Canada, the Spellbinder

Bishop Strachan of Toronto, a priest of the Church of England, whose life fell between 1778-1867, was a strong force both in church and state. No servant of God within the entire Dominion has left a nobler record. When (in 1832) the scourge of Asiatic cholera swept over Canada, it was he who inspired courage, administered the sacraments to the dying, and sustained the survivors. His aid, both legislative and otherwise, to the cause of education, and his activity in promoting all progress in Ontario, are among the most precious records of that province. One passage from his personal counsel may well be held in memory:

"Cultivate, then, my young friends, all those virtues which dignify the human character, and mark in your behaviour the respect you entertain for everything venerable and holy. It is this conduct that will raise you above the rivalship, the intrigues, and slanders by which you will be surrounded. They will exalt you above this little spot of earth, so full of malice, contention, disorder; and extend your views, with joy and expectation, to that better country."

Nothing in all religious advancement is more impressive than the great work of the Methodist denomination in Canada. Their vital and fervent spirit has kindled the zeal of the people with the flame of the living coal on the altar. One of the remarkable contributions to the lofty order of creative forces was made by the Reverend Doctor Egerton Ryerson, the celebrated Methodist leader, and the organiser of the Public School System of Ontario. In 1841 Doctor Ryerson became Principal of Victoria College; in 1844 ne was appointed Superintendent of Public Schools in Upper Canada, and he brought to bear upon educative work the enduring impress of his ideals. "By education I mean not the mere acquisition of certain arts," he said, "but that instruction and discipline which qualify men for their appropriate duties in life, as Christians, as persons in business, and as members of the civil community." Doctor Ryerson lived until the year 1882, and he thus was enabled to see much of the fruit of his wise and untiring endeavour.

Although the Right Honourable Sir Wilfrid Laurier is still, happily, dwelling among his countrymen and lending to many notable occasions the rare distinction and the prestige of his presence, the gratifying fact that he is a factor in the life of the hour cannot constrain one to fail to express the recognition of Canada's indebtedness to his splendid services during her more recent past. A native of Quebec (born in 1841) his unqualified devotion has been given to the Empire without regard to restriction of race or language. His political career as a member of the House opened before he was thirty years of age; six years later he was called to the Cabinet; and in June, 1896, at the age of fifty-five, he became the Premier of the Dominion. When the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria was celebrated, one special feature was the invitation extended to all the Prime Ministers of the British Empire to honour it by their presence. Among these Ministers Sir Wilfrid was singled out for many special attentions. He was distinguished by being made a member of the Imperial Privy Council; he was appointed a Knight of the Grand Cross of the Order of St. Michael and St. George; he was invested with honorary degrees by both Oxford and Cambridge; he was made an honorary member of the Cobden Club which awarded to him a gold medal "in recognition of exceptional and distinguished services to the cause of international and free exchange." Sir Wilfrid Laurier visited President Faure and the President of the French Republic named him as a Grand Officier of the Legion d'Honneur. In 1902 Sir Wilfrid was invited to the Coronation of Edward VII. and his presence at this imposing ceremonial reflected distinction of the highest order on Canada by his brilliant and impressive addresses made on Imperial interests and affairs. England could not but realise that in the Parliament of the vast country over the sea there were orators who would add new lustre to her national eloquence and splendid traditions.

Well, indeed, has Canada been called the country of the Twentieth Century. To no inconsiderable extent the appliances that introduce a new order of life have been either invented or first experimentally considered in the Dominion. Indeed, as if already under the spell of Destiny, these great modern miracles of communication—the railways, telegraphs, and telephones will be forever associated with the name of Canada; the country that cradled James Jerome Hill and Samuel Rogers Calloway; in which William Cornelius Van Horne and Charles Melville Hays gave the best years of their lives to building and improving transportation facilities; in which Alexander Graham Bell initiated his experiments and where he still makes his summer home; and in which Thomas Alva Edison worked as a telegraph operator on the pioneer railway, where he printed and issued The Grand Trunk Herald, the first newspaper ever printed on a railway train.

