Kitabı oku: «Pictures of Canadian Life: A Record of Actual Experiences», sayfa 5
‘Is our civilization a failure,
Is the Caucasian played out?’
I answer in Canada with an emphatic No! Canada is redolent of industrial success. The very air of the place is full of hope.
Not only has the Canadian Pacific Railway opened up the country, but it has established experimental farms in different parts, in order to test the capabilities of the soil and the advantages or disadvantages of the climate. It is said, and extensively believed, that the soil between Moose Jaw and Calgary is made up of desert and alkali lands, and entirely unfit for cultivation. With a view to correct that idea, ten farms were established at the following stations: 1, Secretan; 2, Rush Lake; 3, Swift Current; 4, Gull Lake; 5, Maple Creek; 6, Forres; 7, Dunmore; 8, Stair (these two being the nearest stations east and west of Medicine Hat at the crossing of the Saskatchewan River); 9, Tilley, and 10, Gleichen, the last being within view of the Rocky Mountains. The breaking throughout was found to be easy, the soil in every case good and in most instances excellent, ranking with the choicest lands in the Company’s more eastern belt: wherever the rating of the soil is lowered, according to the Company’s standard, owing to its being of a lighter grade, the inferiority will be compensated for by the certainty of the grain maturing more rapidly.
In a pamphlet just issued it is stated that the average from all the farms was as follows:
‘Wheat 21½ bushels; oats, 44¼; barley, 23¼; peas, 12½.
‘The above yields were ascertained by accurately chaining the ground and weighing the grain, this work being done by a qualified Dominion Land Surveyor, and the results, both favourable and otherwise, have been fully given.
‘At each farm about one acre of spring wheat and oats were sown and harrowed in in the fall when breaking was done. Much of this grain germinated during the mild weather of November and December, at which time it showed green above the ground, and as a consequence it was nearly all killed during the winter, and the ground had to be resown in spring. Some small pieces of wheat which were not entirely killed out were left; and, though the straw showed a rank growth, with heads and grain much larger than that sown in spring, the crop ripened very unevenly and much later. Fall sowing of spring wheat, which has proved successful in Manitoba, is not likely to be a success in the western country, as the winter is much more mild and open, and the grain liable to germinate and be killed. Fall wheat has not, as far as we are aware, been tried, and there seems no reason why it should not prove successful.
‘The results obtained, considering the manner in which the land was treated, proved much more satisfactory than was anticipated, and show —
‘1st – That for grain growing, the land in this section of country is capable of giving as large a wheat yield per acre as the heavier lands of Manitoba.
‘2nd – That a fair crop can be obtained the first year of settlement on breaking.
‘3rd – That for fall seeding with spring grain on the western plains, a satisfactory result cannot be looked for with any degree of certainty.
‘4th – That cereals, roots, and garden produce can be successfully raised at an elevation of 3,000 feet above the sea-level.
‘5th – That seeding can be done sufficiently early to allow of all the crop being harvested before the first of September.’
And I hear of many who have done well – some of whom came out without a rap – and who enjoy a robust health unknown to them at home.
Perhaps nowhere has a village so suddenly sprung up into a city as at Winnipeg, which first obtained notoriety by the advent of Lord Garnet Wolseley, then a young man, who came to suppress the rebellion raised there by a half-breed of the name of Riel, a daring young French Canadian, wily as a savage, brilliant and energetic. In 1870 he appealed to the prejudices and fears of the half-breeds, and in a few days had 400 men at his back. Owing to the clemency – perhaps mistaken – of his captors, Riel escaped the punishment due to his crimes. In 1873 he was enrolled as a member of Parliament, notwithstanding that at one time a reward of 5,000 dollars had been offered for his apprehension as a murderer.
