At Victoria we were entertained by gentlemen of public position and were also shown many attentions by private citizens. We were invited to attend a dinner on board of a great British war vessel, then lying at Esquimault. A canvass of our party disclosed the fact that our dress suits had been left at Vancouver, and being on foreign soil and under the domination of her British majesty's flag, we felt it was impossible to accept the invitation, and so, with a manifestation of great reluctance on the part of my associates, the invitation was declined.
We went by steamer to Seattle, Washington Territory, where we remained over night and were very kindly received and entertained by the people. Among the persons who joined in the reception were Watson C. Squire and his wife, then residents of the territory. Mr. Squire, after the admission of Washington as a state, became one of her Senators.
We were joined on this part of our journey by Carter H. Harrison, of Chicago, whose fourth term of office as mayor had just closed, and who was escorting his son and a young friend on a journey around the world. While waiting for the departure of the Canadian Pacific steamer from Vancouver, he joined in this excursion through the sound. He was a most entertaining conversationalist, and we enjoyed his country greatly.
There was much rivalry at that time between the growing cities of Seattle and Tacoma. At a reception in Seattle, one of the party, in responding to a call for a speech, spoke of having inquired of a resident of Seattle as to the whereabouts of Mount Tacoma. He said he was informed by the person to whom he applied that there was no Mount Tacoma. On stating that he had so understood from citizens of Washington Territory, he was informed that there was not then and never had been a Mount Tacoma. The gentleman was informed, however, that in the distance, enshrouded in the gloom of fog and smoke, there was a magnificent mountain, grand in proportion and beautiful in outline, and the mountain's name was Rainier. Later on he said he had inquired of a citizen of Tacoma as to the whereabouts, from that city, of Mount Rainier, and the gentleman, with considerable scorn on his countenance, declared that there was no such mountain, but in a certain direction at a certain distance was Mount Tacoma. The gentleman closed his speech by saying, whether it was Mount Tacoma or Mount Rainier, our party was unanimously in favor of the admission of Washington Territory into the Union.
We visited some sawmills at Tacoma where lumber of monstrous proportions and in great quantities was being produced by a system of gang saws. This is a wonderful industry and as long as the material holds out will be a leading one of that section. The deep waters of Puget Sound will always offer to the industrious population of Washington ample and cheap means of transportation to the outside market, and I predict a great future for the state.
We returned east more hastily and with fewer stops than in the western journey. We spend a night at Port Arthur, and the next day, embarking upon one of the great steamers of the Canadian Pacific line, found among our fellow-passengers Goldwin Smith, the distinguished Canadian writer and statesman. We had a most pleasant trip, arriving at Owen Sound without special incident; thence to Toronto, and by steamer to Niagara, where we remained until the next day, when our party separated for their several homes. The trip occupied exactly a month and was full of enjoyment from the beginning to the end.
After my return home I wrote a note to General Sherman, describing my impressions of the country. In this I said:
"My trip to the Pacific over the Canadian railroad was a great success. We traveled 7,000 miles without fatigue, accident or detention. We stopped at the chief points of interest, such as Toronto, Montreal, Sudbury, Port Arthur, Winnipeg, Calgary, Banff, Donald, Glacier House, Vancouver, Victoria, Seattle and Tacoma, and yet made the round trip within the four weeks allowed. We did not go to Alaska, because of the fogs and for want of time. The trip was very instructive, giving me an inside view of many questions that may be important in the future. The country did not impress me as a desirable acquisition, though it would not be a bad one. The people are hardy and industrious. If they had free commercial intercourse with the United States, their farms, forests, and mines would become more valuable, but at the expense of the manufactures. If the population of Mexico and Canada were homogenous with ours, the union of the three countries would make the whole the most powerful nation in the world."
I then entered into the canvass. I attended the state fair at Columbus on the 2nd of September, first visiting the Wool Growers' Association, and making a brief speech in respect to the change in the duty on wool by the tariff of 1883. I reminded the members of that association that they were largely responsible for the action of Congress on the wool schedule, that while all the other interests were largely represented before the committees of Congress, they were only represented by two gentlemen, Columbus Delano and William Lawrence, both from the State of Ohio, who did all they could to prevent the reduction. Later in the day I attended a meeting of the state grange, at which several speeches had been made. I disclaimed the power to instruct the gentlemen before me, who knew so much more about farming that I, but called their attention to the active competition they would have in the future in the growth of cereals in the great plains of the west. I described the wheat fields I had seen far west of Winnipeg, ten degrees north of us in Canada. I said the wheat was sown in the spring as soon as the surface could be plowed, fed by the thawing frosts and harvested in August, yielding 25 to 40 bushels to the acre, that our farms had to compete in most of their crops with new and cheap lands in fertile regions which but a few years before were occupied by Indians and buffaloes. "We must diversify our crops," I said, "or make machines to work for us more and more. New wants are created by increased population in cities. This is one lesson of many lessons we can learn from the oldest nations in Europe. With large cities growing up around us the farmer becomes a gardener, a demand is created for dairy products, for potatoes, and numerous articles of food which yield a greater profit. In Germany, France and Italy they are now producing more sugar from beets than is produced in all the world from sugar cane. The people of the United States now pay $130,000,000 for sugar which can easily be produced from beets grown in any of the central states." I said much more to the same purport.
I visited all parts of the state fair, and tried to avoid talking politics, but wherever I went on the ground I found groups engaged in talking about the Toledo convention, and the prospects of Republican or Democratic success. I had been away so long that I supposed the embers left by the convention were extinguished, but nothing, I think, can prevent the Ohio man from expressing his opinion about parties and politics. I met William Lawrence, one of the ablest men of the state as a lawyer, a judge and a Member of Congress. An interview with him had recently been published in respect to the resolution indorsing my candidacy. This was frequently called to my attention, and though I had not then read it, my confidence in him was so great I was willing to indorse anything he had said.