In the light of the eventful period that has passed since that momentous date of August, 1914, it would seem to be a curiously prophetic glimpse that rose, like a mirage on the far horizon, before Sir Wilfrid Laurier when, in response to a toast at the banquet given on June 18, 1897, by the Imperial Institute in London in honour of the Colonial premiers, he said:

"... England has proved at all times that she can fight her own battles; but if a day were ever to come when England was in danger, let the bugle sound, let the fires be lighted upon the hills, and in all parts of the Colonial possessions whatever we can do shall be done to help her.... I have been asked if the sentiments of the French population of Canada were those of absolute loyalty towards the British Empire. Let me say ... it was the privilege of the men of our generation to see the banners of France and of England entwined together victoriously on the banks of the Alma, on the heights of Inkermann, and on the walls of Sebastopol."

Seventeen years had but passed—from 1897 to 1914—when again the banners of France and England were intertwined; and since that fateful midsummer's day what treasure and sacrifice has not Canada poured out with a courage and unflinching heroism for which words furnish no adequate interpretation. The future of the Canadian Dominion is seen, in the words of the poet, as "along the grand roads of the universe." Her citizens realise that "To-day is a new day" and the hand of Destiny is leading her on to exemplify to the world a new and a more glorious civilisation.

CHAPTER II

QUEBEC AND THE PICTURESQUE MARITIME REGION

The Maritime region of Canada embraces only, strictly speaking, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick; although Quebec is sometimes thought of as being included in this historic portion of the Dominion, because of its geographical situation. The city of Quebec has always been a favourite point of pilgrimage, and when Mr. Howells, in his early youth, enshrined it in a half-romantic narrative, as the scene of Their Wedding Journey, its attractions were heightened by his facile and charming pen. The old French city dates back to 1608, and its history, for more than a century and a half, is really the history of Canada as well. All the maritime provinces of Canada take a prominent place in poetic legend and lore as well as in historical associations. When, in 1845, the poet Longfellow wrote his tender and touching, though historically misleading poem, Evangeline, the poem focussed the general attention on Acadia (the modern Nova Scotia and New Brunswick), and particular attention on the little village of Grand-Pré, which,

"... distant, secluded still,"

lying in the fruitful valley, invited many excursions of those who delight in pilgrimages to poetic shrines. For

"Plant a poet's word but deep enough,"

and woodland or hill, mountain or shore, are thereby enchanted. The Maritime region, still vocal with the dreams and discoveries of adventurous spirits; where all pledge and prophecy still linger in the air; where impassioned endeavour, long-patient endurance, faith to break a pathway through to untrod regions with some Ulysses to inspire a faith that it is never too late to seek a newer world—how wonderful is the spell this province weaves around the wanderer!

The noble St. Lawrence is a river that fairly fulfils the purposes of a sea, with its kaleidoscopic shore lines, now bold and forbidding, now dreamy and undefined with their fleeting, ethereal beauty; and all the maritime land is pervaded by memories and associations of the brave Cabot who first sighted Nova Scotia on June 24, 1497, the date of the special festa of his native Italy—this festival of San Giovanni, when all Venice is on the Grand Canal in the fleets of gondolas; all Florence illuminated at night, a resplendent spectacle from her surrounding hills and her background of purple amethyst mountains; and when Rome, at night, disports herself in a thousand ways upon the Campagna Mystica. It was a fitting date for Cabot, the Venetian, to discover the new land. Voices unheard by others had called to him; hands, from starry spaces, beckoned and led him on. What was there in the air but

"Winged persuasions and veiled destinies,"

and all the past that came thronging to meet all the future? Cabot, Venetian born, English by adoption, was followed by several other intrepid explorers, and not to insist too much upon chronological order, what a group of wonderful names are associated with all the province of Quebec! Cartier, Champlain, Frontenac; Sir Humphrey Gilbert of the Elizabethan period, whose brave expedition was engulfed by winds and waves and went down in the great deep off Campobello.