The name of Winnipeg was then little known outside Manitoba. It was built by traders, who wished to rival Fort Garrey, then the headquarters of the Hudson’s Bay Company, and to carry on a free trade on their own account. After the suppression of the rebellion, Manitoba had a local Parliament, which met at Winnipeg, and also sent its representatives to the Dominion Parliament. The place grew rapidly, though even at that time Mr. Mackenzie, Sir John Macdonald’s political opponent, declared that a cart track was good enough for Manitoba for many years to come. In 1875 the total population was 3,031 assessed and 2,000 non-assessed, which was a pretty respectable increase, considering that in 1869 there were hardly a hundred settlers in the place. As late as 1876 the sport of wolf-hunting was carried on by several of the inhabitants just outside the city. Now it has churches, banks, schools, manufactures, and mercantile men of great energy and high standing; and has become, especially since the Pacific Railway Company has made it one of their great stations, the gateway of the North-West. Settlers came crowding in from all quarters, and in ten months, in 1878, 600,592 acres of land were located. In 1879 Winnipeg boasted of a street extension of 83 miles, and then came the bridge over the Red River to render the town easy of access to all new-comers. Intoxicated with success, what the Americans call a ‘boom’ was created a year or two since, which seemed to have made everyone lose his wits. There was no end to speculation in town lots; merchants, tradesmen, professional men, could think of nothing else. The bottom, however, soon fell out, and at this time Winnipeg is in rather a depressed state; but it is clear, from its peculiar position, that this depression can only be temporary. It is destined to be the great distributing and railway centre of the vast North-West. The town has now a population of 26,000, and three daily papers, besides weekly ones. Ten years hence, it is predicted, she will be ten times her present size. Her wharves will be lined with steamboats; her river-banks with elevators; industries and manufactures will spring up in her midst, and her streets will be fuller of life than they are to-day.
Winnipeg stands low, and at certain seasons – that is, when the thaw commences – it is liable to floods; but the air is singularly pure and bracing – while I write the sky is an azure blue – and the hottest days are followed by cool nights. The inhabitants all seem to be in the possession of good health. Then the water was said to be bad, whereas I find it to be quite the reverse. The supply of gas is poor, and it seems rarely used. The one great drawback is Winnipeg mud.
The streets, all of them, are as broad as Portland Place, only with handsomer shops. I fear in wet weather they must be almost impassable. As it is, the sides are now dried up, as if they were ploughed, and carriages seem to make their way with considerable difficulty; but there is a magnificent broad wooden side walk to all the streets, while in the middle sufficient smoothness has been attained for the due working of street railways, which seem to be in a satisfactory condition. I have also been agreeably disappointed with the hotels, which I was told were all bad and all tremendously dear. On the contrary, I have found in the new Douglas Hotel, in the main street, as good accommodation as I require, and at a very reasonable rate; while the proprietor – Mr. Bennett, a worthy Scotchman – does all he can for the comfort of his guests, having introduced into this far distant land all the latest improvements, such as heating the place by steam and the use of electric bells.
A walk in the city is amusing. Grand shops and well-built offices everywhere attract the eye. Ladies in the latest fashion meet you one minute, and the next you jostle a swarthy Indian, half civilized, and his squaw, still less civilized than himself. Odd fur-skins are exposed for sale, while a stuffed bear adorns the main street, up and down which run all day long the newsboys with the latest telegrams from London, or Paris, or New York. To-day I have seen a photograph of the original fireman of the ‘Rocket,’ who lives here, and has made a large fortune by contracts. Unfortunately, at this time he is absent from home, and I fear I shall not have a chance of interviewing him. Religion flourishes here. There are about fifteen churches and chapels in the city, and the Young Men’s Christian Association is in a very successful condition. Of Protestant bodies, the leading ones are the Presbyterians, the Methodists, and the Episcopalians. In connection with the Cathedral of St. Boniface, the oldest church in the city, it is interesting to note that the bells came originally from Birmingham, by Hudson’s Bay, and that after the destruction of the building the remains of the metal were gathered up and sent to Birmingham, whence they have again come back after an interval of three years. The city stands in the midst of a fertile plain, adequate to the support of any amount of population. But the land is far better further on. At Manitoba, for instance, the soil is much finer. Manitoba is an Indian name denoting the Voice of God. It seems that the rocks on the river are cavernous, and that at certain seasons of the year the wind strikes them with such force as to produce a singular reverberation, which the rude Indian, whose untutored mind teaches him to see God in the cloud and hear Him in the wind, considered to be no less than the utterance of the Deity Himself.
