April 2, IPOO.] THE TROPICAL 
AGRICULTURIST. 
693 
The climate of Vancouver is wet and mild ; snow 
may be seen on the mountains which -iurround 
the city for five months of the year, bui it is 
seldorm that it falls in the city. 
The distance from Vancouver to Halifax (which 
is the terminus of the railway on the Eastern coast) 
is 3,666 miles, the journey occupies a week ; the 
passenger only chans'ini; cars once. Leaving 
Vancouver the scenery is very beautiful, as the 
train winds its way along the bank of the Fraser 
River, which is known throughout the world for 
the large numbers of salmon that are caugiit 
every year, canned and shipped to all parts of 
the world. 
On wakening the following morning the scenery 
is very different, the train which the day before 
was covering some sixty miles an hour, is now 
creeping slowly up the sides of steep gorges 
through whif-h torrents of icy water are rushing ; 
on either side stand gigantic cliffs towering 
hundreds of feet above, covered with ice and snow. 
At noon we reach Glacier House, and stop for 
lunch. Last year the fall of snow at this particular 
point registered fifty feet. Facing the station 
stands the "Great Glacier" only half a mile 
diaiant, an amazing sight, as you will imagine 
when I tell you that this field of perpetual ice 
covers some 200 square miles, some hundreds of 
fflet in thickness. To the left of the " Great 
C^laoier" rises Mount Sir Donald, a naked and 
a,bcupt pyramid to a height of a mile and a half 
above the station. This stately monolith was 
named after Sir Donald Smith, now Lord Strath- 
cona, Agent-General in Lont'.on for Canada, the 
man who has offered to equip and transport to 
South Africa 400 picked Mounted Infantry at his 
own expense ; the cost of which I have heard 
will exceed two hundred thousand pounds sterling. 
Lejiving Glacier House the train continues iis 
winding route steadily climbing up the sides of 
the steep gorges, now and again diving through 
long snowsheds, which have been built where it 
was (found impossible to keep the line clear of 
snow. During the winter months hundreds of 
men are employed in removing the snow off the 
line, in these pai;ts. 
As l am writing we, are steaming out of Mount 
Stephen Station, above which stands Mount 
Stephen towering 8,000 feet above the valley, to 
the left is seen a huge green glacier 800 feet in 
thickness. The cold here is more than a -typewriter 
c^n describe ; and as darkness has set in I think 
bed the best place, leaving my letter to be con- 
linued tomorrow. 
Moose Jaw, Jan. 28. — Rising at 9 a.m. I found 
the train travelling at a good pace alona: the 
great prairie plateau which extends for some 
thousands of square miles to the north and east 
of the Rocky Mountains, which are now out of 
sight. In winter tliis great prairie is enveloped 
i|i snow and ice; in summer it is cohered with 
riqh grass, not a tree to be seen. At the stations 
where we stop, Indians board the train and oft'er 
n\ilk ;and buffalo horns for sale. This race who 
in the past were renowned for their powers in 
hunting big game, and for their brave and fierce 
n\ethods of fighting, are fast becoming extinct. 
Tomorrow we enter the more civilized regions 
wherein suuimer farms covering thousands of 
acres may be seen under wheat. In the evening 
we ajrive at Winnipeg, where I will stay for two 
days before continuing my iourney to the East 
Coast, en route for Paris. This afternoon the 
Cpnduotqr took compassion on my solitude and 
began to give a detailed account of what I would 
and v,'ould not see as we went farther East ; 
I soon brought him up with a round turn, by 
informing him that "this was my eighth journey 
across this track in the past seven years."— Yours 
truly, R. VALEiNTINE WEBSTER. 
LABOUR IN INDIA AND CEYLON. 
Coonoor, Nilgiris, Feb. 23. 
Sir, — There are upwards of 3f millions of people 
now being relieved ly the Government of India 
in connection with the present famine, and as the 
population in this year is increasing at the rate of 
six millions, or two per cent per annum, and 
this rate will continue in larger numbers every 
year, it is evident that famines in the future 
will become more and more costly. That financial 
difficulties must ensue is evident, and just as the 
previous difficulties were met by forcing up the 
e.xchange, so will future financial embarrassments 
be met by the same expedient with the view of 
reducing the home charges. There are two reasons 
why it is certain that the same exjiedient will 
be resorted to— the fact chat the unpopularity 
necessarily accompanying fresh taxation will be 
avoided, and the still more influential fact that 
the officials, who are really the rulers of India, 
will gain largely by still further raising the rate 
of exchange. That they will seize the first pre- 
text for doing so in the future as readily as they 
have done in the past, no one can doubt, who has 
the smallest experience of human natuie. The 
|)lanters of India and Ceylon will have to face 
two serious facts^the fact lh;it they lia\e been 
pliiced at a great disadvantage in competing 
with their rivals in the other .'•ilvei -usin*-- 
countries, and the fact that iheie i.s every 
prospect, I might almost say certainty, of their 
being placed at a still further dL«advanta<j-e. 
Does any one believe, or can it be for one moment 
supposed, that the producers of India and Ceyhm 
and the capita'ists who work in cfinjum'tion 
with them are blind to these facts ? Tnat they 
are not so is proved by the facts which 
appeared in the leading aiticle of the Ceylon 
Observer of Feb. 7, which tells us that in 
1899 (when it was certain that the Governmenj; 
would adhere to its fatal cuirency policy) the 
coaly immigrants fell ott' by about half, while 
the departures exceeded the anivals by 13,000. 
And that both producers and capitalists are 
rightly judging the situatiun, we have ample 
* evidence, in India where wages are being reduced 
and advances too, all of which indicates what 
everyone knows, namely, that extensiotis have 
been stopped, and that land is being thrown out 
of cultivation, being either wholly abandoned 
or put into an inferior state of working. I heve 
is only one thinf; that can arrest this decline 
and that is the granting of such a Bounty on 
exports as will place producers in the s?ame 
position which they occupied previous to th« 
closing of the mints. The ))roducers would be 
thus placed on a secure footing, confidence would 
at once be restored both to thein and to the 
capitalists, and India and Ceylon would soon 
exhibit the same signs of progress tvbich they 
did previous to the closing of the mints, and 
■ about up to the time when it was certain 
that they would not be reopened. The 
proposed step would probably call for a 
further raising of the exchange, but this would be 
all in favour of the proposed measure, ere the 
officials would gain on their home remittances, 
