Federal Relations of the North-West. 465 



the fertile prairies of the North-West and Hudson's Bay shall be com- 

 menced within one year, or even eighteen months, and completed within 

 four years, renewed prosperity will follow, and a tide of immigration will 

 set in such as has not yet been witnessed. Everything in the North-West 

 depends upon it, and nothing else, no matter what, can take its place. 



You are making a great mistake, in my humble opinion, to spend your 

 time and energies urging upon the Dominion authorities the cession of the 

 unclaimed public lands of the Province. Let the Ottawa Government keep 

 the lands, and give us instead material assistance to local railways, and 

 above all, the Hudson's Bay road. 



I cannot urge too strongly upon you the importance of this question. 

 The establishment of the route will mark the beginning of a glorious era 

 of prosperity, and the Federal guarantee, if given now, will inaugurate that 

 prosperity at once. I hear most people talk of the Hudson's Bay road 

 only as the hope of the people for the exportation of grain. This is very 

 well ; but, sir, I tell you we want that highway opened most of all to facili- 

 tate immigration. There are five millions of people in the old world who 

 would find happy, prosperous homes in the Peace River Country, on the 

 elevated plains of the Athabaska, in the great Saskatchewan valleys, and 

 in the country of the Assiniboine and Red Rivers, if the natural channel 

 of communication between those vast fertile areas and Europe, via Hudson's 

 Bay were opened. With such a rush of immigration the Canadian nation 

 would soon rival the United States in population, commerce and national 

 importance. There is nothing to prevent it, save opposition to and con- 

 sequent delay of the Hudson's Bay railway. 



By the Hudson's Bay route, if it were opened, immigrants could be 

 landed in the North-West from Europe at an expense of less that $20 a 

 head, and hundreds of thousands would reach those prairies where one 

 thousand reaches them now. The route would not only ensure us a vast 

 immigration, but would be the best guarantee of prosperity to the immi- 

 grant, for by it he would receive all necessary supplies from the best 

 European markets .at a much less cost of transportation then at present ; 

 and by it he would send his surplus products to Liverpool, direct, at less 

 than one-hall the present rate. With the Hudson's Bay route opened, tea, 

 sugar, and such like necessaries would be much cheaper in Manitoba than 

 at present, and wheat and beef, the great staple exports, would be worth 

 at least thirty per cent, more than they are to-day. In short, the North, 

 West would be one of the cheapest countries on the continent to live in- 

 and its products would be worth the most. 



Look for a moment at some of the advantages to the North-West of the 

 Hudson's Bay route, as set forth by distances. Taking Montreal and 



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