THE GROWTH OF CANADA 295 



tions on the part of Germany or France or 

 Japan; the tariff of the Cape Colony might be 

 directed against the intrusive competition of 

 these or half a dozen other enterprising nations : 

 but in connection with the Dominion of Canada 

 military and commercial protection could refer 

 primarily to no power save the United States. 

 Hence it was that the animated discussion of 

 imperial federation acted as a challenge to the 

 militant national spirit in the republic. Inci 

 dents of normal national development in which 

 the Canadians took justifiable pride the sup 

 pression of the Riel uprising of 1885 by Domin 

 ion forces, the completion of the railway line 

 from ocean to ocean in the same year, the great 

 improvements in the canals, and the develop 

 ment of manufactures were jealously regard 

 ed by sensitive Americans as so many steps 

 toward the perfection of an imperial policy of 

 hostility toward the United States. 



The internal party politics of the Dominion 

 presented certain incidents that served to con 

 firm the unfriendly trend in American opinion. 

 In the later eighties systematic agitation was 

 begun by a small group of able men for a policy 

 of commercial union, even if it should lead 

 eventually to political union, between Canada 



