Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-11-19
CANADA IN DISTRESS.
She Sees Her Population Gradually
Drifting Away.
HER DOCTORS ARE In AQUANADRY
They Can Find No Remedy For the Evils
That Are Threatened.
PROMISES THAT WERE NOT FULFILLED

be little room for doubt that they have
pretty sick subject on their hands in the
shape of the Dominion of Canada An in
teresting subject she is, too, and a some
what puzzling one. Why should she be ''in
a bad way?" OF magnificent physical pro-
portions, possessing magnificent natural en-
dowments and une1celled resources for the
maintenance of an exuberant national
vitality, in the very hey day and lustihood
of youth, too. All these points are in her
favor and vet, though not dangerously i'll,
she is nevertheless quite poorly" She
has been in this condition for some time,
and seems to have been getting worse of
late instead of better. What can be the
matter?
The doctors are quite at a loss. Her
case bears some resemblance perhaps to that
of the unfortunate woman in Scripture,
who, after spending her substance on
various physicians, found to her bitter sor-
row that instead of growing better she was
rather growing worse For decade and
more now Canada has submitted herself to
the protective treatment as administered by
the school of political therapeutics, whose
idol and lodestone was Sir John Macdonald,
whose financial oracle now is Mr.. Foster,
and whose forlorn hope for moral rehabili-
tation in the eyes of the world is Mr..
Abbott
The Things That Were Promised.
Great things were promised her when
these gentlemen took hold of her case.
They promised her health, they promised
her wealth, they promised her long life
and bountiful supply of all the good
things of this world; in fact, they were as
lavish and unstinted in their promises as
the most glib tongued quack of the market
place whoever persuaded the gaping gulls
around him to buy his merchandise. To-
dav they are still beside the bed, but poor
Canada is not financially healthier than
when they first felt her pulse and
looked at her tongue. She is not
relatively richer either il pocket or in
population. In fact, she suffers now as
she suffered then from that deadly tissue of
blood" which consists in yearly drain
age to the extent of hundreds and thousands
of young, vigorous and prolific lives to the
south of the border line.
That drainage has gone on until it is
hardly an eXaggeration to say that half as
many Canadians are now living in the
United States as are to be found in the
whole Dominion OF Canada. The French
population of Eastern Canada is almost
astride the border by this time. The Anglo
Saxon settler of Ontario has not the same
incentive to emigration as the inhabitant of
the East, for ne has no oppressive title
taxation to escape from, as well as con-
stricted opportunities for material advance
ment to contend against, but he. too, has
been trooping across by hundreds and by
thousands to the wider field of opportunity
presented by the Republic. The \. p ,as it
is called, National Policy, or the policy of
Canada for the Canadians was inaug-
back these wandering sheep to the fold. and
preventing other sheep from following their
footsteps to the more tempting pastures of
the South But it has been all in vain.
The Sheep Won't BE Coaxed Back
Few sheep have been coaxed back, and
every year has witnessed the same streams
of emigration Eastward, Southwark and
Westward. And now the case stands thus,
that after plenty of time for fair trial, the
national policy stands revealed as very
much of a national failure. Canada to-day
is suffering Efrom anaemia of money and of
men. She wants both, for the populating
and the ploughing of her prairies, for work.
ing III the forests, for delving in her mines
and developing her magnificent water
powers, vet do what she will apparently
she doesn't seem able to get them. The
efforts she has made have been gigantic In
a population small as hers is these efforts
have been little short of sublime She has
flung railroad from ocean to ocean through
her chain of confederated provinces, and
sunk millions in the enterprise Other
millions have been expended in public
works which bear ample testimony to the
dignity of her ambitions but which would
serve for population threefold such as
hers
As result of these energies her shin of
state is to-day staggering under head of
sail In the shape of taxation that is almost |
more than they can safely carry, while her |
population during the last decade has barely |
held Its own. For though she has not been |
silent in the crowded centers of the Old |
World as to her undoubtedly great advan- |
tages as a ield for enterprise and the found |
alton of new homes, she has nevertheless |
failed to prove attractive to any but small |
minority of the thousands who have made |
their way from the Old World to the New.
Settlers Object to an Old World Power.
She labors under the disadvantage, as |
regards emigrants from the European |
continent, of being a British colony. Their |
national prejudices make them unwilling to |
become the subjects of another Old World |
power They have not the same feeling |
toward the Government of the United States, |
which stands aloof from European politics. |
SO they crowd to the Republican shores, |
and are quickly absorbed into citizenship |
there. Neither has Canada proved what |
might naturally have been expected popu-
lar goal for emigrants from Great Britain
itself. There is much ignorance concern
ing Canada in Great Britain and as much |
Indifference.
There is much of the same spirit abroad
there, as was expressed by Scotch manu-
facturer, who said to the writer: ''The States
is the place for business, sir, the States is
the place You are nowhere in Canada.
Over in Scotland we care nothing about
the Canadian trade and make 10 efforts for
it. It's the American trade we're after"
That wasn't fattery, but it was frank
enough. How thoroughly that one mans
views expresses the prevailing attitude to-
toward things Canadan.,of the manufacturing
and middle classes generally in Great Brit
ain am not in a position to say, but
think such views are tolerably wide spread.
If such is the case, it is certain enough that
the British Government will not be allowed
to quarrel with the United States for the
sake OF Canada, If the money-making classes
III Britain can prevent it. And they have
great power. 1t appears then that Canada
is unfortunately situated. She is shut out
to a large extent from the benefits of trade
with the great and wealthy nation to the
south of her by double array of custom
houses along the imaginary line dividing
two peoples whose mutual resemblances are
Infinitely greater than their divergence.
Shut Out FLom Many Advantages.
She is isolated from her mother land.
Great Britain, not by 1000 miles of ocean
merely, but by modes of thought, moral and
intellectual attitudes, which are of the New
rhar hop 81 h. |