The making of a man

BY W. D. FLATT
TORONTO WILLIAM BRIGGS 1918
Copyright, Canada, 1918 by W. D. FLATT.
NOTE
THIS BOOK IS NOT SOLD FOR THE USUAL COMMERCIAL RETURNS. THE PROFITS WILL BE DEVOTED TO PATRIOTIC PURPOSES
TO The Twenty-eight Boys in My Sunday School Class at Port Nelson, Ontario, whose joys and sorrows I try somewhat to share—this story of real men and women is dedicated
Your battle of Life, boys, has just begun. If you have the courage to be fair, honest, strong and clean now, and if you follow along the paths your conscience indicates, you will have the strength of character which produces heroes, in your years of manhood
The story within these covers has been written from impressions received in boyhood days, ideas which time could not erase and which the passing of the years has developed and strengthened. It is perhaps only fair to state frankly that the story is largely founded on fact, though, for purposes which will be obvious, the characters have been treated from a general rather than a particular sense.
The aim has been to follow a young man’s life from his home in the Orkney Islands, one hundred years ago, through his experiences in what was then an untravelled country in the Canadian West, and to show how, in his humble, commonplace way, he took hold of the opportunities which presented themselves, small though they might seem to us to be, and built up a character and a place for himself in the community which stood the test of time.
Hundreds of our Canadian pioneers did just this in the simple, honest, straightforward lives they led in the early days of this country, and it is on the foundations they laid in those days that Canada’s greatness now has been reared.
All honor to the stalwart Canadian pioneer. Both the young and the old of to-day may well renew in memory the struggles and sacrifices by which Canada’s foundation was well and truly laid. It is one of the greatest legacies which the past has bequeathed to us. It is one of the treasures that we should fondly cling to.