the Indians. It is hardly possible to speak with any 
 exhaustive detail of the men who made the romantic 
 history of that time. Of them all Champlain 
 has undoubtedly come down to us as the most 
 distinguished name on the list, and the story not 
 only of his daring but of his statesmanship, makes 
 extraordinarily interesting reading. 
 
 Champlain sailed up the St. Lawrence in a little 
 vessel of only one hundred and twenty tons, having 
 made the fastest passage across the Atlantic that 
 had then been accomplished. The Don de Dieu 
 sailed from Honfleur to Tadousac in eighteen days 
 and, no doubt, entered the St. Lawrence River 
 as proudly as a steamship with a record does to-day. 
 Imagination can easily picture the fleet of Indian 
 canoes, with their warriors crested with war plumes 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 and uttering their strange cries, that put out to meet 
 him. Long ago as that early landing was, Champlain 
 has stamped himself upon Canada in a very remark- 
 able way. The principal street of Quebec was 
 designed by him and remains as he designed it, 
 and we learn on good authority that the sphere of his 
 influence can be followed even further than Canada 
 — that he was the first man to suggest the building 
 of the Panama Canal. His personality seems to have 
 been an extraordinary one, and it is related of him 
 that his courtesy never deserted him, being as 
 marked in an Indian wigwam as in the Court of 
 France. He will probably always be the popular 
 hero of Canada, and deservedly so. Primarily he 
 was an explorer, and so well did he ingratiate himself 
 with the Huron Indians that we find him trading 
 peaceably with them, and even joining them on an 
 expedition up country in their light birch canoes. 
 Raids with the Iroquois Indians delayed him at 
 every point, forcing him to return to France in 
 order to seek royal permission to assume a more 
 definite form of warfare against them. We find him 
 urging upon young Frenchmen to seek adventure 
 in the West, and quite suddenly, as it seems now, 
 Canada became the fashion for hot bloods with a 
 love of daring. Fabulous tales were circulated 
 about adventures on creeks and lakes, and the possi- 
 bility of an occasional fight, and not only so but the 
 romance of Canada extended itself to serious- 
 minded men and women in France, resulting in the 
 remarkable missionary effort, which was afterwards 
 to bear its terrible quota of privation and suffering 
 and horrible torture. 
 
 Three women sailed about this time for Canada, 
 who very deeply affected its history, one of them, 
 La Mere Marie de V Incarnation, being known as 
 
 42 
 
CONCERNING QUEBEC 
 
 one of the five founders of new France. Their 
 voyage was made practically into the unknown, but 
 Father Lejeune had made an appeal for women to 
 convert the Indian girls of Canada, and the appeal 
 was answered by three Ursuline nuns, whose lives 
 of devotion in a hostile and difficult country make 
 a pathetic appeal to the imagination. They had 
 everything to contend with, and their story has 
 never been more beautifully told than in the book 
 called, In the heart of old Canada, from which we 
 have permission to quote. The first Ursuline con- 
 vent was a grey hovel, near the site of " Notre 
 Dame des Victoires," and their first Indian school 
 established in it was broken up by a terrible attack of 
 small-pox. In 1641 the first stone was laid on the 
 site of the present convent. But the next spring, 
 Madame de la Peltrie, burning to carry the Cross 
 still further into the wilderness, followed Maison- 
 neuve, a brave and devout soldier, to the founding 
 of Montreal. In spite of everyone's advice to her to 
 turn back, she wrote saying that, having once put 
 her hand to the heavenly task, she would never 
 give it up alive. Quebec became half a mission 
 station, half a trading post, and more than once 
 the colony nearly lost its life altogether. The 
 Iroquois Indians never ceased their warfare against 
 the Whites, and the situation became more com- 
 plicated when their old enemies the Hurons put 
 themselves under the protection of the fort at 
 Quebec. La Mere Marie was ever foremost in 
 succouring them, and bringing the children into 
 her school. She took lessons herself in Huron 
 from Father Bressani, who had escaped death at 
 the hands of the Iroquois as by a miracle, after 
 having suffered the extremity of torture. Just as 
 her classes were well established, the convent was 
 
 43 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 burned to the ground. The nuns barely escaped 
 with their lives, running out barefooted and half- 
 clad into the intense mid-winter cold. La Mere 
 Marie issued her orders as calmly as if going through 
 her regular routine. She went all over the building 
 to make sure that everyone was safe, paused one 
 reverential moment before the altar, and then walked 
 out as the flames met behind her. 
 
 To quote more from a charming book would be 
 robbery. The Ursuline Convent still stands in 
 Quebec, but the monument thus raised by devoted 
 women is as nothing compared with the work done 
 in Eastern Canada by the Ursulines . Their influence 
 in the early days was not only spiritual but civilising ; 
 the convent was a refuge for the destitute and the 
 friendless, for the wounded in wars and for the sick. 
 Its work has never ceased, either in cold or heat, 
 through poverty or when exposed to bombardment. 
 When Quebec stood aghast and defenceless before 
 the American army, the Ursulines were instant 
 in prayer, and Frontenac boldly flung back defiance 
 to Phipps, declaring he had no answer to give to 
 his summons to surrender except from the cannon's 
 mouth. A cannon ball burst through the shutters 
 of the convent, and the devoted nuns ran up a 
 picture of the Holy Trinity to be hung in the steeple 
 of the Cathedral to show under whose direction 
 they were fighting. When victory was proclaimed 
 their church was named " Notre Dame de la 
 Victoire." 
 
 The nuns were statesmen too, as their history 
 shows, and they could provide funds for a cause, as 
 was proved when they melted down the whole of 
 the silver plate of the convent to pay for the support 
 of the French armies. 
 
 With these and many other kindred deeds of 
 
 44 
 
CONCERNING QUEBEC 
 
 devotion and heroism we have little time to dwell. 
 The early history of Canada teems with heroic names 
 — Roberval, Radisson, Grosseillers, La Violette, de 
 Maisonneuve, Bienville, Iberville, La Salle, Mar- 
 quette, La Verendry*, or Montmorency-Laval, the 
 first bishop of Quebec, or even of Frontenac, who 
 built its first walls, defeated the Indians and repulsed 
 the first American invasion. On the English side 
 the list of names is not less heroic. 
 
 John Cabot, dwelling peacefully with his sons at 
 Bristol, in England, was commissioned by Henry VII 
 to go on a voyage of discovery as early as 1487. His 
 voyage was one of the epoch-making things in 
 Canada's history, giving England the right to claim 
 a new Continent, for he returned with the news 
 that the New World was not part of Asia, as had 
 previously been thought. Hudson, the English 
 pilot, sailed from the port of London and entered 
 Hudson Straits in 16 10. His ship's sides were 
 torn and scarred by the ice through which he had 
 come, and there was something dangerously like 
 mutiny on board, yet he still sailed forward and 
 southward into the unearthly silence reigning 
 round the bay which he called by his own name. 
 Here he built winter quarters and ranged the 
 woods of James's Bay for game, but provisions ran 
 short, the mutiny continued, and the horrible 
 whisper went about that with fewer men rations 
 would be more plentiful. The drama in the ice- 
 bound land ended tragically, for the mutineers 
 flung Hudson and his son into an open boat and 
 left them to their fate. The great bay of the North, 
 with its future almost limitless developments, bears 
 the name of an English pilot, who was deserted and 
 died of starvation on a sullen winter sea. 
 
 Gilbert and Raleigh wrote their names upon the 
 
 45 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 heroic sheet before Gervase Kirke rallied the 
 merchants of London, in 1628, to fit out privateers 
 to wage war on France on new soil. War had 
 broken out between the two countries, but Quebec 
 was ignorant of the fact until six English frigates 
 lay at Tadousac. Kirke demanded the keys of the 
 fort, but with only fifty pounds of ammunition 
 behind him Champlain declined the request and 
 the English fleet, loaded with booty, sailed home 
 again, while the starving garrison remained on in 
 Quebec. It was not until the following July that 
 the British Flag flew from the fort. Charles I of 
 England held the country for three years in pledge 
 for the dowry of his Queen, Henrietta Maria of 
 France, and afterwards granted to his friend, Sir 
 William Alexander, Earl of Stirling, " the County 
 and Lordship of Canada.' ■ But military glory was 
 spoilt by politics in this case as in many others, 
 Canada being given for the dowry which went to fill 
 the private coffers of Charles I. 
 
 There are long narrow streets in Quebec with 
 high houses on either side of them and rattling 
 cobble stones underfoot. Beyond is a rich country 
 which, seen down the long telescope of its grey 
 stone streets, reminds one quaintly of the " tail 
 pieces " which one finds at the ends of chapters in 
 an old book. 
 
 Many travellers stop at Quebec because of one 
 old house which stands close to the Ursuline Con- 
 vent. Its rooms are wide and lofty and filkd with 
 treasures of old china and old pictures, and there 
 the traveller may, if he is fortunate, get his first 
 experience of Canadian hospitality with its fine 
 sense of plenty and disinterested generosity. The 
 house is too well known to English travellers to 
 need any disguise. It has a garden under the 
 
 46 
 
CONCERNING QUEBEC 
 
 ramparts where humming birds flit, and every 
 alley is fragrant with the smell of roses. From the 
 garden in Quebec, Canada no longer appears a big 
 space with some lines across it. Down below on 
 the great St. Lawrence the ships sail noiselessly 
 like little toy boats on a river made of glass. Oppo- 
 site lies the beautiful island of Orleans, and westward 
 the great yellow foaming falls of Montmorency pour 
 their heavy waters in a continuous roar. 
 
 We drive down to St. Anne's — perhaps the 
 happiest of miracle working places — where stacks 
 of crutches and cases full of discarded spectacles 
 bear witness to instantaneous cures, or we take 
 the train out to some little French Canadian village 
 and hear stories of the days of Evangeline. They 
 are almost forgotten now. France seems not to 
 have sung of her sufferings as Scotland used to do. 
 We do not know of any " Flowers of the Forest " or 
 " Will ye no' come back again/ ' but surely there is 
 hardly a more pathetic story than that of the simple 
 Acadian farmers exiled from their homes, under 
 the stern plea of necessity. 
 
 The expulsion in 1755 of the French settlers, 
 men, women and children, from Acadia (the present 
 Nova Scotia) is a measure hard to justify seen at 
 this distance of time, though most historians agree 
 that it was only carried out after the English had 
 exhausted every means to a peaceful settlement. 
 For forty years the English Government had dealt 
 with the simple peasantry in a kindly and lenient 
 manner, only to be repaid by the French in Canada 
 sending missionaries to inflame the ignorant and 
 superstitious Acadians against any allegiance to 
 their heretic rulers. When the Seven Years War 
 caused conflagration in America, it was feared that 
 the so-called " neutral " Acadians, encouraged by 
 
 47 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 fanatical priests, might become open foes. The 
 story of the suffering of these unfortunate people, 
 torn from their homes, has been told in such 
 moving language by Longfellow, that one almost 
 forgets there is another side to the picture. 
 
 Quebec teems with tales and old stories, many 
 of which are on a heroic note. The Joan of Arc of 
 Canada is Madeline de Vercheres, who held the 
 fort almost single-handed against the Iroquois 
 Indians, and whose simple telling of her own story 
 has impressed itself upon everyone's mind. The 
 child was fourteen years of age at the time. When 
 called upon to fly and with bullets whistling about 
 her ears she shouted, " To arms ! To arms ! " 
 The story thrills us yet, the young girl appealing 
 to her two little brothers to die like gentlemen for 
 the King, and bidding the two remaining soldiers 
 in the fort, " Begone, you rascals ! " when they 
 suggested blowing it up rather than it should fall 
 into the hands of the Indians. 
 
 We wonder whether there has ever been written 
 a more plucky page of history than that which 
 recalls the story of this girl, who, donning a soldier's 
 helmet and carrying a musket, gave decisive orders 
 that even if she were killed the gates were still to be 
 kept shut and the fort defended, and then went 
 out to try and draw the fire of the Iroquois upon 
 herself. The whole garrison consisted only of the 
 two little brothers, one servant, two soldiers and 
 a few women, but the child of fourteen put herself 
 at their head and bade them never surrender though 
 she should be cut to pieces before their eyes. 
 
 " Only put up a fight," she urged them, and for 
 twenty-four hours, without rest or food, she went 
 about from one corner of the bastion to the other, 
 and thus for eight days she withstood the siege. 
 
 4 8 
 
CONCERNING QUEBEC 
 
 There is a pathetic touch when at last Lieutenant 
 Monnerie raised the siege with his relief party of 
 forty men. Madeline was dozing with her head 
 upon the table and a musket across her knee when 
 she heard the soldiers ask, " Who goes there ? " 
 They answered, " French come to your aid," and 
 the French girl, with the grace of her nation, swept 
 the young man a curtsey and offering him her 
 musket exclaimed, " Sir, I surrender my arms to 
 you." 
 
 On the old ramparts of Quebec we are reminded 
 of other days of daring, and of the fact " that the white 
 man has been building forts there in five different 
 centuries already, and that he is building forts there 
 still." Jacques Cartier was the first of the whites 
 in fort building as he was in everything else, when 
 he raised the stockade against the Indians and 
 claimed the valley of St. Charles for the crown of 
 France. 
 
 In those early days it seems to have been the 
 fashion to plant a flagstaff on a stockade, run up 
 a flag, and claim Canada for whichever country that 
 flag belonged to. 
 
 After the death of Cartier two generations passed 
 before the French again took possession and began 
 another fort. This was the famous " abitacion " 
 of Champlain, built on what is now the lower town 
 of Quebec. It probably never had a garrison of 
 more than twenty men, but it was the foundation 
 of an empire, garrisoned and held, and three 
 hundred years later representatives of nearly every 
 civilised nation of the world went to Quebec to 
 celebrate the doings of a solitary naval officer, who 
 with a handful of men founded a colony and ensured 
 its safety. 
 
 In 1698 Frontenac built the first wall round the 
 E 49 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 city after Colbert had recommended, and recom- 
 mended in vain, its re-fortification. Frontenac is 
 one of those persons who has gone down to history 
 without a stain upon his name, but the building 
 of his wall, while safeguarding Quebec against its 
 enemies, introduced into it, more cunningly and 
 more mischievously than the most diabolically con- 
 trived onslaught of a foe, the bugbear of corruption. 
 There was money to be made out of the huge con- 
 tract for Quebec's walls and Bigot made it. The 
 most deadly form of disease in a camp would have 
 been less dangerous and less harmful and perhaps 
 less infectious. Jobbery and chicanery spread like 
 wildfire, bringing with them their inevitable con- 
 sequences. The works were done badly and re- 
 quired patching almost before they were finished. 
 Bigot, the Intendant, waxed rich, as did Vaudreuil, 
 the Governor- General, and money being much 
 more important to them than good work, they 
 sacrificed the safety of Quebec to the filling of their 
 own purses. Middle men, directors and engineers, 
 infected with the same malady, grew rich by charging 
 exorbitant prices. It is not difficult to find a 
 " sermon written in stone " when we wander round 
 the ramparts of Quebec and try to trace a line of the 
 old French works which entirely disappeared from 
 the permanent plan of 1833. It is a story of honour 
 sold for money and of lives sacrificed to greed. In 
 its last results it meant the loss of Canada to France. 
 Bigot was Minister of Finance and of Public 
 Works. His frauds were extraordinary and his 
 corruptions absolutely systematic and deliberate, 
 whilst his sense of pity followed the usual corollary 
 of fraud. It is stated that whilst the people were 
 forced to eat grass to keep themselves alive he 
 never altered his style of living, and balls and 
 
 So 
 
CONCERNING QUEBEC 
 
 parties with elaborate suppers were of nightly 
 occurrence at the palace. It would be undesirable 
 to dwell on the doings of such a knave, were it not 
 that the story of Quebec and the tragedy of Mont- 
 calm cannot be very well told without reference 
 to this sinister tale of disaster and fraud. Montcalm 
 set a good example by having horse flesh every day 
 on his own table, and by enforcing an order against 
 card-playing and unseemly entertainments. In 1758 
 he wrote home, " Our Government is good for 
 nothing and provisions will fail. The farms are 
 scarcely tilled at all, the people are dispirited, there 
 is no confidence in Monsieur Vaudreuil or in 
 Monsieur Bigot. Monsieur Bigot appears to be 
 occupied only in amassing a fortune for himself and 
 in his appearance. Cupidity has seized officers and 
 storekeepers, the commissaries are making astound- 
 ing profits. Everybody appears to be in a hurry to 
 make his fortune before the Colony is lost." 
 
 In that same year the state of Canada was more 
 perilous than ever. Naval and military defences 
 were entirely neglected, for in spite of anything 
 that Montcalm could say the most ordinary pre- 
 cautions were neglected. 1 No reinforcements were 
 being sent from France, but the British were being 
 greatly strengthened and getting ready for a three- 
 fold attack. Ostensibly Vaudreuil gave the French 
 General a free hand in everything, but we find him 
 whenever a critical moment approached, inter- 
 fering, safeguarding his own credit, and trying for 
 nothing but to ensure his [>oV.tion, whatever might 
 be the fate of Canada and the men who were defend- 
 ing it. 
 
 When the first shot of battle came Vaudreuil 
 
 1 The story of these days has been ably told by Colonel 
 Wood in The Fight for Canada. 
 
 51 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 seems to have been so carried away by the pre- 
 liminary success of the French arms that he sent 
 bombastic instructions for the total annihilation of 
 the British army. He also forwarded reinforcements 
 to Montcalm now that he no longer required them. 
 The whole story is a miserable record of a fine 
 military genius and a straightforward man sacrificed 
 to the personal greed and ambition of two worthless 
 men. 
 
 Montcalm determined to make one more desperate 
 appeal to France. The mission was a failure, but 
 at least the King's orders were received to defend 
 the Colony, and for this Montcalm prepared to sell 
 his life. 
 
 All that follows has about it something of the 
 inevitableness of Greek tragedy, the triumph of 
 it only coming when the great Frenchman is at 
 last confronted by an honest-hearted, worthy British 
 foe, whom he met in the open on the Plains of 
 Abraham. It is worthy of record that in Quebec the 
 national monuments to both heroes are almost side 
 by side. On one appears the inscription : — 
 
 Here died Wolfe victorious. 
 
 and on the other : — 
 
 Honneur a. Montcalm 
 Le Destin 
 En lui derobant la Victoire 
 
 L'a recompense 
 Par une Mort glorieuse. 
 
 whilst on the monument to Wolfe and Montcalm 
 together are the words : — 
 
 Mortem Virtus Communem 
 
 Famam Historia 
 
 Monumentum posteritas Dedit. 
 
 52 
 
CONCERNING QUEBEC 
 
 Wolfe was one of those men whom we associate 
 with the best type of English soldiers, such men 
 whom we say very thankfully our island and her 
 colonies seem singularly capable of producing. 
 There is a very long list of their names, but our 
 concern at present is with one only, but one who 
 seems typical of many others. Wolfe was a man 
 who, under a soldier's carelessness, took a very 
 serious view of life, his letters to his mother showing 
 a mind singularly faithful, with the fear of God 
 wholesomely before him from very early boyhood. 
 He was a man of good family but of small means, 
 and at sixteen he was acting as Adjutant to a battalion 
 on active service in Germany. His life is a fine 
 story of endeavour and industry. But in Wolfe 
 these were combined with a curiously sympathetic 
 mind, an almost womanly feeling for suffering, and 
 a gentleness towards all men which is not always 
 synonymous with industry and zeal. In the midst 
 of his campaigns, when everything depended on his 
 leadership, his decision, and his strategy, he always 
 found leisure to look after the individual comfort 
 of his men, and few military commanders have 
 effected better reforms. When Pitt chose Wolfe to 
 go to Canada he proved, not for the first time, his 
 knowledge of men, but the General seems himself 
 to have been as modest as are most heroes. While 
 writing to his mother about the small business 
 application or education which his officers possessed, 
 he regrets that a person of " his own very moderate 
 capacity " should be thought worthy of the high 
 distinction he had attained. 
 
 A week before the battle Montcalm sent a regi- 
 ment to guard the Heights of Abraham, and on the 
 very eve of the first engagement he ordered back 
 the same regiment to watch the path up which 
 
 53 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 Wolfe came next morning. But the Governor 
 again counter-ordered, and the important strategical 
 position was left undefended. 
 
 The history of Wolfe's landing reads like a tale 
 of romance. Print carries a certain conviction with 
 it, but it is only when one stands on the spot where 
 he and his men silently left their boats and climbed 
 up the wet steep banks of the river that the tale of 
 that night attack in the rain and the darkness can be 
 even faintly understood. In the silence of the woods 
 the whole scene very vividly impresses itself, and 
 almost one can imagine the hush of the night, when 
 the brawling of the little stream and the slipping 
 of the men's feet on the loamy uneven soil were the 
 only things to break the silence. It was a breathless 
 climb and victory was never ensured, while defeat 
 could only mean total annihilation. Needless to 
 say such a consideration did not act as a deterrent 
 to Wolfe and the men whom he commanded. Some 
 sleepy sentries were found in the little wood, and 
 the rest is soon told. Montcalm, reconnoitring the 
 plains in the early dawning, found that a red wall 
 had sprung up across it in the night and shouted, 
 " There they are where they have no right to 
 be." 
 
 " He had no choice but instant action. He rode 
 down the front of his line of battle, stopping to say 
 a few stirring words to each regiment as he passed. 
 Whenever he asked the men if they were tired, they 
 said they were never tired before a battle ; and all 
 ranks showed as much eagerness to come to close 
 quarters as the British did themselves. . . . Mont- 
 calm towered aloft and alone — the last great 
 Frenchman of the Western World ... he never 
 stood higher in all manly minds than on that fatal 
 day. And, as he rode before his men there, his 
 
 54 
 
CONCERNING QUEBEC 
 
 presence seemed to call them on like a drapeau 
 vivant of France herself.' ' 
 
 " Never were stauncher champions than those 
 two leaders and their six brigadiers. ' Let us 
 remember how, on the victorious side, the young 
 commander was killed in the forefront of the fight ; 
 how his successor was wounded at the head of his 
 brigade ; and how the command-in-chief passed 
 from hand to hand, with bewildering rapidity, till 
 each of the four Generals had held it in turn during 
 the space of one short half-hour : then, how the 
 devotion of the four Generals on the other side was 
 even more conspicuous, since every single one of 
 these brave men laid down his life to save the day 
 for France ; and, above all, let us remember how 
 lasting the twin renown of Wolfe and Montcalm 
 themselves should be, when the one was so consum- 
 mate in his victory, and the other so truly glorious 
 in defeat/ " 
 
 The ramparts of Quebec tell other stories which 
 would take too long to recount. Two invasions by 
 America were defeated. The first by Frontenac 
 in 1690, and the second under Murray and Carleton 
 when Arnold and Montgomery were repulsed. 
 There is an interesting monument to the memory of 
 the defenders upon which is inscribed : 
 
 Here stood 
 
 Her Old And New Defenders 
 
 Uniting, Guarding, Saving, 
 
 Canada. 
 
 Defeating Arnold 
 
 At the Sault-Au-Matelot Barricade 
 
 On the last day of 
 
 1775 
 
 Guy Carleton 
 
 Commanding at 
 
 Quebec. 
 
 55 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 The third American invasion was in 1812, but 
 this time the tide of war did not sweep up to her 
 battlements. In 1822 the citadels and walls built 
 after a plan approved by Wellington were completed 
 at a cost of £7,000,000. This was only one item of 
 over £100,000,000 sterling spent by the mother 
 country in the works and actual fortifications 
 alone. 
 
 As we walk upon the solid ramparts of stone we 
 are told of this vast expenditure of money laudably 
 and rightly spent, but looking round at the country, 
 at the St. Lawrence River, and the old town at our 
 feet, we are reminded, not for the first time, that 
 it is not money but the lives of men that make 
 bulwarks, and in old heroic Quebec this fact is so 
 apparent that we should be unworthy if we did not 
 send a grateful thought back to those who lived 
 and died there long ago. 
 
 56 
 
Chapter IV Story of the C.P.R. 
 
 THE actual making of the C.P.R. is so full 
 of interest and even of romance that it is 
 difficult to dissociate it in one's mind from 
 stories of fancy and imagination. 
 
 Canada was to become a nation ; more than that 
 it was to become a compact and powerful nation. 
 East and West were to join hands in a strong grip ; 
 scattered districts, provinces the* size of empires 
 were to be joined together under one Flag, and the 
 integrating factor was to be the great railway system 
 of Canada. As we now know, its final triumph 
 has been complete, but men still living can remember 
 the early days of the Canadian Pacific Railway, 
 which are almost more like the personal history of 
 a living creature than the story of a line of rails. 
 The defeats, the hopes, the despair which followed 
 each other quickly contributed to the personal 
 interest that surrounds it, while the very fact that, like 
 all pioneers, the railway was met by scoffs and jeers 
 carries the analogy still further, and promotes 
 almost a sense of affection and loyalty to the great 
 enterprise. 
 
 The proper treatment of the subject involves the 
 whole story of the federation of Canada. It could 
 hardly be briefly described, and yet it is so well 
 known that it seems hardly necessary to do more 
 than recapitulate it here. 
 
 57 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 The gigantic scheme had been the dream of 
 politicians, the objective of Lord Durham's famous 
 Proclamation, and the kernel of Sir John Macdonald's 
 magnificent and far-reaching policy. 
 
 During his short regime as Govenor-General, 
 Lord Durham, in 1840, had brought about the union 
 of Upper and Lower Canada, but at the same time 
 he had made a larger and more comprehensive 
 suggestion. 
 
 He wrote in his report : 
 
 " I discussed the general improvement of the 
 government of the colonies with the deputations 
 from the Lower Provinces and with various leading 
 individuals and public bodies in both the Canadas, 
 and I was gratified by finding the leading minds of 
 the various Colonies generally inclined to a scheme 
 that would elevate their countries into something 
 like national existence. I am inclined to go further 
 and enquire whether all those objects would not 
 more surely be obtained by extending this legis- 
 lative union over all the British Provinces in 
 North America, and whether the advantages which 
 I anticipate for two of them might not and 
 should not in justice be extended over all. It 
 would enable all the Provinces to co-operate, and 
 above all it would form a great and powerful 
 people possessing the means of securing a respon- 
 sible Government for itself, and which under the 
 protection of the British Empire might fin some 
 measure counterbalance the preponderality and in- 
 creasing influence of the United States on the 
 American Continent." 
 
 His masterly suggestion was not carried out at 
 the time, but it remained an ideal in the minds of 
 far-seeing men, and when in 1864 the Maritime 
 provinces of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and 
 
 58 
 
STORY OF THE C.P.R 
 
 Prince Edward Island proposed a conference to 
 consider a union, the Government of Canada urged 
 the advantages of a general confederation of all 
 the provinces. Federation was in the air and 
 finally carried everything before it in spite of a 
 natural hesitancy on the part of some of the pro- 
 vinces. 
 
 On paper the scheme looked both tempting and 
 easy, but there were circumstances which made it 
 unusually difficult, and it is scarcely possible to 
 exaggerate the importance at that time of wise 
 statesmanship and a far-seeing policy. Canada 
 was full of alluring possibilities, but the growth of 
 trade, like everything else, was hampered by the 
 inadequacy of the postal and telegraph systems, 
 while various systems of law, civil and criminal, 
 hampered the administration of justice. Added to 
 this there was serious tension between the United 
 States and the Provinces of Upper and Lower 
 Canada, and not only was commercial war 
 threatened, but it was believed that actual invasion 
 might follow on the Alabama exploits and the raids of 
 the Fenians. Canadian sympathy with the South 
 heightened the ill-feeling with America, and the 
 abrogation of the commercial treaty between the two 
 countries was undoubtedly to starve Canada into 
 union. 
 
 Following on this, and as a result of it, came the 
 splendid vision of an united Canada. The scheme 
 was so vast that at first both statesmen and people 
 were inclined to approach it warily. Sir John 
 Macdonald saw future trouble in Quebec, but 
 George Brown put into the whole matter his warmth 
 and enthusiasm and his belief in federation, and 
 shortly afterwards we find Sir John, although at 
 first he advanced with greater caution than Brown, 
 
 59 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 speaking proudly of the great alliance, and saying 
 that he was satisfied that Canada's future progress 
 depended upon this. 
 
 Upper and Lower Canada seemed resolved on 
 federation, which indeed was an obvious advantage 
 to both. In the Maritime Provinces local patriotism 
 showed itself in a strong desire to retain their own 
 laws and institutions and their ancestral associations. 
 The loss of individuality is always a bugbear to 
 those who, by their individuality have come to 
 success. Besides this, the commercial prosperity 
 of the Maritime Provinces tended towards free 
 trade, and that of the Canadas to protection. Nova 
 Scotia and New Brunswick had nominative Upper 
 Chambers, while in the Canadas the Legislative 
 Council was elective. 
 
 Upon this scene, with its discontent and agita- 
 tion, Sir Charles Tupper's conviction, to which he 
 stuck through thick and thin, that it was to the 
 advantage of all the provinces, whether large or small, 
 to join in the federal scheme, carried weight. Joseph 
 Howe, one of the ablest of Nova Scotia's politicians, 
 prolonged the agitation in the Maritime Provinces 
 beyond the time that the Provinces wanted to agi- 
 tate. 
 
 Amidst the storm and the strife which ensued, 
 Sir John Macdonald stood firm, beholding always 
 the idea of a great nationality in Canada, com- 
 manding the respect of the world. 
 
 In the end Upper and Lower Canada accepted 
 the scheme with enthusiasm, Nova Scotia and New 
 Brunswick more slowly, while Prince Edward 
 Island joined later on, though when confederation 
 was first carried, newspapers on the island printed 
 their current numbers with a black edge, and 
 patriotism, mingled with provincialism, fostered 
 
 60 
 
STORY OF THE C.P.R. 
 
 objections which were not always substantiated by 
 any real fact or grievance. 
 
 But most important of all was the fact that 
 Western Canada was invited to join the Federation, 
 and Western Canada made conditions. These 
 conditions were to prove one of the most significant 
 and far-reaching events in the life of the new 
 Dominion. British Columbia, which until then had 
 had a government of its own, an English Governor, 
 and a British warship, should not it have the promise 
 to become part of new Canada ? But the condition 
 which she made was this : that she should be joined 
 thereto by a transcontinental railway within ten 
 years. The condition was accepted, and, in the 
 words of George Brown : " Our scheme has given 
 prodigious satisfaction ; everyone is delighted, and 
 everything Canadian has gone up in public estima- 
 tion immensely. ,, The complicated question, in 
 spite of some sullen murmurs, was at last decided ; 
 even jealousy was satisfied, and race feeling put 
 on one side when the friendliness, not to say 
 generosity, of the Federal Scheme was made 
 known. 
 
 In February the completed Bill was submitted 
 to the House, and on March 29th it received the 
 Royal Assent under the title of the British North 
 American Act of 1867. Federation had been 
 carried, and now it remained to be seen whether 
 the conditions which British Columbia had im- 
 sposed could be carried out. Many electors were 
 afraid of the scheme for completing a railway across 
 the Continent, and nothing in Sir John Macdonald's 
 ministry was more sharply criticised than the rail- 
 way inducement held out to British Columbia. 
 Party feeling ran high, but in spite of this the 
 railway, with a sort of splendid inevitableness, went 
 
 61 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 forward. The railway track, 3000 miles long, 
 through a comparatively unknown country and 
 over a vast range of mountains, was begun in 1871, 
 and round the completing of it are gathered not 
 only the names, but the lives of some of the most 
 important Canadians who have yet lived. Everyone 
 knows the storm of objections which greeted its 
 commencement. The English Press became hysteri- 
 cal over the mad project of a transcontinental 
 railway in Canada, which was described as being 
 just as ridiculous as a scheme for the utilisation of 
 icebergs. The country through which it ran was 
 declared to be as forbidding as any place on earth 
 and quite unfit to live in, while the Canadians 
 themselves were accused of being perfectly well 
 aware that the Canadian Pacific Railway would 
 never yield one cent of interest on the money sunk 
 in it. Not content with this description, various 
 towns were signalled out for a frank exposure of 
 their pretensions, and it was confidently stated that 
 where men did not die of frost-bite in the winter 
 they were generally killed by malaria in the 
 summer. 
 
 Through this austere, inhospitable, ice-bound 
 land the railway resolved to run, and from that 
 moment it becomes to us not merely a great under- 
 taking, but a sentient thing filled, we may say, with 
 a high purpose and with a goal in view to which at 
 all hazards it meant to arrive. 
 
 In its early beginnings it was met not only by 
 discouragement but by failure. Round it factions 
 of every sort met and fought, politics and principles, 
 friendships and reputations were laid upon the two 
 long lines of rails, fortunes were made and lost 
 upon it, and if blood was not actually spilt, hearts 
 were broken on Canada's first great high road. 
 
 62 
 
STORY OF THE C.P.R. 
 
 Like all stories of endeavour involving sacrifices, 
 there was a sustaining courage running through the 
 whole project which lifted it far above mere money- 
 making, and while health and spirits failed only the 
 indomitable perseverance of the men who made 
 the Canadian Pacific Railway saved it from failure 
 and carried it triumphantly through. 
 
 The scheme, long before its completion, was, 
 however, to be met by political difficulties which 
 could at first hardly have been foreseen. Graver 
 matters were to follow, and the tragedy of scandal 
 of a personal character, not unmixed with dishonour, 
 makes the story of the Canadian Pacific Railway 
 one of the most remarkable in the world. 
 
 In the first instance, it was stipulated that it 
 should be built, not by Government, but by a 
 State-aided company, and during 1871 and 1872 
 two such companies received charters from the 
 Dominion Government, one headed by Senator 
 D. W. Macpherson, of Toronto, and one by Sir 
 Hugh Allan, of Montreal. Under the skilful and 
 diplomatic leadership of Sir John Macdonald the 
 two companies were amalgamated, but a difficult 
 point arose as to whether Allan or Macpherson 
 should be President. Neither was inclined to yield, 
 and finally a new company was started with Sir 
 Hugh Allan as President of the Board of Directors. 
 The construction at first was very slow, but all 
 might have gone well but for the open page in the 
 history of the Line, which involved Sir John A. 
 Macdonald in the unhappy history of the Canadian 
 Pacific scandals, and plunged his Government into 
 the worst sort of trouble — political dishonour. 
 
 To understand the situation it is necessary first 
 of all to understand the character of a man like Sir 
 John Macdonald. 
 
 63 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 His place in the history of Canada is so large that 
 it is hardly possible to think of the country without 
 him. He loved Canada and he believed in her, and 
 Canada returned his affection with a warmth and 
 a sincerity which has never been equalled in that 
 country. They knew his faults, but they knew also 
 that those faults were never mean or petty. Always 
 Canada came first with him ; his worst mistakes 
 were never connected with the thought of self, but 
 were all for the sake of the land which he loved. 
 As a statesman there are few to equal him. He 
 dared to attempt great changes and great reforms, 
 doing so with courage, believing that those re- 
 forms and those changes were for the public 
 good. 
 
 All his greatest qualities were given unreservedly 
 to Canada, his imaginative power, his quick judg- 
 ment and his loyalty. It was said at the gloomiest 
 crisis of his life that there did not exist in Canada 
 a man who had given more of his time, more of 
 his heart, or more of his wealth, to the good of 
 Canada. 
 
 He saw what not everyone else was able to see, 
 that loyalty to the Dominion meant also loyalty 
 to Great Britain, and the saying most often quoted 
 about him — " British I was born, British I will die " 
 — strikes the keynote of his life. 
 
 That his failings were many no one will deny, 
 least of all perhaps those who loved him best. 
 But already the memory of these failings has been 
 turned into more of a kindly jest, without bitterness 
 in it, than any fault-finding. The stories told of 
 him are always touched with a sense of personal 
 regard which transcended every other consideration 
 when it came to the point of criticising Sir John 
 Macdonald. 
 
 6 4 
 
STORY OF THE C.P.R. 
 
 Perhaps above all things he was a man who 
 never shirked responsibility, and he expected this 
 characteristic in everyone who served him. A 
 man, in a responsible position, once telegraphed 
 to him a long message, describing his difficulties 
 in connection with the Indians, and the telegram 
 ran : " Wire advising me what to do." 
 
 Sir John's answer was brief and may at first have 
 puzzled the man who received it. It contained the 
 brief message : " Go and get your hair cut." 
 
 On many occasions he was able to turn the joke 
 upon his friends, in a manner very adroit. As, for 
 instance, upon one occasion when, having dined 
 somewhat freely, his after-dinner speech was so 
 confused that it was very difficult for the reporters 
 to take it down. The following day one of these 
 gentlemen called upon him and asked if he would 
 look over the speech and correct it. Sir John 
 looked at the queer jumble through his spectacles 
 and then, turning to the reporter, he said : ■ Young 
 man, let me give you one piece of advice, never 
 take down a speech when you are drunk or else 
 you will make a mess of it, as you've done with 
 this." 
 
 On another occasion he made so clever a retort 
 about his personal appearance that it seems worth 
 quoting here. He had an unusually large nose, and 
 a friend, going in one day when he was being 
 shaved and seeing the barber in his usual position, 
 remarked to Sir John : " That's the only man, Sir 
 John, whom I have ever seen lead you by the 
 nose." 
 
 " Yes," said Sir John, " and he finds it rather 
 a handful." 
 
 It was one of his characteristics that he had an 
 adroit way of getting the better of everyone. An 
 
 f 65 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 opponent of his writing of him one day remarked : 
 "As usual, Sir John gets the oyster and I get the 
 shell.'; 
 
 This statesman, benevolent, whimsical, intrepid 
 and far-seeing, was the man who once had to leave 
 the service of his country in disgrace. Sir Hugh 
 Allan had been nominated President of the Board 
 of Directors of the new Canadian Pacific Railway, 
 and Mr. Huntingdon, in a remarkable speech, 
 accused him of having given money for electioneer- 
 ing purposes to Sir John. 
 
 No one at first could believe what had been said, 
 but the charges were too serious to pass over. It 
 was declared that the Government had trafficked 
 with foreigners in Canada's most precious interests, 
 and had obtained gold as the price of their treachery ; 
 that an agreement had been entered into between 
 Sir Hugh Allan and other Canadian promoters and 
 G. W. Macmillan, the latter agreeing to furnish all 
 the funds necessary for the construction of the 
 contemplated railway and to give the former a 
 certain percentage of interest ; and finally, that the 
 Government were aware of the negotiations going 
 on between these parties. 
 
 Many people still living remember the terrible 
 time through which the Government of Canada 
 then passed. 
 
 Sir John denied absolutely that there was any 
 corrupt bargain between Sir Hugh Allan and 
 himself. 
 
 Had a bomb-shell exploded it could scarcely have 
 startled more, not only the House of Parliament, 
 where the words were spoken, but the whole of 
 Canada. 
 
 But in spite of Sir John's strong personal pleading 
 and the fact that Sir Hugh Allan, when he made 
 
 66 
 
STORY OF THE C.P.R. 
 
 the large contribution to the party fund, knew that 
 the railway contract could only be given to an 
 amalgamated company, Canada pronounced against 
 the Prime Minister, who immediately resigned. 
 There was no question that the money had been 
 paid to the Government, and even Sir John's most 
 staunch followers felt that they could not support 
 him. 
 
 This scandal hurt Sir John's reputation, but he 
 out-lived it, and it is a credit to himself^as well as 
 to those whom he led, that he was able to stand on 
 his feet after he had fallen in public estimation, 
 and that he was able to triumph over his mistakes. 
 
 Four years of precious time were frittered away 
 in political squabbles, and only a small amount of 
 grading at the eastern end of the Line was attempted 
 in that time. By 1879 tne en ti re mileage only 
 amounted to 700 miles of track, and now British 
 Columbia became impatient, and insisted upon 
 the redemption of Canada's promise to join East 
 and West together by a railway system. It was 
 none too soon to do so. British Columbia had, in 
 a sense, been re-discovered since gold had been 
 found there. Adventurous American citizens, owing 
 to their near proximity, were of course first in the 
 field, and there is no doubt about it that absorption 
 by the United States of this important country was 
 not only a remote contingency but a peril very near 
 at hand. 
 