"Alas, the land-wind failed.
    And ice-cold grew the night,
And never more on sea or shore,
    Should Sir Humphrey see the light."

But the high ideals these heroes brought did not go down nor become extinguished in the storm-tossed waters.

"Say not the struggle naught availeth!"

The struggle always avails, and leaves humanity better and farther on than the effort finds it. Then, too, came a band of holy women, the Ursuline nuns, and the sacred zeal of the novitiate lent its vital power. What is there not of spiritual nobility, of sublimest self-sacrifice, of thrilling ideals, of a truer life, associated with the early history of Canada? This is all a part of her spellbinding power; it has left its significance on the air, its impress in wave and tree and flower; its exaltation in every heart.

Quebec city is now becoming an attractive winter haunt as well for those who love out-of-door sports in the snowy carnival and who find themselves so comfortably domiciled in the Château Frontenac. The esplanade of Dufferin Terrace commands delightful views across the St. Lawrence as far as the Isle d'Orleans. The Citadel, the Parliament Buildings, the Ursuline Convent, the Basilica, and the palace of the Cardinal; together with the libraries, Laval University, the drives to the old battle-grounds, and the excursion of twenty-one miles to the shrine of Saint Anne de Beaupré, provide the visitor with abundance of interest.

The Ursuline Convent covers seven acres of ground in almost the centre of the city of Quebec. It is the largest convent on the continent, and it dates back to the July of 1639, when Marie Guyart, and three other sisters of the Ursuline order, under the protection of the Archbishop of Toulouse, were led by Divine guidance to the new country of Canada and entered on their work. Marie Guyart, the foundress of the convent, was the daughter of a silk merchant of Tours, France, and her childhood is invested with legends similar to those that are associated with the name of Catherine of Sienna. She married one Joseph Martin, but at the age of twenty-three she was left a widow, and soon became a novitiate of the Ursulines, rising to be the Mother Superior of her convent. At the age of forty, through the instrumentality of the Duchesse D'Aiguillion, a niece of Cardinal Richelieu, she came to "New France," and as recently as the August of 1911 this remarkable woman was canonised by the Sacred College of Rome and named as a saint under the title of Marie de l'Incarnation. For thirty-three years she pursued an exalted life in the convent of her founding, and died at the age of seventy-two, in the May of 1672.

A much-sought shrine is that of Saint Anne de Beaupré, easy access to which is gained by the electric railway, and in the summer it is a pleasant local sail down the St. Lawrence. The legend runs that a group of Breton mariners, in the early years of the seventeenth century, found themselves almost engulfed in the river in the sudden violence of a storm, and that they called upon la bonne Saint Anne for deliverance; earnestly declaring that if she would save them they would erect to her a shrine at whatever point she should bring them to land, and that this shrine should be sanctuary forever. The good saint was merciful to their entreaties, and guided them safely to land. According to their promise they at once built a small wooden chapel, very near a spring whose waters are claimed to possess a miraculous power for healing. Since that remote time three larger churches on this site have successively replaced each other, the latest of which dates only to 1878. The primitive little chapel is still preserved, even as at Assisi the Portiuncula of San Francisco is preserved near the magnificent church of Santa Maria degli Angeli.

That marvellous ministry of San Francisco (who is more familiarly known to us as Saint Francis of Assisi), which was initiated in the thirteenth century, love and sacrifice being the supreme ideals, is recalled to mind by many of the legendary incidents relating to Saint Anne de Beaupré. The mystic pilgrimage to Assisi, the "Seraphic City," is to some extent paralleled by the latter-day pilgrimages to the shrine of Saint Anne. "Any line of truth that leads us above materialism," said Arch-deacon Wilberforce of Westminster Abbey, whose passing on to the life more abundant at the date of this writing is but the larger inflorescence of his beautiful and consecrated life—"any line of truth that forces us to think and to remember that we are enwrapped by the supernatural, is helpful and stimulating. A human life lived only in the seen and felt, with no sense of the invisible, is a fatally impoverished life; a poor, blind, wingless life." Such is the deep, perpetual conviction of mankind. "The things that are seen are temporal; the things that are not seen are eternal." The mystic union of the soul with God is the one underlying and all-determining truth of life.