Just now people are rather exercised with the Indians, who have been placed in reserves where they cannot get a living, and who, besides, find their location an unhealthy swamp. One of the Winnipeg journals is very indignant, and says this is what may be expected from the Government. From all I can learn, the Indians are sturdy maintainers of their rights, and take care that the Government shall not easily overreach them; and perhaps, on the whole, the Indians are better off under Canadian than they would be under American government. Indeed, people say they are very good fellows when uncorrupted by Englishmen. The emigrant in these parts must not be surprised at the occasional appearance of an Indian; and perhaps it is well that the farmer takes care of his horses. I am sorry for the poor Indian, who is the original owner of the soil, and whom, perhaps, one day Mr. Henry George may see fit to visit with a view to the recovery of his rights and the redress of his wrongs. When that is the case, the emigrant will have to pack up and return to his native land. Till that is the case, however, he may safely cross the water, and avail himself of the advantages offered him by the Dominion Government; but to do that he must have at least £200, and then he can stock his farm and keep himself till the return for his labours comes in.
‘The worst of all our books on emigration,’ said the editor of one of the dailies to me, ‘is that they give too glowing an estimate of the state of affairs. They say a farmer will do well with £100. This is not sufficient capital as a rule to start with. It is true there have been instances where settlers have succeeded on this sum, but with such a sum as £200, Manitoba offers the farmer advantages such as no other place offers him.’ Here, also, the regular farm-hand is sure of his living. I see an attempt is being made by a gentleman, now in Winnipeg, to plant out a couple of hundred boys – and I hear there is room for them. But there is little building going on in Winnipeg, and the mechanic need not trouble himself to come here. All in this part are loud in condemnation of emigration from the East-end of London. Those poor of the East-end – alas! neither the Old World nor the New seems to know what to do with them. Since this was written I see the Manitoba Mortgage and Investment Company have declared a dividend of eight per cent., an indication that at any rate in their part of the world money is being made.
CHAPTER VII.
LIFE ON THE PRAIRIE
‘You will find Moose Jaw a very pretty place,’ said a gentleman to me as I left Winnipeg; and certainly it is a pretty place, though not exactly according to an Englishman’s idea of prettiness.
It consists of a railway-station and an assemblage of wooden huts and shops, which have all been called into existence within the last twelve months. It boasts a weekly organ (such as it is), two or three places of worship, one or two billiard-rooms, and a post-office – not a tent, as in some parts of the country in which I have been, but a real wooden-house. The shopkeepers seem to have nothing to do, and the pigs perambulate the streets, evidently enjoying the fine freedom allowed them in this part of the world. There are at this time about 700 or 800 settlers, some of the farmers who came out last year having moved further west.
I am writing in the railway-station, in the waiting-rooms of which are many farmers, all on their way to Calgary – for which place, also, I am bound, expecting to start at the very inconvenient hour of two p.m.
The scene, as I sit, is not cheering. Far as the eye can reach there is the prairie. It was the same all the way from Winnipeg. It will be the same all the way to Calgary, some 400 or 500 miles hence. It is intensely hot, and men and women sit in the open air, under such shade as the wooden houses afford. It is intensely cold in the winter. Not a tree is to be seen, or a hill, or a farmhouse; nothing to relieve the monotony of the sea of grass land on every side, except here and there a prairie fire – the first step to be taken before the farmer commences the cultivation of the soil; and I must own a prairie fire by night is rather a pretty sight.
I parted last night with a General and his wife, who have come to settle about forty miles off. At present he and his family have no fresh meat, and he has to make an arrangement with a Brandon butcher, about a hundred and fifty miles off, to supply him with a Sunday joint. Tinned meats his family have tried, and he has got with him a fresh joint of meat, which he purchased in Winnipeg; but there are prairie chickens always to be had, and in some places, as we came along, we saw an abundance of wild ducks on the Assiniboine River, and in swamps, over which we rushed in the Pullman car.
This luxury cannot be expected in Moose Jaw. Here there is no water at all. Last year the farmers had no rain, and they fear they will have none now. As it is, the prairie begins to look a little scorched. I should be loth to spend the remainder of my days here; but a farmer may make a living, and so may a farm-labourer. As to any other class of people here, there is no opening at all. The town is full of shopkeepers, barristers, auctioneers, and dealers. Mechanics who come out will starve. When the land around is taken up they will have a chance, but not till then.