 At the same time there were difficulties in Eastern 
 Canada. Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland 
 set out against Confederation, and Newfoundland 
 still remains outside it. Prince Edward Island came 
 into the Union in 1873, but it would have been 
 impossible to bring British Columbia into the 
 Union without the meeting of the railway. How 
 
 67 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 indeed, could it have been expected that any form 
 of Union was possible with two countries divided 
 by a vast range of mountains and an unknown 
 prairie. So detached did the two countries seem 
 from each other that we find the same opposition 
 to federation at both the extreme points ; Prince 
 Edward Island in the East, and Vancouver Island 
 in the West, professed themselves altogether un- 
 favourable to the idea, and only the determination 
 of a handful of men at that moment saved the 
 country from a disintegration. It is a little difficult 
 to realise the absolute lack of communication that 
 then existed between the East and West. There 
 were only trails suitable for the roughest form of 
 conveyance, and commerce in the ordinary sense 
 of the word was practically impossible. All com- 
 munication between British Columbia and Eastern 
 Canada had to be conducted via San Francisco 
 or the Isthmus of Panama. But, strangely enough, 
 the simple expedient of a railway that would merge 
 the two countries together was vehemently opposed 
 by the Liberal Party. It was freely stated that such 
 an enterprise would result in the ruin of the country. 
 As a sequence there was a general election in 1872, 
 when those men who were frankly accused of 
 attempting the impossible were returned to power. 
 An excellent move was made by bringing the Hon. 
 Joseph Howe into the Government in 1869, and 
 he and Sir Charles Tupper between them carried 
 every seat in the province in Nova Scotia. All 
 promised well until 1873, when the Canadian 
 Pacific scandal, to which we have before referred, 
 threw everything back, and produced so much heat 
 and discord in the country that it was perhaps 
 impossible at that time rightly to gauge the exact 
 brainworthiness of the men at the head of affairs. 
 
 68 
 
STORY OF THE C.P.R. 
 
 Undoubtedly Sir John Macdonald dictated, or wrote, 
 the famous despatch to Sir Hugh Allan, then Presi- 
 dent of the Line, asking him to send 10,000 dollars 
 more. It was supremely evident that the 10,000 
 dollars were paid by Sir Hugh for electioneering 
 purposes. 
 
 The plea that two blacks will make a white is 
 always a feeble one ; nevertheless, it must be 
 admitted that it is possible that the Government 
 were not alone in the matter of receiving monetary 
 support, but the accusation of bribery could not 
 be met, and, to the credit of the Canadians and of 
 Sir John himself, he tendered his resignation, and 
 it was accepted. 
 
 The Mackenzie party now came into power, and 
 remained until 1878, during which time they did 
 not build one yard of railway in British Columbia, 
 and it was not until Sir John Macdonald came back 
 triumphantly to power on the strength of his 
 National policy that anything was done about the 
 railway. A sweeping change was made when it 
 was resolved to take it out of the hands of the 
 Government altogether, the whole responsibility 
 of the enterprise being undertaken by Mr. George 
 Stephen (Lord Mountstephen), Mr. Donald A. 
 Smith (Lord Strathcona), with Mr. William van 
 Home as actual Director of the Line. Other names 
 on what later became known as the Canadian 
 Pacific Railway Syndicate were : Mr. Duncan 
 Mclntyre, Sir John Rose and Baron Reinach, of 
 Paris. Mr. J. J. Hill did not appear publicly on the 
 Syndicate, and he afterwards withdrew from it to 
 build the Great Northern Railway. 
 
 The Hon. Edward Blake was at this time the 
 chief opposer of the railway policy ; he publicly 
 declared that the whole country was to be ruined 
 
 69 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 for the sake of 12,000 white people out in British 
 Columbia. In the face of this opposition Sir John 
 Macdonald, the Hon. John Pope and Sir Charles 
 Tupper went to England to organise the financial 
 business of the railway. Certainly at first there 
 was no indecent haste betrayed by Great Britain in 
 taking the matter up, and almost to the time of 
 opening the railway the bonds were exclusively in 
 the hands of foreigners. But even those who 
 believed in the success of the undertaking felt 
 bound to declare that the Line could not be made 
 to pay operating charges until the North- West had a 
 population of two million people. 
 
 At this time the Government induced Parliament 
 to alter in some respects the route which the railway 
 should take. 
 
 The story of the actual construction of the 
 Canadian Pacific Railway can be found in many 
 engineering works and books about Canada. We 
 have borrowed largely from one before us : — 
 
 The new Railway Company stipulated that it 
 should receive 25,000,000 dollars in gold, and 
 equal numbers of acres of good prairie land ; that 
 it should be accommodated with free right of way 
 and sites for stations, docks, etc. That all materials 
 should be admitted untaxed ; that the Company's 
 lands should be exempt from taxation, and, last but 
 not least, that the Government should make it a 
 present of the 700 miles of partly completed track. 
 
 The Government on its side exacted the con- 
 dition that the line should be open for traffic by 
 May, 1 89 1, which meant that more than 250 miles 
 of rail must be laid every year. 
 
 As one of the Company's main assets — the land — 
 depended for its value upon the railway, and so 
 could not be realised to any profit until the railway 
 
 70 
 
STORY OF THE C.P.R. 
 
 should be built, the Company found itself in heavy 
 financial straits. Its stock fell heavily, and a loan 
 of £6,000,000 had to be made from the Govern- 
 ment, which took advantage of the position to 
 clip five years off the time originally allowed for 
 construction. The Government engineer, now 
 known as Sir Sandford Fleming, started with a 
 small exploratory expedition across the Continent, 
 and took the Line across the prairies and the 
 Rockies, which he eventually selected in preference 
 to ten other alternative routes suggested by Surveys 
 working under his direction further north. Work 
 began in 1874, ana * tnat Y ear there was a fall in the 
 price of steel rails, 50,000 tons of these being 
 bought from English companies, who were allowed 
 to import duty free. The first efforts of the Govern- 
 ment were devoted to that portion of the land which 
 runs from Fort William, at the head of Lake 
 Superior, into Manitoba, and in 1876 the first loco- 
 motive was landed at Fort William. From Fort 
 William to Fort Garry (Winnipeg) there was a heavy 
 
 Ciece of engineering work, the engineers being met 
 y the very serious difficulty of the Muskegs. These 
 are lakes hidden under a thick surface of decayed 
 vegetable matter, not solid enough to carry a railroad 
 track. They had to be filled up with vast quantities 
 of timber, and those who worked on this business 
 often declared that they believed they were trying 
 to fill up bottomless pits. As far as Winnipeg the 
 need for speed was not so much felt, and the work 
 could go on in comparative peace, but everything 
 was changed when British Columbia, tired with 
 delay, threatened to withdraw from the Union. 
 This entailed a fresh effort, and a supreme attempt 
 on the part of the Company to hasten forward the 
 construction of the Line. The prairie section was 
 
 7i 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 undertaken by Messrs. Langdon and Shepherd, 
 and the crossing of the Rockies was engineered by 
 the North American Railway Contracting Com- 
 pany, under Mr. James Ross. The engineering 
 department consisted of five divisional engineers, 
 each in charge of thirty miles, divided into ten- 
 mile sections under an assistant engineer, who had 
 his own camp of men to look after. In 1882 there 
 were four thousand men at work, with seventeen 
 hundred teams, consisting each of a pair of horses 
 and a large four-wheeled waggon. Many settlers, 
 especially in Manitoba, joined the work, and were 
 glad to find remunerative jobs for themselves and 
 their horses during the months when work on their 
 farms was slack. On the other hand, there were 
 very many men of quite another class working on 
 the Line — men of every colour, caste and creed — 
 men of muscle and endurance, but without, perhaps, 
 any great veneration for law and order. That they 
 were a difficult lot to manage there is no doubt ; 
 the country through which they passed was in 
 many cases a wilderness, where rough-handed 
 justice might be meted out, but where very little 
 backing was possible in the matter of legislation. 
 Providentially the North- West Mounted Police had 
 by that time been formed, and it was largely owing 
 to their exertions, and the fine standard of conduct 
 which they maintained that they were instrumental 
 in keeping order during a most difficult time. We 
 have alluded to the North-West Mounted Police in 
 another chapter, but perhaps higher testimony 
 was never given them than by the men over whom 
 they exercised very firm control during the making 
 of the Canadian Pacific Railway. 
 
 The work proceeded at high pressure, and in the 
 face of peculiarly trying circumstances. The tunnels 
 
 72 
 
STORY OF THE C.P.R, 
 
 of the railway were not only expensive, but they 
 required infinite patience to make, because every 
 foot of them had to be timbered up as it was driven, 
 in order to prevent the caving in of the clay soil. 
 The winter temperature in which the men worked 
 varied from a few degrees above to about fifty 
 degrees below zero. A steam saw-mill was erected 
 on the margin of Kicking Horse Lake, cutting up 
 the timber into poles and sleepers, bridges and 
 trestles, and here also was erected a dynamite 
 factory to obviate the dangers of transporting high 
 explosives by rail. The descent of the Kicking 
 Horse River is so rapid that the engineers found that 
 enormous tunnelling operations would be necessary, 
 and here they had to build a temporary line in order 
 to conform with certain items in the contract. The 
 cost of construction increased as time went on. At 
 Big Hill a dozen pusher locomotives had to be kept 
 on hand as auxiliaries, three engines being required 
 to do the work of one on other sections of the 
 Line. From the top of Kicking Horse Pass to 
 the mouth of the Beaver (73! miles) there are seven 
 tunnels totalling 2552 feet. The Kicking Horse 
 River is crossed nine times, six of these crossings 
 being over a distance of only twelve miles. The 
 total length of bridging and trestling work from the 
 summit to the first crossing of the Columbia River 
 (62 miles) was 8039 lineal feet. The greatest feat 
 in trestle bridging was performed near Bear Creek, 
 about eight miles east of the summit of the Selkirk 
 range. Here the railroad, at an altitude of 3673 
 feet, crossed several narrow gorges carved out of 
 foaming rivers, and at Stoney Creek there was a 
 timber railway bridge built which at the time was 
 known as the finest specimen of its kind in the 
 world. Solid ice covered the rivers, during much 
 
 73 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 of the time that the task of pile driving and erection 
 went on, holes having to be cut in the ice for struc- 
 tural woodwork. The men were walking on ice 
 most of the day, boring auger holes with half- 
 frozen hands. 
 
 The crossing of the Gold Range by the Eagle 
 Pass was a simple matter compared with the titanic 
 engineering accomplished on the Kicking Horse 
 and Rogers Passes. It is stated that trains have to 
 climb so steep a gradient round the Loops, that 
 it is quite possible for an active man to drop off a 
 train at one point, and, by climbing a hundred feet 
 or so of steep bank, to reach a spot which the train 
 must travel a mile or more to attain. 
 
 Hundreds of statistics can be furnished by anyone 
 interested in engineering work on the subject of 
 the Canadian Pacific Railway. Hundreds of people 
 could give technical details relating to it far better 
 than we are able to do, but these statistics and these 
 figures are only one part, and perhaps the smallest 
 part of the matter. We have, for instance, spoken 
 of Rogers Pass, but who shall eventually tell the 
 story of this engineer who, being simply told to get 
 there, and to get there in time, found by sheer force 
 of will, energy and enterprise, a road through the 
 mountains. It is difficult to convey the anxiety 
 which depended upon his survey for its success. 
 There was no time for properly drawn plans to be 
 made out. There was not even a direct certainty 
 that the pass would prove feasible. Major Rogers 
 said he had found a way, and his word was accepted, 
 but whether, or how far, a railway would be able 
 to follow on that way was a matter of faith. At one 
 time it even seemed possible that it might be 
 necessary to drive a tunnel under the Rocky Moun- 
 tains, but the vast expense of this scheme rendered 
 
 74 
 
STORY OF THE C.P.R, 
 
 it impracticable, and there was nothing for it but 
 to follow where Major Rogers led. It is said of 
 Sir William van Home, the General Manager at 
 that time, that not even the Rocky Mountains 
 appalled him. There were some good men who 
 stood by each other in those days : Sir James 
 Shaughnessy, Mr. Harry Abbott, Mr. James Ross, 
 and Messrs. Mclntyre, Mann, Holt, Cambie and 
 White. They worked together and seemed to 
 enjoy difficulties. Even when money failed there 
 was no grumbling or discontent, but only the 
 honest-hearted belief in the work they were doing. 
 Lord Mountstephen might exclaim in despair 
 " my coat does not belong to me," men might be 
 unpaid, and the health and nerves of those respon- 
 sible for the undertaking might break down, there 
 were still left the unflinching courage which fights 
 on and never counts the cost nor even the odds 
 against it until victory is won. 
 
 Sir William van Home came to a friend of ours 
 engaged on the construction of the railway one day, 
 and said cheerfully : "I am going to do a little 
 blood-letting, and I intend to begin with you." 
 He then proceeded to cut down all salaries by 20 per 
 cent, and in the face even of depleted purses the 
 work went forward. A story is told of one of the 
 engineers, whose work in laying lines had to teach 
 a certain point by a given time. The rails failed to 
 arrive ; he had nothing left to work with. But he 
 laid down the few he had left, and ran a trolly over 
 them ; then, taking up those behind, over which 
 he had passed, he laid them in front of the trolley, 
 and so continued until eventually to the prescribed 
 time he and his trolly were at the point indicated, 
 though behind him was a long gap in the steel. 
 
 Another story, which concerns Major Rogers, 
 
 75 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 shows something of the spirit of those days. The 
 pass he had found was attempted. It was the old 
 case of English muddling — but always muddling 
 through ! The line of railway had to be made by 
 a certain given time. It was finished with five 
 years to spare, and it was glorious British stupidity 
 that did it, because British stupidity is far too dense 
 to see difficulties until they are over, and even then 
 they have to be pointed out. 
 
 The Canadian Pacific Railway Company sent 
 Major Rogers a cheque for £1000 in apprecia- 
 tion of his services in having discovered the pass 
 through the Rockies. At the end of their financial 
 year they were surprised to find the cheque had 
 not been cashed. They wrote to Major Rogers, 
 asking for an explanation, and his reply was : 
 " I have had it framed and glazed and hung in 
 my room. You did not suppose I was going to 
 do anything so silly as to cash a thing so valuable.' ' 
 But although this was the temper of the time and 
 the men who worked, the situation at Ottawa was 
 becoming daily more serious. It was stated deci- 
 sively that the railway could not pay until the 
 North-West had a population of two million people. 
 Yet now the enterprise was committed to enormous 
 expenditure, and could neither stop nor go back. 
 Neither New York nor London would guarantee 
 the money, and if despair ever seized upon the 
 makers of the C.P.R., it was now. A certain baffling 
 indifference met them everywhere. Lord Mount- 
 stephen, waiting in the Parliament Buildings from 
 eleven o'clock in the morning till two in the after- 
 noon, found out casually that his application had 
 been forgotten, and that no one was now in the 
 House to give it any consideration. Sir William 
 van Home laid before Sir John Macdonald a list of 
 
 76 
 
STORY OF THE C.P.R. 
 
 names of the men who would be ruined if money 
 was not forthcoming to finish. Sir Charles Tupper, 
 then acting High Commissioner, came to Ottawa 
 to find the Directors at the end of their tether, and 
 everyone in despair. He suggested that Parliament 
 should be asked to authorise the Government to 
 advance thirty million dollars for four years at 
 4 per cent, on the difficult condition that the Com- 
 pany should agree to finish the road five years 
 sooner than the contract called for. 
 
 The proposal was met by derision, but the 
 Government gave the suggestion its support, and 
 a settlement was made by which the Company 
 surrendered its land to the value of seven and a half 
 million dollars at one and a half dollars an acre. 
 This was done, and the land was actually bought 
 back again at a later date by the railway. 
 
 Later on came happier days, and an easier time, 
 when twenty-five million dollars of C.P.R. 5 per cent 
 bonds were floated. Later, through the agency of 
 Sir Charles Tupper, a contract with Bearings and 
 Glims was signed, by which they promised to take 
 half of the Issue at ninety-one, with a privilege of 
 issuing the second half at a later date. 
 
 But what actually made the scheme a success, 
 or even a possibility, was doubtless the fact that 
 the National policy now held sway in Canada. 
 The land and its people were beginning to come 
 into their own ; the old feeling of unrest was 
 over, the conservative fiscal policy was teaching 
 Canadians, and giving to them that sense of oppor- 
 tunity, of which they were capable of taking such 
 intelligent advantage. Trade had now become a 
 possibility ; industrial enterprise was going for- 
 ward. Farming was protected, and there was no 
 longer the conviction that the United States was 
 
 77 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 the only place where a man could build up his 
 fortune. There seemed some object now in a 
 young man trying to do his best. Commercial 
 grievances were at an end, and a country of enor- 
 mous potential wealth was now going to have that 
 wealth developed. From East to West a message 
 of hope rang, and its echo has never died away. 
 
 There will always be a number of clever people 
 who occupy their valuable time in pointing out 
 impossibilities and in uttering well-meaning warn- 
 ings about dangers and difficulties. Fortunately 
 there still remains a large class of stupid, blundering 
 people, who go straight on and do the things. Some 
 of these worked on the C.P.R. Some of them made 
 South Africa. One delicate man went there because 
 everyone said he could not grow rice. Cecil Rhodes 
 said, " I intend to grow rice." And he did. In 
 after years he was always fond of saying when 
 insuperable objections were made to anything he 
 had in hand : They used to say I could not grow 
 rice in South Africa/ ' And that settled the matter 
 as far as he was concerned. 
 
 There used to be a saying that there would never 
 lack a man to the House of David. The saying 
 almost seems to hold good of the Anglo-Saxon race. 
 The need arises, and with it comes the man, often 
 of delicate physique, sometimes of humble origin, 
 nearly always of humble mind. One who sets out 
 quite quietly to do something for the land which 
 he loves so much. A single-armed sailor, with an 
 empty sleeve and a blind eye raised his flag over the 
 waters and claimed the sea for England. Another 
 sets out to grow rice, and gains a kingdom. The 
 man who won Canada on the heights of Abraham 
 was a chronic invalid, and an English pilot dies in 
 an open boat in Hudson Bay. 
 
 78 
 
STORY OF THE C.P.R 
 
 So that, on the whole, we may, I think, satisfy 
 ourselves that there are a few men and women of 
 courage and enterprise left amongst our poor race, 
 of which we hear so many murmurings. 
 
 We like to think that amongst them we may 
 class some of the men and women who have made 
 Canada. 
 
 79 
 
Chapter V Lord Strathcona : A Sketch 
 
 TO write the life of the late Lord Strathcona 
 would be to write the history of modern 
 Canada. Few persons, either living or 
 dead, have been more intimately associated with its 
 development, and fewer still have laboured as Lord 
 Strathcona laboured for the prestige of the country 
 which he loved. He lived at a critical moment in 
 Canada's story, and such critical moments have 
 ever found, in the development of the world by 
 Anglo-Saxon races, the necessary man, the strong 
 individual, the leader, whether soldier or civilian, 
 fit to carry great matters through and to carry them 
 through greatly. 
 
 Yet these leaders have seldom been the men who 
 would have been chosen by a consensus of public 
 opinion for their suitability to the task before them. 
 The need arises and the unexpected man appears. 
 
 Lord Strathcona 's figure is not an isolated one in 
 the page which it adorns. It would be invidious 
 to mention him above the name of his famous 
 cousin, Lord Mountstephen, or of his able col- 
 league, Sir William van Home. But his recent 
 death has inspired a fresh interest in the life of the 
 veteran who has passed away, and if a biographical 
 sketch is in some sort a funeral oration, the sad 
 honours of the occasion belong to him alone. The 
 honour must necessarily be inadequate and the 
 meed of praise wholly imperfect, because the future 
 
 80 
 
LORD STRATHCONA : A SKETCH 
 
 alone will show how invaluable to his country was 
 the service of such a man as the late Lord Strath- 
 cona. 
 
 The harvest of Lord Strathcona's life, in so far as 
 recognition went, came late. Most people are in- 
 clined to regard him as a brilliant man, always 
 before the eyes of the world, always successful, not 
 born perhaps to any great position, but coming into 
 his own, and deservedly a successful man from the 
 first. Lord Strathcona was forty-eight years old 
 before he was made even Chief Factor in a fur com- 
 pany, and he was forty-eight when he leapt with all 
 the vigour of youth into fresh activities bearing 
 responsibilities for which he appeared to have had 
 but little training, and into positions of importance 
 for which he was always equal although not osten- 
 sibly prepared. 
 
 His preparation, indeed, for the life of ceaseless 
 public work before him was one of the most curious 
 and most unusual that we believe has ever fallen to 
 a man's lot. We have heard of men being snowed 
 up for a winter. Donald Alexander Smith, as he 
 was then, was snowed up for thirty winters. And 
 we have heard of men being lost to their relatives 
 and their friends for the space of a few years. 
 When Donald Smith bade his home and his people 
 farewell, the farewell was an eternal one ; he never 
 saw his parents after he quitted Scotland at the age 
 of eighteen. In Labrador he was almost without 
 postal communication with the rest of the world, 
 and he lived amongst trappers, Indians, and fur 
 traders, and saw no one else at the very age when 
 young manhood is most disposed for enjoyment, and 
 in face of the fact that his limited opportunities did 
 not, to use the common expression, seem to " lead 
 to anything." 
 
 G 81 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 At home, it might reasonably seem that the young 
 man would have had better chances, for he had had 
 a sound education and his thrifty parents were pre- 
 pared to make sacrifices for the boy whom they 
 thoroughly believed in. 
 
 " Donald will surprise them yet," his mother 
 used to say sturdily when all her ambitions for her 
 son were overthrown by his choosing to sail for 
 Canada rather than to study law. 
 
 " They will be proud of my Donald yet," she 
 repeated when still another opening came for the 
 young man in the form of an offer of a desk in the 
 house of his merchant uncles, the Grants, of Man- 
 chester, kindly men of good repute, who have been 
 immortalised as the Cheeryble Brothers by the pen 
 of Charles Dickens. But Donald had adventurous 
 blood in his veins. Two of his uncles had travelled 
 far and done excellent pioneer work, and, who knows, 
 the story of their lives may have fired the deter- 
 mined youth to launch out into the deep rather than 
 hug the shores of his native land and enjoy its calm 
 waters. 
 
 There is nothing particularly arresting in the 
 figure of a Scottish boy in the middle classes sailing 
 for the West as many others have done before him. 
 The heroic side of it lies in the fact that for thirty 
 years he never turned back. Yet the discontent 
 which every boy must feel at a hard lot and a solitary 
 existence must have been felt by him as acutely as 
 by any other ; his surroundings were infinitely more 
 austere, and it is conceivable to suppose that his 
 courage often failed him and that the longing to 
 return home must at times have been well-nigh 
 unendurable. Thirteen years in the silence of 
 Labrador might well have broken down the deter- 
 mination of most young men. One might even say 
 
 82 
 
LORD STRATHCONA : A SKETCH 
 
 that it would have been excusable had mind as well 
 as courage given way. Yet we find him at the age 
 of eighteen settling down at a lonely fur-trading 
 station, and here for thirteen years silence falls upon 
 him like a fog. Hardly ever did his own voice 
 pierce the silence. Donald Smith was a quiet 
 Scotsman who disliked talking about himself, and 
 only here and there will be found old friends of his 
 to whom he spoke of his life in the lonely land. 
 
 There was only one post in the year to Labrador, 
 but every week Donald wrote to his mother. The 
 letters must have lain beside him unposted for 
 months after they were written, but at least they 
 formed an outlet for self-expression and affection on 
 the part of the solitary boy. Perhaps the punctually 
 written letter was the result of a promise made 
 before leaving home, and his mother may have 
 asked him to write every week, as is the custom of 
 mothers. He himself uttered a pathetic need when 
 he told an old friend that when he used to get too 
 homesick he always wrote home. One can imagine 
 the routine of the life which included the writing 
 of a weekly letter, and still more characteristic of 
 the man is the well-authenticated story that he 
 always had the Times for a year sent out to him, and 
 each day the sheet was laid upon his breakfast table 
 and was diligently read by him. The news was a 
 year old, but the next year's issue lying upon the 
 top of the orderly pile was never even glanced at 
 by him — a small act of restraint and self-discipline 
 which, no doubt, was not without its bracing effect 
 upon the young fellow's character. 
 
 It is not idle to wonder whether, in seeking for a 
 man to do imperial work for a great nation, a more 
 unlikely spot could have been found than mist- 
 veiled, remote, inaccessible Labrador, where in a 
 
 83 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 rudely constructed wooden shack, conducting a 
 very poor fur trade amongst Indians, the young 
 Scottish clerk stuck to his work and did his duty. 
 
 The ice clings long about the solitary shores of 
 that land, and the mists hang heavily through the 
 interminable winter. The nights are long and 
 intensely cold, the silence is sometimes broken by 
 the cry of an animal travelling soft-footed over the 
 snow, or by the roar of wind upon the shore. Dogs 
 bark furiously at night-time, and when early spring 
 comes and food is scarce they do more than bark 
 and howl. It is not good to meet hungry dogs when 
 the winter supply of fish is gone and they search 
 ravenously for scraps and food under the snow. In 
 summer-time no doubt all was well, and the young 
 clerks at the fur station passed their time canoeing, 
 fishing, and shooting. But there are eight months 
 of winter in Labrador, and it is not unusual for the 
 thermometer to drop to forty degrees below zero. 
 The forests are very quiet then in the long, clear, 
 frosty nights, and the fur stations were two to three 
 hundred miles apart. And once a year the post 
 came in and once it went out. 
 
 A man might live there for a whole summer and 
 get material for a book, or a sportsman might 
 collect provisions for one desperate winter. But 
 thirteen years in Labrador must have had moments 
 of dullness. 
 
 We first hear of Donald Smith quitting the in- 
 hospitable shore on account of his eyes, which gave 
 him great trouble. His modest trip to an oculist 
 entailed the trifling feat of walking nearly one thou- 
 sand miles to Montreal in winter-time ; while the 
 story runs that Sir George Simpson, the Governor, 
 treated the expedition as being " absent without 
 leave." He sent a messenger to meet the young man 
 
 8 4 
 
LORD STRATHCONA : A SKETCH 
 
 and to demand of him why he had quitted his post, 
 and ordered his immediate return, pointing out 
 with perhaps unnecessary plainness that the eyes of 
 one young clerk were of very little importance com- 
 pared with the interests of a great fur-trading com- 
 pany. 
 
 Donald received the message and walked back 
 to Labrador without having seen the oculist. 
 
 At the end of thirteen years he was transferred to 
 another fur-trading station on Hudson Bay, where, 
 he informed a friend of his, he had the companion- 
 ship of a few employes and his own thoughts. But 
 the Governor, Sir George Simpson, had by this time 
 discovered one important thing about the young 
 clerk. However poor the trade, Smith's ledgers 
 were able to show a profit. He learned the right 
 way to treat the Indians. He nursed some and 
 doctored others, and he acted honestly by them. 
 The young man with few opportunities did what he 
 could, and on the death of Sir George Simpson he 
 was made Chief Factor in the fur company. 
 
 And here, at the age of forty-eight, an honourable 
 career might have fitly closed. Donald Smith had 
 done his share of the world's work, and after a hard 
 life he deserved the ease and prosperity to which he 
 had attained. As a matter of fact his real work was 
 only just to begin. 
 
 There were quick happenings in Canada in those 
 days. Events were succeeding each other with 
 startling rapidity. Half a continent which had been 
 forgotten was bursting into life. The buffalo and 
 the moose were disappearing, and in their place 
 were coming new men — men of vigour and of pur- 
 pose, men who saw far and intended to go far, and 
 amongst the foremost of these men was Donald 
 Smith. The story of Canada at this time reads like 
 
 85 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 something more than romance ; it is a story of 
 strong endeavour and great causes, and above and 
 noblest of all, it is the story of strong self-assertive 
 individualism coming to something better than it 
 knows, fighting for bigger issues than those for which 
 it at first set out to fight, and inspired at last by a 
 great imperial idea stronger than self-interest. 
 
 We cannot do more than touch lightly on the 
 Riel Rebellion, which may be briefly described as 
 an agitation to force the settlement of Red River 
 from the Hudson Bay Company's rule and possession. 
 The rapid increase of population in Assiniboia had 
 entirely altered the Company's conditions of tenure ; 
 and when Canada proposed, by an arrangement 
 with the directors in London, to take over this 
 country, it involved a very difficult problem. To 
 the men living there annexation by America would 
 scarcely have seemed less unintelligible than the 
 proposal held out by Canada. For to the West, 
 Canada was still almost an unknown country. In 
 the end an arrangement was made whereby the 
 Company agreed, with some notable reservations 
 including large tracts of land, to surrender their 
 interests in the North- West District to the Crown. 
 Hence ensued a long and important dispute between 
 the " wintering partners " and those who stayed at 
 home and simply enjoyed the revenues of the 
 Company. There was bold talk of establishing a 
 republic in the North- West, and the Governor of 
 Assiniboia travelled in hot haste to the most loyal 
 man of the Hudson Bay Company and put the 
 immediate danger of the case in front of Donald 
 Smith. 
 
 A less strong or a less sober-minded man might 
 easily have been carried away by the turmoil of 
 talk and agitation which ensued ; but not only did 
 
 86 
 
LORD STRATHCONA : A SKETCH 
 
 Smith see with his almost unfailing judgment and 
 far-sighted outlook that in the end the Company 
 might very well profit by the transfer, but he had 
 sufficient belief in the innate justice of his fellow- 
 countrymen to believe that the wintering partners " 
 would get a very fair share of the price paid in 
 London. He could not, however, stay the march 
 of events which was going forward with headlong 
 Vapidity. The Deed of Surrender was signed in 
 London ; and Canada, proud of her new possession, 
 was already flooding it with surveying parties and 
 speculators. The North- West, with perhaps ex- 
 aggerated ideas of its own rights, resented the 
 arrival of new-comers, and the general discontent 
 found voice in the man who has given his name to 
 the rebellion — namely, Louis Riel. Of the involved 
 politics of those times we have, as we have said, 
 not enough space to speak. Suffice it to say that 
 the torch of insurrection was lighted when the 
 French leader prevented by force the entrance of 
 the new Governor, Macdougall, into the territory. 
 Following on this came the capture of Fort Garry, 
 and this remained in the hands of the insurgents 
 until the arrival of the Imperial force under Colonel 
 Wolseley. 
 
 Meanwhile the situation was both complicated 
 and dangerous, and one of the most striking features 
 of the general distraction which ensued was the 
 suspicion with which men of the time regarded 
 each other. Hardly any of the prominent actors 
 escaped calumny, and quarrel succeeded quarrel in a 
 perfect maelstrom of suspicion and distrust. 
 
 Upon this scene entered Donald Smith, always 
 quiet, seeking justice and doing it with that keen 
 sense of fairness which was his chief characteristic. 
 Not waiting for instructions from London, he set 
 
 87 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 out for the North- West with the authority of Sir 
 John Macdonald, who, in order to back his authority, 
 invested him with the title of Commissioner. There 
 must have been a dramatic moment when, un- 
 guarded and without even a message being sent to 
 herald his arrival, he drove up in his sleigh to Fort 
 Garry with no other introduction than his own 
 words to the chief sentry, " Je me nomme Donald 
 A. Smith." 
 
 He struck the right note when, in his opening 
 appeal to the mixed races round him, he first 
 of all claimed to be a Scot amongst Scotsmen, and 
 afterwards in truly Imperial fashion declared that 
 he was neither for Canada nor for the Company, 
 but for the Country ! 
 
 His belief in his country, or, as it has since been 
 more popularly termed, the Empire, was not only 
 sincere but was worth, as he believed, any personal 
 sacrifice. His singleness of aim gave him a dignity 
 such as is not often surpassed, and in the turmoil 
 around him his large and forcible silence was more 
 impressive than brilliant oratory or fierce denuncia- 
 tions. What he believed men should have, that he 
 demanded, no more and no less. What he believed 
 they should give, that also he stated as plainly as he 
 stated demands. But always at the back of his 
 great utterances one seems to feel the great silence 
 engendered by a lonely life and the strength that 
 comes to a man from knowing himself thoroughly. 
 His own thoughts had been his companions at the 
 fur-trading station of his youth. Now his thoughts 
 were to be put into action in the midst of the roar 
 of men. Hot and excited were the meetings over 
 which he presided, and always it seemed he waited 
 until others spoke, and then with the slow, gentle 
 Scottish voice, which those of us who knew him 
 
 88 
 
LORD STRATHCONA : A SKETCH 
 
 remember as one of his characteristics to the end of 
 his life, Donald Smith would announce a programme 
 or deal with a situation deliberately, thoughtfully, 
 slowly, and in a way which imposed silence on the 
 maddest spirits round him. Perhaps of all the 
 tense moments of the Riel Rebellion none can have 
 been more arresting than when Donald Smith read 
 the Queen's message signifying her sorrow and 
 displeasure at the lawless proceedings that had 
 taken place. It was spoken by a man who was 
 nominally a prisoner, and who might actually be 
 made one any day, and yet his voice of authority 
 never failed, while the text of his speech was Justice, 
 undeviating and indifferent. The perturbed and 
 excited Frenchman who opposed him called upon 
 his men to shoot " that Scotsman Smith " if he 
 disobeyed injunctions, but neither this threat nor 
 that other, which was infinitely more serious — 
 namely, the annexation of the North-West by 
 America — seemed to alarm him unduly. He felt 
 throughout that direct communication with the 
 Dominion Government was what really should be 
 aimed at in order to effect a peaceful settlement, 
 and the murder of Scott alone convinced him that 
 peace could only be bought at the price of war. 
 
 In 1870 he returned to Ottawa to find himself 
 surrounded by petty jealousies, and his important 
 services were not even recognised until two years 
 later, although by this time he had practically 
 undermined the forces of the Riel Rebellion. 
 Evidently quite unperturbed by this somewhat 
 ungenerous treatment, Donald Smith plunged 
 eagerly into work for the Company again, and 
 next we find him at a motley meeting of Indians 
 and fur traders at Norway House settling the ques- 
 tion of the " wintering partners ' " claim to a part 
 
 8 9 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 of the £300,000 obtained by the English share- 
 holders. His mission to London was urged in 
 loyal terms by those who, being without great powers 
 themselves, were content to say, " We shall get our 
 fair share if Donald Smith goes to London for us." 
 
 " I will get you £100,000," said Mr. Smith. 
 And in the end he returned with £107,000. 
 
 The Red River Expedition under Colonel 
 Wolseley, in 1870, is a matter of comparatively 
 recent history. Its peaceful termination gave 
 Donald Smith leisure for fresh enterprise. He had 
 by this time gained not only the affection but the 
 confidence of the people of Canada. In after 
 years it was as little possible for him as it is for any 
 strong man in a high position to avoid differences, 
 and, in two cases at least, very serious differences, 
 with those about him. His quarrel with Dr. 
 Schultz, who at heart respected him, lasted, and 
 lasted fiercely, for many a long and controversial 
 year ; and his sharp, painful, and wholly un- 
 expected opposition to Sir John Macdonald doubt- 
 less brought suffering to both ; while the reconcilia- 
 tion which followed was as much a credit to one as 
 to the other. 
 
 His connection with Sir John Macdonald brings 
 us abruptly to the story of the Canadian Pacific 
 Railway. It is a tempting subject on which to linger, 
 but even a cursory treatment of it involves the 
 whole story of the Federation of Canada. 
 
 As everyone knows, it was at first a Government 
 undertaking, and curiously enough the man who 
 was subsequently to be the head and forefront of the 
 private company which built it was at first wholly 
 opposed to its being undertaken by any but Govern- 
 ment. Donald Smith urged that it should be 
 wholly regarded as outside party considerations, 
 
 90 
 
LORD STRATHCONA : A SKETCH 
 
 and stated that nothing short of a guarantee from 
 the Government of interest on the whole amount 
 of the bonds could induce capitalists to embark in 
 the enterprise. It was only after each Government 
 in turn had failed to construct the railway that he 
 saw clearly that individual enterprise alone could 
 carry it through. Before, however, this daring 
 scheme — involving as it did tremendous financial 
 issues — could materialise, came the turbulent Parlia- 
 mentary Session of 1873, and with it the publication 
 of the Canadian Pacific Railway scandals, when Sir 
 John Macdonald's Ministry was charged with 
 receiving funds for electioneering purposes, in 
 return for a charter to construct the railway. A 
 period of almost unparalleled excitement ensued, 
 and the burning question centred round the possi- 
 bility of saving Sir John Macdonald's party. His 
 following was large, his adherents were faithful, 
 and whatever may have been his mistakes he was 
 a man whom Canada trusted, and rightly trusted, 
 to act for her best interests. 
 
 Donald Smith was then Member for Selkirk and 
 an intimate friend of Sir John. The casting vote 
 would lie with him, and there was a breathless 
 sense of uncertainty as to whether the amendment 
 which would retain Sir John in power would be 
 defeated or not. Donald Smith was telegraphed 
 for and was closeted with the Premier for some 
 hours, but the result of the interview remained a 
 secret and the fate of the Government was still un- 
 decided. When Parliament met, Sir John, in an 
 impassioned speech, appealed to the loyalty of his 
 supporters, and with his powerful gift of oratory 
 seemed to have carried the House with him. 
 
 At one o'clock in the morning, upon a scene of 
 tense expectation, Donald Smith rose, and one 
 
 9i 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 can well imagine what effect the quiet voice, the 
 well-weighed sentences, spoken in the rugged 
 tone of his forefathers, must have had upon the 
 heated assembly. But even as he spoke no one 
 was cognisant of the fact whether his old personal 
 friendship for Sir John would be the deciding 
 factor, moving him to vote for the Government, or 
 whether the man's own inherent sense of fair play 
 and his fine sense of what was just would triumph. 
 His concluding words, spoken with what difficulty 
 he alone knew, must have fallen with the dead 
 sound of stones upon a coffin-lid to the almost 
 frenzied party who waited for his support. 
 
 " For the honour of the country," said Donald 
 Smith, " no Government should exist that has a 
 shadow of suspicion resting upon it, and for that 
 reason I cannot give it my support." 
 
 The scene in the corridor of the House which 
 followed has often been described, but probably no 
 words will ever do justice to it. Men, wrought up 
 to a curious state of excitement, threw off all reserve, 
 and whether cheering or denouncing raised their 
 voices in a roar of sound. Suddenly the crowd 
 parted to right and left as if by magic, and through 
 it strode Sir John. There was, no doubt, something 
 about the advancing figure which made men draw 
 back from his path, leaving no one in front of him 
 but the solitary figure of the friend who had 
 defeated him. Scot has met Scot before and the 
 fight is always grim when it does come. Straight 
 to the erect figure strode Sir John. . . . 
 
 And there it is usual for historians to ring down 
 the curtain. But living men who were present tell 
 us that the fiery Premier, feeling no doubt the 
 inadequacy of words, planted two vigorous blows 
 upon his opponent before the surrounding crowd 
 
 92 
 
LORD STRATHCONA : A SKETCH 
 
 intervened. The language which he used meantime 
 has not been handed down to us, but it is generally 
 believed that Sir John was a past master in strong 
 invective. 
 
 For many a day the Canadian Pacific Railway 
 remained unbuilt, but in 1878 we find Donald 
 Smith engaged in the reorganising of an American 
 bankrupt railway, known as the St. Paul and 
 Pacific. Ridicule was freely poured upon the 
 undertaking by men who, without the power and 
 the initiative which would render them capable of 
 making a few thousand dollars themselves, are 
 always able to prophesy defeat to those who can 
 see farther than they are able to do. The taunt 
 levelled at Donald Smith was that through him the 
 Canadian Pacific had been shelved for a generation, 
 while his Yankee railway would be as great a fiasco 
 as the Canadian one. Financiers and politicians 
 derided the scheme, and in face of this, Smith, with 
 his usual directness, formed a company with Mr. 
 James A. Hill and his kinsman, Mr. George Stephen, 
 to teach a lesson of financial daring at which even 
 New York stood aghast. 
 
 From this successful project, triumphantly carried 
 through, there was only a step to the acquisition of 
 the Canadian Pacific Railway itself. In 1880 a 
 syndicate was formed, of which the heads were 
 Mr. George Stephen and Donald Smith, with Mr. 
 William van Home as actual constructor of the 
 road. During many vicissitudes and many delays 
 and disappointments Smith's belief in the project 
 never wavered, and it is a matter of financial 
 history that, in order to prevent the cessation of 
 work on the line through lack of funds, he and Mr. 
 George Stephen pledged the whole of their private 
 fortunes to the enterprise. The last spike of the 
 
 93 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 railway was driven in at Craigellachie on November 
 7, 1885, and the great road which Sir Edward Blake 
 had described as"a streak of rust across the wilder- 
 ness " without earning power to grease a train's 
 axle- wheels, had bound together half a continent. 
 
