538 Our North Land. 



yet in its main features it is the same right up to the forks of the 

 Saskatchewan. I deeply regret that I was not able to visit 

 Edmonton, which bids fair to rival any place in the North-West. 

 Settlement is rapidly increasing there, and I met at Battleford one 

 man who had a commission from ten farmers to buy for them at 

 that place. Nothing can exceed the fertility or excellence of the 

 land along almost the whole course of that great river, and, north of 

 it, in the wide strip belting its banks and extending up to the Peace 

 River, there will be room for a great population, whose opportunities 

 for profitable cultivation of the soil will be most enviable." 



An attentive perusal of the Marquis' speech will convince every 

 unprejudiced mind that all indications point to Manitoba and the 

 North-West Territories being, at no distant day, the favourite spot 

 whence Old World agricultural and stock-raising immigrants will 

 direct their steps on their arrival on the American Continent. 

 -Already the tide is beginning to flow in that direction, and there is 

 every reason to anticipate that there will be such an influx into that 

 country as was never anticipated by the most sanguine among those 

 who looked forward to a great future for that portion of Canada's 

 rapidly developing Dominion. This is the more certain because the 

 people of the North-West will leave no stone unturned to secure 

 the establishment at an early date of the Hudson's Bay route, and 

 with the evidence of the practicability of the navigation of the 

 waters of that line that is now before the world there can be no 

 reasonable doubt of their success. 



Following is the speech of the Marquis of Lome on the Canadian 

 North-West, at Winnipeg in 1881. He said : — 



" To be ignorant of the North-West is to be ignorant of the 

 greater portion of our country. Hitherto I have observed that those 

 who have seen it justly look down upon those who have not with a 

 kind of pitying contempt, which you may sometimes have observed 

 that they who have got up earlier in the morning than others and seen 

 some beautiful sunrise assume towards the friends who have slept 

 until the sun is high in the heavens. Our track, though it led us 

 far, only enabled us to see a very small portion of your heritage 

 now being made accessible. Had time permitted, we should have 