"Oh, beauty of holiness!
Of self-forgetfulness, of lowliness."

The latest church erected here as the shrine of Saint Anne was not completed until 1889, and it was then proclaimed a Basilica by Pio Nono. It is one of colossal space and splendour, a remarkable triumph of the Corinthian architecture, and between the two towers of the front a superb statue of Saint Anne rises above the façade. The interior is rich in paintings, sculpture, and mosaics, and on a column of onyx is another statue of the saint in whose name the church is built. It has also a Scala Santa, as has the vast Basilica of San Giovanni in Rome. Thousands of suppliants annually visit the shrine of Saint Anne. The church has a superb chasuble, the gift of Anne of Austria and Queen of France, the mother of Louis XIV. On either side of the entrance are huge piles of canes and crutches and other discarded appliances left as visible testimonials that the efficacy of prayer at this shrine enabled their possessors to dispense with adventitious aid.

Dufferin Terrace, Quebec, from the Citadel

A little book that is for sale by the Redemptorist Fathers, who occupy the monastery connected with this basilica, gives much curious information regarding Saint Anne. She is represented as being of the tribe of Judah and of the royal family of David. Her husband, Joachim, was of the same family, and of the same tribe, and the Blessed Virgin was their only child. This little record further narrates that the body of Saint Anne was originally buried in Bethlehem; but that it was brought to France by Lazarus, who, after being raised from the dead by the Saviour, became the first Bishop of Marseilles. The body of Saint Anne was then committed in burial in the village of Apt, and when Charlemagne came to celebrate the Easter feast—so runs the story—a man who was blind, deaf, and dumb came to the ceremonies, and was instantly restored. The first words he uttered were: "This hollow contains the body of Saint Anne, Mother of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother of God." With the clue given in these words the hollow in the rocks was then opened and the body disclosed. This took place in the year 792, and from that remote date to the present time the church of Saint Anne at Apt has been a notable place of worship and of pilgrimage.

In the Basilica of Saint Anne de Beaupré there are some rich and massive reliquaries of gold, inlaid with jewels, in which the holy relics of the Saint are enclosed. All the gold and the jewels are votive offerings left by grateful pilgrims to this shrine who have been restored to health. It is said that there are literally bushels of watches, chains, bracelets, rings, and all manner of personal adornments that have been given in gratitude for blessings received. Large gifts of money are also among the never-ceasing stream of accumulating wealth. Twelve large chalices of gold, valued at ten thousand dollars each, have been constructed from the rings and personal articles left by the devotees. The church is fairly lined with the evidences of grateful appreciation and the tributes of enthusiasm. Each chapel is a memorial gift of personal gratitude; the altar, organ, and the electric light plant are also personal gifts, and to these there is a rather curious story attached.

Over a long period of years the newspapers of the United States printed advertisements of a widely-known patent-medicine lady who brewed her concoctions, and either by means of their intrinsic worth, or by the credulity of her customers, accumulated a large fortune. It is said that this lady made a journey to the church of Saint Anne out of curiosity, alone, but was suddenly stricken with a severe illness; that she was cured by faith, and that, through the direct influence of Saint Anne, she then became a Catholic and was baptised in the Basilica. She at once abandoned her pursuit and expressed her desire to devote her fortune to good works, in honour of the Saint; and it was she who presented the altar, the organ, and the electric light plant as well as other rich and valuable gifts.