 It is almost impossible to speak with any degree 
 of thoroughness of the work of the man who, with 
 many goods laid up, yet seemed determined not to 
 take his ease. After the railway had been opened 
 hospitals had to be built and colleges had to be 
 founded. The once lonely fur trader was always 
 busy in a throng of men. In 1897 we find him raised 
 to the peerage with the title of Lord Strathcona, 
 and on the outbreak of the South African War 
 Strathcona's Horse, raised and financed by him 
 and largely recruited from that splendid body, the 
 Canadian Mounted Police, which he himself had 
 been instrumental in raising, brought Canadians 
 and Englishmen together in a way that perhaps only 
 those who fight side by side can understand. The 
 magnificence of Lord Strathcona's gift cannot be 
 reckoned by dollars — the battlefields of South 
 Africa are where the price of this great gift was 
 paid. In 1896 he was made Lord High Com- 
 missioner of Canada, but the high-sounding title 
 always seems to those who knew him to suggest but 
 little of the man whom they remember. Rather, 
 a memory of Lord Strathcona recalls a vision of an 
 old man, a little deaf and with curiously gentle 
 manners, sitting and working in a plain office 
 room. 
 
 It was his simplicity of life and of thought which 
 endeared him to his fellow-men, and his old friends 
 love to recall the fact that even in the matter of taking 
 precedence it was very difficult indeed to persuade 
 him to " stand in the order of his going ; while 
 
 94 
 
LORD STRATHCONA : A SKETCH 
 
 one of them recalls a characteristic story of him in 
 connection with old days at Winnipeg. With his 
 usual hospitality Lord Strathcona had invited far 
 too large a party to dine and stay the night at his 
 house at Silverheights. In his perplexity, and 
 suddenly realising that some dozen friends at least 
 would be without sleeping accommodation and that 
 the dinner provided might also be inadequate, he 
 transferred the feast to the Club House at Winnipeg, 
 where an excellent entertainment and fine old 
 Hudson Bay port beguiled the party for a consider- 
 able time. Lord Strathcona meanwhile was busy 
 at the telephone ordering extra beds to be taken out 
 to Silverheights, and when the company arrived 
 there in the evening he was able to give them all 
 accommodation. 
 
 His old friend who told me the story was obliged 
 to leave early the following morning, and passing 
 through the hall at 6 a.m. he found his host sleeping 
 peacefully in a straight-backed wooden chair. In 
 his preparations for his guests he had overlooked 
 one man. 
 
 " It was so like Donald Smith/ ' said his old 
 friend, " to remember everybody except himself." 
 
 95 
 
Chapter VI Sir William van Home 
 
 \ S the months of the war have lengthened 
 / \ out many of us must have noticed, as we 
 J. jl have added up our heavy losses, that it is 
 not war only which has deprived us of friends. 
 Side by side with lists of casualties there has been a 
 very long list of deaths at home, while the obituary 
 notices of newspapers have been busy with the 
 names of many who have not lived to see the end 
 of a great struggle. This can hardly be a coincidence. 
 It points rather to the fact that in spite of our forti- 
 tude, in spite of the courage that has been shown by 
 men and women, and in spite of their steadfastness 
 and patience, the war has proved a very heavy strain 
 on those who have hearts to weep and minds to feel. 
 The sheer bodily fatigue of extra work has gone very 
 hardly with many of those who were of an age when 
 it seemed not idleness to put their tools aside ; while 
 the mental tension, the uncertainties of war, the 
 very absence of news, has often broken down the 
 health of the man or the woman who is outwardly 
 showing a calm and sanguine spirit. Outside the 
 ranks, many splendid fighters have fallen, and 
 amongst them there lies the figure of one who in 
 his lifetime was one of the giants, and whom we 
 pause to honour now, not with words only but by 
 showing if possible in a sketch, however crude and 
 faulty, some aspects of one of the greatest intellects 
 and most powerful personalities of his day. 
 
 9 6 
 
SIR WILLIAM VAN HORNE 
 
 A story is current in Canada to the intent that a 
 stalwart miner out West, being impressed as every- 
 one was by the extraordinary amount of work which 
 Sir William van Home habitually accomplished, 
 once said that he would do in one day exactly and 
 hour by hour what Sir William was doing in order 
 to see how he got through his work. At the end of 
 the day he was carried to his bed and remained there 
 for some weeks afterwards in a state of collapse. 
 
 If work means success — and certainly there is no 
 surer road to it — the success of Sir William van 
 Home was ensured and preordained from the very 
 first. It is not too much to say that he was a man of 
 colossal industry. " Sleep," he said once, " is a 
 habit, and it is rather a bad habit, like eating." 
 During pressure of work it used to be quite a usual 
 thing for him to give up all sleep for many nights, 
 and yet it would be giving a wrong impression of 
 him to say that his energy was indomitable. Rather 
 his leisure was indomitable. He had time for every- 
 thing ; no one was ever less pressed or hurried. 
 He had time for art, which — had he devoted all his 
 energies to it — would have probably made him twice 
 famous. And he had time for building houses, and 
 for farming in a manner that was as successful as it 
 was original. And he had time for building railways, 
 and for seeing his friends, and for making one of the 
 most remarkable collections of art that has ever 
 been placed under one roof. And all the time he 
 was laughing at industry and pretending he knew 
 nothing about it. 
 
 " We are all born lazy," he said one day. " Some 
 of us get impressions, vivid impressions, which call 
 for our industry ; industry leads to facility, and 
 everything becomes easy." 
 
 " Work ! I never work. I never have worked 
 
 h 97 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 since I was ten years old and split logs. I have only 
 enjoy ed." 
 
 Yet this was a man who built a railway from one 
 ocean to another in Canada, and from one end of 
 an island to the other in Cuba. He never worked ; 
 he only enjoyed himself ! The radiant philosophy 
 of such a life, and the sheer success of it, seems to 
 make endeavour at once easier and finer. 
 
 Sir William made no trumpet call to work, to 
 suffer, or to endure. But he gained a height, and 
 from there he called down to men struggling below 
 that it was great fun up on the top, and great fun 
 getting there, and that it was all perfectly easy ! 
 
 Nothing ever seemed to be a matter of difficulty 
 with him, and we well remember hearing him say 
 one day, when talking over some of his achievements, 
 that in order to succeed he had never taken as much 
 physical exercise as it takes a young man to play a 
 game of baseball, and he had never taken so much 
 mental exercise as it takes to play a good game of 
 bridge. 
 
 A masterly facility in everything he attempted was 
 far the most striking thing about him, and always 
 out of what one might call his most serious success 
 he got the full enjoyment of a schoolboy. Even in 
 describing his early and very poor days, one never 
 heard him allude to them as his early struggles. 
 He gave us anecdotes about them, made us laugh 
 with him over them, and told us stories of giant 
 difficulties only to make fun of them. Always he 
 gave the happy idea, not only that difficulties were 
 made to be overcome, but that they were made to 
 be enjoyed. No one who has ever heard him talk 
 at his own table in Montreal will readily forget the 
 presence of the man who dominated the assembly 
 by the sheer force of his personality and held a 
 
 9 8 
 
SIR WILLIAM VAN HORNE 
 
 room or a table entranced by his conversation. He 
 had a great gift for descriptive narrative, choosing 
 his words with a sort of unfaltering sense of art 
 which made action visible. This was noticeable 
 particularly when he dwelt on very small incidents, 
 which another less skilful story-teller might have 
 left out altogether. We recall one case in particular, 
 when he was describing a long march through a 
 trackless country. Darkness began to fall and the 
 men were so worn with fatigue that they were far 
 too tired to look about them and merely followed 
 doggedly in each other's footsteps, finding firm 
 ground where they could. The man who marched in 
 front of van Home was an old pioneer of the back- 
 woods of Canada. There was something inimitable 
 in the very way that Sir William used to describe 
 the squelching sound of the trailer's heavy boots 
 clogged with the mud of melting snow ; and himself 
 as a mere boy following doggedly behind on the long 
 march. He made no attempt at dramatic utterances, 
 yet one felt vividly the dim hush of the forests, 
 with the single line of tired, hungry men, slogging 
 it through unknown passes and breasting their way 
 where others would one day follow. 
 
 Very clearly the scene of the room where his 
 stories were told comes back to one. The rare and 
 beautiful collection of pictures on the walls, the 
 long dining-table with its flowers and silver, and at 
 the head of it the figure of the man who was re- 
 nowned throughout Canada as an ideal host. But 
 it was not only to a careful and appreciative audience 
 of friends that Sir William loved to tell his stories 
 (toying with a heavy silver fork balanced on his fore- 
 finger meanwhile !) but always his best seemed to 
 come out whenever he spoke, nothing being re- 
 served or held back for a more important occasion. 
 
 99 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 All Sir William's work was done very rapidly, his 
 painting being one of the most rapid things that he 
 ever did. Often we have seen large canvases covered 
 in quite a few hours, and we remember hearing him 
 say to some friends who had admired a large picture 
 made by him of a birch tree in autumn glory of 
 colouring, that the whole painting had taken him 
 eight hours to do and that it had all been done in- 
 doors. When they exclaimed at this, his reply was : 
 
 " Yes, but I know what a birch tree looks like ! 
 Why should I sit outside in the cold and do it ? I 
 know the dip of its branches ; I know the curl of 
 its leaves ; I know the colour of it where the sun 
 touches it in autumn /' So he came home and painted 
 the picture. 
 
 " I never believe," he went on, " in taking long 
 over anything, or in making great preparations for 
 work, and when I hear of studios and north lights 
 and the impossibility of working with this thing or 
 with that, I always feel, either that man is a humbug 
 or he does not know his job." 
 
 He liked the story of Velasquez, who was a 
 marshal of the Court and never knew that he was 
 a painter, merely loving to get his colours out when 
 the children of the King of Spain came down at 
 tea-time, and to make sketches of them on his 
 canvas. And we used to hear him talk of the small 
 round window in the courtier's room (the only 
 place he ever had in which to paint), and where by 
 that single light he learned to concentrate the 
 inimitable shadows of his pictures. 
 
 " Anyone," said Sir William, " can be an artist 
 who will just go ahead and paint a picture every 
 day." 
 
 A sincere optimism governed his life and must 
 have showed itself, we believe, from the time he 
 
 ioo 
 
SIR WILLIAM VAN HORNE 
 
 was a very little boy. Certainly his accounts of his 
 childhood were amongst some of the most interest- 
 ing stories he told. They were such inspiring things 
 towards effort and towards success, that it hardly 
 seemed an impertinence to ask from himself the 
 particular influence that had determined his life. 
 
 " The best thing a boy can do," he replied, " is 
 to begin to collect. Let him collect something — I 
 don't care what it is — and you will find he begins 
 to notice, and from noticing he begins to classify 
 and to arrange. Interest develops, and wherever 
 he goes there is nothing connected with his col- 
 lection about which he is not keenly interested. 
 The real education for a boy is simply a matter of 
 impressions. These cannot be selected for him, 
 but they colour the whole of his life." 
 
 We were anxious to know at what age a boy may 
 reasonably be expected to take an interest in col- 
 lections, and we learned from Sir William that he 
 himself began at the age of two and a half years. 
 
 " I had," he said, " a collection of bright pebbles 
 which were my greatest treasures, and I arranged 
 them according to their colours. Fortunately I 
 only had what I could pick up and find for myself. 
 No one ever gave me anything. Once, in a stream, 
 I found what appeared to be a black stone, and I 
 took it home in great delight. But when it was dry 
 it turned grey, and my mother had to confess to me 
 that it was only a bit of slate. To console me, she 
 pointed out that it would write. I then began 
 drawing. Whenever I could find a place to draw 
 I used to reach up as far as I could and make coloured 
 designs and lines with my pebbles and my piece of 
 slate. My only canvas was a bare white wall, and I 
 traced upon it patterns of my own making. One 
 day in a quarry, while still searching for pebbles, I 
 
 IOI 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 found a fossil. I had never seen or heard of any- 
 thing of the kind, and it was in some sort a revela- 
 tion to me. That fossil never left me. It was my 
 fossil, part of my collection and a thing that made me 
 important. Sometimes people asked to see it, and 
 I began consciously to live because it was I that had 
 found so rare and beautiful a thing as a fossil. I 
 asked no one to share in my search, nor in my 
 collection, and it was quite by accident that I made 
 a boy a partner with me in the business. We were 
 friends at school, and on one half-holiday I was to 
 go and fish with him. I called for him but he told 
 me that he was unable to find his fishing rod, while 
 not explaining that his mother had forbidden him 
 to go on the expedition/ ' She, poor lady, does not 
 seem to have had any great faith in her son's 
 rectitude, for in order to enforce her prohibition 
 she had hidden the fishing rod under the wooden 
 paths of the garden ! 
 
 While the boy searched, William van Home went 
 to the parlour and found lying on the table a book 
 on geology. On turning over its leaves he dis- 
 covered to his amazement a drawing of his own 
 precious fossil. That it was quite a common 
 specimen need hardly be told. His excitement 
 knew no bounds, and not even the discovery of a 
 portrait of himself within the pages of the book 
 could have given him a greater sense of wholesome 
 importance. He and his friend quitted fishing and 
 started off for the quarry to look for fossils. 
 
 The collection became the centre of their lives. 
 
 One day a State geologist came to the place and 
 asked if there were any interesting fossils to be had 
 in the neighbourhood. He was told in reply : 
 " Two boys about here gather rocks, no one knows 
 why." 
 
 102 
 
SIR WILLIAM VAN HORNE 
 
 The man came and saw the two collections and 
 went away, but he seems to have liked the idea of 
 the little fellows collecting their pebbles and stones 
 and fossils, and cataloguing and arranging them 
 without any help from outside. He told to others 
 the story of their enterprise and industry, with the 
 result that one day the uncle of the other boy — in 
 order to encourage him to study — sent him Hitch- 
 cock's book on geology. 
 
 " In all my life," said Sir William, " I never longed 
 for anything as I longed for that book. I never 
 envied anyone as I envied that boy. I would have 
 sold all my chances in life and thrown in my soul 
 too, to have had it. Sometimes I was allowed to 
 peep at it if I had washed my hands. But it was not 
 mine. I would do anything for the boy who had it 
 in hopes of a loan of it ! When I heard that he and 
 his parents were going to New York for two weeks 
 the idea seized me that I must ask him to let me have 
 the book while he was away. I believe I grovelled 
 to that boy, while I courted him in every way. And 
 at last I made my request, and was refused. I con- 
 tinued to slave for him in the hope that he might 
 change his mind. I suppose he must have told his 
 mother of my importunity, for on the day that they 
 were leaving home she brought the book across to 
 our house, and on its cover she had sewn a piece of 
 calico to keep it from being soiled. She said, if I 
 made myself quite clean before reading it, I might 
 have it while they were away. I took the book and 
 ran with it to a place sixteen miles off, and I slept 
 there all night under a haystack in case the boy 
 should change his mind and want the book back. 
 The next day when he was safely away I returned. 
 
 "I had a little bedroom under the roof and it 
 was bitter cold November weather, but I sat there 
 
 103 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 reading and reading. One day I got fifty cents for 
 taking a telegram up to the quarry to a man who 
 was working there. There was an old woman in the 
 village called Mrs. Savage, who sold stationery. 
 She used to give me tracts and thought I read them. 
 I asked for fifty cents of foolscap, and as I was a 
 favourite she gave me a great pile of it at cost price. 
 
 " I took it to my room and I copied out the whole 
 of that book. I copied the illustrations exactly. I 
 made an index. I had a lead pencil — they were 
 rare then, Faber invented them and they cost ten 
 cents each. I know I was proud of mine ! I drew 
 and copied and wrote until at the end of five 
 weeks my task was finished. I did not sleep much 
 in those days — often I worked all night/ ' 
 
 He copied out many other books afterwards, 
 because he never had money to buy them, and the 
 very first that he ever bought and called his own 
 was an encyclopaedia. The purchase was infinitely 
 characteristic of him. He was an artist to his finger 
 tips, he was a lover of literature, he was a student 
 of geology, but a book of poetry, or a work of geology 
 was not what he wanted. It was knowledge, know- 
 ledge in its fullest and widest sense that he must 
 have, and he put aside for the time being at any 
 rate, everything but his determination to know 
 things. He was a telegraph messenger when he 
 bought the book, and he bought it with the very 
 first wages he earned. 
 
 As a telegraph messenger, it is needless to say, he 
 was a success. 
 
 " I was put on to the station service," he said, 
 " and as I was very young, the men didn't mind my 
 asking questions, and what is more they answered 
 them too and told me things. I learned to be an 
 operator and remained on as a night dispatcher." 
 
 104 
 
SIR WILLIAM VAN HORNE 
 
 Always there is a sense of the forward movement 
 in his life. The inevitable consequence was that 
 he got on, that he was raised to a higher position, or 
 that he went to get to a higher still. 
 
 " One day," he said, " there was a great stir in 
 the place. The General Superintendent was coming 
 to visit the little branch line where I worked. I 
 then saw a private car for the first time. A big man 
 in a " duster ' got out of it. We were all crowding 
 about the station to see him, for his arrival was 
 held to be a great event. When he left his car I 
 looked into it and saw the dinner table spread with 
 white linen and decorated with flowers, and the 
 easy chairs in the parlour. 
 
 " I said to myself, ' / am going to be a General 
 Superintendent. 
 
 ' I was eighteen at the time and I was a General 
 Superintendent before I was twenty-eight. Yes, I was 
 the youngest man who had ever held this position. 
 
 " I began with the mistaken idea that a General 
 Superintendent knows everything about a railway. 
 I therefore determined to know everything about 
 railways too. I kept accounts. I dispatched trains 
 by night and by day. I looked after freight and I 
 was telegraph operator as well. I spent my evenings 
 in learning and all the day I was working. 
 
 11 Then the War broke out. Everything in 
 America was disorganised. Railway staffs were 
 reduced. Railways were running at a loss. All 
 the men on our part of the line knew they might be 
 dismissed ; no one could be sure of keeping his 
 situation from one day to another. There were 
 nine of us working together and I felt I would be 
 one of the first to go, for one man was nephew of 
 one of the Directors of the line and another was a 
 grandson of the Superintendent, 
 
 105 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 " At last the dreaded telegram came, and as I was 
 telegraph clerk I took it down and handed it to our 
 chief. He read it and said nothing, but I made up 
 my mind I must go. In the evening he sent for me 
 when I was pretty near to despair and said : " You 
 saw the telegram ? Well, the staff has to be reduced, 
 but I have decided to keep you on. Now, how much 
 of the work can you do ? ' I said, ' I guess I can 
 do it all.' The Chief said, * I must keep on one 
 other man,' and he did, and he and I did the whole 
 work of the office. " 
 
 The story requires no comment. The boy who 
 takes on the work of nine men does not require any 
 praise at the hand of his chronicler. The simplicity 
 of his own words make the story double worth 
 telling. 
 
 It is, of course, in connection with the Canadian 
 Pacific Railway that Sir William van Home is best 
 known. But the human interest of his life cannot 
 be limited to railway schemes, although the story 
 of it cannot be told without them. That the schemes 
 were romantic or wild must be judged by posterity. 
 The fact remains that it took some big men to make 
 the railway ; Lord Strathcona, Lord Mountstephen, 
 and Sir Thomas Shaughnessey are the names that 
 most readily are recalled whenever the Canadian 
 Pacific Railway is spoken of. The actual builder of 
 the line was Sir William van Home. 
 
 Everyone now knows the history of this pioneer 
 movement. It has been discussed and pronounced 
 upon and written about till we seem to know its 
 history very well. But who could ever describe, 
 as Sir William used to do, the crisis when the 
 whole of Canada's future seemed to hang in the 
 balance. The Bank of Montreal had financed the 
 new railroad, and if they failed, the Bank failed 
 
 106 
 
SIR WILLIAM VAN HORNE 
 
 and half the people in Canada would be ruined. 
 Such, very briefly stated, was the position. A 
 meeting was held to discuss the financial question, 
 while next door to the Board Room waited William 
 van Home with some of his friends. Between the 
 two rooms were boards and in the boards was a 
 chink. 
 
 " I guessed," said Sir William, " that sound 
 would come best to me if I stood opposite the 
 glass door in the room which would help to act as 
 a resonator, for though I could hear each voice as 
 it spoke I was unable to make out clearly what 
 anyone said. It was an awful time. Each one 
 of us felt as if the railway was his own child. We 
 were prepared to make any sacrifice for it, but 
 things were at a deadlock and it seemed impossible 
 to raise any more money. We men ourselves had 
 given up 20 per cent of our salaries and had willingly 
 worked, not overtime but double-time, and as we 
 waited in that room, we thought about these things 
 and wondered whether all our toil was going to be 
 wasted, and what would happen if Canada were 
 ruined. . . . 
 
 " At last Joe Pope came in with a yellow paper 
 in his hand. He said the Government were pre- 
 pared to back the Bank of Montreal to the extent 
 of one million dollars. 
 
 " I think we waited till he left the room," Sir 
 William said. " I believe we had that much sanity 
 left in us, and then we began. We tossed up chairs 
 to the ceiling ; we trampled on desks ; I believe 
 we danced on tables. I do not remember now what 
 occurred ; no one who was there can ever remember 
 anything, except loud yells of joy and the sound of 
 things breaking ! " 
 
 Meanwhile George Stephen had been working 
 
 107 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 and getting Bonds out. Then Baring Brothers 
 came in and voted fifteen million dollars, repayable 
 in three instalments. The Canadian Pacific Rail- 
 way began to move again. But men were wanted 
 — badly wanted — and William van Home set out 
 to ransack Canada to find them. He had eight 
 thousand workers, but he wanted twelve thousand 
 and he got them. It was winter : he took them up 
 in sleds to Lake Superior, and to his lasting credit 
 Sir Frank Smith, Grocer, Toronto, advanced the 
 whole of the food supply without conditions. The 
 workmen were fed, they did their work and Sir 
 William got them all safely " froze in " on Lake 
 Superior. 
 
 Before the line was completed the Riel Rebellion 
 broke out, and it was imperative that it should be 
 put down immediately and without delay. Indians 
 can do nothing until the grass is green because 
 Indians are helpless without a horse. It follows 
 that winter time is the time for attack. In winter a 
 rebellion might be put down by three thousand 
 men ; in summer it would take fifty thousand. 
 
 The new railway line had one hundred and thirty 
 miles still unfinished. Sir William said to Sir 
 John A. Macdonald, " The Rebellion must be 
 crushed now and the soldiers must be taken West ; 
 I'll do it." 
 
 The obvious answer and the one which Sir 
 John Macdonald made was, " How can you carry 
 men without a railway ? " 
 
 " I shall do it." 
 
 " It is impossible.' ' 
 
 " Raise the men," said Sir William van Home, 
 " and give me a week's notice of their arrival, and 
 I pledge myself to do it." 
 
 " What do you pledge ? " asked Sir John. 
 
 108 
 
SIR WILLIAM VAN HORNE 
 
 " I pledge my word, and if necessary, my life," 
 was the answer. 
 
 " Can you do it in a month's time ? " was the 
 next question. 
 
 " I will do it in eleven days to Fort Qu'Appelle." 
 
 " You are talking nonsense," was the reply. 
 
 " Send up the men," said van Home, " and I 
 only make one stipulation. I shall carry them up 
 in my own way, and they are under my direction 
 for transport and supplies." (" I was not going to 
 have quartermasters and suchlike bothering about 
 red tape and supplies," said Sir William.) 
 
 The railway was being built in sections and there 
 were many gaps in it. But the sleds which had 
 brought four thousand men up to work on the rail- 
 way line were available. Into these Sir William 
 packed the soldiers like sardines in a barrel. He 
 directed his own transport, and he took them across 
 the snow whenever there was a gap in the railway 
 line and reached Qu'Appelle in six days, thus 
 leaving five days to spare over and above the 
 contract which he had made. 
 
 " The biggest things are always the easiest to do," 
 he used to say, " because there is no competition. 
 Men stand around and laugh and say, * Watch 
 him break his neck/ That leaves one a clear space 
 to work in." The energy spent in games, he used to 
 consider, if directed into other channels, might 
 make of anyone a success, and one of his favourite 
 remarks used to be, " Anyone can do anything if 
 they begin early enough." 
 
 Whether early begun or late, he himself had a 
 very genius for success. The Cuban railway is a 
 case in point. 
 
 It was the result of Sir William van Home's 
 leisure. He had come to believe that perhaps he 
 
 109 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 had worked long enough and hard enough to fill the 
 life of an ordinary mortal, so he gave up his Chair- 
 manship of the Canadian Pacific Railway and deter- 
 mined to devote the rest of his life to enjoying 
 ing himself in various directions. All his life, he 
 told us, he had lacked time to do the things which 
 he most cared about, and he was able to name six 
 or seven particular interests which would now 
 entirely fill his life. In the first place he desired to 
 travel, and he set out for a trip to the West to enjoy 
 the rare sensation of being a spectator only, where 
 for so long he had been an active worker. 
 
 His voice used to bubble with laughter when he 
 told the story of his days spent as a fine gentleman. 
 Filled with the laudable intention of enjoying himself 
 he made his way on the Canadian Pacific Railway. 
 Never, he said, would he forget the dullness of it ! 
 To sit there and be interested to order, froze him 
 with its chilly dullness. He watched the landscape 
 and was not amused by it, and he looked at the 
 sky and felt bored for the first time in his life. 
 Yet, even so he meant to give the experiment a fair 
 trial. He had so often heard of the joy of having 
 time to oneself and of the privilege of leisure and 
 of the proud sense of being in a position to be idle, 
 that he pursued his uninteresting journey much 
 further than he intended. He went, indeed, to 
 San Francisco, still laboriously bent on enjoying 
 himself. 
 
 He arrived, and deliberately set out to see the 
 many things which he had never before had time to 
 see. At the end of a very few days sightseeing, 
 being a limited occupation, was finished and began 
 to pall. Utterly wearied, for the first time in his 
 life, Sir William said good-bye to the great city at 
 the end of two days, and in despair of finding what 
 
 no 
 
SIR WILLIAM VAN HORNE 
 
 he sought, he finally went to Cuba and sat on the 
 balcony of his hotel and solemnly began to reason 
 with himself. His journey had not interested him. 
 He was bored to death, and it felt almost like an 
 illness that had come to him. He lighted one of 
 his big cigars and then — as he used to say, having 
 worked us up to a point of interest in the story 
 quite disproportionate to the words which he used 
 in the telling of it — he wound up with a drop in 
 his voice and the confession, " I found out quite 
 suddenly and painfully that it was because I had 
 never had much time for anything that I had 
 found recreation so delightful, and that as an end 
 in itself it was amazingly dull." 
 
 For how long he stayed communing thus pain- 
 fully over his evening smoke, we do not know, but 
 in the end we find him throwing away his cigar 
 and with almost a shout exclaiming : "I'll build a 
 railway." He had found his job again and boredom, 
 sight-seeing, leisure were once more at an end, and 
 because a railway across Cuba was according to all 
 showing utterly impossible and because it was one 
 of the most difficult things that could be attempted, 
 Sir William van Home rolled up his sleeves, as he 
 loved to do, and set to work to do it. 
 
 No doubt it gave him some little surprise to find 
 that six railway companies were practically in Cuba 
 before him, and that each of them had determined 
 to build a railway there. He did not retire grace- 
 fully from the contest. In Canada it used to be 
 said that his prophecies came true because he made 
 them come true ! 
 
 Cuba was under the provisional government of 
 the United States of America, which Government 
 was forbidden by the Foraker Amendment to grant 
 any public franchise. Consequently no railways 
 
 in 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 had begun, and as far as the five other companies 
 were concerned, the Foraker Amendment settled 
 the question. 
 
 Sir William van Home saw the difficulty as plainly 
 as the others saw it. 
 
 " But," he said to himself, " Government cannot, 
 as far as I know, prevent me building a railway on 
 my own land if I like." 
 
 He began to buy up acres right and left in the 
 Island of Cuba. Sometimes he was able to buy it 
 in a narrow strip suitable for a railway, at other 
 times he had to buy an unnecessarily large portion 
 in order to get the little bit he wanted. By the time 
 he had finished buying land his private property 
 extended across the whole of the island. But he 
 could not cross the roads. The roads were Govern- 
 ment property. They were not purchasable, they 
 presented insurmountable barriers. 
 
 Sir William began building his railway. 
 
 He built in sections. He employed many men 
 and paid them well, and whenever the railway 
 building came to one of those barriers, work and its 
 delightful accompaniment — wages — abruptly ceased. 
 " This seemed," he said, " a great pity." 
 
 Sir William was not in a hurry but continued 
 building in sections and stopping at intervals, and 
 during the whole of his operations he acted on two 
 rules only ; he always took off his hat first when he 
 met a Cuban, and when one of them bowed to him 
 he returned the bow twice. 
 
 Of all the difficult places on the island the one 
 where men were most suspicious of his work and 
 most dogged in their determination to oppose him 
 was in the city of Camaguey. Here, with great 
 difficulty and from a friend, Sir William was able 
 to buy a corner block, and on this valuable space 
 
 112 
 
SIR WILLIAM VAN HORNE 
 
 his railway workshops were built. When they were 
 completed he sent out many invitations, courteously 
 worded, asking the Cubans to come to an inaugural 
 breakfast on the happy occasion of turning the first 
 sod of the Cuban railway. No one came. The 
 Cubans were sullen and distrustful. They did not 
 want either it or Sir William's breakfast. But the 
 Mayor of Camaguey at last very reluctantly put in 
 an appearance and brought with him his brother-in- 
 law and his little niece. With charming courtesy 
 Sir William invited the child to perform the cere- 
 mony of turning the first sod, and with an audience 
 of only a few small boys she did what had been so 
 pleasantly asked of her, and after the turning of the 
 sod Sir William went to Montreal. 
 
 The first thing he did on his arrival there was to 
 hold an important meeting consisting of the Presi- 
 dent and the Board of Directors of the new railway, 
 and it was proposed, seconded, and carried unani- 
 mously that a vote of thanks should be sent to the 
 young lady at Camaguey. The President and the 
 Board of Directors then went out and bought a 
 pretty gold watch and chain. Also he had the vote 
 of thanks charmingly printed on parchment. Being 
 a President and Board of Directors undoubtedly 
 makes for freedom in the matter even of choosing 
 a watch and chain and having a vote of thanks 
 engraved on vellum. Sir William returned to Cuba 
 with his pretty gift, and going to the house of the 
 young lady he made a little ceremony of the occa- 
 sion, even going so far as to invite her into the 
 patio of the house and making the affair semi- 
 public. Everyone was delighted, and the Cuban 
 Railway might have then been continued with the 
 full consent of all the island, had it been possible 
 to get the franchise. This, however, was a State 
 
 i 113 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 matter which could not be handled by mere cour- 
 tesy, and a railway with gaps in it is not of much 
 use to anyone. 
 
 Sir William went to consult the Governor, heard 
 the whole of the difficulties of the situation, and was 
 informed that His Excellency would think the 
 matter over. Doubtless this meant that he would 
 consult his principal adviser, and to this adviser 
 went Sir William van Home. Of the consultation 
 which followed we have no account. It is sufficient 
 to say that on the following day the Governor had 
 a brilliant and original suggestion to make, viz. 
 that a revocable permit should be accorded to Sir 
 William to complete his new railway. 
 
 This, no doubt, was the moment in which to look 
 dejected and discouraged, and we believe that Sir 
 William was able to hang his head successfully until 
 he was well out of sight of the Governor's house. 
 He did not, this time, dance on a table, but his 
 pace may have quickened. At any rate we learn 
 that his orders to his chief engineer were couched in 
 language so triumphant that nothing was really 
 intelligible except the direction to start immediately 
 and go full steam ahead. 
 
 During moments of strenuous leisure, Sir William 
 catalogued the whole of his collection of pictures 
 and works of art by a method of his own, and illus- 
 trated it by a process of colour photography invented 
 by himself. Besides this, every piece of porcelain 
 in his world-renowned collection is illustrated by a 
 thumb-nail sketch drawn to scale and so finely done 
 that only a magnifying glass can reveal the minute 
 perfection of the work. After each article is 
 drawn, its exact " life " size for a larger catalogue 
 is made, and these drawings give faithfully every 
 quality of paste, crack, or faintest marking on 
 
 114 
 
SIR WILLIAM VAN HORNE 
 
 the porcelain. Dealers will always buy even the 
 most valuable piece of china from a glance at these 
 drawings, and can actually tell the quality of the 
 paste without seeing the thing itself. 
 
 " This is play," Sir William used to say, " and I 
 never allow myself to touch it till after 10.30 p.m. 
 I do each of my drawings in one and a half hours. I 
 know I do not exaggerate in saying this, for some- 
 times a friend sitting by me has timed me " ; and 
 once more he added, " I think things ought always 
 to be done quickly." 
 
 His was a long life, and he always did things 
 quickly. Consequently it was fuller of incident, 
 fuller of work, fuller of success than almost any 
 other that we know of, and whether we think about 
 the little boy collecting pebbles, or the telegraph 
 messenger volunteering to do the work of nine men 
 at a railway station, or the man with a world of 
 leisure in front of him setting out to build a railway, 
 we always have a sense of the elan of life, always 
 the zest and the joy of it, and the perpetual youtn- 
 fulness of endeavour. But more than all I think 
 we feel the calmness and superiority of a great 
 mentality, a gift for success which made success 
 easy, and a fine outlook which scorned inferior or 
 little things and developed itself and its own work 
 on its own lines. He will not readily be forgotten 
 in Canada, where he was much beloved, but, more 
 than this, his life we believe ought to prove an 
 antidote to half-heartedness and slackness. To 
 know Sir William van Home was an incentive to 
 high courage, and to something that was tireless 
 and faithful to ideals. Even to read of him, we 
 believe, must make a man abler, more real than he 
 was before, and more determined to make a success 
 not only of his work but of his life. 
 
 ii5 
 
Chapter VII Story of the Canadian Northern 
 
 OVER a mile a day for twelve years has been 
 the record of the Canadian Northern 
 construction. The land over which the 
 railway runs does not make construction easy. It 
 is mostly rich alluvial soil not especially suitable 
 as a bed for rails. Gravel for ballast has to be 
 hauled long distances to make the road bed perfect, 
 but on the other hand it must be admitted that the 
 soil is undoubtedly splendid for crop producing. 
 
 There can scarcely, we imagine, be a much more 
 interesting journey than that which one may take 
 from coast to coast on the Canadian Northern line 
 during harvest time in what is called a " bumper " 
 year. The country is new with a splendid sense of 
 youth about it, and almost one might be tempted 
 to ignore its wealth-producing qualities for the sake 
 of the sheer beauty of it were it not that it is the 
 abundance of things which makes Canada so 
 extraordinarily attractive. Wheat is not cultivated 
 by the acre but by the mile. Woods grow in deep 
 luxuriance, and it becomes a mental difficulty to 
 recall the fact that there are countries in the world 
 where to cut a stick is a crime. The rivers rush 
 to the sea in volumes of water, the singing valleys 
 stand thick with corn, and the fruit trees yielding 
 fruit after their kind seem to hold out arms weighted 
 with plenty. 
 
 Canada's autumn harvest is too beautiful a thing 
 
 116 
 
STORY OF CANADIAN NORTHERN 
 
 to be counted by pounds, shillings and pence, for 
 there is something splendidly magnificent in the 
 fact that there is enough for everyone. Statistics 
 themselves seem out of place and yet the railway 
 enterprise about which we are at present speaking 
 has been such a remakable one that a short history 
 of it will, perhaps, not be out of place. It was 
 begun in 1900 and has grown to be the second 
 system in Canada. The Lake Manitoba Railway 
 and Canal Company was bought in 1896 by Mr. 
 Mackenzie and Mr. D. D. Mann. In 1902 the 
 Manitoba Lines and the Northern Pacific were 
 leased on option of purchase, and the same year 
 the road to Port Arthur and Lake Superior was 
 completed. By 1905 Edmonton was reached, 
 while in the next year entrance was gained to 
 Prince Albert. The first hundred miles were run 
 from Gladstone, eighty-three miles from Winnipeg, 
 to a pair of log houses on the site of which is now 
 the flourishing town of Dauphin. Already the 
 important line from Edmonton to Athabasca Land- 
 ing has been completed and the fertile Peace 
 River country into which settlers are now pouring 
 is fed by branches of the same line. 
 
 These prosaic details, however, do not compare 
 in interest with the real making of the line or of the 
 country 1 through which it passes. They are rather 
 the material of one part of that extraordinary 
 movement which has been taking place in Canada 
 during the last few years and which is taking place 
 to-day. The psychology of it is almost impossible 
 to explain unless, perhaps, we accept the philo- 
 sophical one of the elan or forward spring which 
 can best be described as the life principle seeking 
 to realise itself. There are abundant evidences of 
 this spring forward in Canada, and nowhere is it 
 
 117 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 more self-evident than on this new line of rails. 
 There is an extraordinary sense of vigour even in 
 the very small towns which are pushing up their 
 heads like daisies on a lawn all over the country. 
 The towns are a good deal alike, but while it is 
 self-evident that they lack historical interest, the 
 human interest is profoundly there. Their growth 
 and their success are punctuated in a manner a 
 little curious to the onlooker. First of all there is 
 a little group of wooden houses, then a railway 
 station, afterwards one, two or three grain elevators, 
 according to the success of the prairie town. These 
 are followed loyally by church and schools, and the 
 apex is crowned by a cinematograph. Where a 
 " movie," as it is affectionately called, exists the 
 success of the town seems to be established. 
 
 We are not competent to say, as we have not stayed 
 a long time at any of these places, whether internally 
 they are so peaceful and pleasant as they appear 
 from the outside, but a halt for an hour or two at 
 any of them makes an interesting pause on a long 
 journey. From somewhere and inevitably appears 
 a motor-car in which we are invited to take a tour 
 through the town. The chauffeur, one hand alone 
 being given to the steering gear, waves the other in 
 every direction to point out improvements and the 
 future prospects of the place, while all the time he 
 delays us with accounts of real estate and its grow- 
 ing value. Afterwards there is dinner or, as it is 
 more usually called, supper at some hotel whose 
 inhabitants all seem to sit speechless and with 
 serious expressions gazing out of a plate glass 
 window, looking on the street. There may be a 
 little store opposite, or if the town is advanced 
 enough there may possibly be a tramway line 
 loosely set amongst stones. But whatever it is, it is 
 
 xi8 
 
STORY OF CANADIAN NORTHERN 
 
 deemed of sufficient interest to warrant the pro- 
 longed gaze of the smokers in the window, who sit 
 with spittoons beside them, while boots oddly con- 
 trived with a big bulge over the toes are set upon the 
 window ledge. At the back of this hall or general 
 rendezvous may be seen the " shining parlour " 
 on a raised platform and with feet extended the 
 same boots may be brushed, while in the body of 
 the room men with white sheets about them are 
 being shaved. Shaving and boot brushing seldom 
 seem to go on at home as in England and are 
 generally performed later in the day than is cus- 
 tomary with us. In the evening there is a cinemato- 
 graph performance. 
 
 In some of the larger towns the programme is 
 more varied. We were met at one place by a 
 11 Publicity " man, an official whose like we had 
 not seen before and who was, therefore, especially 
 interesting to us. The function of the " Publicity " 
 man is to boom some town in particular. One we 
 remember was an American, clad in brown and 
 accompanied with the inevitable motor-car. Having 
 accepted the pleasure of a drive we were well 
 rewarded for the time thus delayed. 
 
 " I have only one question to ask you," said the 
 " Publicity " man as we stepped into the motor- 
 car, " and that is, ' What do you know about 
 hogs ? ' " 
 
 Our ignorance was so self-evident that it hardly 
 required confessing. 
 
 " Right here," said the " Publicity " man, " and 
 I will get you some folders." 
 
 This city is going forward on hogs or it is not 
 going forward at all. 
 
 Certainly the folders which he produced were, to 
 use a word often heard in Canada, optimistic, and 
 
 119 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 the personal touches in it almost made one believe 
 that to settle at . . . and raise hogs must be one's 
 highest duty. 
 
 The only drawback seemed to be that Mrs. Hog 
 had to work so extraordinarily hard, the success of 
 the hog-raising enterprise which is urged upon one 
 as a sacred trust seeming to depend upon her having 
 sixteen little pigs a year. This and a pig disease 
 called " Humps " seem to be the only disadvantages 
 in connection with getting quickly rich by this 
 laudable farming operation. The other side of it 
 seems to be altogether sunny, and we were told 
 that were we banking on hogs we need not worry. 
 
