THROUGH THREEFOLD TENSION 177 



the mother country. Canada, owing to its 

 proximity to the United States and the identity 

 of its chief products with those of the republic, 

 required and possessed special preferences in 

 the British tariff in order to maintain any sat 

 isfactory position in the competition with her 

 more advanced and more populous neighbor. 

 In 1843 the Peel government passed an act 

 designed to aid agriculture in Canada, by giving 

 to Canadian wheat and flour a much-reduced 

 duty in Great Britain. The provisions of this 

 act applied to all flour exported from Canada, 

 regardless of the origin of the wheat. The 

 effect of the law was soon manifest in a great 

 development of the milling industry in the col 

 ony, with corresponding activity in commerce. 

 American wheat was imported all along the 

 border, turned into flour, and shipped from 

 Montreal and Quebec to England, where the 

 tariff barred direct importation from the United 

 States. 



The prosperity that followed the Canada Corn 

 Act had just become generally manifest when 

 in 1846 protection was abandoned and the ports 

 of Great Britain were thrown open to wheat 

 and flour from all the world. Every advantage 

 enjoyed by colonial produce in the British mar- 



