11 



That sea has. rolled on ever since, and of .late years in ever 

 increasing- force, until now we have probably one million of 

 inhabitants between Lake Superior Height of Land and the 

 Rocky Mountains. Towns and cities have sprung up, and 

 instead of the war-whoop of the Indian we have the whistle of 

 the steam locomotive, the whirr of the reaper and the thresh- 

 ing machine, and scores of millions of bushels of grain and 

 hundreds of thousands of domestic cattle where half a century 

 ago the buffalo herds were almost the sole denizens of the 

 plains. 



In a few months there is every prospect that the chain of 

 Provinces will be completed from the Atlantic to the Pacific. 

 Let us hope they will be the happy homes of tens of millions 

 of people before the twentieth century has run its course. At 

 all events, we can join in the sentiments and aspirations of the 

 Canadian poet who wrote : — 



" Through the young giant's mighty limbs, that stretch from 



sea to sea, 

 There runs a throb of conscious life, of waking energy ; 

 from Nova Scotia's misty coast unto Columbia's shore, 

 She wakes — a band of scattered homes and colonies no more — 

 But a young nation, with her life full beating in her breast ; 

 A noble future in her eyes — -the Britain of the West ! 

 Hers be the noble task to fill the yet untrodden plains, 

 With fruitful, many-sided life that courses through her veins. 



A people poor in pomp and state, but rich in noble deeds. 

 Holding that righteousness exalts the people that it leads. 

 As i? et, the waxen mould is soft, the opening page is fair ; 

 It rests with those who rule us now to leave their impress 



there : 

 The stamp of true nobility, high honor, stainless truth, 

 The earnest quest of noble ends, the generous heart of youth, 

 The love of country, soaring far above dull party strife, 

 The love of learning, art and song — the crowning grace of life ; 

 The love of science, roaming far through Nature's hidden 



ways ; 

 The love and fear of Nature's God — a nation's highest praise. 

 So, in the long hereafter, this Canada shall be 

 The worthy heir of British power and British liberty." 



