22 COMMISSION OF CONSERVATION 



drawn from the outside of the provinces are cut off, while the internal 

 growth continues. More attention should be given than in the past to 

 keeping the population on the land that is already settled and encourag- 

 ing its healthy growth. Indirectly that will assist the right kind of im- 

 migration, for nothing counts so much as a feature in developing a 

 country as the health, contentment and prosperity of the citizens 

 already settled in the country. At the same time the Canadian settlers 

 are, as a rule, better than immigrants, and we need to pay more atten- 

 tion to the conservation of our existing population.* 



Bad Conditions in Ontario 



While it is claimed that the rural decrease has not been so great 

 as it is made to appear in the census figures, i.e., when the agricultural 

 village and small industrial town is included in the rural category, 

 the revised classification does not afford much satisfaction when we 

 come to consider actual conditions in some of the older provinces. 

 Reports have been written with regard to conditions in 

 Ontario, and these are referred to here merely as illustrations 

 and not to show that conditions in Ontario are worse than in other 

 provinces. 



Rev. John McDougall, in Rural Life in Canada, points out 

 that, while the census of 1911 shows a decrease in the rural population 

 of Ontario of 52,184, or 4.19 per cent, there was, during the decen- 

 nium, a rural gain of 44,940 in five new districts in that province. 

 Therefore, on the census basis, the rural loss in the remaining terri- 

 tory was 97,124. He also shows that the natural increase of the popu- 

 lation of Ontario during the 10 years was 1.5 per cent, which, if it 

 had been retained, would have accounted for an increase of 200,183 

 in rural population; so that, according to his estimate, the actual 

 decrease in rural Ontario amounted to 373,567, instead of 52,184. 

 In Grenville county, alone, the falling off was from 21,021 to 17,545 

 between 1901 and 1911. 



The effect of this diminution on the educational system is very 

 bad. One school district in Ontario, Mr. McDougall says, had only 

 three children on the roll one year, and during three months only one 

 child was in attendance, although the school register, about 40 years 

 ago, showed an average attendance of 45 children. The average 

 school attendance in the rural schools of Ontario in 1913 was only 

 22.9, as against 329.1 in the cities. 



* In an investigation made by the Commission of Conservation in the county 

 of Dundas, Ontario, the satisfactory condition was found that over 98.7 per cent 

 of 400 farmers visited were born in Ontario. 



