3o8 



The Review of Reviews. 



6i per cent, of the immigrants arriving from the United 

 States have been farmers, who, for the most part, have 

 settled in the prairie provinces. Thirty-eight per cent, 

 of the total numher from the United Stiites made 

 entries for homesteads in the West. About 30 per cent, 

 of the European arrivals were farmers or farm- 

 labourers ; while 25 per cent, were classed as general 

 labourers, and nearly the same percentage as mechanics. 

 'I'he influ.x of negroes has totalled a little over 400, 

 while 5,200 Hindus have come to Canada. Of the 

 British immigrants appro.ximately 500,000 have been 

 English and Welsh, 150,000 Scotch, and about 45,000 

 Irish. Figures for other nationalities include Austro- 

 Hungarian, 121,000 ; Italian, 63,817 ; Russian, 39,950 ; 

 Swedish, 19,349; German, 21,146; French, 16,236; 

 Norwegian, 13,798 ; Syrian, 5,223. Western Canada 

 received some 300,000 more immigrants than the 

 Eastern section; Saskatchewan and Alberta received 

 more than half a million ; Saskatchewan is taking 

 15 per cent, more than the latter province. 



In some parts of the West the Canadian-born must 

 be outnumbered two to one, and without any fixed 

 policy for educating the new-comers. 



OBJECTS OF IMMIGRATION. 



The object and aim of any immigration scheme 

 should be to give Canada the very best of the Old 

 Country's surplus population, promoting amongst 

 those of British birth a true sense of Canadian 

 nationality, the main reason for this being that the 

 newly-arrived Britisher on landing in Canada becomes 

 endowed with the full rights of Canadian citizenship. 

 He secures his vote by residing in any one province 

 one year, and three months in one constituency, this 

 being a special privilege accorded to all Britishers by 

 the Canadian Government over all other nationalities - 

 entering Canada. 



The selection and distribution of British new- 

 comers (immigrants) throughout the Dominion calls 

 for more careful consideration. The system, or policy, 

 adopted involves a host of consequences — stragetically, 

 socially, and morally — which are vital to everyone 

 throughout Canada. Many and varied are the schemes 

 put forward from time to time dealing with immigra- 

 tion. Some are certainly theoretically excellent ; 

 others the work of unpractical people. Those who 

 have made a study of the question know only too well 

 the difficulties which exist in any scheme. The whole 

 question is purely a business one after ^11, and must 

 be conducted on commercial lines. A large industrial 

 concern has its different heads of departments, all 

 directly responsible to the general manager, who, in 

 turn, is responsible to the president and directors ; in 

 the .same manner it .seems reasonable to expect that a 

 similar organisation could be developed in each pro- 

 vince, whereby the Commissioner of Immigration 

 would control the different departments. This would, 

 in turn, necessitate a simple classification system 

 dealing with the specific requirements of each city, 

 town, and village throughout the province. The classi- 



fication should cover every opportunity for farm- 

 labourers, dairymen, fishermen, skilled mechanics in 

 all trades, small investors, openings for women, profes- 

 sions, and all branches of trade for British subjects. 



The particular requirements of each city, town, 

 village, or locality could be supplied by the Boards of 

 Trade or other representative bodies, thus preventing 

 any overlapping. 



DUMPING PROCESS MUST STOP. 



During 1909-10 £8,000 was paid in bonuses for 

 agricultural and domestic servants, covering 9,813 men, 

 6,015 women, and 2,840 children. This sum was paid 

 to 3,000 booking agents in the British Isles, a sum 

 sufficient to pay several duly-appointed officials 

 knowing Canadian conditions, and the class required 

 to fill these conditions. The agent gets his bonus, the 

 transaction is finished, he has no further interest in 

 the person emigrating. With an efficient official the case 

 is quite different ; he is directly responsible to the 

 Dominion, Provincial, and British Immigrating 

 Departments as to the welfare of each immigrant. 

 How is it to be expected that an agent in Leeds, 

 England, should be in a position to give the slightest real 

 advice when he has never even been educated to the 

 different requirements of each province, let alone 

 general conditions of the Dominion ? It is, no doubt, 

 a good business for an agent to hand a profusely- 

 illustrated pamphlet to the intending emigrant, draw 

 a rosy picture, say wages are £2 a day, get a commis- 

 sion on the railway and shipping fare, say " It's a 

 glorious country — good-bye ! " This is no imaginary 

 conception of what takes place ; it is done, more or 

 less, hundreds of times a day by a not altogether 

 intelligent class of booking agent. 



THE EFFECT OF THIS SYSTEM. 



Of course, there are exceptions, but they are in the 

 minority. The first shock comes if, on landing, the 

 new-comer finds there is no immediate opening for his 

 particular training ; he feels the loneliness, and instead 

 of going into the smaller cities or rural districts which 

 invariably require him, for some job or other, if he is 

 at all adaptable, he seeks the larger cities, where 

 competition is practically as keen as the city he came 

 from in the Homeland. 



The practice of allowing the class of agent alluded 

 to to solicit immigration is, I believe, attributed to 

 want of thought rather than want of heart on the 

 part of those responsible, for there still exists a wide- 

 spread belief in the Old Country that those wljo are 

 unemployable at home will, as soon as their feet touch 

 Canadian soil, become the wage-earners of any sum 

 double what is paid at home. Now, this is where 

 the objection to the agents' beautiful theory lomes in. 

 The unemployable at home is unemployable here. 

 None has recognised more clearly than the King him- 

 self the evil of such misconducted immigration. " Let 

 us take care," he said in his famous " Wake up, 

 England ! " speech, " that we give the overseas 

 dominions onlv of the best." Words of sound advice 



