Canada: the Empire of the North | Page 6

the trackless seas.
Adventurous young aristocrats, members of the Old Order, led the first
nation builders to America, and, all unconscious of destiny, laid the
foundations of the New Order. The story of their adventures and work
is the history of Canada.
It is a new experience in the world's history, this race movement that
has built up the United States and is now building up Canada. Other
great race movements have been a tearing down of high places, the
upward scramble of one class on the {xiv} backs of the deposed class.
Instead of leveling down, Canada's nation building is leveling up.
This, then, is the empire--the size of all the nations in Europe, bigger
than Napoleon's wildest dreams of conquest--to which Canada has
awakened.[1]
[1]COMPARATIVE STATEMENT OF AREAS OF CANADA AND
EUROPE
Canada . . 3,750,000 square miles Europe . . 3,797,410 square miles
Maritime Provinces Square Miles Square Miles Nova Scotia . . . . .
20,600 England . . . . . 50,867 Prince Edward Island 2,000
Germany . . . . . 208,830 New Brunswick . . . . 28,200 France . . . . .
204,000 ------ Italy . . . . . . 110,000 50,800 Spain . . . . . . 197,000
Quebec . . . . . . . . 347,350 Austria and Hungary 241,000
Ontario . . . . . . . . 222,000 Russia in Europe 2,000,000 Manitoba
Saskatchewan 204,000 Alberta . . . . . . . . 350,000 British Columbia . . .
383,000 Unorganized Territory of Keewatin . . . . . . 756,000
Yukon . . . . . . . . 200,000 MacKenzie River and Ungava . . . . . .
1,000,000
COMPARATIVE STATEMENT OF POPULATION IN CANADA
AND THE UNITED STATES

United States Canada In 1800 . . . 5,000,000 In 1881 . . . 4,300,000 "
1810 . . . 7,000,000 " 1891 . . . 5,000,000 " 1820 . . . 9,600,000 "
1901 . . . 5,500,000 " 1830 . . . 12,800,000 " 1906 . . . 6,500,000
It will be noticed that for twenty years Canada's population becomes
almost stagnant. The reason for this will be found as the story of
Canada is related. If she keeps up the increase at the pace she has now
set, or at the rate the United States' population went ahead during the
same period of industrial development, the results can be forecast from
the following table:
United States in 1840 . . . . . . 17,000,000 " " " 1850 . . . . . . 23,000,000
" " " 1860 . . . . . . 31,000,000 " " " 1870 . . . . . . 38,000,000 " " "
1880 . . . . . . 50,000,000 " " " 1890 . . . . . . 63,000,000 " " " 1900 . . . . . .
85,000,000
{xv} A few years ago, when talking to a leading editor of Canada, I
chanced to say that I did not think Canadians had at that time awakened
to their future. The editor answered that he was afraid I had contracted
the American disease of "bounce" through living in the United States;
to which I retorted that if Canadians could catch the same disease and
accomplish as much by it in the twentieth century as Americans had in
the nineteenth, it would be a good thing for the country. It is wonderful
to have witnessed the complete face-about of Canadian public opinion
in the short space of six years, this editor shouting as loud as any of his
exuberant brethren. Still, as the outlook in Canadian affairs may be
regarded as flamboyant, it is worth while quoting the comment of the
most critical and conservative newspaper in the world,--the London
Times. The Times says: "Without doubt the expansion of Canada is the
greatest political event in the British Empire to-day. The empire is face
to face with development which makes it impossible for indefinite
maintenance of the present constitutional arrangements."
Regarding the Iceland immigrants, to whom reference is made, I
recently met in London a famed traveler, who was in Iceland when the
people were setting out for Canada, Mrs. Alec. Tweedie. She explains
in her book how these people were absolutely poverty-stricken when
they left Iceland. In fact, the sufferings endured the first year in

Winnipeg were mild compared to their privations in Iceland before they
sailed.
The explanations of Canada's hard times from Confederation to
1898--say from 1871, when all the provinces had really gone into
Confederation, to 1897, when the Yukon boom poured gold into the
country--can be figured out. Of a population of 3,000,000, four fifths
need not be counted as taxpayers, as they include