Around the shrine of Saint Anne de Beaupré has grown up a village of some two thousand people, with hotels that accommodate hundreds of guests. There are two convents, several schools, a hospital (providing for the accommodation of the poor who come to be healed), and the monastery already mentioned. The Sisters of the Rosary have also established an academy for young women; the Sisters of Saint Francis have built a convent for their order, and the Redemptorist nuns have their own convent, while there is also a seminary for the education of priests that has about three hundred students.

The sermons of the Fathers who conduct the services in the Basilica are preached in both French and English. Sixteen priests hold continual devotions from four in the morning until nine at night. The number of annual visitors is estimated as being nearly two hundred thousand, representative of almost every nationality and language. An American publicist asked one of the Fathers whether every one who came was cured. "By no means," replied the priest; "although the miracles are many." When asked how he accounted for the failures the Father replied that he was not able to account for them; that a failure might be due to lack of faith, or to some other reason not disclosed to them. Faith is always to be reckoned with as a condition through which alone the Divine energy can flow.

In the vicinity of Saint Anne there is some beautiful scenery—Montmorency Falls, and other points of interest; Quebec, too, is almost as much frequented in winter as in summer, the bracing air being to many the very elixir of life.

Quebec Province has always kept a distinctive atmosphere of its own, due largely to the preponderance of the French-Canadian element and to climatic and topographical conditions. Advantages and privileges are constantly increasing. Macdonald College, at Saint Anne de Bellevue, founded by Sir William Macdonald, admits women on equal terms with men, and beside the School of Agriculture, it has a training institution in Domestic Science and a school for training teachers. The Department of Domestic Science is free to all Canadian girls, and students from outside of Canada pay a small tuition fee and a modest fee of some three dollars and a half a week for board-residence. On this great college Sir William Macdonald's initial expenditure was five millions of dollars. Five hundred and sixty acres were secured for the farm, of which nearly four hundred are devoted to the live stock and grain department, while the remainder is divided between vegetable, poultry, and bee culture, with a liberal share allotted to horticulture.

It is to Quebec that the middle west of the United States must look for the early history of its own great explorers, missionaries, and pathfinders; for it was from here that Champlain, La Salle, Marquette, Joliet, and others fared forth on their pioneer journeys through the Mississippi basin. Champlain died in Quebec on the Christmas Day of 1635; but his burial-place is still undetermined. The Jesuit College in which Père Marquette was domiciled ante-dated Harvard by one year, having been founded in 1635. Here Marquette made his plans for tours along the Great Lakes and down the Mississippi, with the object of converting the Indians. This Jesuit College bears the signal honour of being the first institution for higher education on the North American continent.

Something of the unique and exceptional character of the great Cardinal Richelieu, whose tomb in the Pantheon in Paris is an object of continual pilgrimage by the visitors in the French capital, seems to invest Quebec, the city of which he was the real founder. The convent and hospital of the Hotel Dieu were due to the solicitude and enterprise of his niece, the Duchesse d'Aiguillion, whose interest centred in the promulgation of religion and charities, and these institutions are still preserved as memorial monuments to her fervour. Quebec is pre-eminently a city of churches and the old French Cathedral dates back to 1647. The interior is enriched with several paintings of especial value, among them Van Dyck's "Crucifixion," which was painted in 1630, and which, in the Revolution of 1793, was purchased in Paris by the Abbé des Jardins of Quebec, and presented to the cathedral. In the sacristy are two large vaults filled with sacred relics. The vestments belonging to this cathedral are superb.

An interesting church is the Anglican Cathedral, standing in the centre of the city, to which the late King Edward VII. presented an exquisite Communion service.

For the celebration of the tercentenary of Quebec, Cy Warman, that genial poet (who has set so much of Canada to music), wrote an ode in the dialect of the habitant, of which two stanzas run:

"How you kip yourself so young,
                Ol' Quebec?
Dat's w'ats ax by all de tongue,
                Ol' Quebec;
Many years ees pass away,
Plaintee hair been turn to gray,
You're more yo'gker ev'ry day,
                Ol' Quebec.