 Afterwards we went to see the town which 
 promises to be a very handsome one, church and 
 schools were pointed out to us, a hospital and also 
 a cinema theatre. 
 
 There is a saying current that an American 
 knows the price of everything and the value of 
 nothing. The price of a thing is to us, however, 
 of some human interest although the figures are all 
 too soon forgotten. The " Publicity " man, however, 
 had them all at his fingers' tips. 
 
 " On the right, there," he said, " is our 200,000 
 dollar Collegiate Institute, and our 160,000 dollar 
 school.' ' The churches and hospitals were priced 
 in the same way, ana! we were shown the water 
 works and various other buildings whose principal 
 attractions, it was urged upon us, seemed to be that 
 they were fire-proof. 
 
 We wished good luck to these growing cities and to 
 the men and women who are making them. Their 
 pride in them is honest pride, and their belief in 
 them is very well founded as a rule. 
 
 Edmonton, we believe, will one day be one of the 
 citiesjof the world, renowned for its beauty and its 
 
 120 
 
STORY OF CANADIAN NORTHERN 
 
 position. Except at Ottawa we have seen few finer 
 cities in Canada, and in spite of the racing speed at 
 which it has gone forward the town planning and 
 the position of the Parliament buildings, etc., is 
 beyond all praise. Figures relating to its increasing 
 population become almost difficult of apprehension 
 owing to their size, and our ordinary values of 
 time hardly seem to apply to a town which has 
 made such tremendous progress since 1905 when 
 the C.N.R. linked up with Edmonton, bringing 
 eager settlers attracted by the rich farming pros- 
 pects. 
 
 The vision, however, which will remain with us 
 is not of its teeming number of inhabitants, nor of 
 its fire stations and schools, nor even of its churches, 
 but of a wonderful bend of river upon which the set- 
 ting sun smote fiercely till it looked like a great ribbon 
 of orange fire running between steep wooded banks, 
 while on a promontory stood the great Parliament 
 Buildings hardly finished yet, but already with a 
 sense of age about them. 
 
 Were this a financial work, 1 which most em- 
 phatically it is not, we might speak of the fortunes 
 which have been made in Edmonton and in very 
 many other cities of Canada. Our aim, if we may 
 say so, has rather been to see, if possible, the spirit 
 behind the gold and the enterprise, and the courage 
 which has made this land what it is. But if we may 
 venture one word about the wealth of Canada and 
 its prospects we should like to say that it seems 
 self-evident that a great wave of wealth is coming, 
 not only here but over a large portion of the world, 
 and it is as well to be prepared for it. First of all 
 
 1 This was written before the long duration of the Great War 
 had made the immediate future of the peoples engaged in it 
 somewhat difficult to predict. 
 
 J2I 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 because, of course, an enormous responsibility will 
 attach itself to it, and secondly, because a time of 
 unusual prosperity may sometimes end in bank- 
 ruptcy. We ourselves believe that the time itself 
 is not so very far distant when we shall look back 
 a generation or so and find ourselves amazed at the 
 poverty of these times. There is no time in a work 
 like this to compare the old with the new, nor to 
 touch on a subject very dear to our hearts of the 
 thrift that used to be displayed amongst the Scottish 
 peasantry, many of whose descendants are now 
 in Canada, who managed to live respectable and 
 decent lives, bringing up their children well on 
 literally a few pounds a year. The shepherds in 
 Scotland used to get £iz per annum, a bowl of meal 
 and pasturage for one cow. In our childhood we 
 frequently heard the wives of these men tell us that 
 wool pulled from the hedges against which sheep 
 had scraped themselves used to be spun in the 
 evenings into wool for the children's clothes. Boots 
 and shoes were never worn, and yet these peasants 
 were the proudest of a proud race of people, seldom, 
 if ever getting into debt, and with fine ambitions 
 and a high standard of conduct. Their good clan 
 names are as well known in Canada to-day as in 
 Scotland. 
 
 These strenuous character-making days of 
 poverty are over, we believe, for most of the Anglo- 
 Saxon races throughout the world. Some factor, 
 other than poverty, will now have to be the inspira- 
 tion of work. Just as in art the motive of early 
 paintings was indicative of a fear of death, whereas 
 in later days they were a joyous indication of life 
 and love. So in the history of the world poverty 
 may have done its splendid work, produced its 
 splendid men, something of the joy of life not un- 
 
 122 
 
STORY OF CANADIAN NORTHERN 
 
 mixed with strenuousness may be the inspiration 
 of the future. The change of attitude will, no 
 doubt, be puzzling at first and to some minds 
 shocking until it is acceded that vigour must have a 
 definite outlet, and that the man who sets out to 
 make two blades of grass grow where one was before 
 may stumble upon wealth and must not be afraid 
 of it. 
 
 It is a truism to observe that money depends for 
 all the meaning that it has — the coin itself, of 
 course, being only symbolical — upon exchange, 
 while the welfare of the world, whether we look at 
 it from the point of view of Indian famines or cheap 
 beef, depends largely, if not wholly, upon facilities 
 of transportation. This, up to the present time of 
 writing, is most conveniently supplied by the rail- 
 way systems of the world, but perhaps we have hardly 
 realised how little accustomed we are to them yet, 
 and we are still almost like people who with the 
 telephone in their room are wondering distractedly 
 how to send a message. A hundred years ago no 
 one had heard of railways nor of faster means of 
 transferring either message or material quicker 
 than a horse could carry it. We seem hardly yet to 
 have grasped the potentialities of steam nor its 
 world-compelling resources. Not many habitable 
 countries are now isolated, most of them are open 
 to the ordinary traveller. In time and space alike 
 the dark has been annihilated, and we are com- 
 pelled to see with a new vision much that is happen- 
 ing round us, and to accommodate ourselves not 
 only to a new view of life but to a certain modifica- 
 tion of character which many of us may regret but 
 which is certainly inevitable. Permanence, a love 
 of home, and an intimate knowledge of country- 
 side are hardly any longer possible. Life is inclined 
 
 123 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 more and more to manifest itself by movement — 
 perhaps by movement alone, and force, in many 
 cases, has been superseded by fuss. 
 
 There are many places which railways, we trust, 
 will never touch. We trust that in the world there 
 will always remain certain sleepy dreamy country- 
 sides undisturbed by the roar of engines and by 
 smoke, and that some lovely hills may be left un- 
 scarred by lines of rails. We believe in the dignity 
 and the seclusion of ancestral acres, and we would 
 fain support in every way possible some sanctuaries 
 for wild animals, some large untouched woods and 
 spots where men can be alone. We say regretfully 
 that trains are stirring up all the colours of the 
 world, only they are rapidly making them a uniform 
 grey, and we maintain that grey is an uninteresting 
 colour. But in Canada there is room for railways 
 and there is room too for great quiet places where 
 railways never come. We honour the men of 
 endeavour who are making them, who are running 
 steamship lines and opening up industries and 
 developing the great wealth of a new country. We 
 honour also those who see beyond wealth to a further 
 horizon, and who are able to travel with courage 
 and happiness upon the long road perhaps all the 
 more lightly because of their few possessions. 
 
 124 
 
Chapter VIII Sir William Mackenzie 
 
 THERE is a necklace of lakes in Eastern 
 Canada very like a row of precious stones 
 set in an enamel of dark woods. These 
 are linked together by a slender chain of canals 
 which join the Simco, Cameron, Balsam, and 
 Sturgeon together in the old low portage way of 
 Champlain. Wellington surveyed it as a convenient 
 waterway for moving troops, and upon its little 
 frequented waters there is a surprising and wonder- 
 ful lock suggestive of important traffic, while on its 
 sleeping banks pretty houses are dotted where lock- 
 keepers live a restful life. The place looks ready for 
 great enterprise, but so far it still slumbers. Yet in 
 one of its sleepiest and prettiest villages a man of 
 surprising energy, William Mackenzie, was born. 
 It is sometimes difficult to realise as one treads the 
 tree-shadowed broad street of Kirkfield with its 
 pretty inn, snug little houses, and well-kept gardens, 
 how so peaceful an environment could have pro- 
 duced a spirit so energetic and so enterprising. 
 Yet the forward movement which leaves little of 
 Canada untouched made itself felt even there, and 
 we find two brothers working together with the deter- 
 mined aim to get on in life. The elder, William, 
 might reasonably have been contented at being a 
 certified teacher at an age when many boys are still 
 at school, but we find him leaving this business at 
 the end of the year and contracting with his brother, 
 who was a carpenter, to build a house in the village. 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 We may gather that the contract was well fulfilled, 
 but the possibilities attendant upon the life of 
 contracting small orders for general carpentering 
 seemed to have been less attractive than teaching. 
 William Mackenzie opened a general store, and 
 whatever may have been its success we find him at 
 the age of twenty-two in a position to marry the 
 pretty daughter of a neighbour at Kirkfield. 
 
 There is a saying current in Canada which is 
 extraordinarily characteristic of the place and its 
 people. We believe it would not be amiss in any 
 place where youth congregates — " There is a Klon- 
 dike in every man's brain ; keep digging." 
 
 It is probable that very few of the men who have 
 kept digging have failed to find treasure, and 
 the only difficulty seems to be to persuade those 
 who have not tried this elementary process to 
 attempt it. 
 
 The belief in luck is strong, and constitutional 
 aversion to work is strong also. Yet it is hardly a 
 truism to observe that while a belief in chance 
 almost always ends in failure good workers never 
 lack reward. The work and the reward indeed do 
 on the whole show a perfect equation, and the only 
 point we should like to insist upon in a work which 
 is surely not intended to be didactic is that where 
 there is a prize the best man wins it. In Canada 
 there are many prizes. Many persons believe that 
 they have only got to go there to win them. We 
 have heard the remark made, " I get four dollars a 
 day and I can do all the work I have to do in white 
 kid gloves." This may be so and we wish well to 
 the wearer of the white kid gloves ; we also wish 
 well to the man who urged upon us the necessity 
 for a law forbidding men to work more than eight 
 hours a day, or forbidding them to lay more than a 
 
 126 
 
SIR WILLIAM MACKENZIE 
 
 specified number of bricks an hour. We would 
 merely like to point out, once for all, that success is 
 not for these. The average man, the average 
 worker, the average righteous man does not succeed 
 because succeeding means exceeding, and the 
 average man is one who does not exceed his fellows. 
 
 In real hard work and sleepless toil it would be 
 difficult, we believe, to outstrip the record of the 
 men who have made Canada. Sir Edward Blake 
 used hardly to allow himself more than half an hour's 
 sleep at a time, and this he most often took at his 
 writing table when, with his arms stretched out on 
 the papers in front of him, he would lay down his 
 head for this brief amount of repose. Sir William 
 van Home remarks with a shrug of his shoulders, 
 " Sleep is a mere matter of habit and one can easily 
 do without it." Sir William Mackenzie tells us 
 that he has not had a holiday for twenty-one years. 
 With these men and others like them, the difficult 
 fulfilment of a contract reads with the interest of 
 an account of a forced march when men, perhaps, 
 have been falling by the roadside, while still the 
 determination to get through has never once been 
 forsaken ; while for the other achievement success 
 has not been easily won. 
 
 If only as a study in vigour, decision, and initia- 
 tive we believe that this short sketch of Sir William 
 Mackenzie's life may be of interest to some of our 
 readers. 
 
 Probably his first chance came from Sir William 
 Ross, then Manager of the Canadian Pacific Railway, 
 who persuaded him to go to the West, where he 
 obtained the contract for the railway then under 
 construction in the Rocky Mountains. He had to 
 supply all timber for bridges, building, etc., and 
 not only so, but to erect these same bridges and 
 
 127 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 buildings in order to avoid delay in track laying. 
 This contract ran, we believe, until the completion 
 of the railway, and it is said that no delay ever 
 occurred in the laying of the rail. 
 
 Sir William carried the whole load upon his 
 own shoulders, and notwithstanding the magnitude 
 of the task, the enormous wooden structures, which 
 had to be erected temporarily to carry it through to 
 completion, were ready almost to the hour wherever 
 the line had to be laid. 
 
 A friend of his says, " He had several large 
 sawmills, the largest of which was near Donald, 
 B.C., and these were kept running night and day 
 for the purpose of supplying wood for his contracts. 
 When no trains were running at night, and it was 
 absolutely necessary for him to be at one of his 
 mills next morning, I have known him walk from 
 the end of the track to the mill, a distance of prob- 
 ably from twenty-five to thirty miles, without the 
 least hesitation and to the wonder of all the other 
 contractors and employes. These walks occupied 
 the whole night, but he seemed to know no weari- 
 ness and his energy was tremendous. He seemed 
 to have an idea that if a thing could possibly be 
 accomplished it ought to be done, and the thought 
 of failure never once entered his head." 
 
 After the completion of the road laying for the 
 Canadian Pacific Railway, the following year Mr. 
 Mackenzie obtained the contract for erecting snow 
 sheds on the eastern slopes of the mountains. 
 Eight months were given him from the date of the 
 commencement to the completion of his work. 
 Of course everyone said that such a thing was 
 impossible, and contractors and engineers alike 
 were unanimous in saying that the thing could not 
 be done. But the infection of discouragement to 
 
 128 
 
SIR WILLIAM MACKENZIE 
 
 which weaker natures are so prone does not seem 
 to have affected him. Indeed, throughout life 
 William Mackenzie seems to have been immune 
 from contagion of this sort. As soon as the snow 
 melted in the early spring of 1886 he went into 
 partnership with a young giant of the lumber 
 camps, Donald Mann by name, whose broad axe 
 had as good a gleam upon it as many a man's sword, 
 and the two set their own hands to the job. Depart- 
 mental work was unknown ; there was no Head 
 Office from which orders were written. The two 
 men were at every point themselves, and heart, 
 soul and body were centred in the work. 
 
 That there were difficulties, who can doubt ? 
 The men of 1886 in Canada were not very easy to 
 manage nor were they free from discontent. But 
 more than this a man s life was not accounted safe 
 in the remote passes of the Rocky Mountains in 
 those wild days. Sir William carried the money 
 bags which supplied wages for the men, but he 
 was probably one of the few men in the camp who 
 went unarmed. Whether alone on his midnight 
 walks or riding amongst navvies of every creed 
 and colour he went with his revolver pockets empty 
 and his canvas bags of money full ! Perhaps his 
 confidence in their work was equal to his confidence 
 in their integrity. Be that as it may, the snow sheds 
 were finished at the end of October in the same 
 year with a month to spare, seven months being 
 the time occupied by this tremendous undertaking. 
 
 One incident stands out very prominently in 
 connection with this contract. Through some 
 carelessness on the part of the engineer in charge 
 of the large mill near Donald the drafts were laid 
 open one day, when suddenly a tornado swept 
 down the valley of the Columbia River and struck 
 
 K 129 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 the mill like a whirlwind. Fire immediately began 
 to issue from the smoke stacks in immense volumes 
 and apparently the mill was doomed. Mr. 
 Mackenzie immediately took charge of the situation, 
 ordered men to various posts, and while shouting 
 instructions to all he himself took charge of the hose. 
 To everyone present it seemed a useless and im- 
 possible task to attempt to save the mill, but the 
 man at the hose, calm and self-possessed, worked 
 with an energy that seemed almost fanatical. In 
 half an hour a hundred fires in various parts of the 
 yard and mills were extinguished, and not only was 
 the property saved, but the situation was saved 
 also. The contract for the snow sheds was fulfilled, 
 and the fire which would have delayed the opening 
 of traffic on the Canadian Pacific Railway was 
 successfully overcome. 
 
 After the snow-shed contract the firm, of which 
 Sir William was practically the head, took another 
 large order from the Canadian Pacific Railway to 
 build a short line through the State of Maine in 
 the United States. Time was the essence of this 
 contract also, and unfortunately from a financial 
 point of view it was a disappointment. The survey- 
 ing work had not been properly done nor had the 
 land been sufficiently tested by the experts who 
 had been sent down to examine the country. 
 Consequently a great deal more rock and hard pan 
 was found after the work was opened up than the 
 reports showed. So that after two years of hard 
 work it was a man to man race for the contractors 
 to come out without considerable loss. There 
 was an intense feeling of despondency over every- 
 one connected with the undertaking, but through 
 it all Sir William retained his nerve and encouraged 
 the officials to do the best they could. 
 
 130 
 
SIR WILLIAM MACKENZIE 
 
 It is under the most adverse circumstances that 
 he is seen at his best. Those who knew him at 
 this time say that he was " literally everywhere/ ' 
 endeavouring to save the situation which in the end 
 was concluded with very little loss. 
 
 After finishing this work in Maine he and his 
 associates began the building of what is now known 
 as the Regina and Long Lake Railway, from the 
 town of Regina, about three hundred and sixty 
 miles west of Winnipeg, to Prince Albert, a distance 
 of about two hundred and fifty miles. 
 
 No doubt railway building may become a habit as 
 much as anything else. With Sir William Mackenzie 
 it may be described as an incurable habit. 
 
 No sooner was the line completed than he, with 
 the same company, undertook the building of the 
 Calgary-Edmonton Road, a distance of about one 
 hundred and ninety miles between the two places, 
 and about one hundred and fifty miles the same 
 road south of Calgary. These two roads were both 
 pushed through with Sir William's usual energy 
 and determination, and afterwards, during a lull 
 in laying lines, he and his firm turned their atten- 
 tion to the street car lines of Toronto and Montreal, 
 which cities they finally electrified about 1891, en- 
 tirely abolishing the old horse system. 
 
 Speaking of this we were interested to hear Sir 
 William speak one evening on the matter of science. 
 He said he believed that all knowledge of it might 
 easily be lost should the civilised nations ever be 
 overcome by a horde of barbarians. He said, " I 
 am the owner of vast electric plant — I do not know 
 the meaning of it." And he went on to ask, " What 
 do our telegraph operators know of the telegraph ? 
 or our mechanicians of machines ? " The old 
 question with its ever-recurring interest and its 
 
 131 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 boundless speculations arose, and we wondered, as 
 many people have wondered, how far the use of 
 electricity in its modern sense may have been 
 known to the Ancients, and what sciences, like 
 senses, may have become unused and forgotten. 
 
 The ever-spreading house at Balsam Lake, where 
 the Mackenzies live, lends itself very easily to 
 conversation grave or gay. Outside on the broad 
 verandah there are groups of chairs and swinging 
 hammocks, and tables piled with books ; the lake 
 laps against the low stone wall on the edge of the 
 lawn, and mischievous chipmunks run without 
 pretence of startled haste along the branches of 
 the fir trees. Inside in the timbered hall, the great 
 fire of whispering logs makes almost as pleasant 
 an accompaniment to conversation as the gentle 
 lapping of the waves outside. From the yacht, out 
 in mid-lake, with its white decks and basket-chairs, 
 one can see Canada's tranquil sunsets, when the 
 shimmering gold of the water turns to silver green, 
 and the sun drops quite suddenly behind the low- 
 lying blue woods that fringe the shore. 
 
 " When the barbarian comes," someone said, 
 " we shall begin to seek for the * wild white Pro- 
 fessor ' whom no one ever thought of before to tell 
 us how to do things." 
 
 Probably we think too much of the pick and the 
 shovel and too little of the brain behind them. 
 
 " But hands first taught the brain, not the brain 
 the hands," ventures someone else, " when we 
 learned to balance ourselves on our hind legs and 
 left the arms free." 
 
 " I like a man to work with his arms," remarked 
 a Canadian, in the true Canadian spirit ; and a 
 Scotsman observed, " I never had but two friends 
 in my life and they were my two hands." 
 
 132 
 
SIR WILLIAM MACKENZIE 
 
 " A man never feels that he has done a good 
 day's work unless his muscles are tired," said 
 Sir William. Someone reminded him of a story of 
 the late Charles Darwin's gardener, who said that 
 he respected his master, but that he was the idlest 
 man he had ever known. " He will just sit for 
 hours doing nothing," he said. 
 
 Probably a labouring man in Sir Isaac Newton's 
 orchard may have said the same thing as he watched 
 the apples fall and pondered on the laws of gravita- 
 tion. 
 
 Sir William was insistent on the matter. He 
 said that he often wondered how many scientific 
 men would have to be killed by the long-anticipated 
 horde of barbarians in order to alter the whole of 
 our modern civilisation. He believed that one of 
 the lessons that a new country like Canada would 
 have to learn would be the superiority of brains 
 over mere physical force. 
 
 Probably he is at his best as a maker of railroads, 
 and some proof of this lies in the fact that no sooner 
 was the completion made of electrifying the street 
 cars of Toronto and Montreal than he was elected 
 President of the Toronto Railway Company — a 
 very successful undertaking both from his own and 
 from the shareholders' point of view. 
 
 About the year 1896 the Canadian Northern Rail- 
 way was begun, Sir William taking his old associate, 
 Sir Donald Mann, into partnership, and with Colonel 
 Davidson laid a line of rails from Gladstone to 
 Dauphin, a distance of eighty-five miles. 
 
 Surely no one, not even Sir William himself 
 with all his keen and far-reaching foresight, could 
 foretell what would spring from that small begin- 
 ning, or that at the end of 19 14 — only eighteen 
 years later — a transcontinental railway, extending 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 from the Atlantic to the Pacific coasts, with branches 
 running in every direction as feeders to the main 
 line, would be an accomplished fact. The accom- 
 plishment requires a pause simply to realise the 
 size of it. 
 
 It has often been said that the Scottish nation 
 succeeds through caution or canniness, as we call 
 it, with a love of the sound of the phrase, by extreme 
 carefulness, or as it is more frankly called some- 
 times, extreme meanness. Probably no greater 
 mistake than this is ever made. Scots have made 
 success where other men have failed simply through 
 imagination, daring and lavish expenditure. Their 
 imagination is the most potent factor of the three. 
 Where some men talk about a railway a Scot, par- 
 ticularly if he hails from the Highlands, visualises 
 and sees it finished. His mind leaps to the terminus 
 before a rail is laid, and the road is to him almost 
 a material fact before he has even thought of the 
 financial side of it. 
 
 Mackenzie, Mann and Davidson entered upon 
 a scheme as large as anything which the continent 
 of America has seen, with a certain light-heartedness 
 containing such a conviction of success that it 
 carried men far and swept other men along with it. 
 The optimistic spirit is strong in Canada, yet 
 probably there was a sense of amazement evoked 
 by the very mention of the new railway, and, no 
 doubt, the question was often asked where the 
 money was to come from for the enterprise, and 
 where besides were the men to be found who would 
 organise as well as finance it. 
 
 Somewhere about 1901, and while the main 
 line of the Canadian Northern Railway was being 
 constructed, the Northern Pacific Railway Com- 
 pany, which had built branches into Manitoba, 
 
 *34 
 
SIR WILLIAM MACKENZIE 
 
 determined to dispose of these branches. They 
 consisted of about three hundred and fifty miles of 
 railway running through some of the most fertile 
 wheat-producing districts of Canada. The Govern- 
 ment of Manitoba, we understand, purchased these 
 lines from the Northern Pacific Company. Then 
 came the question, " Who will operate these lines ? " 
 Sir William Mackenzie has a keen eye to them, and 
 after some competition he succeeded in leasing the 
 much sought-after property from the Manitoban 
 Government, for a term of ninety-nine years. 
 
 Following on that came the railway from Regina 
 to Long Lake, known as the " Qu'Appelle, Long 
 Lake and Regina Railway," which after construc- 
 tion has been leased by the English bondholders 
 to another Railway Company. The Agent- General 
 or Director who represented the bondholders in 
 England arrived in Toronto and had an interview 
 with Sir William at his home. Brevity is a trait 
 which characterises Sir William in all his doings, 
 and it is related that this interview was short, 
 though very much to the point. 
 
 Sir William said, " Are you in a position to put 
 a price on these two hundred and fifty miles of 
 fully equipped railroad called the ' Qu'Appelle, 
 Long Lake and Regina Railway/ and have you the 
 necessary authority to dispose of the same ? " 
 
 The Agent replied, " I have." 
 
 11 What price do you put on it ? " said William. 
 
 The Agent named a price. 
 
 To which Sir William replied, " I will take it." 
 
 In this manner two hundred and fifty miles of 
 fully equipped railroad was added to the Canadian 
 Northern System. The whole business had been 
 settled in less than two hours, and that night 
 Sir William started for England. 
 
 J 35 
 
Chapter IX Sir Donald Mann 
 
 ONE of the chief difficulties which meet 
 those who try to make a record of the life 
 or the work of men still living is that 
 those who have most to tell have often to admit 
 that their lives have been so full that the impression 
 left even upon their own minds is that of some 
 rapidly passing scene of which it is very difficult to 
 record impressions. Many of the busiest men, 
 however, are able and are sometimes kind enough 
 to be willing to give their recollections of earlier 
 days when the jealous moments have not flown 
 quite so quickly as they did in after years, and these 
 stories, although they may not be of any great 
 value in themselves, are interesting, not only for 
 the pleasant way in which they have been recounted, 
 but for the light which they throw on a man's 
 character. " The boy that's gone " may almost 
 have been forgotten by the man who speaks, and 
 yet his likeness is very easily traced by the one who 
 looks on. 
 
 For ourselves the stories of " When I was a boy " 
 have always a real human interest and the affection 
 with which the old days are spoken of says much 
 for the kindliness of human nature, which is always 
 ready to forgive the past and to think of it charitably. 
 
 Last autumn at Fallingbrook, when every tree 
 was a burning bush and the woods were one mass 
 
 136 
 
SIR DONALD MANN 
 
 of crimson, Sir Donald Mann began to speak to us 
 about the busy days which had made his career. 
 He said, " They have passed like some cinemato- 
 graph show, and seem to me now only a blur of 
 quickly moving scenes. But I can tell you some- 
 thing of the old days. I never see a wood in autumn 
 without thinking of the day when I was a little 
 boy and my father sent me with some dollars 
 wrapped in paper (* sticks ' we called them : silver 
 currency was mostly used then). I also had a 
 coffee-pot in my arms which was to be repaired. 
 
 It came on very wet and I sheltered in the woods 
 and laid down my burden, but it was impossible to 
 keep out of the deluge of rain, and the wet broke 
 the paper wrapped round the " sticks " and the 
 dollars were scattered in every direction. I picked 
 up all but two twenty-five cent pieces and these 
 could not be found. I think that search was a real 
 agony to me ; every leaf was turned, I grubbed in 
 every direction and I remember sobbing and crying, 
 knowing the punishment that would be in store for 
 me. I don't think I ever prayed so hard for any- 
 thing in my life as that I might find those two 
 missing coins. Then I looked at the coffee-pot to 
 walk home and found them both sticking to the 
 bottom of it. 
 
 I don't think I have anything very interesting to 
 tell about my life or about my people. My grand- 
 father and grandmother, with four sons, migrated 
 from Invernessshire in the year 1834. The two 
 eldest were married and brought their wives with 
 them, and my father married my mother on the day 
 that they sailed from the old land. 
 
 They came out by sailing ship, and were six 
 weeks at sea. They came up through the canals to 
 Lake Ontario and sailed across from Kingston to 
 
 *37 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 Oakville, travelling from Oakville to Acton by a 
 wagon through the woods. A brother of my 
 grandfather had settled about ten years previously. 
 
 My grandfather rented a farm, which they 
 partially cleared, where they all lived — where a 
 portion of the town of Acton is now situated. 
 Later on, my grandfather and father walked to 
 Georgetown and bought three hundred acres of 
 land at two dollars an acre. My father's elder 
 brothers objected, and thought this was too much 
 land to buy at one time. However, they com- 
 menced clearing the land, and shortly afterwards 
 my grandfather died, willing the two eldest sons 
 one hundred acres and the youngest brothers, viz. 
 my father and my uncle, fifty acres each. 
 
 The fifth brother in the family, there being no 
 sisters, came out to Canada some years later. 
 
 It was on this fifty acres that I was born ten years 
 later, that is, ten years after they sailed from Scot- 
 land in 1853. 
 
 When I was about seven years old my father sold 
 the farm to his brother, and moved to another 
 farm about half a mile south of the village, contain- 
 ing about one hundred acres, and, later on, bought 
 an additional hundred acres. The original two 
 hundred acres is still owned by the family — that is, 
 owned by the sons of my father's two eldest 
 brothers. 
 
 I was about seven years of age when we moved 
 from the fifty acres to the one-hundred-acre farm. 
 I worked on the farm during the summer months 
 and went to school in the winter months. 
 
 When about ten years old, in the mornings, my 
 eldest brother would light the fires for a week and 
 the next week I would light the fires in the house. 
 That would be long before daylight. Before break- 
 
 138 
 
SIR DONALD MANN 
 
 fast we would get out, feed the cattle, hogs, sheep, 
 and horses, and after breakfast I would run about 
 a mile to school, taking my lunch with me, and at 
 night would come home, feed the stock, and 
 perhaps cut firewood. On Saturdays I was ex- 
 pected to thresh sufficient peas to feed the hogs 
 during the next week. This was done with a flail. 
 I succeeded in devising an easier scheme, viz. I 
 would spread the peas on the barn floor and would 
 drive in the young cattle, standing on a half bushel 
 in the centre with a whip, I would drive them 
 around in a circle and thresh the grain out, as they 
 used to do two thousand years ago in the Holy 
 Land. Then I would turn the straw over and bring 
 the young cattle in again and repeat the performance, 
 driving them around in a circle until trie peas were 
 threshed. I would then clear away the pea straw 
 for fodder for the sheep, and as the barn was on a 
 high hill I would open the doors as there was 
 generally a high wind, and fling the grain in the air, 
 the wind freeing the chaff, and this was much 
 easier and more exciting than putting it through a 
 fanning mill and turning the mill by hand. After a 
 while the young cattle resented being worked in this 
 way, and I could not drive them into the barn, so 
 that I had to resort to strategy. I would leave the 
 barn door open, go away and hide, and they would 
 flock into the barn to feed. I would then close 
 the door and commence threshing again. 
 
 We made everything ourselves in those days — 
 shoes, home-spun blankets, dresses, canoes, every- 
 thing. I believe in the hands, you know, and the 
 work they can do, and I should not be where I am 
 now had I not made saw-mills, water slides, and 
 every sort of carpentry. 
 
 When I was in my thirteenth year my mother 
 
 139 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 died, leaving a family of eight children — four boys 
 and four girls. After my mother's death my father 
 seemed to have lost his balance and never suc- 
 ceeded in any undertaking, so that everything he 
 had slowly but surely left him, until both farms and 
 their effects had to be sold and left without a penny. 
 The next year after my mother's death there was 
 about an acre of land, nice green turf, lying between 
 the farmhouse and the barns with a creek between. 
 I asked my father to let me have this acre of land to 
 cultivate, which he agreed to. I cultivated this acre 
 and planted it in hops — my father being a hop- 
 grower to some extent. In the winter-time on 
 Saturdays I went to the swamp and got cedar 
 poles, hauled them out and planted the acre plot 
 with hops. I pointed the poles and drove them into 
 the ground. As it takes two years from first plant- 
 ing before a hop yard will yield, I did the work 
 while the horses that I was driving were fed at noon, 
 and at nights and on Saturdays. I worked culti- 
 vating the small hop yard, and at the end of the 
 second year I bagged the hops and kept them 
 separate from my father's own hop yard, and had 
 one short bale of hops. When these were marketed 
 the price would have brought me about thirty 
 dollars. When my father returned from Toronto, 
 after selling the year's crop of hops, I waited for 
 several days for him to speak to me and tell me 
 what he had received for my short bale of hops — 
 anxiously waiting, and could scarcely sleep at 
 nights, thinking about the fortune I was to receive 
 for my two years' work. I finally braced up and 
 had courage to ask him for the money. He stated 
 that he had no money, that it was all spent in paying 
 the interest on the mortgage that was on the farm. 
 This was a severe blow to me. 
 
 140 
 
SIR DONALD MANN 
 
 I did not despair, but asked my father to loan me 
 a pair of horses and a sleigh to haul pine logs to a 
 saw-mill a few miles away. This I did the follow- 
 ing winter, and in the spring looked for at least a 
 part of my winter's work, but when I went to the 
 lumberman, who also kept a general store, he said 
 that the account was overdrawn, and that there was 
 nothing coming either to my father or myself. 
 
 I worked that summer on the farm, and made up 
 my mind that my father could not possibly succeed 
 in making a living for himself and his family. 
 
 In the autumn of that year after harvest, I asked 
 him if he would allow me to cut and sell some hem- 
 lock trees of which the bark had been peeled and 
 sold. During the summer, and with his permission, 
 I went to work and cut these trees into cord wood. 
 I could have teamed the wood to the railway station 
 and got more money for it, but I was afraid if I did 
 so that the money, as usual, would not be there. 
 So I sold it on the ground as it stood and got twenty- 
 three dollars for my work. 
 
 I then told my father that I wanted to go to 
 college. He readily agreed to this, and I packed 
 my trunks, and was all ready to go, when he stated 
 that he would like me to study for a Presbyterian 
 minister. This I refused to do, and he said, " Then 
 I cannot afford to send you to college/ ' I said, 
 " All right. " As my trunks were packed I asked 
 him if he would not allow the horse to take my 
 baggage to the train. This he refused to do. I 
 then picked up a handbag and had just time to 
 catch the train for Sarnia. I left the trunk with all 
 my clothes and took the handbag and raced across 
 the fields to the railway station and arrived about ten 
 minutes before train time. My father arrived about 
 the same on horseback and asked me if I really 
 
 141 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 intended to go away. I said " Yes." He went 
 down to the store and bought me a Bible. He said, 
 " I cannot afford to give you any money, but I will 
 give you what is better," and then he handed me 
 the book. 
 
 At this time I was seventeen years old, and I 
 daresay I was pretty hot-headed. I told my father 
 that the farm would never bring a fortune and, 
 sure enough, he had to sell it before long, but I 
 bought it back for him when he was seventy-seven 
 and he lived there contentedly till the time of his 
 death at the age of ninety-five. 
 
 I arrived at Sarnia, and in crossing the river they 
 used small steamers to convey the passengers, 
 baggage and freight. There were no car ferries in 
 those days. 
 
 In the springtime I took, at the port, the first 
 boat of the season from Fort Huron to Lexington. 
 I could not find any work suitable there. A week 
 later I took the steamer up to Alpena. We called 
 at another place called Tawas, where we remained 
 for several hours. I remember there was an elec- 
 tion on for town officials, and the people stood in 
 two groups ; one group for one candidate, and one 
 group for the other. A smart young fellow there 
 took all our passengers on his side. We said we 
 had no vote, as we were just going through, but he 
 said it made no difference to stand on his side, and 
 he, of course, won the election. 
 
 We boarded the steamer again in the early after- 
 noon and steamed towards Alpena. After we were 
 out about an hour something went wrong with the 
 rudder and the boat turned around, but they ulti- 
 mately got the rudder fixed, and we resumed our 
 journey to Alpena. There was a mild sensation on 
 board, caused by one of the passengers who had 
 
 142 
 
SIR DONALD MANN 
 
 jumped his board bill at Tawas, and everyone 
 thought for a time that the boat was making for 
 that port again for repairs. I wondered how a man 
 could be so mean as to run away and not pay his 
 board bill. Of course, I was only seventeen, and 
 the world was entirely new to me then. 
 
 The next day a contractor for driving logs down 
 the river came to look for me. We were all sitting 
 on the wharf sunning ourselves, and we all jumped 
 up and made application ; I was selected because I 
 was the biggest. I went and got a pair of driving 
 boots made, with about seventy-five corks in the 
 sole of each boot ; these cost me about fifteen dollars. 
 
 The next day bright and early we started through 
 the woods up the river on a tramp of thirty-five 
 miles. It was in April and the snow was just going. 
 We were often knee-deep in ice and soft snow. 
 
 When we arrived at the winter camp where we 
 expected to join the river drivers, we found the 
 camp deserted. The men had camped out on the 
 river bank near the railways, or in other words, 
 where the logs were piled in across the river during 
 the winter. We had nothing to eat, so that some 
 of the old hands who had tramped up during the 
 day with us got some firewood and lit a fire, found 
 an old kettle and an old pan. They scraped the 
 bottom and sides of the old empty flour barrels, 
 and with this flour and some warm water they made 
 
 Eancakes. They took the old molasses cans, put in 
 ot water, and rolled it round and round, and 
 gathered up some syrup, and this is all we had to 
 eat. The boys gave an equal share to everyone, but 
 there was not enough to make a meal, so we all lay 
 down on the floor and waited for daylight. 
 
 We heard the men at work at daylight, and went 
 three or four miles down the river to where the men 
 
 H3 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 were working and had breakfast. We then went to 
 work rolling logs into the river. 
 
 I sat around the camp fire at night until everyone 
 had gone to bed except the foreman. I asked him 
 where I was going to sleep, and he said, " In there." 
 This was a long tent and the men all got under one 
 blanket, that is, ten or fifteen blankets were sewn 
 together, and the men got in under these blankets 
 in a row. I being the last one got the last berth. 
 I was very tired and sleepy. About four o'clock 
 in the morning I wakened up, and found that I 
 had been crowded out of the tent. About two 
 inches of soft snow had fallen during the night. I 
 got up and shot the snow off and crawled back into 
 the tent again. This was my first experience of 
 camping out at night, and I thought it was very 
 great hardship, but I camped out more or less 
 during the next twenty-three years in the lumber 
 woods and on the railways. 
 
 I did not stay very long driving, but went back 
 to Alpena and got a job running a saw in a shingle 
 mill. It was an old mill and very much out of 
 repair, and on account of my size I was put at all 
 the hard jobs in the mill. As they worked from 
 eleven and a half to twelve hours a day, and on 
 account of my youth I was not able to stand the 
 work, I shifted to three or four jobs. 
 
 I finally got down to fifty cents in my pocket ; 
 having been up country and not being able to find 
 a job, I returned to town and paid twenty-five for 
 my bed. In the morning I bought some apples 
 and crackers, paying ten cents for them, and went 
 out to a pine grove at the end of the town and ate 
 an apple and one cracker. I put the balance in a 
 paper bag and tied it to the limb of a tree and 
 marked the spot, so that if I could not strike a job 
 
 144 
 
SIR DONALD MANN 
 
 before noon hour I would come back and have my 
 lunch, but I struck a job and never came back for 
 the other apple and cracker. 
 
 I met a big stout Irishman named Deverall, and 
 we formed a partnership to cut cedar fence poles. 
 We took a contract from a man by the name of 
 Brown, who showed us where the timber was, 
 and we were to get so much a post. After working 
 for about three weeks, making about four dollars 
 a day each, a man came along. " What are you 
 doing here, boys ? " he said. We told him we were 
 cutting posts for Mr. Brown. " Well," the stranger 
 said, " this timber does not belong to Mr. Brown ; 
 it belongs to me, and you boys will have to quit." 
 We asked him if he was going to pay us for the work 
 we had done, and he said, " No." We had boarded 
 with a man by the name of Campbell, who was a 
 fisherman. We owed him for board and could not 
 pay, so we turned to and commenced fishing. 
 We caught white fish and sturgeon — the sturgeon 
 we threw away. We went out every day to haul in 
 the nets. 
 
 About the time that our board bill was paid a 
 contractor came along with a crew of men to cut 
 dock timber, and engaged my partner, Pat Deverall, 
 and myself. Our work was to fell the trees and 
 cut them into forty-foot lengths. I liked this work 
 better than any job I had had since I left home. 
 It was a nice clean job, and the smell of the pine 
 was very attractive. 
 
 I was felling a tree one day, and Pat was cutting 
 off the top of a tree that he had just felled. The 
 wind was blowing the opposite way to which I 
 intended the tree to fall. I yelled to Pat to look 
 out that the tree might go back, and he walked to 
 the top of the tree, quite safe as regards distance, 
 
 L 145 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 but when my tree was falling it was driven back 
 by the wind from the direction in which it should 
 have gone, and fell across the butt of the tree that 
 Pat was standing on, with the result that I sent 
 Pat away up in the air, and he looked like a big 
 frog. Of course, I thought he was killed, and ran 
 and picked him up. Although he was badly jarred 
 he was not seriously hurt. I brought him into 
 Alpena by the first boat. He told me that he was 
 a Fenian and had fought at Ridgeway ; he even 
 showed me where he had been wounded on the hip. 
 He was strong and brave as a lion, and after work 
 we used to wrestle for hours, and he said that I 
 was the only man he had met that he could not 
 throw. When I left Alpena ten days later he was 
 still in bed. 
 
 I wanted him to buy our little contractors' outfit 
 of saws, axes, etc., but he said he had no use for 
 them. My share would have been about eight 
 dollars, and I said, " All right, take my share of the 
 outfit.' * I sailed the next day for home. 
 