As I sit, a dark figure beckons me to come to him. He has a Jim Crow hat, a blanket around his martial form, and a gayer one in front. He has rings in his ears, bracelets on his arms, and a string of some kind of beads around his neck. He offers me his hand, and I shake it. Then I commence a conversation. ‘What you called?’ I say. He makes an unintelligible reply. ‘You Smith, or Brown, or Jones, or Robinson?’ I ask; and again he gives an unintelligent grunt. I offer him a cigar, and he sits down on his haunches in the shade. He is one of the Black Bull men, who have been chased from the States, in consequence of having made that part of the world too hot for them. They are not natives of this country, but have settled in the prairie two or three miles off. I tell him to be a good boy, and I dare say he will obey my injunction as literally as any other man in England or anywhere else.
Again I look, and two red-coated warriors greet me. They are on the look-out for contraband, and are as fine and clean and well-set fellows as any I have seen anywhere. They belong to the mounted police, and live chiefly in the saddle, as there are but five hundred of them to all this gigantic North-West. I had already made their acquaintance. At the first station we came to after leaving Manitoba, one of them came into the car, gave a searching glance all round, and then walked out. ‘What was that for?’ I asked the General. ‘Oh! he has come to see if we have any whisky. They are very particular. I was coming this way once, when a fellow traveller took out his pocket flask and began drinking. The mounted policeman who saw him do it immediately took his flask from him, and emptied it there and then.’ This strict prohibition is the result, not of the prevalence of Temperance sentiment in the North-West, but rather of fear of the Indians, who are better shots than the mounted police, although not so well provided with fire-arms. The people seem to anticipate that the law will be relaxed when the whites are more numerous and the Indians fewer. The law has had good results, nevertheless. In obedience to it the German gives up his lager-beer. And next to the Scotch the Germans make the best emigrants.
The General tells me such is the fineness of the climate that he finds he can get on very well without his customary glass of grog. At Moose Jaw the inhabitants take to Hop Bitters instead, and one of the institutions of the place is the Hop Bitters Brewery.
I believe you may keep whisky if you get a permit, and a permit is not difficult, I understand, to get.
I am sorry to say the General, in spite of the mounted police, offered me a drop of whisky, and at a later period a friend, as we sat smoking, asked me if I was ready for a ‘smile.’ Of course, in my ignorance, I replied in the affirmative. Diving under his seat, he brought out a fine bottle of real Scotch, and, mixing it with water, offered me a ‘smile.’ You may be sure I indignantly refused. You cannot expect me to be a party to the violation of the law.
These Indians just now are creating a little apprehension, especially the tribe under the renowned Yellow Calf, who it was hoped had taken to farming, and who last year had a good crop, and bought a reaping machine; but the Indians are very restless, and Yellow Calf has sent a messenger to rouse the tribes, and a strong party of the mounted police are detached to watch his movements. They are dying off the face of the earth, and we may well suppose that they bear no love to the white man, who has taken possession of the lands which they once knew to be their own. Here the people evidently think that the sooner the Indians are exterminated the better. The men do not work; all that is done by the squaws – wretched women with long black hair, and little black eyes as round as beads, and who rejoice in blankets quite as unromantic, but quite as comfortable, as those of their lords and masters. Hitherto, I have not made way with the dusky beauties, but I may be more successful by-and-by.
I believe the Indians have a real grievance against the Canadian Government. It was agreed that they should be settled in reserves, and that they should have a certain amount of food supplied. This compact was fairly observed by the Canadian Government; but in an evil hour they made this part of their duty over to contractors, and we know what contractors are, all the world over. The Indians say faith has not been kept with them, and it is to be feared that they have good reason for saying so. Just now they are starving, as this is the close season, and they are not permitted to hunt or fish. They say that there is no close season as far as the stomach is concerned, and from personal experience I may say I believe they are right.