Som' brav' men hees fight for you,
                Ol' Quebec;
Dat's w'en Canada she's new,
                Ol' Quebec;
De brav' Wolfe, de great Montcalm,
Bote was fight for you, Madame,
Now we're mak' de grande salaam,
                Ol' Quebec."

The traveller with an impassioned devotion to what he fondly calls "the quaint" may be signally gratified in Quebec. In the business section there will be found one street only four feet in width, quite rivalling the famous via d'Aura in Genoa, the "Street of jewellers," where one can stand in a shop on one side and almost reach his hand into the shop opposite.

The Legislative Buildings are as delightful as those in the other capitals of the Provinces of Canada; and on the brow of the high bluffs are a group of notable buildings of architectural beauty—the splendid Château Frontenac, with its view of thirty miles up and down the St. Lawrence valley; flanked by monasteries, churches, and public structures. The citadel that crowns the height is extremely picturesque to visitors who have all the enjoyment, while the Canadian Government has the doubtful felicity of keeping in due repair this enormous fortification. It was begun two hundred and fifty years ago, and reconstructed in 1823, on plans approved by the Duke of Wellington, at a cost of twenty-five million.

It is not so well known that the Duke of Kent, the father of Queen Victoria, was in command of the garrison of Quebec for several years; that the old-fashioned building in which he lived was restored by his royal daughter, and that his grand-daughter, the Princess Louise, Marchioness of Lorne (later the Duchess of Argyle), when living at Rideau Hall, Ottawa, during the period of the Marquis of Lorne's Governor-Generalship of Canada, laid the foundation stone of this restoration. Moreover, the Princess herself, with that versatility of gifts which characterised Her Royal Highness, devised the architectural plans for the new structure. Nor must the ancient gates of the old wall of Quebec be ignored in any tribute to her picturesque attractions.

Laval University in Quebec is a resort of many students, on account of the numerous manuscripts of historical value deposited there, many of them containing graphic narratives of thrilling experiences undergone in the pioneer days of the Dominion.

To turn from Quebec to the Maritime Provinces proper, they are not by any means all scenery, or historic and legendary atmosphere. Nova Scotia has large lumber interests, with fisheries, mineral wealth, and great iron and steel manufactures; and New Brunswick has ever been the home of the great timber and now of pulpwood so precious in these latter days. Prince Edward Island has a vast amount of red sandstone, and in the regions adjacent to the Bay of Fundy an enormous yield of hay is a feature of resource. The position of the Maritime Provinces is particularly noted by Mr. J. Castell Hopkins, in an extended account of these regions, and he speaks of the climatic peculiarities as one of the things with which the inhabitants must reckon. They have a great coast-line in proportion to their area. The extensive bays and harbours suggest future increase of ocean commerce and travel. "Prince Edward Island is in reality all seacoast," writes Mr. Hopkins, "for no matter how far into the interior one may get, an hour's drive in any given direction will almost invariably discover salt water. There are bays which deserve special mention, one, the beautiful Bay de Chaleur, between New Brunswick and the Gaspé Peninsula, without rock, reef, or shoal in its ninety miles of length and forty-five of breadth, is unique in its safety to navigators, while the Bay of Fundy, between Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, with its mouth wide open to the south-west, has features which are peculiar only to this bay. Lying funnel-shaped toward the great tidal movement from east to west it gathers from the incoming tide a great deal of water that does not belong to it, and then gradually compressing it between narrowing shores, piles it up in places sixty feet in height, and this gives rise to many peculiarities. This rush of tide twice a day has formed enormous areas of marsh land and the process is still going on. The great rise and fall of water in this bay has also a climatic effect in it that keeps the air continually moving, and in the regions about its head there is probably a cooler summer climate than can be found anywhere in the same latitude."