 The next picture on the quickly moving scene is 
 when Donald Mann found himself very ill with 
 pneumonia at Winnipeg. The doctor saw him and 
 told him he had better go to a boarding-house and 
 lie up as he was " very sick." The boy hunted for 
 some place where he could find a bed, and when 
 at last at the end of a long day he lay down he had 
 only sufficient strength to send and tell the doctor 
 where he was and then became delirious for three 
 weeks. No one nursed him or came near him, 
 " and all the time I felt as though there were piles 
 of lumber on my chest, and I kept heaving them 
 off." 
 
 When he was better and free from delirium he 
 asked where all the lumber had gone, and the 
 
 146 
 
SIR DONALD MANN 
 
 doctor pointed to the floor and the rafters which 
 were strewn with the poultices, which he had cast 
 aside. 
 
 When the Canadian Pacific Railway was under 
 construction Donald Mann got the contract for 
 " ties " (sleepers), and from then onwards he was a 
 dweller in tents for twenty years. 
 
 " When I first began to live in a house a few 
 years ago," he said, " I wanted to find some vacant 
 lots where I could go and scream. I had never 
 been indoors before, and I thought walls would 
 have choked me." 
 
 In the deep stillness of the woods of Canada he 
 swung his broad axe and lived to know solitude and 
 all that it may mean when it speaks to a man. 
 
 Some of his friends tell a story that once in 
 Hongkong Sir Donald in protecting a young 
 Englishman at cards was drawn into a quarrel with 
 a Russian nobleman who the following day chal- 
 lenged him to a duel. His seconds waited upon the 
 stalwart " lumberjack," who accepted the challenge 
 unhesitatingly, but sent back the answer that as the 
 challenged party he was entitled to choose what 
 weapons should be used, and he begged to say that 
 his choice was a broad axe. 
 
 The quarrel, very naturally, ended and the two 
 men shook hands. But there is something pecu- 
 liarly attractive in the young giant, like another son 
 of Jesse, disdaining weapons which he had not 
 proved and choosing one to which his hand was 
 accustomed. 
 
 In 1886 Sir Donald went into partnership with 
 Sir William Mackenzie, and an amusing story is 
 told of their first meeting. In Canada there is only 
 one coast, the coast, and for a long time there was 
 only one road, the road, that is, the Canadian 
 
 147 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 Pacific Railway. Both men were working on the 
 line, and both had sent for mules for freight. Only 
 one batch arrived and both men claimed it, and both 
 being men of some tenacity of purpose no doubt 
 meant to get what they claimed. Mr. James Ross, 
 as he then was, tried to settle the dispute, and sug- 
 gested that each man should choose a mule in turn, 
 William Mackenzie to choose the first one and 
 " Dan Mann " to choose the second and third, 
 and so on. Mann's foreman had time to say to 
 him " the two roans are far the best though they 
 don't look it ; you will be safe to leave them to your 
 fifth choice." It seemed risky not to choose them 
 at once, but Mr. Mackenzie's first choice was not 
 for them, nor when it came to choice No. 4 did he 
 take the roans, and when the fifth and seventh lots 
 had to be apportioned they fell to Sir Donald, who 
 found that he had been very well advised in choosing 
 them. 
 
 Mr. James Hill, the great American railroad 
 maker, used to say, " You are too soon with the 
 Canadian Pacific Railway. When we began our 
 great railways we had sixty million people in the 
 country, you have five millions." Donald Mann 
 laughed and said, " We have Europe and America 
 to draw from," and went on with his work. But he 
 was sufficiently a Scot to feel that no railway can 
 be made without interfering rather sadly with the 
 beauties of Nature. When the Rocky Mountains 
 were reached he rode on alone into the very heart 
 of them, far ahead even of the engineers who were 
 surveying the line, and in the early morning he tells 
 us it was like entering a holy place : " It was all 
 untouched and so peaceful. The place was so 
 quiet and the trees were of such a dazzling green 
 and the stillness of it was so vast and so full of 
 
 148 
 
SIR DONALD MANN 
 
 speech. We were going right into the untouched 
 beauty of it with our pickaxes and our shovels and 
 our steel lines, leaving a track of fire and dirt behind 
 us. It felt like murder to go through the untouched 
 forests and pierce the sides of the hills and lay the 
 birches low. I used to ride deep into the beautiful 
 glades and listen to the rush of streams over the 
 rocks and watch the delicate ferns bending in the 
 water, and I used to feel ashamed of myself and of 
 what we were going to do." 
 
 The Celtic spirit with the love of the beautiful is 
 very difficult to eradicate and probably lasts with a 
 man as long as he himself lasts. And there is 
 besides in everyone Scottish born a certain solitude 
 of mind which is often but little understood. They 
 have to suffer and they have to be alone. Almost all 
 their work had been done before they came into 
 prominence or had to live before the eyes of men, 
 and this is very strikingly the case in Canada, which 
 is essentially Scottish. It is exceptional to find any 
 of the men who have come to the front there who 
 have not had a long period of boyhood or young 
 manhood who lived much alone. The application 
 of the theory might no doubt be much more universal 
 than this, but in Canada it is certainly very con- 
 spicuous. 
 
 Sir Donald Mann's connection with the Canadian 
 Northern Railway we have spoken of in another 
 chapter, but the following incident seems to belong 
 to this personal account of him as being more 
 characteristic of the man. The Bill for the con- 
 struction of the railway was before the Ottawa 
 Parliament, and every vote that could be obtained 
 for it was important, and what was more important 
 still was that the thing should be carried through 
 while the public was keen about it. Mr. Hanna, 
 
 149 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 the well-known Vice-President of the Company, 
 was to make an important speech on the subject, 
 and this, one afternoon, was listened to with deep 
 interest by the assembled House. While he was 
 still speaking Sir Donald Mann strolled in upon the 
 assembly, and coming to Colonel Davidson, who 
 sat amongst them, he said casually, " Have you a 
 piece of paper in your pocket ? " Colonel Davidson 
 handed him his visiting card, upon which Sir Donald 
 wrote two words, at the same time remarking to the 
 Colonel, " Block the door, and don't let anyone 
 else in." He called a boy and bade him hand the 
 visiting card to Mr. Hanna, who was still addressing 
 the House. To the astonishment of that gentleman 
 the two words written upon it were, " Sit down," 
 which after one glance of amazement Mr. Hanna 
 did. Colonel Davidson continued to stand in the 
 doorway, the vote was put to the House without 
 further delay, a good part of Mr. Hanna's speech 
 remained unsaid, and the Bill was carried there and 
 then. 
 
 " I should like to know the meaning of that 
 message," Mr. Hanna said, and Colonel Davidson 
 mildly added the request to know why he had been 
 told to block the door. 
 
 " Hull is on fire," said Sir Donald quietly, 
 pointing to the other side of the river, where great 
 lumber mills were already in flames. The windows 
 of the Parliament House are high up on the wall, 
 it is impossible to see out of them while sitting in 
 the body of it. 
 
 " If word had got about that the town was burn- 
 ing," Sir Donald added, " everyone would have 
 scattered, delay would have occurred, and the Bill 
 might not have passed." 
 
 One feels that success is not undeserved by a 
 
 150 
 
SIR DONALD MANN 
 
 man who can act so decisively and with such keen 
 initiative at a crisis. And yet there are those who 
 know well that the practical side of life is not really 
 the strongest motive power of a business man. It 
 may be that like another who did a great deal of 
 work in the world he felt that he was too dreamy to 
 be anything else than practical. It is asserted by 
 those who know him well that love of country and 
 an instinctive love of good literature are also his 
 characteristics. Our business, however, lies with 
 his public character rather than with that more 
 intimate knowledge which rightly belongs to his 
 inner circle of friends and to his home, and on 
 these we do not propose to trespass. 
 
 I5i 
 
Chapter X Colonel Davidson 
 
 IT is a comparatively small and so far not very 
 important place that claims Colonel Davidson 
 as its most distinguished son. Glencoe, 
 Ontario, in the Sixties was remote altogether from 
 the busy sound of the world. But the district 
 boasted a school, and in the school was Mary 
 Campbell, its mistress, and next to his mother, 
 Colonel Davidson owes to Mary Campbell the 
 strongest influence and the largest share of his 
 success in life, and he is proud to own it. The 
 man or the woman who has helped Colonel Davidson 
 has never been forgotten by him, and he seems to 
 hold that gratitude, even for the smallest aid, is a 
 debt which requires sevenfold repayment. 
 
 " I owe it to Mary Campbell," is all that Colonel 
 Davidson says when he is asked about his success, 
 and when pushed for a fuller explanation he simply 
 replies, " She thought a lot about me." 
 
 Like most boys who are in advance of their 
 fellows and whose school mistress or master has 
 been able to detect the latent possibilities in them, 
 school days were not made too easy for the clever 
 boy owing to the jealousy of his mates. But he was 
 difficult to quarrel with. First, because of his gay, 
 good-humoured disposition with which he was 
 born and which has followed him through life, and, 
 secondly, because of his inherent sweetness of 
 temper which made quarrelling with him almost 
 impossible, 
 
 152 
 
COLONEL DAVIDSON 
 
 When Mary Campbell left the school to be 
 married to Mr. Corneill, Andrew, although a mere 
 boy at the time, was bent upon continuing his 
 education, and he meant to leave no stone unturned 
 in order to procure it. There were many difficulties 
 in the way and he set about overcoming them. 
 Probably no one in the world had less desire than 
 Colonel Davidson to be held up as a copybook 
 example to young people, but the attitude of this 
 boy, as he then was, in his teens towards the whole 
 matter of education suggests a certain contrast with 
 that of boys to whom these things are made very 
 easy. The Eton or Harrow, Winchester or Welling- 
 ton schoolboy, sent off punctually with his box 
 packed, his pocket money in his hand, and the 
 special school train awaiting him at the end of a 
 comfortable journey can perhaps hardly realise 
 how much determination and effort were necessary 
 to the Canadian boy in order to procure his mucn 
 coveted education. When Mary Campbell gave up 
 her school his chances seemed to be over. But 
 Andrew did not intend to be beaten quite yet and, 
 unassisted, he made enquiries and considered 
 means and found at last another place at Glencoe 
 where the learning that he wanted might be obtained. 
 At Glencoe he had an uncle who owned a small 
 farm, and to him Andrew wrote offering to take 
 care of his horse and cow and to do a fair share of 
 work if his uncle would in return give him board and 
 lodging and allow him to attend the Glencoe school. 
 
 His mother was against the plan because Glencoe 
 had a sinister character attached to it for being a 
 rowdy place where boys and youths drank more 
 than was good for them. Mrs. Davidson was one 
 of the McRaes of Ross, and the Colonel himself is a 
 descendant: pf the Davidsons of Tulloch. There 
 
 153 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 was gentle blood on both sides of the house, and 
 Mrs. Davidson used all her persuasion to prevent 
 her son declining to the bar-frequenting level of 
 some of the youths in the Glencoe district. 
 
 It says much for the youngster that not even his 
 mother's persuasiveness could alter his purpose, 
 and he found a way out of the difficulty as he has 
 found a way out of many other difficulties in life. 
 " I will promise not to taste wine or spirits until 
 I am twenty-one/ ' he said to his mother, " and, of 
 course, I did not," says Colonel Davidson, when he 
 tells the story. And on this condition he was allowed 
 to go to his uncle's house to continue his education. 
 
 Perhaps not many people after the head-mistress- 
 ship of Mary Campbell was over would trouble 
 themselves to notice the progress of the clever boy, 
 but one thing seems to have been remembered 
 about him and is remembered by some old friends 
 still, and that is his absolute conscientiousness of 
 work on the farm. It has been said that no horse 
 harness ever gleamed as young Andrew Davidson's 
 did, and indeed much more tedious work was done 
 faithfully by him. It is the sons of the farm who 
 seem on the whole to be in the foremost ranks of 
 Canadian men ; and the boys who spent their 
 early days in the fields have lived to be the greatest 
 financiers in the world. Probably there is some 
 time for youthful dreaming in the life of the farm 
 even where, as in Andrew Davidson's case, it might 
 sometimes consist in merely carting wood for 
 months at a stretch. With the Scottish born dreams 
 are a necessity, and the pragmatic Scot is probably 
 the most visionary and idealistic of all men. 
 
 The value of dreams is their lack of limitation. 
 In the quiet woods and solitary fields of Ontario, 
 Andrew began to see his future, arid to see it as 
 
 154 
 
COLONEL DAVIDSON 
 
 dreams painted it. His earliest ambition was to 
 get into a bank. There is a proverb in the Davidson 
 family to the effect that there are no five David- 
 sons of whom one is not a banker. But in these 
 limitless dreams of his, with their unbounded 
 possibilities which are so wholesome and inspiring 
 in youth and so consoling in older age, it was not 
 as a clerk or even as bank manager that he saw 
 himself, but always as the owner of a bank. Some- 
 thing seemed out of order and out of gear when he 
 tried to consider himself as merely a wage-earning 
 man, though we find him saying to himself, when 
 he was a mere boy, " I won't enter a bank unless 
 I can own it some day." When he carted logs he 
 saw himself not working in a lumber yard, but as 
 the owner of the yard. 
 
 He never expected to leap to that position without 
 working for it. The story is told that when he was 
 a boy he took a contract to haul twelve hundred 
 cords of four-foot wood a mile and a half, and pile 
 it eight feet high. It was a job which one might 
 reasonably say would lead to nothing, but even a 
 knowledge of piling wood, if it is thoroughly 
 learned, may be a valuable asset one day. 
 
 One day when the President of the railway where 
 Andrew Davidson was working made a trip over 
 the line he expressed displeasure at finding a 
 diminishing pile of cord wood at the end of the 
 platform. Wood was the fuel used for locomotives 
 in those days, but it had evidently been extrava- 
 gantly treated. Davidson stepped forward and 
 explained to him that the wood was piled in such a 
 way that the company was paying for about 10 per 
 cent more than it got. The President looked at 
 the young man and invited him to get on board 
 the car in which he himself was travelling, at the 
 
 155 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 same time saying, " I will find out myself whether 
 you know what you are talking about or not." 
 
 At the next station there was a similar pile of wood. 
 
 " Now," said Mr. Case," show me what you mean." 
 
 Davidson pointed out that when cord wood is 
 split in the log, it is quartered from the bark in 
 toward the heart, so that a cross-section of a stick 
 would show a triangular form, the outer side 
 bearing the bark ; and that where it was piled bark- 
 side down the sticks would not fit closely in, but 
 leave spaces between them " that you could throw 
 a dog through." The cord measurements being 
 four by four by eight feet these spaces would stand 
 for about one-tenth less wood than could be piled 
 in the same dimensions if so reversed that the 
 sticks would pack tight. He illustrated his point 
 as he talked, by handling the sticks both ways, 
 and proved that the company was getting only 
 about nine-tenths of the wood it was paying for. 
 Mr. Case listened, and saw a light. 
 
 " You are appointed wood inspector for this 
 road, beginning right now," said he. 
 
 Young Davidson accepted the post and worked 
 at it faithfully, but with not the remotest intention 
 of remaining a wood inspector all his life. The 
 desire to push on seemed almost a constitutional 
 part of him. 
 
 In later years he has almost the sense of apology 
 in speaking of these boundless early ambitions of 
 his. Always the size of a thing appealed to him, 
 and he sums up the meaning of his life when he 
 says simply, " I could not have been a success in a 
 store." Perhaps the great size of Canada inspires 
 its sons to great things. Be that as it may, it is the 
 men who have seen furthest who have gone furthest, 
 and Colonel Davidson was one of those who are 
 
 156 
 
COLONEL DAVIDSON 
 
 unable to do little things except with a vision of 
 great things in front of him. Meanwhile he bright- 
 ened harness and carried lumber, took care of a 
 cow and worked hard at school, which on the whole 
 may be said to be a very creditable side of dreaming. 
 
 Of couse he fell in love, and the incident in this 
 case (the affair was a very boyish one) is only 
 important because the father of the young lady upon 
 whom he bestowed his attentions had been to the 
 United States of America, and the United States 
 in those days was to Canada what Canada now is 
 to England — a place of promise, a place of wide 
 opportunities and of hope for everyone ; a place 
 where there is a chance for a man. The girl's father 
 talked about the States until even the wagons about 
 the farm began to look small ! The farm itself be- 
 came an insignificant place, there was something 
 cramped and small in the life that surrounded 
 Andrew and he resolved to escape from it. 
 
 So off he goes while still in his teens to the 
 lumber woods of Michigan, then to Jamesville, in 
 Wisconsin, where he put himself to school, and 
 where in a business college he learned telegraphy 
 during the day and occupied his evenings in reading. 
 
 His career is one of those that proves the hard, 
 dull, old saying, that " nothing succeeds like 
 work," and that lucky chances count for very little. 
 The man who works week in week out, from morn 
 till night, is indeed generally content to do without 
 them so long as he may keep those certainties which 
 are the result of diligence. 
 
 It has often been said that the first element in 
 success is a purpose, but purpose unless it is applied 
 is mere dreaming, and dreaming, as we have tried 
 to show, may have a very practical side to it. Andrew 
 Davidson turned them into realities with every 
 
 157 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 year that he lived ! The longed-for chance of 
 getting into a bank came to him, and it is surely 
 a record that by the time he was twenty-six years 
 old he had been twenty times President of twenty 
 different banks. 
 
 Now came the period when money was for the 
 first time at his disposal, and he began to invest in 
 small sums where he could. Always his belief lay 
 in land, and almost one has a feeling that between 
 him and it there is some curious sympathy and 
 understanding which can hardly be explained by 
 the ordinary theories at our command. Andrew 
 knew good land as a shoemaker knows leather, and 
 he knows it still. It may be that one drives with 
 him through villages and lanes of England hemmed 
 in on either side by houses or hedges. At the end 
 of a considerable journey he will be unable to tell 
 you the name of a single village through which he 
 has passed, but he could make a pretty good map 
 of the land, and not only so, but it is amazing to 
 hear him say, in a country which to him is perfectly 
 new, " I believe there is probably a gully over 
 there," or, " I believe on the south side of the hill 
 there is a slope to westward." His knowledge is 
 instinctive, and is independent either of experience 
 or of teaching. It is hardly too much to suggest 
 that there is something which, for the lack of a 
 better word, we call psychic about it. 
 
 That psychic influences enter very largely into 
 the lives of successful men could scarcely be 
 doubted. One night Colonel Davidson had a curious 
 vision, wherein he saw in a manner perfectly con- 
 vincing to himself that Canada was the land that 
 had to be conquered and won, and that its ultimate 
 success would depend upon its land values. With 
 the vision came a conviction that he himself was to 
 
 158 
 
COLONEL DAVIDSON 
 
 be the exploiter of Canadian land. He told his wife 
 after they were married about the dream, and it 
 proves his belief in it that on the strength of it he 
 left the United States and went back to his native 
 country. Probably, did he but know it, this message 
 and conviction for which we have no adequate name 
 have been the motive power of far more lives than 
 we have any idea. Most people hesitate to speak 
 of their dreams, knowing that, like Joseph, they may 
 be hated for them. But the great Egyptian comp- 
 troller, as well as hundreds of others, have gone 
 forth into the world armed with nothing but the 
 convinced assurance that they are intended to 
 succeed. 
 
 It was in London, Ontario, that Colonel Davidson 
 met the young lady who became his wife. She was 
 a kinswoman of his own, one of the McRaes who had 
 settled in Canada. 
 
 No doubt it is his experience of the excellent 
 brains and the nobility of the lives of the women 
 about him which has made Colonel Davidson a 
 loyal believer in the Woman's Suffrage Movement. 
 The man who was educated by Mary Campbell 
 and who married Miss McRae must undoubtedly 
 have a very high opinion of women. 
 
 " But what convinces me," he sometimes says 
 with a laugh, " that they ought to have the vote, is 
 because it was through their intelligence that I once 
 got my own way in a very important matter. I 
 never expected to get it and I never would have got 
 it if it hadn't been for women and women voters." 
 
 He had entered now on the great railway business 
 of Canada, and in company with Sir William 
 Mackenzie and Sir Donald Mann had carried the 
 Canadian Northern Railway almost to the shores 
 of the Pacific. At Vancouver there came what 
 
 159 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 seemed an insuperable difficulty, namely, that of 
 acquiring land in the very heart of the city. Colonel 
 Davidson's demand was not a modest one. He 
 wanted one hundred and sixty acres in the most 
 important position in the town and he meant to 
 have it, but could not see his way to getting it. He 
 shut himself up in the rooms of his hotel where he 
 received letters and telegrams pointing out that his 
 project was an insane one, and he waited and worked 
 while he waited. But ears were turned to his en- 
 treaties and a real hitch had come. A deputation 
 of women voters of Vancouver, of whom the number 
 was about four thousand, waited upon him to know 
 what were the actual facts of the case, what profit 
 the city of Vancouver would have by giving the 
 land, and how far the drawbacks to the scheme 
 were real or imaginary. 
 
 " I wasn't up against silliness, remember/ ' the 
 Colonel says, I was face to face with intelligent 
 women asking me intelligent questions, and I had 
 to put my best foot forward to answer them. The 
 smoke nuisance was one of the things to be con- 
 sidered, and the question asked was, * Will the 
 smoke of the proposed new railway injure Vancouver, 
 or blight the beautiful park which belongs to it ? ' " 
 
 The word park set Colonel Davidson thinking. 
 He walked to the window of his hotel which looked 
 out on to a public garden. He thought quickly for 
 a moment, and then almost without hesitation 
 turned to the deputation and said, " I'll give you a 
 far better park than this if you will vote me the 
 land. The smoke nuisance shall not destroy it, 
 for the train will run under a cut tunnel and will 
 be electrified where it emerges into the town." 
 
 The women thought over his propositions, and 
 while the men opposed him, with a very large 
 
 1 60 
 
COLONEL DAVIDSON 
 
 majority, the women voters of Vancouver carried 
 through a project of which the results have been 
 almost incalculable towards making the success of 
 the town, and where the first thing visitors see 
 when they come to Vancouver is one of the most 
 attractively laid out spots in the world. 
 
 " So that's why I'm a Suffragist/' says Colonel 
 Davidson with a twinkle in his eye. " I got my 
 hundred and sixty acres in False Creek, and the 
 Canadian Northern Railway will boast of the finest 
 station between the Atlantic and the Pacific coasts.' ' 
 
 His ventures in British Columbia were not con- 
 fined to railways only. In 1908 he started the 
 Fraser Saw Mills, near New Westminster, which is 
 still the largest in existence, and the Columbia 
 River Lumber Company, of Golden, had its begin- 
 ning in 1908. Colonel Davidson is President of the 
 corporation which owns timber limits on Vancouver 
 Island worth millions of dollars, and employs more 
 men than in any other similar industry in British 
 Columbia. His fellow shareholders in these two 
 companies, as well as in the Canadian Collieries, 
 Ltd., are Sir William Mackenzie, Sir Donald Mann, 
 and Colonel A. D. McRae. But Colonel Davidson 
 has gone even further in his industrial investments 
 than his two friends. He is one of the powers that 
 control the Canadian Northern Pacific Whaling 
 Company and the Wallace Fisheries Ltd., all of 
 which are giving hundreds of men employment and 
 making hundreds of men rich. To-day he is con- 
 nected in an official capacity with over fifty different 
 banks and corporations, varying from chartered 
 banks, trust and mortgage companies, to flour 
 milling and grain elevators. He is the senior 
 partner of Messrs. Davidson and McRae, a firm 
 which has a record of having sold more prairie land 
 
 M 161 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 than any company on the Continent, and which in 
 addition acts as the official town site agent of the 
 Canadian Northern Railway. The strenuous rail- 
 way construction on main and branch lines in Mani- 
 toba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta has opened up a 
 vast region to settlement, and each year sees Messrs. 
 Davidson and McRae place from sixty to one 
 hundred town sites on the market. 
 
 A hundred illustrations of his versatility could 
 be given, but one or two will suffice. In 1910 
 Colonel Davidson and Mr. D. B. Hanna, third 
 Vice-President of the Canadian Northern Railway, 
 visited England for the purpose of purchasing 
 steamers for the railway company's proposed trans- 
 Atlantic service. The negotiations were brought to 
 a successful conclusion, and later both gentlemen 
 returned to England to arrange the details of 
 organisation of the service between Bristol and 
 Canada. Other pressing business called Mr. Hanna 
 back to Toronto, so that the whole responsibility 
 devolved upon the Colonel, who, within a few 
 months, had the Royal Line in commission, and was 
 busy handling a large volume of passenger and freight 
 traffic. 
 
 Such a record of work might be considered a 
 handsome one for most men, but we believe that 
 the real story of Colonel Davidson's industry and 
 enterprise is yet to be told. 
 
 There was no Western Canada when he began his 
 career, and it was to the United States of America 
 that everyone turned for wealth and opportunity. 
 There were but three settlers west of Regina, while 
 the prairie provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan, 
 and Alberta were unbroken and practically un- 
 discovered. The man who never did things by halves 
 and was always bothered by small figures, went out 
 
 162 
 
COLONEL DAVIDSON 
 
 to the prairies, saw them in imagination white with 
 harvest fields, and then, instead of contenting him- 
 self with wishing that settlers would come and live 
 there and break up the fallow ground and develop 
 industries, he began to consider how best his project 
 could be atained. Perhaps a letter to the Press might 
 have helped the matter a little, or a boom in Canadian 
 prairie land might have assisted by making its 
 possibilities known here and there. Colonel David- 
 son acted on rather larger lines than these. He 
 sent three thousand agents down into the States to 
 exploit his ideas, and to suggest emigration to 
 Canada to the farmers of the United States. The 
 result in the matter of numbers who flocked across 
 the border was large, and some brought good for- 
 tunes with them and some very little. There seems 
 to have been a great absence of meanness about the 
 dealings with the new-comers. To those who came 
 first in answer to his call Colonel Davidson sold the 
 finest land, to those who were unable to pay at the 
 time he gave the opportunity to save their money 
 and then to make their payments. 
 
 Colonel Davidson asked no one to do pioneering 
 work for him. It is indeed not his way to shirk the 
 business of life. The pioneer talks about possi- 
 bilities, but the man of action goes and sees what 
 other people are talking about. Colonel Davidson 
 went to Saskatchewan in the days when it was 
 almost impossible to hire even a wagon as a means 
 of transit. He found a settler who had a team and 
 hired it from him, and for four or five weeks he 
 drove over the untracked prairies finding, with that 
 wonderful sixth sense of his, the very secrets of the 
 ground. He went back to Winnipeg from whence 
 he had started, with an offer to buy one million 
 two hundred thousand acres of land. He is not a 
 
 163 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 man, as we have said, who deals in small sums. 
 The offer was accepted with a period of seven years 
 in which to pay the required sum. At the end of 
 seven months Colonel Davidson was able to make 
 a suggestion that if full payment was made within 
 a year of the time of purchase fifteen per cent might 
 be deducted from the price. A bargain was struck 
 at twelve and a half per cent by an astonished 
 owner who warned Colonel Davidson not to 
 attempt impossibilities. 
 
 Fortunately, it is only impossibilities which 
 attract him, and inconceivable as it may sound, 
 Colonel Davidson had within ninety days sold the 
 whole of his one million two hundred thousand 
 acres. 
 
 Most of the settlers were from the middle or 
 western States of the Union, of the finest agricultural 
 type in the West. Thousands of them responded 
 to the trumpet call of the courageous pioneer. 
 Thousands of others sat at home and talked about 
 the danger of the American invasion of Canada. 
 Colonel Davidson, undismayed, went on. And his 
 reward perhaps is only dawning now, when it is 
 found that out of every hundred Americans in 
 Canada eighty-five per cent have become naturalised 
 Canadians. 
 
 The scheme of the great American invasion had 
 been maturing in Colonel Davidson's mind for 
 years, so that when the moment of action came, the 
 thing was concluded and the machinery set in 
 motion with a quickness, impulsiveness, and direct- 
 ness which set the world gaping. No one but a big 
 man could have done it, no one but a big man could 
 have attempted it, no one but a big man could have 
 carried it through. Money was wanted for Canada, 
 settlers were wanted, the land was hungry for men, 
 
 164 
 
COLONEL DAVIDSON 
 
 and men were hungry for land. Above all and in 
 order to obtain all, advertisement was wanted. 
 The Press might talk a great deal about the possi- 
 bilities of the West ; three thousand agents might 
 talk about it in the States, but what practical men 
 wanted to do was to see it. Colonel Davidson met 
 by chance one of the practical men, a banker, in 
 Winnipeg. He told the man his scheme and with- 
 out a moment's forethought added, " Come with 
 me and see the place — come as my guest." 
 
 The two men might travel together very com- 
 fortably, might discuss Canada and finance, might 
 help to move the thing forward very slowly. 
 
 This, however, was not quite Colonel Davidson's 
 way. He knows Canada is big enough for everyone, 
 and Canada is rich enough for everyone. It is not a 
 place for one man's fortune, but for millions of men's 
 fortunes. 
 
 " Come along with me and see the place," was 
 Colonel Davidson's invitation, and to this he added 
 impulsively, " Bring your friends with you. It's all 
 right, it's my invitation, they shall be my guests, 
 I'll get another car put on to the train. Ask three 
 or four others. Ask nine or ten." 
 
 But even so the profit was much too small and 
 moved much too slowly. There was a convention 
 of bankers sitting at the neighbouring town of 
 Crookston — they numbered some three thousand 
 bankers. The date of the convention was the 25th 
 of April. The Coronation of King Edward was 
 fixed for the 26th April. " Let's make a Corona- 
 tion thing of it," said the Colonel. " Let's ask 
 three thousand bankers into Winnipeg to meet and 
 talk about Canada." He began to pile up the thing 
 grandly, as is his fashion. " Let them come and 
 see Canada too." 
 
 165 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 " What ! Three thousand of them ! " 
 
 It was one of the impossible things such as he 
 was always attempting. How could he possibly take 
 three thousand men to Canada with him ? How 
 were they to be fed, transported ? The numbers 
 amounted to a small army. 
 
 He began to ask more and more bankers to join 
 him ; the very fun and daring of the thing appealed 
 to him. Dates were fixed and invitations were 
 accepted before anyone had time to cease gaping. 
 
 Three thousand ! Four thousand ! Five thou- 
 sand ! Let them all come. Let the newspaper 
 men come. Let them come with their cameras and 
 their sharply pointed pencils. Let them come 
 with their cablegram forms ready to send to England 
 at any considerable station where the train stopped. 
 
 Too many ? Not a bit of it. It was not a Bank 
 Holiday but a banker's holiday, and there was not a 
 man amongst them who did not treat the outing as a 
 splendid and impossible spree. Of course they all 
 wanted to come, hundreds of others would like to 
 have come. Hundreds of others followed hard 
 after them. 
 
 When Colonel Davidson's train-load was com- 
 pleted, it numbered over five thousand souls. What 
 did it matter how many coaches there were on the 
 train. What did it matter how caterers worked and 
 Pullman Cars people contrived. The American in- 
 vasion was a big thing and it had to be done on big 
 lines. " Go ahead " was the watchword. " Come 
 and see," was the rallying call. And never was there 
 a jollier exodus. These were men not marching 
 out from slavery, but marching from what they had 
 till then believed to be the best country in the world 
 into a country which they believed to be a better. 
 Everyone knows that Canada is the only country to 
 
 X66 
 
COLONEL DAVIDSON 
 
 which Americans have ever emigrated. They did 
 it in true American style, and there were no pillars 
 of salt left in their track because not one of them 
 looked back. All were going forward, all were 
 forging ahead, all were looking out of the railway 
 train windows for the Promised Land. 
 
 And when they came to it in truly American 
 style they planked down the dollars and bought it. 
 
 The men of that train alone purchased one 
 thousand and eighty acres before they returned. 
 
 Not a bad deal for one man's guests, and not a 
 bad beginning for Canadian settlers, also not a bad 
 record for the Joshua who led them forth. 
 
 They had all ennobled him and titled him long 
 before the journey was over, and during the jolly 
 evenings he was dubbed the Duke of Dundrin and 
 the father of the American invasion. 
 
 It was a modern victory, and had no bloodshed 
 about it. No one was turned out of his land to 
 make way for the new-comers. There was room 
 for everyone and a hoard of good fellows with 
 money in their pockets were prepared to pay for 
 what they took and prepared to make Canada not 
 so much a Land of Promise (which is far too slow a 
 method for Westerners), but prepared to make it a 
 country of to-day. 
 
 Practical work went on all the time. The man 
 who had seen visions and dreamed dreams was 
 always wider awake than anyone else as soon as his 
 dreams were realities. An office was started in 
 Toronto for which fifty or sixty girls were busy 
 sending out advertisements. The bankers and the 
 newspaper men went back to their work. 
 
 Western Canada had started. 
 
 Nothing that Colonel Davidson has ever done 
 will compare with what he did for Canada then. 
 
 167 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 It was a national thing and the Empire was proud 
 of it. 
 
 Railways follow on a movement of this sort as 
 inevitably as night follows day. It is of no use 
 giving men a country unless they have the means 
 of getting there. Colonel Davidson, Sir Donald 
 Mann, and Sir William Mackenzie were building 
 the Canadian Northern Railway, and it was a line 
 on which no steam roller went ahead, making things 
 too easy. Its story we have attempted already to 
 tell, but there is one chapter of it so full of interest 
 and so intimately connected with Colonel Davidson 
 that it hardly seems unfitting to speak of it here. 
 
 The chief difficulty and one of the largest expenses 
 in connection with the new line of railway are the 
 termini. A railway cannot finish poetically on the 
 prairie ; it has got to come into a town ; it must 
 have a station ; it must have room to spread ; it 
 must have workshops and yards. Town land is 
 expensive. Town land even at a very high figure is 
 often very difficult to acquire. 
 
 Also there is the other fellow. 
 
 If land is good or if land is valuable, there is 
 always more than one person that wants it. 
 
 The Canadian Northern Railway had to come 
 into Montreal and there was not room for it, and 
 the land in the middle of Montreal is almost price- 
 less. 
 
 There were difficulties ahead again — difficulties 
 which doubtless everyone pointed out without 
 attempting to remove them. Fortunately in the 
 midst of the city of Montreal there is a hill, Mount 
 Royal, which gives its name to the town. 
 
 Colonel Davidson climbed the hill and thought 
 about things. 
 
 He said to himself, " There isn't room for a rail- 
 
 168 
 
COLONEL DAVIDSON 
 
 way on the town side of the mountain and there 
 isn't time to go round it. I'll go through it." It 
 was quite a trifling proposition : merely a tunnel, 
 resulting in a new residential suburb on the other 
 side of Mount Royal. Trains bring men into the 
 city in ten minutes, and the success of Montreal 
 
 Sjoes forward " in leaps and bounds " as Canadians, 
 ove to say. 
 
 Sir William van Home once said that the best 
 part of doing impossibilities was that no one inter- 
 fered with one. Colonel Davidson was alone in his 
 scheme for tunnelling the mountain, and his diffi- 
 culty consisted in the fact that the other fellow 
 wanted the land on the other side of the mountain 
 but he had not quite made up his mind to buy it. 
 He had been given the option of purchase up till a 
 certain Friday morning. On the Monday before 
 that Friday Colonel Davidson made up his mind 
 that he wanted it and meant to have it. 
 
 We can imagine that it must have been a week of 
 some anxiety for him. But we have a shrewd 
 suspicion that what is called the sporting instinct 
 is very strong in Colonel Davidson. A venture is 
 always to him a bit of pure fun, and a decision once 
 made he has the faculty of putting it out of his 
 mind immediately. Nevertheless a certain strain is 
 always involved in playing a waiting game, and it 
 was essential for the success of the enterprise that 
 during the whole of that week Colonel Davidson 
 should keep his own counsel, and, like " Brer 
 Fox," he had to lie low and say nuffin\ Had it 
 once been noised abroad that the Canadian Northern 
 Railway intended to have its terminal on the other 
 side of Mount Royal there is no doubt that the price 
 of that land would not be phenomenally low. Also 
 the other fellow was considering the matter of 
 
 169 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 purchase and might close his deal. Colonel David- 
 son was not even seen in the streets of Montreal ; 
 he went to his room in his hotel and stayed there. 
 Not a suspicion was abroad that he contemplated 
 buying the land nor was his presence in the city 
 suspected. At night-fall he went out in a closed 
 motor-car. In a Russian detective story we may 
 come across such incidents, but we are not pre- 
 cisely looking for them in a modern Canadian town. 
 
 Colonel Davidson stayed during the week in his 
 hotel rooms. The option was to close at twelve 
 o'clock on Friday. At twelve o'clock on Friday he 
 would make his bid if the option had not been taken 
 up by that time. 
 
 " It never cost me a sleepless night," said the 
 Colonel. " I do not see the use of staying awake 
 unless you can do things." 
 
 And all the success of the Canadian Northern 
 Railway in Montreal depended on having the land 
 at the back of the mountain. 
 
 Friday morning came and the success was very 
 near. 
 
 There was a Bill under consideration in the House 
 Assembly at Ottawa, and on this Bill much would 
 depend. The other fellow thought that it would 
 not pass for another year. Even Sir Donald Mann 
 telegraphed to Colonel Davidson, " Go slow." 
 
 At twelve o'clock noon on Friday the option was 
 extended to six o'clock on the same day. 
 
 Colonel Davidson, who had slept as soundly over- 
 night that week as he had slept during his life, 
 except when it has suited him to stay awake, was 
 able to keep his head cool at a crisis. He waited in 
 his rooms until six o'clock, and at six o'clock the 
 option was further extended till midnight. 
 
 Colonel Davidson waited on. He engaged a room 
 
 170 
 
COLONEL DAVIDSON 
 
 next his own to which the owner of the land might 
 be shown at midnight, when his agent would make 
 a bid for it. 
 
 The passing programme may by this time have 
 become somewhat trying, and Colonel Davidson 
 may have given something in the form of a sigh of 
 relief when twelve o'clock struck and the landowner 
 was ushered into the room next his own. It was 
 still necessary that it should not transpire that the 
 land was wanted for the Canadian Northern Rail- 
 way. 
 
 The owner thereof was a cautious man, one who 
 looked several times on every side of a proposition. 
 And rightly too, for the deal was a big one. He set 
 forth his objections, and the agent, we may be sure, 
 travelled pretty constantly between those two hotel 
 rooms during that memorable night. Colonel 
 Davidson sent back his agreement. The agent had 
 something still further to say. The agent brought 
 back the messages and received Colonel Davidson's 
 answer. . . . 
 
 That was a long night, but the agreement of sale 
 was signed at half-past six in the morning, and two 
 men went to bed and Colonel Davidson went to 
 Ottawa. 
 
 His work was not over yet. He had to get money 
 for his terminals. He would go to Ottawa and see 
 what could be done. 
 
 No time to catch the train ? Heaps of time ! 
 Well, two minutes any way ! 
 
 Colonel Davidson seized his hat and a map and 
 flew to the station. He caught the train and met a 
 friend who was going to Ottawa also. The friend 
 was a banker, who tapped Colonel Davidson on the 
 shoulder and told him he had a private car on board 
 the train. 
 
 171 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 " Come into my carriage," said the banker, and it 
 may be noted in passing that he was a man whom 
 Colonel Davidson had not seen for years and had 
 not expected to see in Montreal. 
 
 The two friends journeyed onwards together. 
 
 " I want to tell you something," said Colonel 
 Davdison, speaking on the spur of the moment, as 
 though he had matured the subject for a year. 
 " I don't want anything said about this scheme, 
 and if you don't want to go into it we'll say nothing 
 about it." 
 
 On the conditions of strictest confidence the 
 matter was unfolded, and a chance meeting was 
 turned to such good account that a loan was arranged 
 within an appointed time, and the necessary 
 financial basis. For the third great terminal was 
 built on the great road which was to run from one 
 ocean to the other. 
 
 It is customary to say that good luck has followed 
 Colonel Davidson all the way. As a matter of fact 
 good luck is following everyone, but it is not 
 everyone vfho kiipws how to use it. One man turns 
 a chance n^eting with a friend to good account, 
 another turns it to bad account, but for the most 
 part it is turned to no account at all. Colonel 
 Davidson seized on a chance remark at a luncheon 
 table to begin the inauguration of the American 
 invasion. It was a chance meeting with a banker 
 that led to the famous excursion to the prairies 
 which we have already described. But at the 
 back of it all was the man who never left anything 
 to chance, and who, when he acts, always acts 
 strongly. 
 