It is now noon on the prairie, and I am dying of the heat. Oh, for the forest shade! Oh, for the crystal stream! Alas! the water here is not good for the stranger, and I fear to touch it. At Toronto I managed pretty well on Apollinaris water; but out here nothing of the kind is to be had. What am I to do? The beef here is so tough that you can’t cut it with a knife, and must have belonged to the oldest importation from my native land; and I have to pay a price for which I can have a luxurious repast in London. O Spiers and Pond! O Gordon and Co.! O respected Ring and Brymer, under whose juicy joints and sparkling wines the ancient Corporation of London renews its youth! How my soul longs for your flesh-pots in this dry and thirsty land, where no water is! I have been out on the prairie under the burning sun. It is cracked, and parched, and bare, and the flowers refuse to bloom, and only the gigantic grasshopper or the pretty but repulsive snake meets my eye. That dim line, protracted to the horizon east and west, is the railroad. That far-off collection of sheds is the rising town of Moose Jaw. That blue line on the horizon, which makes me pant for the sea, is a mirage. Far off are some white tents glistening in the sun. They are the wigwams of the Indians.
Like the Wandering Jew, again I urge on my wild career, and here I am with noble savages – so hideous that words fail to tell their hideousness. No wonder the squaws are bashful. They have little to be proud of, though they have necklaces and rings and ornaments around their belts, and gay shawls, which have come from some far away factory. Some of them have put a streak of red paint where the black hair divides. Others are painted as much as any Dowager of Mayfair, and have ear ornaments that reach down to the middle. Not one is fairly passable.
Rousseau and the sentimentalists, who talk of the savage, greatly err in their estimate of that noble individual. He is lazy and filthy, gluttonous, and would be a wine-bibber had he the chance. I looked into his tent, and there he was sitting naked, whilst his squaw was cooking a bit of a horse with the hair on for his dinner. He is unpleasant as a neighbour for many reasons, and is indifferent how he gets a dollar, or how his squaw earns it either. All along the prairie he seems to have nothing to do but to rush to the nearest railway station, and sit there all day in the hope that some passing traveller may give him tobacco or cash, the only two things on earth he seems to care for. Apparently, the mothers are fond of their young. The men are clever at stealing horses, and the traveller must look after his horses by night, or he may find them, as friends of my own did, gone in the morning. But to return to the prairie, it is an awful place to travel in alone; it is so easy to lose one’s way. I heard wonderful stories in this respect. Fancy being lost on the prairie; nothing but the grass to eat; nothing but the sky to look at; nothing in the shape of human speech to listen to. Out here by myself, I felt more than once how appropriate the language of the poet beloved by our grandmothers:
‘O Solitude, where are the charms
That sages have seen in thy face?
Better dwell in the midst of alarms,
Than reign in this horrible place.’
There is a good deal of hardship to be encountered by any who would penetrate to the dim and mysterious region we denominate the North-West. For instance, I left Moose Jaw at half-past two yesterday morning by a train timed to arrive there at a quarter-past one; at which unreasonable hour I had to leave my bed, just as I was getting into a sound sleep, and to catch the train, which was so crowded that I could scarcely get a seat, and the atmosphere of which was not redolent of the odours of Araby the Blest. There I had to sit till the time I mention, as the engine managed to get off the line. Deeply do I pity the poor emigrants tempted into this part of the world by the delusive utterances of sham emigration agents at home and local journals – which, when they are not abusing one another, seem to delight in giving representations of the country by no means literally to be depended on; the only thing to do is to go to the fountain head – the Government office. People who make up their minds to come into these parts must learn to put up with a good deal. Here is a sad case, a very exceptional one, I admit, but I am bound to tell the whole truth. I quote from a Winnipeg paper: ‘David Kirkpatrick, his wife, and nine children, the eldest a girl of twelve, arrived from Scotland on Wednesday. A part of the voyage was made on board the Algoma. The cold was intense, and many of the passengers suffered severely. Among these was Mrs. Kirkpatrick. The exposure, in her case, brought on a kind of low fever, and the poor woman died yesterday morning. The husband’s case is deplorable. With nine children on his hands, what is he to do? He has a longing desire to get back to his friends in Scotland, but has not the means. Will the public come to his rescue? He and his helpless children are to be found in the immigrant sheds.’ I fear such cases are far from uncommon. Imagine a poor woman leaving her native land, crossing the restless Atlantic, perhaps feeble with poor living, and worried with the care of nine helpless children, perhaps scarce recovered from sea-sickness, put on board an emigrant train, snatching hasty meals, or such accommodation as is provided at the expense of Dominion Government (I do not blame them or the railway authorities, they do all they can), travelling at uncertain hours, and arriving at her destination utterly overcome by fatigue. What wonder is it that a poor woman now and then sacrifices her life in the attempt to build up a new home in this Promised Land? No wonder that now and then death comes to such just as they reach Jordan and think that they are to reap the fruit of all their weary toil.
