76 EUKAL LIFE IN CANADA 



lands which should have grown in productive capacity 

 under tillage. 



Among all recent movements one of the richest prom- 

 ise is that of the national conservation of natural 

 resources. Of these, looked at in their widest range, 

 human efficiency stands first ; but next to it, in power 

 for good or ill upon human welfare, undoubtedly ranks 

 fertility of the soil. The Committee on Lands of the 

 Dominion Commission of Conservation carried on in 

 1911 an investigation in the form of an Agricultural 

 Survey of 1,212 farms throughout the Dominion, 100 

 in each of the Maritime Provinces, 200 in Quebec, 300 

 in Ontario, and 412 in the four western Provinces, to 

 discover whether there was upon these farms conserva- 

 tion of fertility, of labor, and of health. The informa- 

 tion received was neither second-hand nor superficial. 

 The report of the chairman. Dr. J. W. Robertson, in- 

 forms us that " In most of the Provinces the farmers 

 are living upon the accumulated capital which nature 

 provided in the soil, leaving their lands poorer because 

 they had been on them."* Yet a fair number are not 

 only maintaining but increasing fertility, and in this 

 fact is found the ground of hope for the future. They 

 are of the type which survives upon the farm, the class 

 to which all shall yet belong. In Prince Edward Island 

 51 per cent, report larger yields than they had formerly, 

 the increase dating from 15 to 18 years ago. In Nova 

 Scotia 46 per cent, of the farms examined show an 

 increase ; in Quebec, 39 per cent. ; in New Brunswick 

 and in Ontario 24 per cent., the increase dating from 

 ten years ago, while in Manitoba not one farmer reports 



* Commission of Conservation Report, III, p. 57. 



