REVIEWS — OVERLAND ROUTE TO BRITISH COLUMBIA. 201 



ducts, and in wants ; it is so also because upon it depends the con- 

 tinuity of the British Empire in North America, the communication 

 within our own dominions between the Atlantic coast and the impor- 

 tant and rapidly rising colony of British Columbia, and the prospect 

 of a future intercourse, by the same route, with Japan, China, Austra- 

 lia, and India. If a good road from Canada to Rupert's Land is not 

 speedily opened who can tell the effect on the minds of the inhabitants 

 of seeming neglect on the part of the mother country and the great 

 and advanced intervening colony, joined with habitual dependence on 

 the United States for means of intercourse with the outer world and 

 for all which they most want ? We have no enmity against the United 

 States. We admire much in their institutions, though, very naturally, 

 we do not like them so much as our own. We esteem their people 

 highly as friendly neighbours, and when some among them abuse and 

 threaten us, we give the great majority credit for more just and rea- 

 sonable sentiments. But there are those in the States who are ambi- 

 tious of territorial extension, and who would not only offer to, but 

 force upon others the institutions they themselves value, and if the 

 affections of our countrymen were cooled by supposed neglect, or 

 their interests be involved in a change of allegiance, it is not difficult 

 to foresee that influences might be brought to bear upon them which 

 we are convinced would not really favour their own welfare and pro- 

 gress, and which would most seriously affect the prosperity of the 

 great empire of which the ignorant and thoughtless might account 

 them an insignificant part. With these views, we cannot but feel how 

 much is involved in the question of a practicable and not too difficult 

 route from Canada to the Red River and thence to British Columbia, 

 and accordingly we looked to the opinions of an experienced and able 

 engineer like Mr. Fleming with more than curiosity. We were not 

 surprised to find Mr. Fleming begin by pointing out the impossibility 

 of proceeding at once with the construction of the great railway line, 

 which he justly regards as the only really satisfacton- means of com- 

 munication across the continent. As this decision^may cause disap- 

 pointment to many, and might possibly lessen the public interest in 

 what may be speedily accomplished, we first give'our author's state- 

 ment of the magnitude and cost of an undertaking, the importance of 

 which he estimates so highly, that we cannot suppose any attempt to 

 frighten us by an exaggeration of the difficulties : — 



"Having determined the character of the means of communication most dc- 