 We hope that it will not be considered an imperti- 
 nence thus to speak of the personal characteristics 
 of one whose life, we believe, may be encouraging 
 
 173 
 
COLONEL DAVIDSON 
 
 to other and to younger men. His manner of 
 trusting those whom he employed has, we believe, 
 had a very fine effect upon the men who work 
 with him and under him, and we have heard of a 
 young man saying, " I don't know what it is about 
 the Colonel ; you have only got to see him and 
 then you feel as if you can go out and do things." 
 His love of humour, his boyishness and a certain 
 gentleness which characterises him have made him 
 much beloved in Canada and elsewhere. Perhaps 
 no one more than he would dislike any reference 
 here to his gifts to public enterprise of various sorts. 
 We respect his view of the matter and would 
 merely like to say that in this as in all else Colonel 
 Davidson deals in big figures. As a boy he very 
 nearly lost a job once because of his extravagance 
 in pencils and blotting-paper, and his employer 
 wrote him a characteristic letter in which he says, 
 " Your own future advance depends on frugality." 
 
 Colonel Davidson's advance has not depended 
 upon frugality, but on wise extravagance and keen 
 Celtic imagination backed by a gift for hard work. 
 
 Our object in giving this sketch of his life — as 
 indeed it is the object of all these sketches, is the 
 desire to show what endeavour may do. Should 
 they have any success in this respect it will not be 
 from any skill of penmanship on our part, but 
 because the men of grit and determination are 
 " making good," as we say in Canada, to-day and 
 to-morrow, and we need not look to our histories 
 of long ago to find out the heroic side of life. The 
 successes which are being made to-day can be 
 repeated by men of pluck and enterprise to-morrow. 
 There is no end to opportunity, and very few 
 things are impossible. 
 
 173 
 
Chapter XI Shipping 
 
 ONCE at Saltcoats, in Scotland, a man built 
 a boat of one hundred and ninety tons 
 ^register, and called her Jean. He put his 
 two sons James and Bryce on board of her as 
 captain and mate, and sent her across the Atlantic, 
 and that was the beginning of the Transatlantic 
 Shipping Trade. The founder of the Line was 
 Captain Alexander Allan, and the date of his first 
 voyage was in 1822, when he sailed from Glasgow 
 to Quebec. No doubt the journey was considered 
 a momentous one, and a fairy story might be 
 evolved without much difficulty by merely imagin- 
 ing the old sea captain coming to life again and 
 being taken on a tour of inspection on board one 
 of the steamships now plying between England 
 and America. But when Alexander Allan sailed 
 no doubt he compared his craft very favourably 
 with those that had gone before it. The long 
 history of naval architecture, with its slow develop- 
 ment, was still easily traceable in the land to which 
 he was bound. Dug-outs had (no doubt reluctantly) 
 given place to boats with ribs, and these again had 
 been superseded by boats with keels ; specimens of 
 them all were extant, or only just extinct, in Canada. 
 Wherefore we can imagine old Captain Allan 
 sailing up the St. Lawrence with a sense of pomp 
 and circumstance, and with the same delightful 
 appreciation in his own enterprise which animates 
 every step in the history of snipping. He was no 
 
 174 
 
SHIPPING 
 
 doubt " miles ahead of everyone/ ' and he meant 
 to be miles further ahead of them still ! 
 
 In 1839 ne retired from the active list as Com- 
 mander, and established an office from which he 
 could manage his rapidly developing business. In 
 the Montreal Gazette in 1839 we find him advertis- 
 ing as follows : " For Greenock, the well-known 
 coppered ship, Canada, 329 tons register, Bryce 
 Allan, Commander, now loading and will have 
 immediate despatch. For passage only, apply to 
 Captain Allan on board and at the Cross.' ' Already 
 he had a fleet of boats which consisted of the 
 Canada, Favourite, Brilliant, Blonde, Pericles, 
 Gypsie, and others, and on these men and women 
 still living in Canada have sometimes travelled. 
 
 But in the construction of wooden boats other 
 countries were forging ahead quicker than England, 
 and she owes her supremacy in the matter of 
 merchantmen to the introduction of steam. In 
 1830 the Royal William was built in Quebec and 
 was the first vessel to cross any ocean except under 
 mast and sail. Almost it seems as though the great 
 engineer, toying with his kettle on the hearth and 
 finding from it lessons which no one else had ever 
 learned, has bequeathed his great discovery of 
 steam power more particularly to those of his own 
 nation than to anyone else in the world. One 
 recognises a curious affinity between it and the men 
 of the island where iron and coal are plentiful, 
 and who are able to use it to its utmost capacity. 
 In their faces one sees a sense of mastery over 
 elemental things : their blackened hands with the 
 oil of engines upon them are widely considered 
 typical about the English nation. For generations 
 an Englishman was a man with a horse ; now he is 
 a man with an engine. 
 
 175 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 One believes, and it is certainly interesting to 
 believe, that the present generation shows the 
 quickest and the most important developments in 
 shipping that have ever taken place in the history 
 of the world. It is hardly necessary to go into the 
 matter of tonnage, or to quote figures, because 
 within the memory of man not only has sail and 
 mast given place to steam, but steam itself, with 
 its later developments of high pressure and turbines, 
 has so materially altered speed and safety in ocean- 
 going vessels that twenty-five knots an hour is 
 lightly spoken of, and a deck a thousand feet long 
 is not unusual. Some of us may remember ships 
 with a good deal of affection which were considered 
 very up-to-date at the time. The saloon boasted 
 a narrow table around which fixed benches were 
 placed, while above it hung a curious mahogany 
 board not unlike an old-fashioned shoe-stand, 
 from which depended green hock glasses, while 
 upon it were placed the dinner napkins of the 
 passengers, and, if we remember rightly, extra forks 
 and spoons. Opening off the saloon were the 
 cabins lighted by port-holes, which were not in- 
 frequently closed during the whole voyage, render- 
 ing it impossible to obtain ventilation except 
 through the saloon. Perhaps our ships were not 
 quite as up to date as we thought they were. Cer- 
 tainly a memory from childhood days remains of a 
 ship whose state rooms were lit by means of a single 
 candle in a glass shade placed on the partition 
 wall and made to do duty for two cabins. This 
 candle remained burning till n o'clock at night 
 when the steward used to remove it, and after that, 
 as far as recollection serves there was no possibility 
 of obtaining any light whatever until morning 
 came. It emphasised the fact which we have 
 
 176 
 
SHIPPING 
 
 already alluded to, that artificial light is a modern 
 convenience. We remember reading in a bygone 
 novel of some horrible disturbance taking place 
 at an inn during the night, the terror of the situa- 
 tion being heightened by the fact that there was 
 not a light in the house. A humble box of matches 
 takes a new significance when we think of such 
 situations, and we venture to wonder whether one 
 day prayers against the terror of darkness will be 
 considered obsolete. 
 
 Be that as it may, the electric lighted steamship 
 of to-day and its well-ventilated rooms makes the 
 business of going down to the sea in ships and 
 occupying business in great waters a very different 
 matter from what it used to be. The courage 
 which was required for a voyage, and the patience 
 also, are things of the past. No shore seems very 
 distant now, and handkerchiefs are not drenched 
 with tears as they used to be when ships with 
 beloved ones on board of them sailed away. Wrecks 
 are one hundred per cent fewer than they used to 
 be, and even on the pathless ocean no ship can be 
 said to be alone that has on board of her a 
 Marconi installation. 
 
 And yet some antique flavour will always belong 
 to shipping, and perhaps more particularly to 
 pilotage than to anything else. We were reminded 
 of this strongly in a large old-fashioned shipping 
 office in Montreal, outside whose windows appeared 
 masts like a forest of trees, and in whose cellars are 
 to be still found chips of old wooden ships of long 
 ago. It was here in a dim wide room which had 
 something of the atmosphere Dickens alone has been 
 able to convey, that we met Jean Baptiste Bonaparte, 
 a tough-haired man with blue eyes and gentle 
 manners, as have all French Canadians. From 
 
 N 177 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 him we heard of neap tides and spring tides, and 
 gas buoys for which he showed keen personal 
 affection. Almost we were persuaded as we heard 
 of their several characteristics that, like St. Francis 
 of Assisi who addressed the birds as brothers, 
 there might be some kindredship between gas 
 buoys and a French-Canadian pilot with blue eyes. 
 
 When in addition to a power of narrative a 
 sailorman wears rings in his ears and on his hands, 
 and talks in French of the seventeenth century, a 
 very pleasing sense of illusion steals upon his 
 listener. The illusion is deepened by the old- 
 fashioned furnishing of the room — a certain plain- 
 ness and austerity about it — and withal very com- 
 modious. Jean Baptiste is a man who likes space, 
 and has much to say about it. He is one who reads 
 the signs of sea and sky as other men read print, 
 who knows a wet fog not as other men do who 
 complain of drenched garments, but as one who 
 has weathered his way through it with a thousand 
 lives depending upon his nerve and skill. 
 
 The sailor is a man who seldom knows he is a 
 hero, or at least not until long afterwards — when 
 he sits with a wooden leg stuck out in front of him 
 and a medal sewn on his coat. We have spoken 
 with North Sea fishermen and have heard tales 
 of venture and heroism so entirely worthy of record 
 that it has sometimes occurred to us to ask why no 
 notice has been taken of such and such deeds of 
 gallantry, until we learned with a wholesome sense 
 of apology that the matter was a very trifling one, 
 not to be mentioned except as a yarn by those 
 concerned. And after that medals seemed very 
 small things, flat and uninteresting. 
 
 Jean Baptiste Bonaparte, if he had tales of 
 adventure to tell, was not going to waste time upon 
 
 i 7 8 
 
SHIPPING 
 
 them in the dim wide offices with the forest of 
 masts outside. Deeds of heroism are not to be 
 named in the same breath with a grievance, which 
 is a far more important thing, and Jean Baptiste 
 had not one grievance but twenty. 
 
 It must be remembered at the outset that every- 
 thing at sea is a pilot's own property. It is " my 
 ship," " my anchorage," " my gas buoy, Q. 129." 
 The only things which do not belong to him are 
 shoals and fogs and governments which will not 
 deepen channels ! 
 
 There is one success always open to everyone, and 
 one position where no one can fail to give satisfac- 
 tion, and that is as an intent listener to grievances. 
 
 We had only to place our chair at a convenient 
 angle and suggest by a movement that Mons. 
 Bonaparte might continue. 
 
 " I think you love the St. Lawrence, hein? 
 You think it a beautiful beeg river ? But I tell you 
 it is not beeg ; it is very small, and of what use is 
 it unless it is made wider and deeper ? " 
 
 " There are such things as dredgers," we began. 
 
 But even French-Canadian manners were power- 
 less to resist making an interruption. 
 
 " I ask Madame," said Jean Baptiste Bonaparte, 
 " how it is possible to respect a dredger if she will 
 only dredge thirty-five feet ? Is it a fine thing, a 
 useful craft, when she will only dredge thirty-five 
 feet?" 
 
 The listener to grievances gave the necessary 
 impetus to a continuation of the conversation by 
 nodding her head in a manner intended to be 
 sagacious. 
 
 * Those boats at Sorelli," said Bonaparte, now 
 beginning to gesticulate, " take two and a half 
 years to build, and then they tumble over. What 
 
 179 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 then ? Do you love such dredgers ? No, Madame 
 cannot love them." 
 
 Madame signified that her love of dredgers had 
 received a blow, and her affection had probably 
 been misplaced. 
 
 " In the Clyde River they build them in six 
 months and they stand up ; they do not need to be 
 ashamed. But why do they not go to St. Roche till 
 June, and so waste one good month out of seven, 
 when the St. Lawrence is navigable ? Madame 
 cannot guess the reason ? It is because no dredger 
 has long enough spuds to dredge there.' p 
 
 Madame remarked that it was " trop fort." 
 
 Madame was doubtless a lady of great dis- 
 crimination. She knew the way of dredgers, and 
 did not need to be told that spuds ought to be 
 forty-five feet long. 
 
 Madame remarked without any overdone eager- 
 ness that forty-five feet seemed a very reasonable 
 length for the spud of a dredger. 
 
 " Mon Dieu ! " said Jean Baptiste, throwing out 
 his hands, " what is a man to do in a shallow river 
 on a ship that draws twenty-eight feet of water, 
 and with a few inches between her and the bottom 
 of the St. Lawrence. We are good pilots, we 
 French-Canadians. We know good navigation, 
 but even so ships cannot be laded to their proper 
 depth, and so lighters have to be used at the mouth 
 of the river, which will prove even to foolish people 
 who live all their lives on the shore that this involves 
 lading twice." 
 
 Madame sought for the best French adjective at 
 her disposal, and gave vent to it with an emphasis 
 which seemed to prove satisfactory to her listener. 
 
 " Helas, mon Dieu" said the pilot, " there is 
 worse to come. Greedy America steals our river, 
 
 180 
 
SHIPPING 
 
 and we know why she steals it. The city of Chicago 
 is a villain and takes water from Lake Michigan 
 which it swears is for its drainage canal (such as 
 they call with great boasting the River Calumet), 
 but they also use it for local power companies, 
 Madame, believe me. I do not lie." 
 
 Madame, feeling that any adjective after the one 
 so emphatically spoken would be in the nature of an 
 anti-climax, merely bowed. 
 
 " Tiens! if it will only be considered for a little 
 while how narrow the river is and how impossible 
 to go to the top waters of navigation ! Big ships 
 should have appliances for anchoring, stern as well 
 as bows, to prevent them swinging round and 
 hitting something.' ' 
 
 " What is the reason ? " began Madame. 
 
 " The reason, Madame, is ' politeeks.' That is 
 the reason for all that is wrong in Canada." 
 
 Madame had heard the story before. 
 
 11 Tiens ! A ship cost three million dollars to 
 build, and there is only one foot of water to spare 
 between her and the bottom of the St. Lawrence 
 River ! Oh ! if they are iron ships it will easily be 
 understood that we scrape along all right, but we 
 cannot do that with steel ships." 
 
 Madame nodded. 
 
 "I'm not a grumbler, Madame. I know dis- 
 cipline because I learnt it with Captain Smith when 
 I sailed in the little Skylark. She was a trim boat, 
 and, oh ! yes, I learnt discipline and ' politeeks ' ; 
 I know politeeks too." 
 
 Jean Baptiste Bonaparte shook his head till his 
 long ear-rings swung on his cheeks, and then placed 
 his finger as the fishermen at Boulogne|do, at the 
 side of his nose. 
 
 " The floating dock at Montreal, where the St. 
 
 181 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 Mary current runs nine knots an hour — that's 
 another case in point. There is no reason this 
 floating dock should be at Montreal. The spot is 
 mal choisi because, as Madame will readily under- 
 stand, a ship is generally damaged at sea before she 
 reaches the St. Lawrence River, and she is generally 
 damaged forward of her engines and she enters 
 with a list by her head. She has to go all the way 
 up to Montreal for repairs. Why ? ' Politeeks I 
 
 The injured ships go in and they will take perhaps 
 two months to repair. Voild ! The ice is then on 
 the river, and they are frozen in and cannot get out 
 again during the whole winter. This may seem 
 sense to Madame, but Jean Baptiste has another way 
 of regarding it ! 
 
 " If there was a dry dock at Port St. Levis ships 
 could get out with the right pilots every week in 
 the year. Perhaps the Government knows why 
 there is a floating dock at Montreal and not a dry 
 dock at Port St. Levis ! 
 
 " Some day, when I am dead, a good time will 
 come for the shipping of Canada, because shipping, 
 it will be allowed, must go on and not back. There 
 are eleven miles of racing current between Cap 
 Leverard and Cap St. Jean to Challons. There is 
 no stopping there even in a fog. That, too, will 
 have to be the way of the shipping in Canada ! 
 * Politeeks ' is crazy, it thinks we can sometimes go 
 backwards and sometimes forwards, but sailors 
 know they have to go on.' ' 
 
 Madame, who had not spoken for some time, 
 murmured " hear, hear." 
 
 " Perhaps in the future we shall have a harbour 
 at Riviere de Loup, with an ice-breaker between 
 Cape North and Cape Ray which will make naviga- 
 tion possible all the year. Perhaps we shall have a 
 
 182 
 
SHIPPING 
 
 great railway terminus at Riviere de Loup. The 
 good God knows. 
 
 " Meanwhile we have a dry dock at Montreal, 
 and for this we must render thanks to Heaven, 
 hein ? Is it easy of access at all times, tides, and in 
 all conditions of weather ? Is it close to the sea ? 
 Is it protected from the gun-fire of the possible 
 enemy ? " 
 
 Jean Baptiste Bonaparte raised his hands to 
 heaven, and metaphorically Madame did the same 
 thing. 
 
 " Montreal itself is situated at least one hundred 
 and eighty miles from easy navigable waters, and 
 this one hundred and eighty miles consists of a 
 narrow channel with many turns, such as Madame 
 might with reason call as twisted as a corkscrew, 
 and with a swift current in it. In thick weather the 
 channel is very nearly impossible, except to experi- 
 enced pilots/ ' 
 
 Jean Baptiste signified by a gesture that he did not 
 require the name of the experienced pilot filled in. 
 
 Does Madame know what a * not under con- 
 trol ' vessel is ? Does she know what such a one 
 would be like with a deep draught, and whether it 
 would be very easy to take her up and dock her at 
 Montreal ? Madame may know, * politeeks ' may 
 know, but not Jean Baptiste. 
 
 " Madame has been a patient listener. Probably 
 she is very learned on these subjects, but ' politeeks ' 
 is a damn fool. Do I know tides or do they ? I 
 think I know both tides and fogs. Do I know the 
 wash which ships going at twenty knots make, and 
 which carries away all the waters of a channel, or 
 does ' politeeks ' ? He is a great bully, but he is not 
 wise. He loves Canada, but does he love his big 
 fat pocket better ? " 
 
 183 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 Jean Baptiste finished up in a manner very 
 creditable both to himself and to the service to which 
 he belongs. 
 
 " Ships are lovers,' ' he said, " although they 
 carry trade. They are a man's love, is it not so ? " 
 
 Madame acquiesced, and left the old office with 
 the towering masts outside, feeling glad she was 
 born on an island, and glad, too, that there are 
 people who understand ships as they ought to be 
 understood. 
 
 There is the Canadian Naval Bill. A nation 
 without ships is like a woman without jewels, or the 
 mother of the Gracchi without her children. There 
 is no prouder possession that a sea-borne country 
 can have than a fleet, and it is as absurd to think of 
 Canada's not having a navy as to think of a high- 
 spirited boy living by the seashore not hoisting a 
 sail and going out with a breeze behind him. 
 Canadians feel very deeply on the matter of a tribute 
 which they were proud to give, it has touched them 
 where they are most sensitive, and that is in their 
 loyalty to the Empire. When a man wishes to play 
 the game, and is not allowed to do so, we feel very 
 deeply for him ; when a nation wishes to play the 
 game and is not permitted to do so, the situation 
 becomes even more serious and more deeply 
 touching. 
 
 Mercifully it was never a question of money or of 
 meanness amongst Canadians themselves, for Cana- 
 dians are never mean. Canada is and was perfectly 
 able to afford ships, but at present she is not able 
 to build them, because her dockyards are not large 
 enough. She has immense coasts to defend, and, 
 much more than that — she has the blood of sea- 
 going people in her veins. 
 
 There is an old saying, as inaccurate as many old 
 
 184 
 
SHIPPING 
 
 sayings are, that human nature is human nature all 
 the world over. As a matter of fact probably nothing 
 varies so much as human nature, and races in close 
 proximity to each other show an extraordinary 
 divergence in the matter of national character, and 
 in individual dispositions. In no case do we see 
 this more strongly marked than in the matter of 
 those who fare forth and go out into the world as a 
 matter of course and in a spirit of courage and enter- 
 prise, and in those who stay at home. 
 
 When a ship leaves England, no matter where she 
 is bound, she leaves, either actually or metaphorically, 
 with flags flying and the band playing. She sails 
 from an open port for all the world to see, and 
 those who are left behind on the docks or on the 
 quay envy those who are outward bound, while on 
 every side one hears the wish sincerely uttered : 
 " I wish it was I ! I wish I was going too." The 
 whole spirit of British enterprise lies in this feeling. 
 Now it is not shared as a rule by other nations, and 
 when other nations envy England her expansive 
 powers, they should bear in mind that expansion is 
 not possible through the simple method of staying 
 at home. In France it is very striking to see a ship 
 put out to sea, not from a great port like Marseilles 
 perhaps, as would seem most natural, but from 
 some quiet harbour where, on the shore, friends 
 and relatives stand mourning those who were going, 
 while in pious language they bless the good God 
 who is allowing them to stay at home. 
 
 These two points of view must be understood 
 before the Canadian Naval Bill can be understood. 
 
 The French are a deeply affectionate, home- 
 loving people, with a touching ideal of family 
 affection. The Britisher, while loving home perhaps 
 as deeply, is by nature and heredity a rover, regard- 
 
 185 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 ing home as a luxury, or as a sailor regards a snug 
 anchorage in some quiet bay ; as a pleasant place 
 to which he can return when he is tired, or when the 
 work of his life is over. He was born on an island, 
 and he pushes forth his boat and goes to sea, just 
 as much as a matter of course as a duckling takes its 
 first swim in a pond. But much more than this the 
 British settler, may we say more particularly the 
 Scottish settler, is a man who has learned to do 
 without. It is an important lesson for everyone ; 
 it is an absolutely essential lesson for a successful 
 emigrant to learn. In order to succeed he will 
 probably find that he may have to do without nearly 
 everything that he is accustomed to. Primarily he 
 may have to do without his home and the friends 
 amongst whom he has grown up. English mothers 
 have learned to pack their boys' boxes, and send 
 them off into the unknown, with the best smile they 
 can fake up for the occasion, and English women go 
 with the men and make their homes for them. The 
 affection of French mothers shows itself by keeping 
 her boy at home whenever it is possible to do so — 
 "Abas la Marine I " from the habitants was the cry 
 of the French mother, who loves to tuck her son up 
 and give him a basin of good soup. And French 
 wives rarely settle in a new country until the con- 
 ditions of that country are comparatively comfort- 
 able. 
 
 It seems a small and domestic matter upon which 
 to hang the issue of a country's navy. But it is the 
 explanation of the French- Canadian opposition to 
 the Canadian Naval Bill, and it was through French- 
 Canadian opposition that Canada has no navy. 
 
 Mere politics was the secondary objection. Poli- 
 ticians are paid to talk and to fuss, and to talk and 
 to fuss is their usual programme, like the old 
 
 186 
 
SHIPPING 
 
 Scotsman who was asked why he wanted to become 
 an Elder, and whose reply was " Because then I 
 can set in a front pew and aye propose everything." 
 So the politician seems unable to acquiesce even in 
 those measures which seem most obviously for 
 the public good. Were they to do so their trade, 
 like the trade of the Athenians who sold idols, 
 would be gone. Most people believe that a man 
 has a right to his trade, and so the politician talks 
 on. The Canadian Navy became the Canadian 
 Naval Bill — quite a different thing and without 
 any poetry in it at all, and, instead of hoisted sails 
 and a merry start, the start was not even made 
 amidst grumblings and discontent — it was never 
 made at all. When people begin to talk they 
 generally end in talk, and enough breath has been 
 wasted on the Canadian Naval Bill to fill the sails 
 of a whole fleet if it had been applied in the right 
 direction. As a matter of fact it was wasted in the 
 hot atmosphere of Ottawa and Westminster. And 
 much more than that was wasted. A great oppor- 
 tunity was wasted, which, although it will come 
 again, will never come with quite the same glad 
 spontaneity and generous disinterested feeling that 
 marked it then. We shall have to come to a 
 Canadian Navy by quite dull methods now. At 
 one time there was a real touch of purple in it. 
 
 The history of the Bill and the things that led 
 to it need not take very long in the telling. Both 
 political parties in Canada until the year 1909 
 were so engrossed in making the new country and 
 in developing its resources and its wonderful 
 riches that the need of defending those riches 
 hardly occurred to them. At any rate no public 
 interest was shown in the matter, and it was not 
 until 1909 that the Canadian Parliament met in 
 
 187 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 pronouncement upon the obligations of the 
 Dominion to enter upon a system of naval defence. 
 During that year a great nation had issued its 
 naval programme, and suspicious attention was 
 aroused by the enormously increased expenditure 
 of Germany on her Navy. The question was asked : 
 is British supremacy at sea to be disputed ? And 
 there went up a great shout from every part of the 
 Empire that this thing was not to be. Australia 
 echoed the shout and dived deep into her big 
 pouch for treasure ; New Zealand made her 
 contribution, and Canada talked about it. 
 
 Germany was buckling on her armour, the 
 mother country was threatened, and the country 
 that perhaps loves England best, and whose loyalty 
 can be least doubted of all her children, passed 
 resolutions, which did not cost her a great deal, 
 and dealt in speeches which were not much more 
 expensive. 
 
 But there was one party which meant to do its 
 duty, and this laid before the House the imperative 
 need of action, and promised that the Canadian 
 people would be found jeady and willing to make 
 any sacrifice that was required to give to the Imperial 
 authorities the most loyal and hearty co-operation 
 in every movement for the maintenance of the 
 integrity and honour of the Empire. " This 
 House," they said, " will greatly approve of any 
 necessary expenditure to promote the speedy 
 organisation of a Canadian Naval Service, in co- 
 operation with, and in close relation to, the Imperial 
 Navy, along the lines suggested by the Admiralty, 
 and in full sympathy with the view that the Naval 
 supremacy of Britain is essential to the security of 
 commerce, the safety of the Empire, and the peace 
 ofpie^world." 
 
 188 
 
SHIPPING 
 
 A rush of patriotic feeling swept over Canada, 
 and Canadian representatives attended on the 
 Admiralty authorities in England and laid before 
 them a proposal as to what Canada proposed to do. 
 
 And there the matter ended. Patriotic enthusiasm 
 failed to reach the point of providing adequate 
 means for the building and maintenance of a 
 fighting unit. Emotionalism had had its say, 
 politicians had had their say. It had done them 
 both no doubt a great deal of good, but it had not 
 increased the strength of the British Navy. 
 
 Up to 19 12 no less than five amending bills were 
 introduced, but it was not until the autumn of 
 that year that the matter was firmly and decisively 
 taken up by the Canadian Prime Minister, who 
 proceeded to England, together with three of his 
 ministers, in order to construct a scheme on a sound 
 basis in conjunction with the British Admiralty. 
 
 Statistics, detail of expenditure and so forth 
 would take up too much space here, but the main 
 arguments of the Imperial Canadian party may be 
 briefly enumerated. 
 
 That in view of the expansion of European 
 Naval Powers, the British fleet is required mainly 
 for home defence and cannot, without taxing 
 herself to the very utmost, afford ships to defend 
 her colonies. 
 
 That Canada's sea-borne trade is increasing, 
 and that her coasts are therefore in corresponding 
 need of defence. 
 
 That she contributes nothing whatsoever towards 
 the maintenance of the Imperial fleet, and that it 
 should be a matter of pride with her as a nation to 
 make some return for the advantages accruing to 
 her through the protection of her commerce and 
 her country by the ships of Great Britain. 
 
 189 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 As one of their own number said : " The funda- 
 mental cause of Canada's rapid development is, in 
 a word, our relation to the Empire." The security 
 which we enjoy from the interference of outside 
 powers gives a permanency and fixity to our 
 internal development, not exceeded by any people 
 in the world. The security which our trade enjoys 
 on the ocean's highway is equal to the security 
 enjoyed by Great Britain. In other words, the 
 security of life and property within Canada, and 
 the security of her trade on every sea are as real, as 
 permanent, and as abiding as if Canada possessed 
 the command of the sea instead of Great Britain. 
 
 " No foreign power would any more think of 
 invading or attacking Canada, or even threatening 
 or attacking her trade upon the highways of the 
 seas, than they would threaten or attack Great 
 Britain. This sense of security we have accepted 
 and enjoyed ever since we have been a part of the 
 Empire, without seriously entertaining the thought 
 of participating in, or contributing to its cause.' ' 
 
 These arguments were telling, and so charged 
 with sincere and noble sentiment that it is difficult 
 to conceive of a dissentient voice, but Canadian 
 Liberalism, if we may so call it, found something 
 to cavil at, and Canadian Liberals affirmed that they 
 would have nothing to do with the British " Arma- 
 ment Trust," and if ships were to be built for Can- 
 ada's coast defences they must be built in Canada. 
 
 To this the Admiralty sent a succinct reply : 
 
 " The suggestion that the proposed battleships 
 could be expeditiously built in Canada cannot be 
 based on full knowledge of the question. 
 
 w The battleship of to-day has gradually been 
 evolved from years of experiments and experience. 
 She is a mass of intricate machines, and the armour, 
 
 190 
 
SHIPPING 
 
 guns, gun mountings, and machinery all require 
 separate and extensive plant of a very costly nature 
 to cope with the constant changes in designs and 
 composition. In addition to this, the actual con- 
 struction of a battleship, where high tensile and 
 mild steel are largely used, requires the employ- 
 ment of special riveters and steel workers. These 
 men are difficult to obtain in Great Britain, and 
 it is thought that it would be a long time before a 
 sufficient number of efficient workmen of this nature 
 could be obtained in Canada. 
 
 " For the manufacture of armour plates large steel 
 furnaces, heavy rolling mills, planing machines, 
 carburising plant, etc., capable of dealing with 
 weights of one hundred and fifty tons at a time, 
 have to be provided, besides which the special treat- 
 ment to obtain the correct quality of plate requires 
 special experts who have been brought up to nothing 
 else. Such men could not be obtained in Canada. 
 
 " For the manufacture of guns, plant consisting 
 of heavy lathes, boring and trepanning machines, 
 wire-winding machines, as well as a heavy forging 
 plant, and oil-tempering baths with heavy cranes, 
 all capable of dealing with weights up to and over 
 one hundred tons are required. The men for this 
 class of work are specially trained, and could not 
 be obtained in Canada. For the manufacture of 
 gun mountings, which involves the use of castings 
 of irregular shape from eighty to one hundred tons 
 and which require special armour treatment, a 
 special armour plate plant is required. The 
 hydraulic and electric machinery for these mount- 
 ings are all of an intricate and special design, 
 requiring special knowledge, and can only be 
 undertaken by a firm having years of experience of 
 work of this nature. 
 
 191 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 " The manufacture of engines, although requir- 
 ing special treatment, does not present such great 
 difficulties as that of armour, guns and gun mount- 
 ings. But in starting a new business of this kind 
 it would be difficult at this stage to know what 
 plant machinery to put down, as the possible 
 introduction of internal combustion engines may 
 revolutionise the whole of the engine construction 
 of warships. The above does not include speciali- 
 ties, such as bilge pumps, steering gear, and num- 
 bers of other details which have to be sub-contracted 
 for all over the country and only with people on 
 the Admiralty List. The expense of fitting these 
 up, sending them out, and carrying out trials would 
 become very onerous. 
 
 " For the building yard itself the installation of 
 heavy cranes and appliances for building a vessel 
 of, say, twenty-seven thousand tons is a very 
 heavy item, and the fitting of the blocks and slips 
 to take this weight would require considerable 
 care in selection of site in regard to nature of soil 
 for the blocks and launching facilities, so that the 
 existing shipyards might not be adapted for this 
 purpose. 
 
 " As an example of the cost of a shipyard it may 
 be mentioned that Elswick, in order to cope with 
 increased work, have lately put down a new ship- 
 yard which is costing approximately three-quarters 
 of a million pounds. This yard has already been 
 two years in preparation, and will not be ready for 
 laying down a ship for another six months. 
 
 " With regard to foreign shipbuilding, Austria- 
 Hungary has largely extended her resources by 
 laying down two large slips at Fiume. This scheme 
 was projected in 1909. It is understood that these 
 slips were put down in 191 1, and the first battle- 
 
 192 
 
SHIPPING 
 
 ship commenced in January, 191 2. The Austrian 
 Press states that the contract date for completion 
 is July, 1 9 14, but that it is probable there will be a 
 delay of some months in the realisation of this. In 
 this instance, however, they have other large yards 
 and all the necessary plant in the country. The 
 cost of this undertaking is not known. 
 
 " The Japanese have taken twenty years in work- 
 ing up their warship building, and now take over 
 three years to build a battleship, and although 
 anxious to build all ships in their own country 
 they still find it necessary to have some of them 
 built in Great Britain. 
 
 11 Spain has developed a shipyard in Ferrol and 
 at Cartagena. They have only found it possible 
 to put down second-class battleships of about 
 fifteen thousand tons at Ferrol (the bulk of the 
 material coming from Great Britain), and the yards 
 are being financed and worked by English firms 
 (Armstrongs, Brown, and Vickers). 
 
 " Taking the above points into consideration, it 
 is clear that it would be wholly unwise for Canada 
 to attempt to undertake the building of battleships 
 at the present moment. The cost of laying down 
 the plant alone would, at a rough estimate, be 
 approximately fifteen millions, and it could not be 
 ready for four years. Such an outlay could only 
 be justified on the assumption that Canada is to 
 keep up a continuous naval building programme 
 to turn out a succession of ships after the fashion of 
 the largest shipyards in Great Britain and Europe." 
 
 But the opposing Liberal Party was thoroughly 
 determined upon its policy, which they voiced in 
 words not very high or heroic, that if Canada 
 could not build ships she would not pay for them. 
 The Canadian Government could not come to 
 
 193 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 terms with the Admiralty. Mr. Lougheed might 
 point out that the building of such plant as had been 
 suggested would mean that they would have to be 
 kept in continuous employment, and that to be 
 kept in continuous employment would mean the 
 steady and constant building of battleships. " To 
 secure this continuity would mean the artificial 
 creation of public opinion and public sentiment 
 favourable to war, therefore, to increased armament, 
 and its corallary the increase of our land forces. 
 In other words, to make such a series of industries 
 and undertakings financially successful amongst a 
 small poulation of eight million people would mean 
 that Canada would become a veritable war camp, 
 and would be kept in a state of martial ferment 
 from one year's end to another.' ' 
 
 Canada was not convinced, and one loves her too 
 well even to suggest that she pretended not to be 
 convinced. No portion of the burden of the naval 
 defence of the Empire has been borne by her, and, 
 with all her proud and independent spirit, she is 
 trusting to the mother country, and to the mother 
 country alone, to defend her shores and her com- 
 merce, and is not contributing in any way towards 
 the expenses. 
 
 Of course this state of things cannot last ; there 
 will be Canadian dreadnoughts floating in blue 
 waters very soon, and Canada's pride will not very 
 long be kept under by politicians and talk. Love of 
 country and love of race are in the ultimate ends far 
 stronger than timidity or weakness or parsimonious- 
 ness. Canada must and will launch out into the 
 deep. We wish her filled sails and a merry breeze 
 behind her, and we think that in great waters she 
 will learn some lessons which only the sea can teach. 
 
 194 
 
Chapter XII Reciprocity 
 
 IT is a curious psychological fact that the most 
 important happenings are those which soonest 
 look like bygone events. The story of the 
 campaign of 191 1 against Reciprocity with the 
 United States of America already reads like a page 
 of ancient history. Yet its final and dramatic con- 
 clusion was only reached in 191 1. The warfare was 
 sharp while it lasted, but like most warfare it had 
 the effect of drawing very closely together those 
 who fought on the same side, and while Canada 
 proved herself loyal up to the very hilt of her sword 
 to the Empire, Great Britain's love for Canada 
 deepened and crystallised during that anxious time 
 in a very remarkable way. Perhaps some of us 
 hardly knew how deep was the attachment that 
 existed between the Old Country and the New until 
 our suspicions were aroused that a near neighbour 
 of hers wished to do a little purse-snatching in a 
 perfectly legal manner, and then we cried Paws 
 off!" 
 
 The pity of it is that this Reciprocity Campaign, 
 like all matters dealing with finance, must perforce 
 be related through the dry medium of figures. 
 Figures do not in any way exhaust the subject of 
 Reciprocity, nor can they even help to describe the 
 intensity of feeling that prevailed in Canada during 
 the closing months of Sir Wilfred Laurier's ministry. 
 Feeling ran high, and money once more assumed 
 
 *95 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 that curious aspect with which it is so seldom 
 credited, namely, the one which transcends alto- 
 gether the mere holding of coin. The wealth of 
 Canada had been made by hard work and great 
 sacrifices. Her early struggles were not merely a 
 picturesque beginning to a successful career, but 
 her poverty in the days of her youth had been a 
 grim and horribly real thing. And in her poverty 
 she had appealed for assistance to her rich neigh- 
 bour, and that assistance had been refused. Canada 
 is proud and does not easily forget, and her neigh- 
 bour's proposal, howsoever skilfully worded, could 
 not disguise the fact that it was only since her 
 prosperity that any friendly interest had been taken 
 in her. There was a just touch of the schoolboy's 
 " Thank you for nothing " with which Reciprocity 
 was received, while it may be confidently stated 
 that the mother country patted her on the back and 
 admired her spirit ! 
 
 A brief summary of the commercial relations 
 between the United States and the Dominion is all 
 that can be attempted. 
 
 In the early days of confederation foreign trade 
 relations meant almost exclusively relations with the 
 United States of America. The home markets were 
 very small, but Canada held rich treasures in the 
 way of Fishery Rights in her in-shore Atlantic 
 Fisheries within the three-mile limits, while the 
 shore fisheries on the United States eastern coasts 
 were nearly exhausted. This advantage, therefore, 
 she could press hard when it came to making a 
 bargain with the United States. In markets, on the 
 other hand, the smaller nation had more to gain 
 from reciprocal trade than the larger. 
 
 In 1854 a Reciprocity Treaty had been concluded 
 which provided for the free interchange of a limited 
 
 196 
 
RECIPROCITY 
 
 list of products particularly natural. But this 
 Treaty had not been long in existence before dis- 
 satisfaction began to be expressed in the United 
 States. Both countries were tenacious of their 
 rights, but anything like a friendly spirit was 
 practically terminated when Britain and Canada 
 lent their sympathies to the South, and a pressure 
 of internal taxation combined with a rising feeling 
 of Protectionist sentiment led to the abrogation of 
 the Treaty. 
 
 Afterwards, and this is what Canada can never 
 forget, efforts were made for its renewal or the 
 negotiation of a new Treaty, but the efforts were 
 made in vain, and what had merely been till now 
 assumed became obtrusively apparent, that America 
 wished to force Canada into a union with herself, 
 and that the only condition under which they would 
 agree to trade with the smaller country was that the 
 same flag should float over both. For near neigh- 
 bours this might seem a reasonable proposal, but 
 Canada had decided once and for all, and had 
 signified her decision at tremendous sacrifice, to 
 belong to the British Empire and to no other, and 
 to trade as well as to fight under the Union Jack 
 flag and no other. Eastern Canada had been peopled 
 by loyalists, and loyalists they intended to remain. 
 In 1783 they had given up their homes and home 
 ties and the soul which they had learned to love, and 
 had gone out into the wilderness for the sake of an 
 idea. That idea was a passionate loyalty to the 
 mother country and to the King, and the united 
 Empire loyalists proved then what has been proved 
 thousands of times before and since, that, however 
 indifferent men may be towards realities, they will 
 fight to the death for ideas. 
 
 This is what is too often forgotten in Canada, and 
 
 197 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 this is what probably will always prevent any union 
 between them and their American neighbours. 
 Canadians are idealists, and those who study Canada 
 and Canadians have got to reckon with idealism. 
 When it fails we may believe that she has become 
 Americanised, but not until then. Americans are 
 Puritans whose nervous energy has outrun some- 
 times the fine old faith of their forefathers, and may 
 in its latter end lead to mere cleverness. They have 
 lacked that vision which, because it is unreal and 
 invisible and cannot even be properly interpreted 
 by words, is eternal. 
 
 Now Reciprocity meant to Canada, and this can- 
 not be too strongly insisted upon, very much more 
 than her financial life, or her civil life, or any part 
 of her material life ; it meant that part of her which 
 we call her soul. At the risk of being discursive we 
 venture to say that a nation's soul, like a human 
 being's soul, is the only part which is capable of 
 survival. It may not survive. It may, like human 
 souls which philosophers talk about, only be ac- 
 corded conditional immortality, but one thing is 
 perfectly certain, and that is that no other part of 
 it will survive. It is not capable of survival. Men 
 and women are born and die every day, and nations 
 rise and fall every day. Our hope is that some- 
 thing of them survives, and that after bones are 
 dust, good swords turned to rust, buildings crumbled 
 and decayed, armies swept away, and civilisation 
 itself has perished, there is still some essence, whether 
 of nations or of men, which survives, which is con- 
 veniently termed their soul. 
 
