But it has been proved over and over again that the gifts of the wilderness are only to be won at great cost of toil, and struggle, and loneliness; and few men or women are cut out for the rôle of pioneer. In Canada hundreds of people every year venture to undertake tasks for which they are not fitted either by knowledge or previous experience or natural tastes, and the result is a vast amount of unnecessary suffering and disappointment, and often loss of health and even life; but I shall have more to say on this matter when dealing with the subject of the opportunities for immigrants. Here I would only add that there are numerous openings for people willing to work in the more settled communities as well as on the very frontiers of civilization; and that Canada has a great variety of opportunities to offer on easier conditions than actual pioneering.
If any one is attempting to obtain a true idea of the resources and opportunities of the Dominion, he should be very particular to bear in mind exactly what part of the country his informant is discussing. It is so large a country that persons talking loosely of what there is or is not “in Canada,” though their remarks may be perfectly accurate with regard to one district, may be totally misleading with regard to another. For example, in the Eastern Provinces, ivy and holly and broom are never seen growing in the open air, though the first-mentioned plant is often grown in pots as a house plant; but in Vancouver and Victoria ivy-covered buildings are as common as in England, and so are hedges and bushes of glossy holly. It is the same in matters other than vegetation. There are differences of manner and custom in different localities. French Canada is a quaint old-world land—how old-world the visitor must penetrate into the country to discover. But the “habitants,” speaking their French patois, scarcely differ more in many of their characteristics from the “go-ahead” English-speaking “Westerners” and the stalwart Nova Scotian fishermen, than do these two latter types differ from each other. You may find that your copper coins will not pass current in a new prairie town, but even a little further east a “cent” will buy a few things, including an enormous morning newspaper, excepting on the train.
It is not indeed surprising that there are many cases in which you cannot judge fairly or accurately of one place by another two thousand miles or more distant, even if both happen to be in Canada. Perhaps, indeed, one of the most general characteristics of the country is what some people might call its incongruities. Take a few instances at random. Canada has cities, where its richer folk live in luxury, and its poorest inhabit genuine slums (more’s the pity). It has, too, small villages and backwoods settlements and country communities, where class distinctions are of little account. In some towns you may see a smart up-to-date motor car, cheek by jowl with an ox wagon. It has a goodly list of well-equipped hospitals, but there are many remote settlements where a doctor is hardly to be had in direst emergency for love or money.
The observation that is true in some well-settled districts may not hold in the depth of its unbroken unexplored woods. One may know “Canada” as a land of quiet hills and valleys, but perhaps the name stands to his brother for a “sea of mountains,” with hundreds of “unconquered peaks” luring the Alpine climber to triumph or disaster. It may be that your Canada is the wide, open prairie country far inland, beautiful in its season, with a wealth of bright flowers or square miles of waving wheat; while the name for me means a rugged coast, where the great Atlantic rollers beat on cliffs of granite, or toss the white-sailed fishing boats in too-rough jest or fury.
“Canada” means all these things and many more. Its life is too complex, its resources too various to be presented satisfactorily in a single sketch; and yet behind all diversity the name does stand for a real unity and a growing national consciousness.
1. BREAKING THE PRAIRIE WITH OXEN,
THUNDER HILL DISTRICT.
2. SETTING OUT FOR THE NEW HOME IN THE WEST.