Canada and the British immigrant

by Emily P. Weaver

The consequence is that while New Brunswick has a ready welcome for good workers—especially those ready to labour with their hands, and having enough in their pockets to tide over the time of seeking for the right niches—the people she wants above all are people to till her fertile soil.

One vast advantage the modern settler on the land has over the old-time pioneer. He will find it easy to get good prices for his produce, either in the local markets or in the more distant but still (owing to railways and steamship lines) easily accessible ones of other provinces or countries.

In common with the other Maritime Provinces, New Brunswick appears to have been somewhat overlooked as a field for immigration from the British Isles, perhaps because, in spite of its possessing seaports of its own, the general line of travel has been by Montreal or New York, or possibly because these provinces have been slow to advertise themselves. “Why did we never hear anything about New Brunswick when we were making inquiries about coming to Canada?” asked a lady, whose settlement with her family in Ontario thirty years ago was due to the excellent report of that province made by a number of Scottish farmers. “If we had only known what a good country it is,” she added, “I daresay we might have stopped there, because it is so much nearer England.”

Nearness to the British Isles is one incontrovertible advantage for settlers leaving behind them friends in the old land; and I must say that the part of New Brunswick that I know best—that is the sunny valley of the St. John—has a pleasantly homelike look to eyes accustomed to England’s green hills and well-tilled fields. The sweeping lines of the low hills, the freshness of the mighty river, the great green woods massed here and there, the shady elms and willows of the little capital, the comfortable-looking farmhouses dotted along the slopes, all have a friendly familiar look of quiet content.

But I would not imply that this province is devoid of life and energy. The commercial capital, St. John (and there are many smaller towns like it), is much alive and “up-to-date,” with its good railway connections and its numerous steamships plying both to American and British ports, and it will be still more busy when its great dry docks and shipbuilding plant are finished. St. John is the Atlantic terminus of the Canadian Pacific Railway, which takes a short cut to Montreal across a corner of the State of Maine, and of one of the two great branches into which the Intercolonial Railway divides. The new National Transcontinental Railway has its Atlantic terminus at Moncton; and altogether it is said that New Brunswick has more miles of railway in proportion to its population than any other country in the world. The province has about thirteen thousand miles of roads, but these generally stand in need of improvement. Of course the numerous rivers necessitate a large number of bridges; and there are nearly four thousand, ranging in type from the quaint old covered bridge, looking like a barn with its ends knocked out, to the great modern erection of steel. The capital, Fredericton, has a bridge about half a mile long, but a few miles higher upstream the St. John is crossed by a primitive-looking ferry.

In some districts population is much scattered. In others the people are “comfortably close together”; but everywhere there is ample room for more people. In fact, there is still land to be had, on certain conditions, for the asking, or “improved farms” may be bought at low prices. Many of these are very good farms; but a few years since the local markets were comparatively poor, work was scarce, and the young people went west or south or to the cities—it is the same story as in Nova Scotia—in search of better opportunities.

With regard to the “free grants,” ten thousand acres have been laid out, in Restigouche county, in hundred-acre lots, and to obtain a title to one of these, the applicant must pay a fee of $5 (about £1) for surveying, reside on the land for three years, clear four acres, build a small house, and do $30 (£6) worth of labour on the roads, or pay an additional $20 (£4) in cash. Besides these free grants, the government has opened to settlement the Blue Bell Tract in Victoria county, between the C.P.R. and the St. John river, on the one side, and the new Transcontinental Railway on the other. This district, watered by the Tobique river, is “a rolling upland, covered with a fine growth of trees, free from underbrush.” Here hundred-acre lots, on a colonization road, are offered for sale at $1 the acre, one-fourth of the money to be paid on taking possession, and the remainder in four equal instalments.

For settlers with a little more capital, the government of New Brunswick has another proposition. A year or two ago a “Farm Settlement Board” of three commissioners was established by Act of Parliament, for the purpose of buying and improving suitable lands, erecting houses and farm buildings upon them, and selling them again to bonâ fide settlers upon easy terms, at cost price. The payment for these may be spread over ten years, and in special cases the Board is empowered to give two years’ further grace; but the title “remains in the Board” till all payments have been made. (For addresses of persons from whom information may be obtained, see Appendix, Note A, page [296].)

In the ordinary way, farms may be bought in New Brunswick from $10 (£2) to $25 (£5) the acre, according to their size, the character of the soil, the condition of the buildings, their nearness to church, school and markets, and the proportion of land under cultivation. Most farmers in the province own the lands they occupy.

Not every man who might do well on an improved farm is suited to the “roughing it” involved in clearing a free grant; but if a newcomer, with little or no capital, is content to work for a time on wages, he can often put by enough to enable him to start to buy a farm for himself. Wages for a good man run from $10 (£2) or $15 (£3) monthly in the winter months to $20 (£4) in the summer, with board and lodging for a single man and a free house for a married one. Sometimes the farmers hire men only for the busy season, but work may often be obtained by a strong man in the lumber camps, even though he may not have had experience of the work. Of course it means hard, long, patient work to obtain success by such means; but the opportunities in New Brunswick are sufficiently great to ensure that thrift and industry usually have their reward.