 Canada's soul had been made at what cost only 
 she knew. Her material prosperity had been 
 equally hardly won, but it had been won, and now 
 her inheritance was being claimed by a nation who, 
 
 198 
 
RECIPROCITY 
 
 during her lean and toilsome years and when the 
 wolf of poverty, almost of starvation, had crept 
 near to many a settler's door, had ignored and repu- 
 diated her. It required a clearer vision than America 
 was capable of to see further than it could reach. 
 So Canada was allowed to shift for herself, which 
 doubtless made her strong — certainly strong enough 
 to refuse the helping hand held out to her when she 
 was big enough to stand alone. 
 
 Figures are altogether inadequate to describe the 
 situation because it was not a matter of figures. 
 Nevertheless the facts of the case are full of interest, 
 and can only be described through this medium. 
 
 The Reciprocity Treaty of 1854, negotiated by 
 Lord Elgin, was the direct result of hard times and 
 of commercial necessity. It was advocated, not as 
 a leaning towards annexation, but as the only means 
 of preventing it. Its schedule referred only to 
 natural products which were henceforth moved free 
 of duty in either direction across the frontier, and 
 it was not concerned with articles in manufactured 
 form. It gave to the United States the right of 
 navigation of the St. Lawrence and the canals of 
 Canada," and to British subjects the right of naviga- 
 tion on Lake Michigan. The operation of the 
 Treaty was always difficult, butTit continued until 
 the American Civil War broke out and "created an 
 enormous demand for the products of Canada. 
 But the termination of the Treaty was due far less 
 to economic than to political reasons. 
 
 After 1866 the reciprocal trade relations between 
 the two countries were not renewed, although 
 during Sir John Macdonald's ministry there followed 
 a brief experiment in retaliation in the imposition 
 in 1870 of duties on coal, salt, and bread stuffs, but 
 this never worked with any degree of success and 
 
 199 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 the experiment was abandoned. Sir John, fighting 
 manfully for Canada, according to his wont, en- 
 deavoured to push some advantage by his offer of 
 free fisheries and canals in return for free markets, 
 but the story of those times is not one of exag- 
 gerated generosity on the part of America. Canada's 
 claim for compensation after the Fenian riots was 
 not even considered, and the fisheries question was 
 settled in a manner that was unpopular with all 
 parties and was considered unfair to Canada by not 
 a few. All proposals from Canada came to nothing, 
 and the apathy of the United States towards her 
 poorer neighbours in those days can only be com- 
 pared to the apathy of a rich and prosperous person 
 towards those who still have their own way to make. 
 Besides this there was a curious sense of injustice 
 abroad which made all treatment difficult, and, of 
 course, political factors were not wanting which 
 traded upon the delusion that the Dominion might 
 be starved into renouncing Great Britain and 
 uniting itself with America. 
 
 The division between them was purely arbitrary ; 
 the dividing line was not geographically existent. 
 It was another of those unreal things which are so 
 potent in their influence. Mountains are material 
 facts and the equator is an imaginary line, but 
 mountains are annihilated while the equator re- 
 mains. 
 
 It is amazing how the analogy holds good in 
 Canada. The imaginary line which divides her 
 from the south part of the Continent can only be 
 fully understood by considering her geographical 
 position. The distance from the Atlantic to the 
 Pacific Oceans is over three thousand miles, and 
 every mile is open to the United States. In these 
 days that perhaps seems a matter of small moment, 
 
 200 
 
RECIPROCITY 
 
 but it must be remembered that at the time at 
 which we write the great North- West was an un- 
 discovered country, Canada was almost without 
 home markets, and certainly without railways, and 
 the whole of her commerce seemed to depend upon 
 trade going North and South. There were no 
 difficulties in the way either of law or of language, 
 and settlers were coming across the border in 
 thousands, bringing with them American customs 
 and modes of thought. Their influence was tre- 
 mendous. Reciprocity between the two countries 
 seemed a foregone conclusion, for East and West 
 trade in Canada was unknown, and, as the phrase 
 has it, Canada " had to live." 
 
 To her credit be it said that in spite of the enor- 
 mous influences, geographical, natural, and political, 
 which were brought to bear upon her, she was 
 strong enough and plucky enough to choose her own 
 system of trade and the flag under which she in- 
 tended to trade. 
 
 The Dominion began its fiscal career under the 
 slightly modified tariff of the old Province of 
 Canada, but in 1867 the British North America 
 Provinces were formed into the Dominion of 
 Canada, and in 1871 a Fisheries Treaty was 
 negotiated, and this too was repudiated by the 
 United States as soon as the term limit permitted. 
 Then followed fresh demands for Reciprocity, 
 which were met with curt refusals. In addition the 
 Dingley and Mackinley tariffs were enacted by 
 the United States which raised the average duties 
 on Canadian exports to 50 and 49 per cent respec- 
 tively, while Canada's average on United States 
 exports was about 29 per cent. 
 
 On the eve of federation Mr. Gait introduced 
 the tariff which was to endure to all intents and 
 
 201 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 purposes unaltered till 1879. It is interesting to 
 note that the very words used by him at this critical 
 moment of Canada's commercial history were 
 exactly the same as those so often quoted from 
 Mr. Taft's famous speech of 191 1. Canada, Gait 
 declared, had come to the parting of the ways, and 
 she must choose between the American system of 
 High Protection and the English and European 
 system of revenue duties. If the Canadians were 
 to adopt the commercial policy of the United 
 States they should join political force also, but if 
 the two separate entities were to be maintained the 
 fiscal system must be advanced. Those who 
 believed in Canada at the time that the Budget of 
 1866 was being discussed and who believed in her 
 coming wealth believed also that she would be able 
 to compete on favourable terms in the markets of 
 the world. Those who believed in her in 191 1 
 thought the same thing. 
 
 But the wealth of 191 1 was a shadowy thing in 
 those days, and the period from 1867 to 1879 * s a 
 story of fluctuating periods of prosperity with long, 
 dull, depressed intervals in between, and after 
 twelve years of existence of a tariff never wholly 
 satisfactory, Sir John A. Macdonald and his 
 Conservative associates adopted in 1879 a system 
 of High Protection which still prevails in a more 
 or less modified form. But Reciprocity was still 
 used as a weapon by political parties during a period 
 of some twenty years. In 1870-73 took place 
 one of those curious bursts of prosperity which are 
 difficult to account for, but which are sometimes 
 very far-spreading in their results. In the United 
 States the period which marked the close of the 
 war had been quiet and Canadian industries had 
 hardly moved. This was followed by a burst of 
 
 202 
 
RECIPROCITY 
 
 activity which has few parallels in history, and the 
 rate at which business and banking and railways 
 grew forms as interesting a chapter in finance as 
 we can well imagine. In this period of her success 
 Canada was able to forget the depressing effect of 
 the abrogation of the Reciprocity Treaty of 1854. 
 She began to find new markets, and, owing to facili- 
 ties in transport, Great Britain became a ready 
 buyer of her products. Wealth began to multiply, 
 home consumption increased, and the surplus 
 produce of the country found a ready market. 
 There was a westward rush of emigrants to free 
 lands on the prairies, fluctuations in the premium 
 of gold ended, and machinery was supplying the 
 aching need for workers. Unfortunately, specula- 
 tive activity was at work too, with the inevitable 
 result that a crash followed, factories were closed 
 by the thousand, workmen were thrown out of 
 work, and it is stated that in 1877 there were five 
 thousand bankruptcies, and in 1878 ten thousand 
 bankruptcies in the United States. The com- 
 mercial panic was of world-wide extent and it seemed 
 for a time as if the trade of the whole world was 
 paralysed. Canada suffered equally with others. 
 There was no busy exchange of products, shipping 
 industries were at a standstill, lumber found no 
 market where for so long it had earned large profits 
 in the United States, building ceased like every- 
 thing else, credit was gone and it became a matter 
 for individual consideration whether or not the 
 wolf could be kept from the door. 
 
 During this financial crisis the chief menace 
 came from America, who in the time of panic and 
 depression flooded the American market with its 
 surplus goods, with instructions to follow Canadian 
 sellers and to cut any rate offered. And the question 
 
 203 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 arose once more : Could Canada hold her own ? 
 In 1879 sne decided that at least she would try to 
 do so. She ceased even to hope for a satisfactory 
 system of Reciprocity and adopted the national 
 policy which aimed at retaliation and a protection 
 of the home markets. Of course it was met on 
 many sides by a storm of disapproval, and the 
 Free Traders pointed out " that no country could 
 at once be protected without the Revenue Duty " — 
 an impossibility, nevertheless, which has become a 
 concrete fact. The effect of the national policy was 
 not only that it preached commercial advantage, 
 but that it was a patriotic measure, and the fiscal 
 struggle was not a war waged on new grounds, 
 and on these grounds it has continued ever since. 
 Britain became once for all Canada's partner, and as 
 such, we believe, she has proved satisfactory to her. 
 
 It was during a time of increased prosperity that 
 America began what has been called its policy of 
 " Compliments and Bouquet-throwing." Perhaps 
 had she been less polite Canada might have trusted 
 her more, but countries bringing such gifts as those 
 offered on behalf of Mr. Taft by America, and 
 coming as they did from a country which is not 
 purely altruistic, gave the smaller nation something 
 to think about. The smaller nation looked on both 
 sides of the offer pretty shrewdly, and undoubtedly 
 there was a very large party who believed that the 
 offer would be accepted. 
 
 Nineteen hundred and eleven was one of the 
 most anxious years in Canada's history. She was 
 then a nation of eight million people, to whom a 
 nation of ninety million people was offering terms. 
 But at the back of the offer was heard the whisper 
 " Annexation," and at this Canada, very naturally, 
 pricked up her ears. Also she found that all along 
 
 204 
 
RECIPROCITY 
 
 the line which exists between her and America, 
 outlets might be pierced through which wealth 
 might very conveniently flow southward. There 
 were railway men ready to tap it at all points. 
 But Canada had built her own railways, and these 
 ran east and west, and not north and south. Also 
 she had learned what at one time would have 
 merely amazed her, that Great Britain was nearer 
 her than some even of her own ports, and that 
 Britain on the whole is a fairly good market with a 
 fairly good credit. 
 
 Meetings began to be called and manifestos 
 issued, and the campaign against Reciprocity was 
 begun. A mass meeting, at which over four 
 thousand persons were present, was held in Massie 
 Hall, Toronto, in which the objections to Reciprocity 
 with the United States of America were so clearly 
 stated that they are worth quoting : 
 
 " i. Because in the year 1897 the Parliament of 
 Canada repealed the legislation then existing relat- 
 ing to Reciprocity, and since such repeal neither 
 the people of Canada nor their Parliament have 
 entrusted the Government with any duty or 
 authority to negotiate with respect to any agreement 
 on the subject. 
 
 "2. Because the present unexampled prosperity 
 of Canada is the result of the policy which has been 
 pursued in the development of her trade and of her 
 natural resources. Because this has involved the 
 expenditure of hundreds of millions of dollars upon 
 railways, canals, on steamships and other means 
 of transportation between east and west and west 
 and east ; and the obligation to incur further great 
 expenditures for the same purpose ; and because 
 further development along the same lines would be 
 seriously checked by the proposed Reciprocity 
 
 205 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 agreement and the benefits of the expenditures 
 referred to would be to a great extent lost. 
 
 " 3 . Because it is essential to the continued national 
 unity and development of Canada that no trade 
 relations with any country should be agreed to by 
 Canada on any basis which would check the growth 
 and development of trade between the various 
 parts of Canada with each other, or between 
 Canada and the various parts of the Empire ; and 
 because the proposed Reciprocity agreement between 
 Canada and the United States of America would 
 seriously check the growth and development of 
 this trade. 
 
 "4. Because any present benefit to any section of 
 Canada or to any interests or individuals therein 
 which might accrue from the proposed agreement 
 would be more than off-set by the loss and injury 
 which would accrue to other sections and interests 
 and individuals, and because the result to Canada 
 as a whole would be greatly injurious. 
 
 " 5. Because as a result of the proposed agreement 
 the freedom of action possessed by Canada with 
 reference to her tariffs and channels of trade would 
 be greatly curtailed, and she would be hampered 
 in developing her own resources in her own way 
 and by her own people. 
 
 " 6. Because after some years of Reciprocity under 
 the proposed agreement the channels of Canada's 
 trade would have become so changed that a termina- 
 tion of the agreement and a return by the United 
 States to a protective tariff as against Canada 
 would cause a disturbance of trade to an unparalleled 
 extent. 
 
 "7. Because to avoid such a disruption Canada 
 would be forced to extend the scope of the agree- 
 ment so as to include manufactures and other things. 
 
 206 
 
RECIPROCITY 
 
 " 8. Because the agreement as proposed would 
 weaken the ties which bind Canada to the Empire, 
 and because the unrestricted Reciprocity which 
 would naturally follow would still further weaken 
 those ties and make it more difficult to avert 
 political union with the United States. 
 
 "9. Because the disruption in the channels of 
 Canada's trade which was caused by the termina- 
 tion of the Reciprocity Treaty of 1854 and the sub- 
 sequent establishment of a protective tariff by the 
 United States gave rise to a decided leaning in many 
 minds towards annexation with the United States, 
 and this at a time when Canada was mainly peopled 
 by native-born Canadians and other British sub- 
 jects, to whom the prospect of annexation was most 
 unwelcome, and because Canada in a comparatively 
 few years will have millions of new-comers, a large 
 percentage of whom will have come from foreign 
 countries, and because if Canada should then have 
 to choose between disruption of her channels of 
 trade with the United States or political union 
 with them the preservation of Canadian autonomy 
 and Canadian nationality would be enormously 
 more difficult. 
 
 " 10. Believing as we do that Canadian nationality 
 is now threatened with a more serious blow than 
 any it has heretofore met with, and that all Canadians 
 who place the interests of Canada before those of 
 any party or section or individuals therein, should 
 at this crisis state their views openly and fearlessly, 
 we, who have hitherto supported the Liberal party 
 in Canada, subscribe to this statement." 
 
 It was signed by some of the most influential 
 men in Ontario and was highly influential in 
 awakening public opinion. 
 
 Many important speeches were delivered both 
 
 207 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 in Canada and in Great Britain, and the matter 
 became a burning question, promoting very strong 
 feeling on either side. 
 
 Sir Edmond Walker was the first man to sign his 
 name to the manifesto, and it is hardly necessary 
 to say that his name carried enormous weight with 
 it. He is a man who, if we may venture on any- 
 thing so personal, may be said to be one of those 
 who mark the new era in Canada. We shall have 
 occasion to speak of some others — men of scholarly 
 and artistic minds, with whom the strenuous life 
 has never been allowed to quench the love of the 
 beautiful which is inherent in them, and who have 
 been educating themselves in the best way all their 
 lives. 
 
 Sir Charles Tupper, one of Canada's first men, 
 speaking at Vancouver, frankly denounced the 
 agreement as the thin end of the wedge. " No 
 man," he said, " has greater respect for the people 
 of the United States than I have, but no man 
 is more suspicious of their aims in regard to 
 Canada." 
 
 The late Liberal Minister of the Interior spoke at 
 the largest demonstration ever held in Montreal, 
 and declared that the Reciprocity agreement would 
 be destructive to the national aspiration of every 
 patriotic Canadian. 
 
 Mr. Lash, k.c, spoke equally strongly of the 
 annexation peril, and said that an agreement which 
 would open the trade northwards and southwards 
 would practically put an end to trade across the 
 ocean. 
 
 Mr. Foster, the eminent Canadian statesman, 
 pointed the moral of certain declarations made by 
 Mr. Taft, and proved conclusively that for Canada 
 " Reciprocity means subjection, reciprocity means 
 
 208 
 
RECIPROCITY 
 
 continental free trade, reciprocity means ultimately 
 political absorption.' ' 
 
 Mr. Macmaster asked, " What do I think of the 
 Reciprocity agreement ? I think it was simply 
 disastrous for this country. It is an absurdity to 
 say that we would have a market with ninety 
 millions of people. And what sort of a market ? 
 In almost every article that we produce they have a 
 corresponding, and in most cases a much larger 
 production, so far as any food stuffs are concerned. 
 Their seasons are earlier than ours, and they would 
 supply our markets at high prices before our own 
 productions were ripe, and when they were ripe we 
 could only send them to a stale market in the 
 United States. . . . All the wheat that would go 
 south of the Line would be ground in American 
 mills to the profit of American millers, and would 
 enable the American to get what he now very much 
 requires, the by-products with which to feed his 
 hogs and cattle, and, as Mr. Taft pointed out, 
 would enable the miller to send the Canadian flour, 
 American ground, as American flour to foreign 
 markets, and thus make up the deficiency of ten 
 millions of barrels — the falling off in the exportation 
 of American flour that existed ten years ago. . . . 
 The American supply of food products is running 
 short, her forest wealth is almost exhausted, and 
 they wish to draw upon these two sources of 
 Canada's natural wealth for their own benefit. . . . 
 The grain products of the Canadian North-West 
 would pay tribute to the wheat pits of Chicago, 
 and not a hoof would tread the prairie that would 
 not be pledged to the cattle yards and slaughter 
 houses of the same city. The cattle trade of Canada 
 must be gravely injured. Winnipeg would have to 
 resign her right to being the second largest city in 
 
 P 209 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 Canada, and Vancouver would have to bend the 
 knee to Seattle." 
 
 Sir William van Home, in a racy speech in St. 
 Andrews, New Brunswick, said : "I may set out 
 the whole situation thus : our trade is 97 dollars 
 per capita, and America's is 33 dollars per capita. 
 In other words, the water in our mill ponds stands 
 at 97 and in theirs at 33, and they want us to take 
 
 away our dam. Shall we not say, ' Not by a 
 
 mill site/ " In more serious vein he said : "I am 
 neither a politician nor a speaker, but I am glad of 
 this opportunity to say a few plain words on Reci- 
 procity, which I regard as the most important and 
 far-reaching question that has come to Canada since 
 Confederation. I am opposed to Reciprocity, be- 
 cause it would destroy our fiscal independence as 
 regards our tariffs, because it would loosen the 
 bonds which bind Canada to the Empire, and 
 ultimately destroy them, because the underlying 
 idea on the part of our American neighbours is our 
 estrangement from the Empire, which would be a 
 long step towards annexation. ... I am opposed to 
 Reciprocity because we do not need it now, having 
 made our own way to success and prosperity. I 
 see many reasons against it, but I don't see one 
 single, real, and unaltered advantage in it to the 
 country at large. There may be individuals here 
 and there who might possibly be benefited in some 
 way, and perhaps localities ; but I doubt if there is 
 a case where the benefits would compensate for the 
 disadvantages sure to follow. Here in the Maritime 
 provinces we hear much about hay and potatoes and 
 apples and codfish, but for all these there are better 
 markets than those of the United States. From 
 my own knowledge I can say that Cuba, the West 
 Indies generally, and Central America and other 
 
 210 
 
RECIPROCITY 
 
 Spanish-American countries offer much better 
 markets for these things ; and these markets are 
 wide open to us, and it only requires a little atten- 
 tion on the part of the Government to enable us to 
 reach them. 
 
 " It is only necessary to secure the establishment 
 of regular steamship connections. There the profits 
 would be counted in dollars rather than in cents, 
 as in the case of the American markets. And it is 
 only now dawning upon some people in New Bruns- 
 wick that Montreal is a better market for their 
 potatoes than can be found in the United States, 
 and that American potatoes are brought there in 
 the face of the duties in quantities sufficient to 
 govern prices/ ' 
 
 Non-politicians, or those who were non-official 
 politicians, joined in the fray. Mr. Rudyard Kipling 
 wrote lines which, while they almost escaped notice 
 in England, were received with the consideration 
 which they deserved in Canada. " I do not under- 
 stand/' he wrote, " how nine million people can 
 enter into such arrangements as are proposed with 
 ninety million strangers on an open frontier of four 
 thousand miles, and at the same time preserve 
 their own national integrity. Why should Canada, 
 when she has made herself what she is, throw the 
 enormous gifts of her inheritance into the hands 
 of others ? Whatever the United States may gain, 
 I see nothing for Canada in Reciprocity except a 
 little money which she does not need, and a very 
 long repentance." 
 
 The feeling about Reciprocity was as strong in 
 Great Britain as in Canada, and there were those 
 who said that Mr. Asquith's Government had 
 jumped at the American proposals with breathless 
 eagerness, without a thought for the future of 
 
 211 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 Canadian autonomy, or even for the immediate 
 and pressing interests of British trade, but simply 
 because they appeared to offer hopes of side-tracking 
 Imperial preference and of putting difficulties in 
 the way of Tariff Reform. 
 
 In his speech on the subject in the House of 
 Commons he alluded to the disastrous political im- 
 posture of Imperial preference, and his attitude 
 towards Canada at this crisis shows a singular lack 
 of sympathy or of interest. 
 
 But the matter was not to be decided by Parlia- 
 ment in any drastic or high-handed manner. It 
 was, as a matter of fact, to be decided in every home 
 in Canada. Feeling might run high in speeches 
 and at meetings. Mr. Beauchamp Clark might 
 publicly declare the intention of the United States 
 to annex the Dominion, and say that England's 
 consent would not be withheld when the annexa- 
 tion took place, while he offered her the prospect of 
 " One flag, the stars and stripes, from Central 
 America to the North Pole. ,, 
 
 But the people of Canada were thinking over 
 things in a quiet way — particularly on the farms. 
 It was the farmers to whom the most specious 
 advantages were offered by the supporters of Reci- 
 procity. And arguments were not wanted to show 
 that in many ways it would have been to their 
 advantage to vote for the Liberal party. It was told 
 them that under the present conditions of trade 
 they had very real grievances which would be re- 
 moved, and some important and very tempting 
 figures were used. For example, wheat, it was 
 stated, was dutiable in the United States at twenty- 
 five cents a bushel, and in Canada at twelve cents a 
 bushel. In both countries wheat was made free, 
 therefore the reduction in Canada would be twelve 
 
 212 
 
RECIPROCITY 
 
 cents a bushel, while the United States reduction 
 would be twenty-five cents a bushel. The duty on 
 the Canadian wheat going into the States would be 
 nothing, while barley, which was a large crop in 
 Ontario some years ago, was now made free, and 
 Canada's reduction was fifteen cents per bushel, 
 while the United States reduction was thirty cents 
 per bushel. And so on through a long list of figures. 
 
 The reply was that the removal of the American 
 duty could not bring to the Canadian producer any 
 advantage at all equal in amount to the duty itself. 
 The range of prices for the American and Canadian 
 grain crops was very nearly the same, and the 
 removal of the duty amounted to little more than a 
 name, while the removal of the duty on Western 
 grain showed other consequences, because the differ- 
 ence of a cent or two might prevent the crop coming 
 into the hands of the Canadian miller, and send 
 them southwards across the line. Both milling and 
 transportation would thus be seriously affected. 
 
 In the midst of these arguments and counter- 
 arguments the Canadian farmer sat still and said 
 very little. As a matter of fact, no one knew how 
 he would vote. Meanwhile the grievance mongers 
 were busy, as they are ever ready to be, alighting 
 like bluebottle flies on every sore they can find, and 
 spreading a pestilential infection wherever they go. 
 And in the midst of it all the Canadian farmers, 
 shrewd Scotsmen many of them, kept cool heads, 
 and when the moment for action came entered a 
 decisive " nay " and went back to their farms again. 
 
 The farmers, perhaps, had but little part in the 
 general scenes of excitement and enthusiasm in the 
 towns. Montreal and Ontario were in an uproar, 
 citizens were shaking hands with each other, 
 suppers were given to pledge toasts and drink 
 
 213 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 healths, and old stories were recalled of the un- 
 daunted Fifty, who had safeguarded Canada in the 
 old days, while descendants of the united Empire 
 loyalists spoke of the days of their fathers and 
 gloried in the fine old English, Scottish, and Irish 
 names which belonged to them. Only those who 
 were present can at all realise the full measure of 
 the burst of enthusiasm that rang from shore to 
 shore in Canada. Her identity had been threatened, 
 her loyalty had been doubted. But Canada had 
 decided that no price could be put on these things, 
 and that they were not for sale. 
 
 The overthrow of the Government was emphatic 
 and complete. Canada declined the Taft- Fielding 
 agreement. If they should lose by their decision, 
 well, then let them lose ! Like an Eastern king of 
 old they chose wisdom and found it well, and their 
 choice, it was believed, would be justified by genera- 
 tions of experience. . . . 
 
 Careful people went so far as to say that in the 
 end the decision might be regretted. Careful people 
 always exist, and are generally wrong. There is a 
 saying that if you face a bogey or a bully both will 
 fly — but the bully and the bogey, if such they may 
 be called, did not upon this occasion fly. They 
 came back two years later and offered to the little 
 nation for its own convenience, and because it had 
 to have it, the very gifts for which they had tried to 
 strike so hard a bargain ! 
 
 214 
 
Chapter XIII The Royal North-West 
 
 Mounted Police 
 
 IT is very characteristic of men, and bodies of 
 men, who are doing their duty in a simple, 
 straightforward manner, to feel a real sense 
 of distaste towards having their deeds magnified or 
 extolled. To use a common phrase, they cannot 
 bear a " fuss " being made over them. 
 
 The Royal North- West Mounted Police are 
 men of this pattern, and perhaps no treatment 
 would suit them less than to make them subject- 
 matter for a printed page. 
 
 Already their story has been told so ably by Mr. 
 Haydon that to attempt to add anything to it seems 
 a task as daring as it is unnecessary. Our only 
 excuse for touching on it here is because the subject 
 is a very inviting one, and because without some 
 reference to the Royal North-West Mounted Police 
 a book on Canada would hardly have fulfilled its 
 purpose. There is also some fresh matter published 
 year by year which was not available at the time 
 when Riders of the Plains was written. 
 
 Mr. Haydon begins by quoting the report of 
 Colonel Robertson-Ross, who was dispatched by 
 the Canadian Government in the summer of 1872 
 to make a reconnaissance of the North- West 
 Provinces and Indian territories of the Dominions : 
 
 " When at Edmonton and the Rocky Mountain 
 House/ ' he states, " I was informed that a party 
 of American smugglers and traders had established 
 
 215 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 a trading post at the junction of the Bow and the 
 Belly rivers, about thirty miles due east from the 
 Porcupine Hills, and about sixty miles on the 
 Dominion side of the boundary line. This trading 
 post they have named Fort Hamilton, after a 
 mercantile firm of Fort Benton, Montana, U.S.A., 
 from whom it is said they obtain supplies. It is 
 believed that they number about twenty well- 
 armed men, under the command of a man called 
 John Healy, a notorious character. Here, it appears, 
 they have for some time carried on an extensive 
 trade with the Blackfeet Indians, supplying them 
 with rifles, revolvers, goods of various kinds, 
 whisky and other ardent spirits, in direct opposition 
 to the laws both of the United States and the 
 Dominion of Canada, and without paying any 
 customs duties for the goods introduced into the 
 latter country. 
 
 " The demoralisation of the Indians, the danger 
 to the white inhabitants, and injury resulting to the 
 country from the traffic are very great. It is stated 
 upon good authority that during the year 1871 
 eighty-eight of the Blackfeet Indians were mur- 
 dered in drunken brawls among themselves, pro- 
 duced by whisky and other spirits supplied to them 
 by those traders. At Fort Edmonton during the 
 past summer whisky was openly sold to the Black- 
 feet and other Indians trading at the Fort by some 
 smugglers from the United States, who derive 
 large profits therefrom, and on these traders being 
 remonstrated with by the gentlemen in charge of 
 the Hudson's Bay Post, they coolly replied that 
 they knew very well that what they were doing was 
 contrary to the laws of both countries, but as there 
 was no force to prevent them they would do just 
 as they pleased. 
 
 216 
 
NORTH-WEST MOUNTED POLICE 
 
 " It appears that of late years no attempt has 
 been made to assert the supremacy of the law, 
 and the most serious crimes have been allowed to 
 pass unpunished. Hardly a year has gone by 
 without several murders and other crimes of the 
 most grave nature having been committed. During 
 the present year, about three weeks before my 
 arrival at Edmonton, a man, by name Charles 
 Gaudin, a French-speaking half-breed, cruelly mur- 
 dered his wife at no great distance from the gate of 
 the Hudson Bay Company's Post. I was informed 
 that the criminal might have been arrested, but 
 there was no power to act. This same man had 
 previously most wantonly and cruelly mutilated 
 an old Indian woman, by severing the sinews of 
 her arm so as to incapacitate her for work. 
 
 " At Edmonton there is a notorious murderer, 
 a Cree Indian called Ta-ha-kooch, who has com- 
 mitted several murders, and who should have been 
 apprehended long ago. This man is to be seen 
 openly walking about the Post. Many instances 
 of a similar kind can be adduced, and as a natural 
 result there is a widespread feeling of apprehension. 
 The gentleman in charge of the Hudson Bay 
 Company Post at Fort Pitt, as well as others else- 
 where, assured me that of late the Indians have been 
 overbearing in manner, and threatening at times. 
 Indeed, the white men dwelling in the Saskatchewan 
 are at this moment living by sufferance, as it were, 
 entirely at the mercy of the Indians. They dare 
 not venture to introduce cattle or stock into the 
 country, or to cultivate the ground to any extent, 
 for fear of Indian spoliation. 
 
 " I would urge," said the Adjutant-General, 
 " if it be the intention of the Government to retain 
 any military force on duty in Manitoba, that one 
 
 217 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 hundred men of the Provisional Battalion be sup- 
 plied with horses and equipped as Mounted Rifle- 
 men, that an addition of one officer and twenty-five 
 gunners from the School of Gunnery at Kingston 
 be made to the Artillery detachment, and the 
 Artillery supplied with four of the Horse Artillery 
 guns recently obtained from England. Thus the 
 force would form a small but effective Field Brigade, 
 and its military power be increased. With regard 
 to the necessity for maintaining any military force 
 at Fort Garry, no doubt whatever exists in my 
 mind as to the propriety of doing so, in view of the 
 presence of many bands of Indians, considering 
 the primitive state of society in the Province, the 
 strong political party feeling which exists, and the 
 fact that on both sides of the International Boundary 
 Line restless and reckless characters among both 
 white men and Indians abound. 
 
 • i It is undoubtedly very desirable to maintain a 
 certain number of police constables in the Province 
 under the civil power, some of whom should be 
 mounted, but I feel satisfied that the great security 
 for the preservation of good order, and the peace 
 of the North- West territories, under the changing 
 state of affairs, will for some years be found to lie 
 in the existence and presence of a disciplined 
 military body, under its own military rules, in 
 addition to, but distinct from, any civil force which 
 it may be thought proper to establish. Whatever 
 feeling may be entertained toward policemen, 
 animosity is rarely, if ever, felt towards disciplined 
 soldiers wearing Her Majesty's uniform in any 
 portion of the British Empire. In the event of 
 serious disturbance a police force, acting alone and 
 unsupported by a disciplined military body, would 
 probably be overpowered in a Province of mixed 
 
 218 
 
NORTH-WEST MOUNTED POLICE 
 
 races, where every man is armed, while to maintain 
 a military without any civil force is not desir- 
 able." 
 
 Colonel Robertson-Ross's conclusions led him 
 to suggest that no time should be lost in establishing 
 a chain of military posts from Manitoba to the 
 Rocky Mountains. The appointment of a Stipen- 
 diary Magistrate for the Saskatchewan, who should 
 reside at Edmonton and act as Indian Com- 
 missioner was also, he urged, a matter of the first 
 importance. " The individual to fill this post 
 should be one, if possible, already known to the 
 Indians, and one in whom they have confidence. 
 No Indian Commissioner should proceed un- 
 accompanied by a military force. A large force is 
 not required, but the presence of a certain force, 
 I believe, will be found to be indispensable for the 
 security of the country, to prevent bloodshed and 
 preserve peace." 
 
 Upon this scene of disorder and lawlessness, 
 indicated by the Report, rode the Mounted Police, 
 red-coated as became the Queen's soldiers, and 
 with no less a determination than to put things 
 right wherever they found them wrong, and to do 
 justice, if necessary at the point of the sword, 
 amongst a people who had much to learn in this 
 matter. Stories of American Indians have filled 
 the imaginations of boys and girls for many a long 
 year, and round their deeds of daring has been 
 woven many a tale of romance. Their fine physique, 
 their vigour and their daring justify this, and no 
 more thrilling stories of adventure have ever been 
 told than those by Mr. Ballantyne, who himself, we 
 believe, was a Hudson Bay clerk. 
 
 The very words " Cree," " Blackfeet," " Bloods," 
 " Sioux," " Assiniboines," suggest lives of adven- 
 
 219 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 ture on the lonely trail like nothing else can suggest 
 them, while the names of chiefs are equally stirring 
 to the imagination. We doubt if any boy or girl 
 could fail to be enthralled by tales of Braves called 
 " Owl-Child," " Many-tailed-Feathers-round-his- 
 neck," "Black-Evil," " All-and-a-half," "Medi- 
 cine-pipe-stem," " Good- Young-Man," or even 
 " Big- Belly." But there was another side to this 
 brave and adventurous life, perhaps even more 
 lurid, but certainly not so picturesque. The 
 Indians were trappers, but they were also traders, 
 and for years they had been content to trade their 
 valuable pelts in exchange for cheap pocket- 
 handkerchiefs and glass beads. Now, however, a 
 more attractive exchange was being offered them 
 in the form of whisky, or fire-water as they called 
 it. To this indulgence the Indians succumbed 
 with surprising readiness, and to fire-water some 
 of the bravest tribes owed their complete degrada- 
 tion, their loss of physical strength, and in many 
 cases the mild form of insanity that prevailed amongst 
 them. Once tasted, our fire-water became a craving 
 amongst them, and no skins were too valuable to 
 give in exchange for it, while cunning or force 
 would be used to obtain it when it was not bartered. 
 It was useless to make laws for the suppression of 
 the liquor traffic, because laws could not be en- 
 forced, and the trade was far too lucrative to be 
 readily abandoned. A fine race was rapidly de- 
 teriorating ; the old hardihood and courage of the 
 Indians was going, and besides this, a bitter spirit 
 of discontent was growing up amongst them, and 
 small wonder that it should be so, for not only 
 were American traders bringing fire-water amongst 
 them, but the buffalo, which was the Indian's 
 chief form of trade, was rapidly being exterminated 
 
 220 
 
NORTH-WEST MOUNTED POLICE 
 
 by them. It is amazing to think that there are people 
 still living who can remember herds of these beasts, 
 twenty-five miles in extent, and the plains covered 
 with them, literally by the million. To-day there 
 is a miserably small number of them penned in an 
 enclosure at Banff, in the Rocky Mountains, and 
 two or three more, also penned and enclosed, at 
 Winnipeg, and these are the only remains of the 
 animals to which at one time Canada practically 
 belonged, and which furnished the Indian with all 
 that he required in the way of food and clothing. 
 The ruthless destruction of these animals seems 
 to have been almost childish in its wantonness, and 
 in many cases a misused sense of sport led to ridicu- 
 lous bets as to how many of these creatures could 
 be killed within a certain given time. 
 
 With the destruction of the buffaloes the Indians 
 might almost have ceased to exist, and they doubt- 
 less owed their survival to the formation of the 
 North-West Mounted Police. In 1862 occurred 
 the terrible massacre of the whites at Minnesota, 
 but this no doubt was the retaliation for years of 
 ill-usage and ill-treatment on the part of the " Long 
 Knives/' as the Americans were called. A feeling 
 of hatred sprang up between the two races, which 
 it required all the tact and all the firmness possible 
 on behalf of Canadians to allay. Their messages 
 from the White Mother were explicit, perfectly 
 just, and quite unalterable, and the Indians, to a 
 man, learned to trust them, and to trust the police 
 who administered the laws. 
 
 It would be merely borrowing from an excellent 
 book, and one which we recommend to our readers, 
 to give anything like a full account of the difficulties 
 that followed, and the growing work that confronted 
 this newly raised body of men. They might set 
 
 221 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 out to be policemen, but it very soon became 
 apparent that they had also to be doctors, judges, 
 river patrols, and relief officers, besides inspectors 
 of immigrants and general referees to the large 
 number of lawless strangers who were beginning to 
 come into the country. The tale of their doings 
 during the rush into the Yukon is a tale of strenuous 
 work, undertaken in very difficult circumstances, 
 but always with so much success that we venture 
 to think there was hardly a well-established claim 
 made against them of incivility or backwardness in 
 giving help. It had been a difficult enough matter 
 to convince American- Indians that they must not 
 lift cattle ; it was probably a far more difficult 
 matter to convince gold-diggers that they must 
 take a sufficiency of food with them into an unknown 
 and frozen land. Perhaps the highest testimony 
 that was ever paid to the work of the North-West 
 Police in these trying circumstances was the case of 
 an American, who said : " Where the North-West 
 Police are you pack your revolver.' ' 
 
 It was not, however, only in the Yukon and in 
 the wildest parts on an only half-discovered country 
 that the police did their excellent work. It is not 
 so very long ago that there was a strong pallisade 
 round the Hudson Bay Stores in Calgary, while in 
 many districts it was impossible to go unarmed by 
 day or by night. Added to this, lynch law was not 
 unknown, and had to be suppressed. To put the 
 matter briefly, the civilisation and the safety of half 
 a continent depended upon the police. 
 
 Their work was not easily done. It involved 
 sacrifice, and a life during many months of the year 
 of daily personal discomfort, and expeditions into 
 the unknown, with dangers and hardships attendant 
 on them such as are only casually, and almost by 
 
 222 
 
NORTH-WEST MOUNTED POLICE 
 
 chance, alluded to in some of the diaries and the 
 reports of the men engaged in them. 
 
 The story of how Inspector Fitzgerald and his 
 little body of men met their death is one of the 
 most tragic in all the records of the North- West 
 Police. All the more moving because, in the diary 
 kept by Inspector Fitzgerald to record the daily 
 events of that ill-fated journey, there is no appeal 
 for sympathy, nor even any natural outbreak of 
 despair. The third last entry in his diary contains 
 the optimistic words : " I think we will make it all 
 right.' ' And this when they had only three or four 
 dogs left, one hundred miles to go, and the temper- 
 ature was twenty-six below zero. 
 
 The facts are these : On December 21st, In- 
 spector Fitzgerald, accompanied by two corporals 
 and a guide named Carter, set out on a patrol from 
 Fort MacPherson to Dawson. They took with them 
 a certain amount of provisions, but rather less than 
 usual, as it was expected to be a quick trip, and the 
 party were confident of encountering Indians on the 
 route. From the first everything seems to have 
 been against the expedition. Heavy snow fell, and 
 the going became extremely slow and difficult. The 
 temperature varied from zero to sixty-four below. 
 What the travellers must have suffered from exposure 
 in such intense cold it is difficult for Europeans to 
 realise. Then Carter became uncertain about the 
 trail. For days the expedition wandered, first in 
 one direction, and then in another ; three or four 
 times they had to turn back upon the trail, and every 
 effort failed to bring them to the Hart- Wind Divide, 
 where they would have met Indians and where they 
 would have been able to procure a fresh guide and 
 increased provisions. 
 
 On Wednesday, January 18th, the stock of food 
 
 223 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 was finally exhausted, and the first dog killed and 
 eaten. From that time on until the end dog flesh 
 was the only sustenance of the little band. The 
 men got weaker and weaker, and sickness, conse- 
 quent upon the unnatural food, set in ; their skins 
 began to peel, and their lips were swollen and split ; 
 for want of proper food the intense cold became 
 agonising. And yet the party struggled on, even at 
 the very last hoping that it would be " all right," 
 and that they would strike the right trail. 
 
 On March 21st, the search party, sent to discover 
 traces of the lost expedition, came upon the 
 emaciated bodies of two men, lying side by side in 
 the desolation of the country which had conquered 
 them. They were Constables Kinney and Taylor. 
 Taylor had blown his head off, and the report has 
 it that he was probably insane through hardship, 
 but there would be found very few people to con- 
 demn the taking of a life existing under such appal- 
 ling conditions. Near by was a kettle containing 
 moose skin, which the unfortunate men must have 
 endeavoured to masticate as food. 
 
 Fitzgerald and Carter had managed to struggle 
 on for another ten miles or so, but here they suc- 
 cumbed, worn out, exhausted by misery, privation, 
 and suffering that we can neither imagine nor 
 describe. Their bodies lay extended in the snow, 
 mere wretched skeletons of humanity, but skeletons 
 that had been the frame work of the best and 
 noblest flesh and blood that Great Britain contributes 
 to the making of her Empire. 
 
