The Sun.
London, England, 1860-10-09 00:00:00

TflE PR INCE' 8 rISIT TO THE UNITED

STATES.

( 'rums the spec ^ial Correspondent of the Times.)
CHICAGef, ILLINOIS, SEPT. 23.
After two long and 'weary railway journeys (and
ra',lway journeys in ~.merica are very like being at
sea in a small berat o n a rough day with the addi-
tion of plenty of dust) the Prince of Wales has
reached the m oat westerly point but one of his
long Americare tours. He has yet to make one
heavy and to ilso me run to St. Louis, where the
great waters. of the Missouri join the huge yellow
turbid stream of the Mississippi, and then at
length, thank goodness, the course turns east again.
It is no use crying till one is out of the wood, and
I well know that the route which stretches between
this and Portland is checkered by many visits to
many towns, and that the Scylla of Washington
has to be undergone before one plunges headlong
into the Charybd.l.s of New York festivities. I
know that after St. Louis, visits to coal mines, in-
spection s of colleges, torchlight processions, and
civic balls, intermingled with long days of dusty
travel, have yet to be surmounted; but still from
St. Louis the route is eastward, and the nadir of
this long wild land-travelling progress is passed at
last. When the Prince left Hamilton it rained
hard, and nobody regretted it (I mean the rain),
for only during heavy rain, which keeps down the
dust, is the jolting, noisy discomfort of an American
railway endurable at all. There was the usual
crowd to see him depart ; the slack umbrellas and
dripirlegcloaks; the wet handkerchiefs which flapped
and draggled heavily when attempted to be waved,
the mud, the dirt, and drizzle which has more or
less accompanied the Royal arrival and departure
through all the route. Nothing would have en-
livened the scene but the warm heart-stirring cheers
of affectionate loyalty which the crowds raised
again and again as the train prepared to depart,
and there were many shouts of " Come soon again,"
and " Why did you not stop longer ?" as the Prince
stepped into his car. There was great shaking of
hands as his Royal Highness and all the suite took
a kindly leave of Mr. Rose, whose arduous labours
terminated with the last State visit to the last
Canadian city, and I am sure it must have been
with. a feeling of deep regret that the Royal party
bade adieu to one who had so ably and so success-
fully ministered to the comfort of their tour
throughout.
Before taking leave of Canada, his Royal High-
ness read the following Address at the opening of
the Hamilton Agricultural Exhibition. There was
-notime to send it by the last mail, but I repair the
omission now. It is the finals of all the Royal
replies which have been delivered during this long
and memorable progress. It was as follows :
" Agricultural Society of Upper Canada, Sept. 20.
" Gentlemen,—l return you my warm acknowledgments
for the address which you have just presented upon the
occasion of the opening of the 15th Exhibition of the Agri-
cultural Society of Upper Canada, and I take this opportu-
nitev of thanking the agricultural citizens and manufacturers
who are now assembled from distant parts in this city of
Hamilton for the more than kind and enthusiastic reception
which they gave me yesterday and have repeated to-day.
Blessed with a soil of very remarkable fertility, and a
hardy race of industrious and enterprising men, this district
must rapidly assume a most important position in the
markets of the world, and I rejoice to learn that the im-
provements in agriculture which skill, labour, and science
have of late years developed in the mether country are fast
increasing the capabilities of this young soil, and enable you
to compete successfully with the energetic people whose
stock and other products are now ranged in friendly rivalry
with your own within this vast enclosure.
" The Almighty has this year granted you that greatest
boon to a people—an abundant harvest. I trust it will make
glad many a home of those I see around me, and bring in-
creased wealth and prosperity to this magnificent province.
"My duties as representative of the Queen, deputed by
her to visit British North America, cease this day ; but in a
private capacity I am about to visit, before my return home,
that remarkable land which claims with us a common
ancestry, and in whose extraordinary progress every
Englishman feels a common interest. Before, however, I
quit British soil, let me once more address, through you,
the inhabitants of United Canada, and bid them en affec-
tionate farewell. May God pour down His choicest bless-
ing upon this great and loyal people I"
I need not say how this was listened to, as his
Royal Highness, with that soft, clear, dignified
utterance, which he inherits from his Royal mother,
read the Address aloud, concluding with a solemn
earnestness that moved the whole audience, till
their feelings seemed too deep for utterance.
The distance from Hamilton to Detroit, the first
resting-place on the long journey here, is about 200
miles, a matter of some four hours to a Royal train
in England, but which here, with all speed used,
took rather over seven. From the roughness w ith
which most Canadian and nearly all American lines
are laid down, great speed is unattainable, and with
American roads, unless the country is prepared to
incur at least half the expenditure they have alreldy
sunk, said in most cases lost, in forming their line,