Harbour of St. John, New Brunswick

This peculiarity unfits the climate for fruit-raising, but is especially favourable for live stock. The production of hay is very large. The water supply is inexhaustible, and water-power is always at hand to grind grain or to transform trees into lumber. The spruce and fir are found here in great abundance. The Maritime Provinces have practically no mountains, although a few heights approaching two thousand feet may be seen. Of late years the people of this region have been urged to develop agriculture to a greater extent. It is already demonstrated that wheat, barley, oats, buckwheat, and corn can be cultivated with profit; potatoes and carrots also thrive. In New Brunswick, apples, pears, grapes, and cherries do well; and every one knows of the apple orchards of Nova Scotia. The dairy industry is one of the greatest sources of revenue. Factories for the making of cheese and butter are numerous; and quite apart from the home market, the facilities for export to Europe and to the markets of the South are one special factor in the conditions for profit. Agricultural schools, a feature of the Dominion, have a particularly good representative at Truro, and the Federal Government has established experimental farms and stations throughout the Dominion, while the provincial authorities have also organised similar enterprises under their own jurisdiction. The Provincial Government of Ontario, in particular, has devoted large sums to the encouragement of agriculture, having three experimental farms, one of these being devoted to fruit.

The Central Experimental Farm of the Dominion Government is at Ottawa and there are branch farms at Charlottetown on Prince Edward Island; at Fredericton, New Brunswick; at Nappan and Kentville, Nova Scotia; at Saint Anne de la Pocatière, Cap Rouge, and Lenoxville in Quebec; at Brandon, Manitoba; at Indian Head, Rosthern, and Scott, Saskatchewan; at Lethbridge and Lacombe in Alberta; and also at Agassiz, Invermere, and Sidney in British Columbia. Sub-stations have also been established at Fort Vermilion in the Peace River District, at Grouard near Lesser Slave Lake, Grande Prairie, and Forts Resolution and Providence—all these being in northern Alberta. At the Central Experimental Farm (at Ottawa) much attention has been paid to tests, as to the growing of oats, barley, varieties of grass, and turnips and mangels. Nor has the culture of ornamental shrubs and trees been neglected; and orchards of various kinds of fruit have been planted with watchful care. Potatoes, too, have received special attention as one of the most profitable products of this region.

The picturesque attractions of the Maritime Provinces, moreover, tend to make them each year a summer resort for increasing numbers of people from the United States and elsewhere. Mail routes are well extended; the postal service is good; and the improvements in navigation have included the erection of many lighthouses on the prominent headlands and in the harbours, so that the scenic panorama at night witnessed by those on or near the coast is often most fascinating, and the presence of these aids to navigation is full of practical reassurance to those who travel by water.

Halifax is important not only as the capital of Nova Scotia, but as the leading seaport of Canada on the Atlantic coast. It has a magnificent harbour whose even depth is a joy to the navigator; it is curiously free from extremes of temperature, the coldest day of one average year being but eight degrees below zero (in February), the warmest day falling in early September when the mercury registered eighty-seven degrees. The evenings are always cool. The city has its citadel, its rocky areas, and beside its university (Dalhousie) there are colleges doing various special work, institutions for the defective classes, and several libraries, that of the Institute of Science and History being consolidated with the Library of Parliament. In the magnitude of its exports Halifax stands next to Montreal. In its imports it ranks third, Montreal and Toronto alone taking precedence of the Nova Scotian capital.

CHAPTER III

MONTREAL AND OTTAWA

Montreal, the metropolis of Canada; Ottawa, the Capital; each a city supreme in a certain individual type; within three hours of each other by rail, are closely inter-related, as are New York and Washington in the United States. In England, and in France, the Capital and the metropolis are one; but there are certain advantages to a country when its legislative centre may be kept apart from the engulfing life of its commercial metropolis. It was one of the felicitous inspirations of Queen Victoria when she chose the little village that had been known as Bytown (in honour of Colonel By, the builder of the Rideau Canal) to be the capital of the Dominion and to be known as Ottawa. For many years the parliamentary sessions had alternated between Montreal and Quebec. The foundation stone of the new Parliament Building was laid by the Prince of Wales (later Edward VII.) in 1860, when the youthful prince made his memorable tour of the Dominion and the United States. Some seven years later the first parliamentary session was held in the new capital. A most significant session it was, as it marked the date of the complete federation of all the Canadian Provinces then existent and ushered in the Dominion.