 Inspector Fitzgerald's diary was found under the 
 bodies of Constables Kinney and Taylor. No one 
 who reads it can doubt that it was simply written 
 as an official police report, and yet its very sim- 
 plicity lends such force to it that we feel that 
 
 224 
 
NORTH-WEST MOUNTED POLICE 
 
 nothing else can so vividly convey a picture of the 
 scene through which he passed, and the daily life 
 on the trail : — 
 
 Twenty-one below. Wednesday, December 21 . — 
 Strong N. wind, with heavy mist and light snow. 
 Left Fort McPherson at 7.45 a.m. Nooned 2 
 spells up river and camped in Indian cabin 15 miles 
 up river. Going very heavy in some places. 15 
 miles. 
 
 Seventeen below. Thursday, December 22. — 
 Strong S. wind, with heavy mist. Left camp at 
 8 a.m. Nooned one hour and camped below portage 
 at 3 p.m. Going fair. 18 miles. 
 
 Seven below. Friday, December 23. — Slight 
 N.E. wind, with heavy mist. Left camp at 8.30 
 a.m. Nooned one hour and camped at south end 
 of 7 mile portage. Snowing last night, making 
 heavy going. 17 miles. 
 
 Seventeen below. Saturday, December 24. — 
 Fine, with strong S.E. wind. Left camp at 8 a.m. 
 Nooned one hour above Colin 's cabin and camped 
 for night in old Indian camp at 3.15 p.m. Heavy 
 snow during night, making heavy going. 16 miles. 
 
 Thirty below. Sunday, December 25. — Light 
 N.W. wind, with heavy mist. Left camp at 8 a.m. 
 and arrived at the mouth of Trail Creek at 10.15 
 a.m. and loaded up the cache of fish and left at 1 1 .45 
 a.m. and camped about eight miles up Trail Creek 
 in old camp at 2.15 p.m. Going heavy on Peel 
 River, good going on Trail Creek. 16 miles. 
 
 Twenty-four below. Monday, December 26. — 
 Strong S.E. wind, with heavy mist. Left camp at 
 7.30 a.m. Nooned one hour and camped at Indian 
 encampment at 1.45 p.m. 20 miles up Trail Creek. 
 Going very good. 18 miles. 
 
 Thirty-nine below. Tuesday, December 27. — 
 
 Q 225 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 Fine, with strong S.E. wind. Left Indian camp at 
 7.30 a.m. and travelled up Trail Creek for 5 miles 
 and then went up small creek, due south, for 7 
 miles and camped for night at 2 p.m. Sent Con- 
 stable Kinney and Indian ahead to break trail for 
 to-morrow. Hired Indian and dog team to help us 
 across 80 mile portage, paying him $3 a day. Going 
 very bad all day, had to break through three feet of 
 snow and only made about 12 miles. 12 miles. 
 Climbed 800 feet. 
 
 Forty-three below. Wednesday, December 28. — 
 Fine. Very cold and very misty in hills. Left camp 
 at 8 a.m. and travelled up ravine until 1 p.m. 
 Nooned one hour and camped on the upper end of 
 Caribou Born Mountain at 2.30 p.m. Indians 
 followed our trail and caught us up at 10 a.m. and 
 all camped together. Very deep snow and very 
 steep climb, and only made about 12 miles. Climbed 
 1000 feet from camp until 1 p.m. At the head of 
 the mountain the climb from Trail Creek is 1000 
 feet. 12 miles. 
 
 Thirty-four below. Thursday, December 29. — 
 Fine. Clear and cold in valley, very misty in hills. 
 Left camp at 8 a.m. and travelled down 1^ miles to 
 head of small creek and followed it to Caribou 
 River, and camped at start of portage on Caribou 
 River. Snow very deep, dogs very tired. 14 miles. 
 
 Fifty-one below. Friday, December 30. — Fine, 
 with light S. wind. Left camp at 8.15 a.m. and 
 travelled until 2.30 p.m. and only made about 9 
 miles. Snow on the portage very deep, and some 
 very steep hills ; found it very cold on account of 
 going so slow. 9 miles. 
 
 Forty below. Saturday, December 31. — Fine, 
 with strong S. wind. Saw the sun to-day. Left 
 camp at 7.30 a.m., nooned one hour and camped at 
 
 226 
 
NORTH-WEST MOUNTED POLICE 
 
 3 p.m. 4 miles down Mountain Creek. Going 
 very heavy on the portage and Mountain Creek. 
 1 6 miles. 
 
 Thirty-seven below. Sunday, January i, 191 1. — 
 Heavy snow storm all day. Left camp at 8.45 a.m., 
 made one drive and camped in small cabin 4 miles 
 above mouth of Mountain Creek at 2 p.m. Going 
 very heavy, over 3 feet of snow. Paid off 
 Indian, 5 days coming and 3 days to return. 
 11 miles. 
 
 Thirty-five below. Monday, January 2. — Heavy 
 snow storm during night and all day. Left camp at 
 7.30 ; had to cut our way through the bush twice, 
 owing to driftwood being piled up in the river ; 
 nooned one hour, and camped on the Peel River, 
 5 miles above Mountain Creek at 2.15 p.m. Going 
 very heavy, owing to deep snow. 10 miles. 
 
 Forty-six below. Tuesday, January 3. — Light 
 snow all day. Left camp at 7.30 a.m., nooned one 
 hour, and camped at Waugh's old tent, 2 miles up 
 Wind River at 3.30 p.m. Mouth of Wind River f 
 of a mile above lower end of Peel River canyon. 
 Going very heavy ; dogs played out. 12 miles. 
 
 Forty-seven below. Wednesday, January 4. — 
 Strong S.E. wind with snow. Left camp at 8.30 
 a.m., nooned 1 hour and camped at 2.30 p.m. 
 Going very heavy ; over 3 feet of snow most of 
 the way. 10 miles. 
 
 Sixty-five below. Thursday, January 5. — Fine, 
 with slight head wind. Left camp at 8 a.m., but 
 only went about 6 miles, when we had to go in the 
 bush and make camp at noon, owing to the intense 
 cold ; some slight frost-bites among the party. 
 Going heavy, but a slight improvement in the last 
 few days. 6 miles. 
 
 227 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 Thirty-seven below. Thursday, January 12. — 
 Fine, with slight head wind. A nice day. Left 
 camp at 8 a.m., and stopped 3 hours at noon, and 
 sent Carter to look for portage but he could not 
 find it. At 3 p.m. found that the river was getting 
 very small ; camped and sent Carter on ahead, and 
 came to the conclusion that we were too far up. 
 12 miles. 
 
 Twelve below. Friday, January 13. — Snowing, 
 with light fair wind. Left camp at 7.30 a.m., came 
 back down the river 5 miles, and went up small 
 creek 4 miles, which Carter thought was Forrest 
 Creek, but found it was not, and came down 2 miles 
 farther and camped at 1.30 p.m., and sent Carter 
 out to look for creek. 15 miles. 
 
 Twenty-three below. Saturday, January 14. — 
 Very strong gale all day, head wind, could not leave 
 camp. 
 
 Thirty-nine below. Sunday, January 15. — Very 
 misty, with slight head wind. Left camp at 7.30 
 a.m., and followed up east branch of Little Wind 
 River, and camped at 3.15 p.m. at what is supposed 
 to be the mouth of Forrest Creek. Going very 
 good ; a little heavy snow at the start ; the rest of 
 the way mostly ice. 16 miles. 
 
 Forty-three below. Monday, January 16. — Fine, 
 with very strong S.W. wind. Left camp at 7.45 
 a.m. and travelled up creek for 6 miles, and found 
 that it was not Forrest Creek and had to return to 
 mouth again and camp. Sent Carter out in after- 
 noon, but he had no success. 12 miles. 
 
 Twenty-three below. Tuesday, January 17. — 
 Fine in a.m., with strong S.W. wind which turned 
 to a gale in the evening. Did not break camp, sent 
 Carter and Kinney off at 7.15 a.m. to follow a river 
 going south by a little east ; they returned at 3.30 
 
 228 
 
NORTH-WEST MOUNTED POLICE 
 
 p.m., and reported that it ran right up in the moun- 
 tains, and Carter said it was not the right river. I 
 left at 8 a.m. and followed a river running south, 
 but could not see any cutting on it. Carter is 
 completely lost and does not know one river from 
 another. 
 
 We have now only 10 pounds of flour and 8 pounds 
 of bacon and some dried fish. My last hope is gone, 
 and the only thing I can do is to return and kill 
 some of the dogs to feed others and ourselves, 
 unless we can meet some Indians. 
 
 We have now been a week looking for a river to 
 take us over the divide, but there are dozens of 
 rivers, and I am at a loss. I should not have taken 
 Carter's word that he knew the way from Little 
 Wind River. 
 
 Thirteen below. Wednesday, January 18. — 
 Very strong S. gale last night and this morning, 
 moderated in afternoon. Left camp on the return 
 to Peel River, at 7.45 a.m., nooned one hour and 
 camped at 3 p.m. 20 miles below. Killed the first 
 dog to-night for dog feed ; hardly any of the dogs 
 would eat him, and had to give them a little dried 
 fish. Our food consisted of a small piece of bannock 
 and dried fish. Good going on our back trail. 20 
 miles. 
 
 Twenty-eight below. Thursday, January 19. — 
 Very misty, with slight S.W. wind. Left camp at 
 7.30 a.m., nooned one hour and camped about 29 
 miles above the mouth of Little Wind River. Most 
 of the river was overflowed, and we were at times 
 ankle deep in water. Killed another dog to-night. 
 21 miles. 
 
 Twenty-one below. Friday, January 20. — Very 
 strong S.W. gale all day. Could not leave camp, it 
 was all we could do to keep the tent standing. Ate 
 
 229 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 the last of the flour and bacon to-day. All we have 
 now is some dried fish and tea. 
 
 Zero. Saturday, January 21. — Strong gale until 
 noon, moderated in p.m. Left camp at 7.45 a.m., 
 nooned one hour and camped about 12 miles above 
 the mouth of Little Wind River. Nearly all clear 
 ice, making the going slow. Killed another dog 
 to-night. 20 miles. 
 
 Fifty below in a.m. Sunday, January 22. — 64 in 
 p.m. Very misty, with slight S.W. wind. Left 
 camp at 7.45 a.m., nooned one hour, and camped 5 
 miles down Big Wind River, 4p.n1, Going very 
 heavy, our old trail filled up and had trouble with 
 water. Carter's fingers badly frozen. 17 miles. 
 
 Sixty-four below. Monday, January 23. — Misty, 
 with strong head wind. Stayed over in camp as it 
 was too cold to travel. 
 
 Fifty-six below. Tuesday, January 24. — Strong 
 S. wind, with very heavy mist. Left camp at 7.30, 
 went 6 miles and found the river open right across. 
 Constable Taylor got in up to his waist, and Carter 
 in up to his hips, and we had to go into camp at 1 1 
 a.m. Cold intense with all the open water. Killed 
 another dog, and all hands made a good meal on 
 dog meat. 6 miles. 
 
 Fifty-three below. Wednesday, January 25. — 
 Left camp at 7.30 to look for place to cross open 
 water, and did not start with dogs until 9.15. 
 Nooned 3 miles above Mount Deception and camped 
 at 3.30 p.m. 20 miles above mouth. Going fairly 
 good. Had our old trail part of the way. Killed 
 another dog to-night. Our food is now dog meat 
 and tea. 18 miles. 
 
 Twenty-one below. Thursday, January 26. — 
 Snowing, with very heavy mist. Left camp at 7.30 
 a.m., lost some hours getting around open water, 
 
 230 
 
NORTH-WEST MOUNTED POLICE 
 
 and nooned one hour, and camped at 3.30 p.m. 
 Going very heavy in deep snow, and all hands and 
 dogs getting weak. 8 miles. 
 
 Thirteen below. Friday, January 27. — Heavy 
 snowstorm, with heavy mist. Left camp at 7.30 
 a.m., nooned one hour, and camped at Waugh's 
 tent at 2 p.m. Searched tent and cache for food, 
 but found none. Going very heavy. Killed another 
 dog. We have now only 9 dogs ; the rest are 
 gone for feed. 11 miles. 
 
 Forty-five below. Saturday, January 28. — Strong 
 south wind with mist. Left camp at 7.45 a.m., 
 nooned one hour 3 miles below Peel River canyon, 
 and camped at one of our old camps at 3.15 p.m. 
 Taylor sick last night and all day. Going very 
 heavy ; very little sign of our old trail. 12 miles. 
 
 Twenty below. Sunday, January 29. — Snowing, 
 with light N.E. wind. Left camp at 7.30 a.m., 
 nooned one hour, and camped in cabin at 1.30 p.m. 
 5 miles up Mountain Creek. Killed another dog 
 to-night. Men and dogs very weak. Cached one 
 sled and wrapper and 7 single dog harness here. 
 10 miles. 
 
 Fifty-one below. Monday, January 30. — Fine, 
 with light W. wind. Left camp at 7.45 a.m., nooned 
 one hour and camped at 3.15 p.m. at foot of big hill 
 on Mountain Creek. Going very heavy ; old trail 
 all filled in. All hands feeling sick, supposed to be 
 from eating dog's liver. 14 miles. 
 
 Forty-five below. Tuesday, January 31. — Sixty- 
 two below in p.m. Fine, with slight S.W. wind. 
 Left camp at 7.15 a.m., had to double up for the 
 first 1^ miles ; nooned one hour and camped at 
 4.15 p.m. 4 miles from Caribou River. Going 
 heavy ; travelled part of the time on our old trail, 
 but it was filled in. Skin peeling off our faces and 
 
 231 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 parts of the body, and lips all swollen and split. I 
 suppose this is caused by feeding on dog meat. 
 Everybody feeling the cold very much for want of 
 proper food. 17 miles. 
 
 Fifty-one below in a.m. Wednesday, February 1 . 
 — Two below in p.m. Fine, with strong S.W. wind. 
 Left camp at 7.30 a.m., nooned one hour, and 
 camped at 4 p.m. on the river where we start round 
 Caribou Born Mountain. Followed our old trail, 
 but found it very heavy. Killed another dog to- 
 night ; this makes 8 dogs we have killed, and 
 we have eaten most of them, and fed what dried fish 
 we had to the dogs. 16 miles. 
 
 Seven above in a.m. Thursday, February 2. — 
 Twenty-three below in p.m. Fine in a.m., very 
 misty on mountain in p.m. Left camp at 7 a.m. ; 
 nooned one hour, and had to camp on the mountain 
 at 3.30 p.m., as we got astray in the mist. Going 
 heavy in Creek ; very good on the mountain. 10 
 miles. 
 
 Twenty-six below. Friday, February 3. — Misty 
 in a.m., clear in p.m. Strong N.E. wind. Left 
 camp at 7.45, crossed the mountain by 1.30 p.m., 
 and camped on Trail Creek at the mouth of the 
 small creek. Killed another dog to-night, and had 
 to feed some of it to the dogs as we have no dried 
 fish. Men and dogs very thin and weak and cannot 
 travel far. We have travelled about 200 miles on 
 dog meat, and have still about 100 miles to go, but 
 I think we will make it all right, but will have only 
 three or four dogs left. 14 miles. 
 
 Fifty-two below. Saturday, February 4. — Fine, 
 with strong S.E. wind. Left camp at 7.15 a.m. ; 
 nooned one hour and camped at 3 p.m. 8 miles 
 down Trail Creek. Going very heavy, and every- 
 body suffered very much with the cold. 8 miles. 
 
 232 
 
NORTH-WEST MOUNTED POLICE 
 
 Fifty-eight below. Sunday, February 5. — Fine, 
 with strong S.E. wind. Left camp at 7.15 a.m. ; 
 nooned one hour, and camped about 8 miles further 
 down. Just after noon I broke through the ice and 
 had to make fire ; found one foot slightly frozen. 
 Killed another dog to-night ; have only 5 dogs 
 now, and can only go a few miles a day ; everybody 
 breaking out on the body and skin peeling off. 8 
 miles. 
 
 This was Inspector Fitzgerald's last entry. His 
 will was found in his pocket. Writing with a piece 
 of charred wood, he had left everything he possessed 
 to his " dearly-loved mother." Then he had 
 written simply, " God bless all," and so died. 
 
 As well as the difficulties and dangers of patrols, 
 the nervous and risky work of searching for 
 criminals, and the arduous nature of their ordinary 
 police duty, the North- West Police have over and 
 over again to play the part of the Good Samaritan 
 to those unfortunates who have tried to win success 
 in the new country and have failed. For months 
 together immigrants are provided with food and 
 shelter and care. Sometimes, on a patrol, when 
 food is of such vital importance, constables will 
 deplete their own stock of provisions to feed a 
 hungry man they meet on the roadside. They will 
 go many miles in the bitterest days of a bitter winter 
 to rescue destitute families from starvation, and no 
 case is too desperate for them to attempt to relieve. 
 Now and again a constable has even worse to do 
 than merely to rescue immigrants under difficul- 
 ties. 
 
 A trapper was frozen to death fifty-five miles 
 distant from Prairie Creek, and a constable at that 
 
 233 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 station was detailed to go and bring the frozen 
 corpse for burial. The journey was long and 
 weary in the cold, for speed under the circum- 
 stances was impossible. The body was frozen 
 into an awkward position and had to be repacked 
 several times a day, and though Constable Thorne 
 had a pack outfit and a man with him, the grue- 
 some undertaking must have taxed his nerves and 
 powers of endurance to the utmost. On another 
 occasion Corporal Handcock journeyed sixty-five 
 miles from his station in order to bear the corpse 
 of one more unfortunate trapper to Prince Albert, 
 a distance of one hundred and fifty miles in 
 another direction. Such tasks must be horrible 
 and unnerving in the extreme, and yet the re- 
 ports show no instances of grumbling or discontent 
 or mutiny. 
 
 The treatment of the insane is another of the 
 heavy tasks of the North- West Police. There is a 
 fine story of one member of the police force who 
 had to carry a distance of thirteen hundred miles 
 across the snow, a missionary who had become 
 insane, and whom it was necessary to bring down 
 to a lunatic asylum. The journey of the one solitary 
 man in a dog-sleigh with an uncontrolled lunatic, 
 and with no shelter for either of them, in mid-winter, 
 reads more like a tale of ancient heroism than one 
 which concerns, even remotely, present day condi- 
 tions. Cases of insanity are of great frequency on 
 the prairie, and are induced, it is believed, by the 
 excessive loneliness which prevails there, and the 
 hard life. There are a considerable number every 
 year for the North- West Police to treat with, and 
 this, no doubt, is one of the saddest parts of their 
 work. 
 
 Of crime there is of course a considerable amount, 
 
 234 
 
NORTH-WEST MOUNTED POLICE 
 
 but not so much as might be expected from the 
 isolated position of many of the settlers' dwellings, 
 combined with the fact that " toughs " from all 
 parts of the world are to be found in Canada. 
 The report of 191 1 has the story of a murder which 
 taxed the Force to the utmost : 
 
 " The murdered man himself wrapped up his 
 business in impenetrable mystery. He was known 
 to have a large sum of money — how much no one 
 knew, but it consisted of a large roll of bills. He 
 was scrupulously honest in his dealings and was 
 well liked by his neighbours, who, however, knew 
 very little about him. He was the personification 
 of eccentricity. He would not entrust his money 
 to a bank, and no one knew where he kept it. I was 
 able to find only one man who ever saw him with 
 a roll of bills in his hand, and that on one occasion 
 in the Dunbow Industrial School where he was 
 making some small payment to the accountant. 
 He was known to have at least one sister in England, 
 but, after weeks of correspondence with English 
 authorities, I failed to find her. He himself led his 
 neighbours to believe that he was in process of 
 selling his ranch and its belongings to a young 
 Scotsman, and when he disappeared without having 
 gone to bid his old-time neighbours good-bye, 
 they thought it strange and unneighbourly, but put 
 the omission down to eccentricity, and nothing was 
 ever said to the police about it. 
 
 " His real name was A. J. Tucker Peach, but he 
 was generally known as ' Old Tucker/ and compara- 
 tively few people knew that his name was Peach 
 at all. The postmaster at Gladys and John Fisk 
 were two of the few. 
 
 " On June 29, 1910, the headless trunk of a man 
 was found in the Bow River, where it had been 
 
 235 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 washed by the current against a fallen tree. Part 
 of the body which was out of the water was very 
 much discoloured, and the whole of it was de- 
 composed. A shirt and undershirt were on it, but 
 these gave no clue to his identity. No one was 
 known to be missing and Dr. Nyblett, Coroner of 
 Macleod, who was called to the spot, issued his 
 order for burial. The remains were buried on the 
 river bank by two settlers. 
 
 " In the month of November following a skull 
 was found under the fallen tree previously men- 
 tioned, and near it, half buried in the sand and 
 frozen stiff were a blanket, a cowhide and a piece 
 of rope. The skull had a small clean hole in the 
 centre of the forehead ; a few iron-grey hairs 
 attached to it ; a piece of cotton batting in one of 
 the ears ; and a slight dent, apparently the mark of 
 an injury received many years previously during 
 lifetime, which extended both ways across the 
 forehead from the centre ; some few teeth were 
 also missing. 
 
 " A few of the settlers in that neighbourhood, 
 on being shown the skull, said from the first that it 
 ' looked like Old Tucker.' 
 
 " One settler remembered that some twenty-five 
 years previously * Old Tucker ' had been kicked in 
 the forehead by a horse, and he had bound up his 
 head for him. Another recalled that ' Old Tucker ' 
 always wore cotton batting in one or both ears. A 
 third judged from the shape of the skull and the 
 iron-grey hairs that it was ' Old Tucker's ' cranium 
 that was presented to him. 
 
 W The skull was sent for examination to Dr. 
 Revell, Provincial Bacteriologist, at Edmonton, an 
 inquest' was called for November 29, at Okotoks, 
 and the previously buried body was exhumed. 
 
 236 
 
NORTH-WEST MOUNTED POLICE 
 
 " In the interim we searched high and low for 
 Tucker Peach, of whose disappearance we now 
 learned for the first time. 
 
 " A young man was then living on his ranch as 
 caretaker for the young Scotsman who was said to 
 have bought it, Thomas Mitchell Robertson. The 
 latter young man was working as a brakesman on 
 the C.P.R. between Medicine Hat and Calgary. 
 
 " Robertson had left word with the postmaster 
 at Gladys to forward any mail matter for Tucker 
 Peach to his Calgary address. On being served 
 with a summons to attend the inquest at Okotoks, 
 Robertson told us that he had bought the Peach 
 ranch of one hundred and sixty acres for $26 per 
 acre — half down, half payable in twelve months. 
 He told us also that Peach went first to Carstair 
 and from there to England, whence he had written 
 about his money. We had Robertson interviewed 
 at various times and places, and on each occasion 
 he told a somewhat different story from what he had 
 previously told. We investigated each story as we 
 received it, to find that it was founded on fiction, 
 but we never said a word to let him think we 
 regarded him with suspicion. 
 
 On the day before the inquest Robertson left 
 Calgary for the south, having stolen $90 from a 
 fellow-boarder, but instead of leaving the train at 
 Okotoks he went on to Macleod, where he spent 
 the afternoon in dissipation at a house of ill-fame. 
 Towards evening he became the worse for liquor 
 and said that he had stolen $75,000 in Alaska, that 
 the police were after him, and that he wanted to 
 catch the Spokane flier that night. The woman of 
 the house communicated with the officer com- 
 manding the Mounted Police, and Robertson was 
 taken into custody. The summons to the inquest 
 
 237 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 was found on him, the Coroner was appealed to, 
 and he issued a warrant under which Robertson 
 was conducted to Okotoks next day. 
 
 " The first witnesses called established the 
 identity of the dead man to the satisfaction of the 
 jury, and Dr. Revell, who had made a masterly 
 examination of the skull, showed clearly the course 
 which the bullet must have taken after entering 
 the forehead to find an exit at the inner corner of 
 the left eye. Dr. Revell repeated his story to two 
 other juries, who unreservedly accepted his able 
 exposition. 
 
 " In the afternoon Robertson underwent a lengthy 
 examination and his story then differed from any of 
 his previous stories. He swore that he had bought 
 two quarter sections from Tucker Peach, being three 
 hundred and twenty acres at $26 per acre, which 
 price included twenty-one horses on the place. The 
 purchase money to the extent of $5000 had come 
 to him by bank draft from Scotland to the Bank of 
 Montreal at Calgary, where he cashed it for notes 
 and gold. He did not remember the respective 
 amounts of each, and so the silly story went on 
 until at last he was informed that Bank of Montreal 
 officials could, and would be called to contradict 
 his statements in detail, and he was then asked by 
 Inspector Duffus if he had any explanation to 
 offer as to the conflict of evidence between himself 
 and them. His reply was, ' Well, I guess this 
 isn't the place to say it. I do not wish to say any- 
 thing further.' 
 
 " Inspector Duffus who was watching the case for 
 the Mounted Police . . . saw that the psychological 
 moment had arrived — obtained the Coroner's 
 permission to speak to the witness — asked Robert- 
 son if he had anything he would like to say 
 
 238 
 
NORTH-WEST MOUNTED POLICE 
 
 to him privately, and on an affirmative gesture 
 took him to another part of the house. There, 
 in the presence of witnesses, having given the 
 witness the full caution laid down in the Criminal 
 Code, he wrote down Robertson's confession 
 and asked him to sign it, which he did. The 
 confession briefly set forth that, on the morning 
 of King Edward's funeral, Robertson and one 
 John Fisk had murdered Tucker Peach in his own 
 shack ; that they had wrapped the body in the dead 
 man's blanket and cowhide, and, with his own 
 horses and wagon, had driven it into the middle 
 of the Bow River, and there dumped it into the 
 stream. 
 
 " It was after ten o'clock that evening before I 
 heard and digested the reports made by Inspector 
 Duffus, and there was no time to lose. John 
 Fisk had recently left the Gladys district and gone 
 to Carbon, to the north-east of Calgary, where he 
 had bought a livery stable. We had a detachment 
 at Carbon, but for some reason or other the wires 
 were down and we could not communicate with 
 them quickly enough. 
 
 " Soon after midnight on November 29, there- 
 fore, the most powerful motor that I could hire in 
 Calgary, containing two non-commissioned officers, 
 crept quietly out of the city on its seventy-five mile 
 run to Carbon. 
 
 " The men had positive orders to wait for the 
 opening up of the stable in the morning, and to 
 take Fisk while he was engaged in his daily routine, 
 for he was well known to be a desperate man. The 
 arrest was effected without difficulty, and the motor 
 discharged its three passengers into Calgary Barracks 
 by 1 p.m. of November 30. Five dollars per hour 
 for thirteen hours paid the motorman's account. 
 
 239 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 " Now that the two perpetrators of the murder 
 were secured, there was obviously only one course 
 to pursue to convict both men, namely, to use 
 Robertson's evidence against Fisk, and Robertson's 
 confession against himself. 
 
 " Robertson never weakened in the stand he 
 had taken. It was such a relief to him to have dis- 
 burdened his guilty conscience that he became 
 cheerful, and was not only willing but anxious to 
 give us every assistance in his power. 
 
 " Inspector Duffus, having been the recipient 
 of his first confidence, was the only person allowed 
 to talk to him, and any conversations were reduced 
 to writing, and taken in the presence of the Provost, 
 for my information. 
 
 " After I had heard by wire from Sergt. Tucker 
 at Irricana that Fisk was in custody on November 
 30, Inspector Duffus had an interview with Robert- 
 son, and the following is what he said. I give it 
 in extenso in order to show how completely a man 
 of weak mind may be dominated by a stronger will. 
 
 " Thomas Mitchell Robertson states as follows : 
 
 " The latter end of January, 19 10, I was working 
 down at Bob Begg's at the corner of the Bow and 
 High rivers. One day — I don't remember the day 
 or month — I think it was February last, Jack Fisk 
 drove down with a team and box sleigh to Begg's 
 place. 
 
 " Mrs. Begg, the two children and I were the 
 only ones there ; he sold her a washing-machine 
 and a couple of patent fasteners for horse collars 
 he had with him ; this was the first time I met 
 Jack Fisk. 
 
 " About two or three weeks after this Old Man 
 Tucker came down to the river at Mrs. Begg's for 
 water ; he said that Jack Fisk's pigs disturbed the 
 
 240 
 
NORTH-WEST MOUNTED POLICE 
 
 water on the top of the hill and he couldn't drink 
 it ; he took a barrel of water with him with a team 
 and wagon he had with him. 
 
 " I rode the range for Begg for about a month, 
 looking after his cattle, and one day I rode over 
 to Begg's gate at the north-east corner of his place, 
 where I met Jack Fisk chasing his milk cows into 
 Begg's place. I had some conversation with him 
 about some horses ; it was then that he told me 
 that Old Man Tucker was getting after him about 
 some horses he (Tucker) had lost ; he said Tucker 
 was going to have him run in for stealing them. He 
 said, * I'm scared the old man will get me into 
 trouble,' and as he (Tucker) had no friends and 
 relations and no one to take care of him, he thought 
 it would be a good thing to get him out of the way. 
 I said, * If you have got his horses the old man is 
 right and you should get into trouble.' He then 
 said to me, * If you will help me get Peach out of 
 the way you can have his land and I will take the 
 horses as I want 'em.' I didn't say anything to 
 this as I was scared. He then threatened me and 
 said, * If you say anything about this I will .put a 
 shot in you.' I said nothing to nobody and rode 
 home to Begg's, and he went on rolling his Fall 
 wheat. I used to meet him nearly every morning 
 after this when I was riding ; he would ask me 
 what I thought of it, and if I said anything to 
 anyone. We discussed the thing on and off for 
 about two months, until the last Saturday in April, 
 1900. I think it was Saturday when I came to 
 Calgary about my job on the C.P.R. I stayed at 
 the King Edward while at Calgary. Begg was in 
 town and stopped at the Dominion, I think. The 
 two of us went home on Monday — this would be 
 the beginning of May. 
 
 R 241 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 " That afternoon the team I was working got up 
 in a bunch and got away from me. Mrs. Begg sent 
 me on top to look for them. While I was up on 
 the hill I met Fisk, when he began talking about 
 getting rid of old Peach, and said then if I helped 
 I could have the land and he would take the horses ; 
 he was to take them at any time he wanted them. 
 I then agreed to help him. 
 
 " Two weeks after this I went into Calgary and 
 started working on the C.P.R. as brakesman. I 
 made a couple of trips and went out to Fisk's place 
 the following Wednesday. Before going out to 
 Fisk's I hired a rig from Frank Pashak, who runs a 
 store at De Winton. I told Pashak that I was 
 going to drive to Tucker Peach's. When I got to 
 Fisk's place he sent me to Tucker's shack about 
 three or four hundred yards away. This was 
 Thursday afternoon. I helped to clean his grain 
 that afternoon and talked to him about selling his 
 place and horses ; he made out a memorandum 
 on a sheet of paper, which is now at Medicine Hat 
 in my box ; the memorandum showed what he 
 wanted for horses, land, etc. I went back to 
 Fisk's that night and slept there. Fisk and I agreed 
 that night that we would kill Tucker Peach the next 
 morning ; he was to fire the first shot and I was to 
 fire the second. 
 
 " He wanted me to fire the first one, but I 
 wouldn't. 
 
 " The next morning, Friday, the day of King 
 Edward's funeral, about six o'clock, Fisk and I went 
 to Peach's shack and tried to look in the window. 
 We couldn't see anything as it was covered over 
 with a tent. I knocked at his door, and the old 
 man called - Who is there ? ' I said I was there, 
 telling him my name. He opened the door ; he 
 
 242 
 
NORTH-WEST MOUNTED POLICE 
 
 had his drawers and shirt on ; he sat down on his 
 bed, which was on the floor, and started to put on 
 his trousers. Fisk then fired a shot at Peach with 
 a revolver ; blood started to trickle down his face ; 
 at the same time he fell back. Fisk handed the 
 revolver to me and told me to do the same. I took 
 the revolver, pointed it at Peach, and fired. I don't 
 know whether I hit him or not, I was so excited, 
 but I guess I did. Peach never spoke ; he was dead 
 after the shots. We both came out of the shack and 
 looked around to see if anyone was there. There 
 was no one in sight. We then hitched up Tucker's 
 team and drove up to the door, rolled the body in 
 some blankets, and drove it down to the Bow River 
 at Tucker's lower place. We drove into the river 
 along the west fence or west side of his property, 
 and dumped the body into it. The blankets and 
 cow robe which we rolled him into were tied around 
 him. The river at this point runs east. 
 
 " From what I heard the body was found about 
 a quarter of a mile from where we dumped it. 
 
 " After this I came into town, but stayed at the 
 Dunbow School Saturday night. I told some of 
 them there that I had bought the place. The team 
 I took in were Peach's. I sold them to the Alberta 
 barn for $200 and put the money in the savings 
 bank of Montreal. I was to give Fisk any money 
 that he needed. I gave him two payments, one of 
 $50 and one of $30, the amounts shown in my 
 pass book in Medicine Hat. 
 
 " I went back to the ranch in about two weeks. 
 I saw Earny Adams there, and he told me that 
 Fisk had been looking after his horses, and that 
 four two-year-old horses were missing. Adams 
 told me he thought Fisk had stolen them. I didn't 
 say anything. Shortly after this the body was 
 
 243 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 found. Fisk, I think, was living on his place, but 
 shortly after this left for Carbon. Shortly before 
 the body was found I brought one of Peach's horses 
 to town and traded it for one belonging to Mr. 
 Gilmore, the plumber, of 827, 5th Avenue, West. 
 I sold the horse I got from him to a grocer, who 
 has a store east of the post office, for $18 ; the 
 grocer is just east of the Queen's Hotel. I gave 
 him a bill of sale. I sold a stud about two weeks 
 ago. My cousin sold it for me. My cousin is E. 
 Davis, and is looking after the place for me ; he 
 knows nothing about this affair. 
 
 " Fisk threw the revolver we shot Peach with 
 into the middle of the river. When I speak of 
 Tucker I mean Tucker Peach. 
 
 (Sgd.) THOMAS M. ROBERTSON. 
 (Sgd.) ARTHUR W. DUFFUS, Insp."| 
 
 The men who would do the Queen's business so 
 well in Canada were not backward in coming 
 forward to do her work in South Africa at the out- 
 break of the Boer War. To the first Canadian 
 contingent which sailed in October, 1899, tne 
 Police were not called upon to contribute any 
 officers or men, but some months later a second 
 contingent was asked for, and the recruiting for 
 this cause was^placed in the*hands of the Mounted 
 Police. 
 
 And thus came into being the 2nd (afterwards 
 called the 1st) Battalion Canadian Mounted Rifles. 
 The original contingent, raised in Eastern Canada, 
 became known as the Royal Canadian Dragoons, 
 in order to connect them with the permanent 
 calvary which bear that name. In^addition to*the 
 1st C.M.R. the Police also supplied men to Strath- 
 
 244 
 
NORTH-WEST MOUNTED POLICE 
 
 cona's Horse, the 2nd C.M.R., the South African 
 Constabulary, and the 5th C.M.R. It is a great 
 pity that in so doing the N.W.M.P. lost their 
 identity as a Force while in South Africa. Two 
 hundred and ninety officers and men in all thus 
 went to the front, and were merged with other 
 volunteers in the different Canadian contingents. 
 No other permanent corps in the Dominion could 
 boast of such a representation, and this fact alone 
 speaks volumes for the splendid spirit which 
 animated the members of the Force. " With but 
 few exceptions/ ' says the Commissioner, " all 
 ranks were willing to volunteer. It was not a 
 question of who would go, but who must stay at 
 home." 
 
 It was not our good fortune to be anywhere near 
 the Canadian Contingent during the fighting in 
 South Africa. But we remember well arriving at 
 Paardeberg not long after Lord Roberts's famous 
 march from Kimberley to Bloemfontein. The track 
 of a great army is rather a curious thing to witness. 
 Here is the field telegraph still standing, and there 
 the deep marks of the wheels of gun carriages in the 
 sand, and everywhere are carcases of horses strewn 
 in the way. Vultures fly low over the fields, or hop 
 heavily across the sun-baked earth. Here and there 
 are farm-houses, whose names have since become 
 famous in history : " Poplar's Grove," " Drie- 
 fontein." Their walls are riddled with bullets, 
 and in the'garden, "perhaps, r shells are raked together 
 into piles. In some quiet corner are the graves 
 of those^ who 1 have" fallen ,^(covered| with* heapsfof 
 stones. 
 
 At one place some poor farmers had come back, 
 and were full of tales of fighting — tales which will 
 never appear in newspapers or in records of the war, 
 
 245 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 and which form very striking telling. This is not 
 the place for them ; the story has been told over and 
 over again, and does not want recapitulating here. 
 But at Paardeberg we were struck by the scene so 
 closely connected with the Canadian Contingent 
 that we touch upon it without apology, only asking 
 for uncovered heads for a moment. 
 
 At Paardeberg there is a river which has eaten its 
 way downwards until its banks are like great cliffs 
 of hardened mud. On these banks, and by the 
 shore, trees grow which hang out great branches of 
 tasselled green, which trail lazily in the running 
 water. On the height above the mud cliffs wrecked 
 wagons, dead horses, scattered ammunition, are 
 still here. An Australian sergeant took us round 
 the place. Here on these steep cliff sides were the 
 dug-outs where the Boers lived ; here are little 
 notebooks, odds and ends such as pocket knives and 
 pieces of clothing still lying about, and everywhere, 
 strewing the ground, are scattered bullets and 
 shells. 
 
 Yes, it was a tough job, the sergeant says, to turn 
 the Boers out of this. That valley was filled with 
 lyddite smoke for days together, and the firing never 
 ceased. It went over their heads of course — to fire 
 into that valley meant like firing over gulls' nests 
 from the side of a rock, so the place had to be taken 
 not by shells, but by bayonets and at close quarters. 
 
 We went past different spots where this regiment 
 had done splendidly, or the old — th " had behaved 
 well. 
 
 There was a chance for everyone that day, the 
 sergeant says, and not many of them missed it. 
 
 The air was alive with the singing of birds that 
 day at Paardeberg, and a number of them were flying 
 over the trenches. 
 
 246 
 
NORTH-WEST MOUNTED POLICE 
 
 " The sappers were digging these every night and 
 all night long — there are some of their spades lying 
 about still. This trench here is the last one of all ; 
 it was after this they made the final rush. There 
 was no cover to be had after the last trench was left, 
 but all the boys seemed in a hurry to come out into 
 the open. 
 
 " That group of thorn-bushes there is where so 
 many of the Canadians fell." Between the last 
 trench and the enemy's lines there was a little group 
 of Wachteinbitte thorns, covered with great white 
 needles, and underneath them were some uneven 
 mounds. 
 
 " They dashed across the open to the thorn 
 bushes — even thorn bushes can look like a bit of 
 cover sometimes, and they got their wind again 
 then. And some of them fell." 
 
 This is all part of the story of the Royal North- 
 West Mounted Police. 
 
 Here Miss Macnaughtan had to leave her book — 
 and the other chapters planned were never written 
 — for like the brave Canadians of whom she had 
 just been writing, when the call for volunteers came, 
 in August, 1914, she left her work and all her 
 interests, offering her services with an eager willing- 
 ness. As her niece writes in the biographical 
 sketch attached to Miss Macnaughtan 's war diaries, 
 " She was on fire with patriotism and a burning 
 wish to help her country. Every other consider- 
 ation was put on one side, and the writing which 
 was the joy of her life was neglected to give 
 personal, active help to the wounded and suffer- 
 ing. She ended by giving her life, a sacrifice 
 brought about by her war service in Russia. " The 
 
 247 
 
MY CANADIAN MEMORIES 
 
 seeds of her illness, " writes her niece, " had 
 probably been sown some years before, during a 
 shooting trip in Kashmir, and the hard work and 
 strain of the first year of the war had weakened her 
 powers of resistance. But it was Russia that killed 
 her." The last entry in Miss Macnaughtan's 
 diary, written by her feeble hand in far-distant 
 Tehran, rings down the curtain of her life. She was 
 filled with a sense of weakness and wrote pathetically 
 that she would like to have quitted the feast of life 
 when all was gay and amusing. " But now so 
 many of the guests have left and the fires are going 
 out and I am tired." 
 
 The Mayflower Press, Plymouth, England. William Brendon & Son, Ltd. 
 
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