I should say great profits are also unattainable too.
With hardly one exception throughout the United
States, there are only a single line of rails, and this is
a fatal objection to a great increase of traffic. The
time will come, and soon, when it will pay. and pay
well for double rails to be laid down on some lines, and
when that day arrives, which many lcok to even
now, there is certain to be sueh a railway mania
here, to which that of ours in '47 and '4B will be a
joke. Let Englishmen, if they are wise, keep from
this coming vortex. Great and prosperous as this
country is now, and must be still more so in the
future, the time is still distant when the present
huge network of single lines will pay a profit worth
investing for. Some of the best lines in the States
—those which have been entirely carried out by
English capital—don't pay their working expenses.
The Grand Trunk, in a financial point of view, has
up till now been a failure. But its prospects, even
at this day, are good compared to many of the chief
American railways through this part of the country.
The country between Hamilton and Detroit was for
a long time, like all the land of Upper Canada, rich
a nd well cultivated—even where the black gnarled
stumps of burnt pines stick up like tombstones of
th.e forest, looming dark and mournfully upon the
upstart growth of Indian corn beneath. Sometimes
it -was meadow land, with the ragged zigzag fences
or lopped trees strewn loosely between the fields—
scenetimes a large tract of corn was passed, with the
massive sheaves stacked together like straw tents,
and the ground covered with bright orange pump-
kins and squashes, which the inexhaustible fertility
of the land has nurtured between the ridges of
maize. Then comes acres and acres of orchards,
with trees heavy and o.erborne with their rich
burden, drooping down like willows to the ground,
and their red and lyellow fruit sparkling sofrly in
the evening sun. All the barn-doors of the clean.
white farm-houses stood wide open, showing heaps
of corn piled high within, and across the ocarirgs
.oxen came slowly along with mounds of other
s heaves in rough wooden carts, dragging a plenty
for which the fanner had no room in the timber
outbuildings which ordinarily accommodated the
harvest. On every side were such signs of boun-
teous abundance, there was such a calm in these
-wild, clean, fruitful homesteads, there were such
Signs of progress and of energy, even in the forests
acked aside to make room for cultivation, that one
could not but gaze with lingering astonishment
upon the scene of rising prosperity, and think of
that vast class at home wom Bumble denominates
as "able-bodied paupers" going supperless to bed
for want of work. Why, here are millions of acres
of sue.h fertile land as English farmers never think
of getting without draining, manures, and top
dressings and all the scientific agricultural slang
wh;.ch mark the presence of poor land. Here are
rniflions of acres still clad in all the savage gran-
deur of the wilderness, and seeming to call—in
their rich matted growth of timber and luxuriant
underwood—for some one to clear an overburdened
soil, and let the natural fertility of the earth have
scope to show its proper might and usefulness.
Where the lumberers fell timber in the Upper
Ottaway they:scatter handfuls of Indian corn among
the ragged stumps, and 10, in some six weeks' time,
a harvest for a few in number, though enough in
quantity to keep an English parish. Yet men
break stones in England for Bd. a-day, and cost
the country 10d. more while doing it, and farmers
here cry out for labour and get it for a few short
months, till their servants have saved enough to
better themselves and buy land, when at once the
law of Canada steps in with restrictions which
drive them inmeric
hundreds and thousands yearly to the
A
far west of a;whileh tis not to be supposed that
the active follyd
drove the
States into
manly insurrection and
independencernment. but
will ever be
Home Government repeated by the
one sees
each hour such slimy traces of red
tape Barnacles
over Canada, such signs of its being left to the
miseries of shortsighted legislation, such checks
upon its growth, as no
young colony, however na-
turally vigorous, withstands for long. There is a
mighty future for Upper Canada if emigration to
its fertile soil is only fairly encouraged and developed
by the Government at home—if they will only hold
out such real inducements as American agents hold
out falsely, and who manage to persuade people even
when half-settled in British dominions, to make
another and a final move for prairie land. In truth
and honour, and as one responsible for every
written word, I cannot help saying that, land for
land, the prairie is better than even the picturesque
valleys of Upper Canada, but there is not at all that
difference between the two which would lead a
farmer to prefer 100 acres out West to 150, or even
120, round Hamilton or London. Enable emigrants
to buy three acres in Canada for what they would
only get two in Michigan, Illinois, or Wise nsin—
let a man buy 10 acres or 1,000 if he pleases, or as
his means permit, and there would be no want of
coolerss in Canada. Occasionally, however, once in
laarsrfive or six years a dim and premature Con-
flesne" of what mast in time be their prosperity
Ronvder,tiEft:!..,!lse Cauadians of the Upper Province,
"'"' with the trading naania of their near