As I left Brandon on my way hither I saw by the side of one of the stations quite a little village of tents. ‘What is that?’ said I to one of the mounted police. ‘The emigrants,’ was his reply. ‘They do say,’ said he slowly, ‘that there is some sickness amongst them.’ Whether the rumour was founded on fact I had no time to inquire, but certainly, when one thinks of the hardships of the emigrants’ lot, and the peculiar unfitness of many of them to stand hardships, I should not be surprised to learn that such was the case. The further I come out, the less demand I find for emigrants. It is only ploughmen who are wanted here. The man who will succeed is the farmer with a small capital. He has a splendid chance. When the country is settled the mechanic may have his turn.
But remember, after all has been said and done, this is the Great Lone Land. Emigration here is but a drop in the ocean as regards results. I am now some 850 miles to the north-west of Winnipeg. The country is an unbroken level, and, with the exception of Brandon and Moose Jaw, you see hardly a farmhouse, hardly any ploughed land, no sheep grazing on the downs, no herds fattening in the prairie; not a single tree to hide one from the snows of winter or the suns of summer. By day you melt in the sun, by night you shiver with the cold. When we came to a swamp now and then we saw a few wild ducks. Once in the course of the weary ride we saw two or three deer. All the rest was a parched plain, with here and there some lovely flowers, and with buffalo bones bleaching wherever you turn your eye. In some parts the soil was strongly impregnated with alkali, so much so, indeed, that it made the ground white, and left a crust of what looked like ice on the lakes and ponds. Can that huge region ever grow wheat and fatten flocks? The experience of the experimental farms proves that it will. All I know is that ages must elapse before Moose Jaw shall be a Manchester, or Brandon, in spite of its many advantages, the headquarters of the agricultural interest, with a corn market equalling that of Norwich or Ipswich. Yet there are parts of Manitoba which contain undoubtedly as fine corn-growing country as any in the world.
This is especially true of the new tract of country opened up by the Canadian Pacific in the south-west. As a rule, the further from the railway the land is, the better it is. At the same time, it is to be remembered that a farmer who has no railway access is at a great disadvantage, and that in the winter it is no joke sending a man with a team of oxen and a waggon-load of produce twenty or thirty miles across the prairie, where a snowstorm, or ‘a blorrard’ at any time, may occur.
This is the great drawback of Manitoba: it has no trees. In Ontario the farmer has his crops protected by a belt of trees from the inclemency of the weather. But, then, in Manitoba the farmer has this advantage, that he has not to devote the greater part of his time and money to the cutting down of his trees. He has only to plough the soil, and there is an abundant harvest. If Manitoba lacks trees, it is expected to yield a plentiful supply of coal. As I came along last night we saw a station supplied with gas. It appears that in boring for water they discovered gas, which they now utilize to light the station and to work a steam engine. This was not, however, in Manitoba, but in Alberta, just after we had left Medicine Hat, that pretty oasis in the desert, with the usual supply of hotels, billiard-rooms, and stores, and where I came into contact with the Cree Indians, a race even uglier than the Sioux Indian, whom I found at Moose Jaw. They have higher cheekbones, and don’t plait their hair, and some of the old men reminded me not a little in outline of the late Lord Beaconsfield, whom the Canadians consider Sir John Macdonald strongly resembles.
It is curious to note how the buffalo has vanished from the region which was formerly his happy hunting-ground. He has now forsaken the country; you see only his bones and his track. Some people say that the railway has done it, and others that the destruction is the work of the Americans, who say, ‘Kill the buffalo and you get rid of the Indians.’ These latter are to be met with everywhere, clad in flannel garments radiant with all the hues of the rainbow. Chiefly they affect blankets – red, blue, or green. At Calgary I came across more of them – this time of the Blackfoot tribe. There is very little difference in any of them. In one thing they all resemble each other, that is, they don’t seem to care much about work. As English does not happen to be one of their accomplishments, my intercourse with them has been of a somewhat limited character.
