34 ESSAYS ON WHEAT 



the track pushed from the east, past lake and swamp and 

 stream, onwards amid the lonely forests of Pine and Pop- 

 lar, of Spruce and Birch, on, on, through all that long 

 stretch of rocky bowlder-strewn country north of the Great 

 Lakes which was swept bare of soil in the dawn of human 

 history, onwards and ever onwards, until at last it reached 

 the West. All the vast difficulties in the path of the engi- 

 neers were overcome because the men behind the C. P. R. 

 were men of vision, men who could see in the mind's eye 

 under the blue dome of heaven the golden grain which 

 would come to clothe the fertile acres of the broad prairie- 

 land. Surely the brightest dreams of the founders of the 

 0. P. E, have been amply justified by events. 



The completion of the eastern half of the Canadian Pa- 

 cific Railway immediately provided that direct connection 

 with the Old Country market for which Manitoba had been 

 longing ; and soon the agricultural progress and prosperity 

 of the West were assured. The tide of immigration grew 

 ever stronger and Winnipeg became the great gateway to 

 the new Land of Promise. The buffalo disappeared, the 

 Indian gave place to the white man, and vast tracts of the 

 virgin prairie were turned with the plow. The wheat of 

 the prairie provinces, on account of its high quality, ac- 

 quired universal fame, and Canada came to be called the 

 Granary of the British Empire. How well that Granary 

 served the cause of the Allies in its time of trial needs 

 no telling, for it is known to the whole world. 