It is an anomaly that Montreal, a commercial metropolis of the most prominent and pronounced type, should be the one Canadian city that most lends herself to idealisation. One treads her thoroughfares as if under the spell of some Merlin of old, and sees the moving panorama of life as if in distance and in dream.

One is led on by invisible hands; he is haunted by voices that for centuries have been silent on earth; beckoned by some inconceivable sign and signal in the dreamy blue of the distant horizon, in whose shades phantom forms are vanishing.

"Flitting, passing, seen, and gone,"

baffling all recognition, yet beckoning by mystic flash from the ethereal realm. Was it one of these vanishers, questioned the observer, as a gleam passes in the distance, or was it instead a flash from some electric circuit, to be scientifically accounted for? One is steeped in bewilderment, for who indeed may interpret this legend-haunted air? The life of the dead centuries presses closely upon the life of the throbbing hour.

The visitor to Montreal instantly feels that anything might be possible in the strangely fascinating atmosphere of this old-world city. One has more than crossed the border line between the Dominion and the United States; one has crossed the border line of centuries. Is it 1535 or is it 1915? The twentieth century clasps hands with some dim historic period. The result is bewildering. All modern beauty of vista, of groups of sculpture, or the architectural magnificence of stately and splendid public buildings, of magnificent private residences, of cathedral and churches, of great institutions, of all latter-day conveniences and luxuries of life—all these, as one would find in New York or Paris; yet with them, as an intangible and invisible scenic setting, an impalpable atmosphere lingers, that haunting impress of the far-away past, of historic associations that persist with singular vitality; of great personalities who trod these regions where now stretch away the handsome modern streets; of intense purposes borne on the air, purposes that struggled to fulfilment, or went down to temporary defeat in darkness and tragedy—all these seem to throng about the visitor who for the first time finds himself in Montreal.

Montreal may be entered by many ways, by land or by sea; but she is very conveniently entered from New England.

It is a picturesque trip, that between Boston and Montreal, and as the sun journeys onward to the horizon line the purple valleys and the rose and amber that tinge the summits of the Green Mountains afford luxurious contrasts of colour. In the late evening the brilliant illuminations of Montreal at the west side of the Victoria Jubilee Bridge, spanning the St. Lawrence River, come into view.

In all Canada, perhaps, there is no more beautiful view than that of Montreal lying under the white moonlight with Mount Royal in the shadowy background, as seen from the railway train crossing the Victoria Jubilee Bridge. The broken reflections of the moon are seen in a wide track in the rippling, dancing waters in the middle of the river, while every lamp of the long rows that border each side of the bridge is repeated in the river below. The water front of the city is all aglow with brilliant lights; backward, in the soft, receding shadows, gleam points of light from myriad homes, and the long lines of street lamps make illuminated avenues of the thoroughfares. The moon, like a silver globe, hangs over Mount Royal, while floating clouds imprison the radiance for an instant and then, relenting, set it free again.

Interior of Notre Dame, Montreal

Nor is the view by daylight less to be remembered. The mighty river sweeps under the massive and majestic structure, while hundreds of steamers, sailing vessels, steam tugs, craft, indeed, of every description, are plying the waters of the St. Lawrence opposite the harbour, and the vast city of Montreal in its transcendently beautiful location at the base of the mountain completes a picture never to be forgotten. For miles the harbour is lined with imposing stone structures, the city's warehouses; and the numerous manufactories, with their tall chimneys sending out great volumes of smoke, stretch away on the shores of the St. Lawrence as far as the eye can reach, with their story of the wonderful commercial metropolis of the Canadian empire. The picture is one to enchain the artist and the social statistician as well. It is of itself a study in economics and commercial development.

From an engineering standpoint this bridge ranks with the foremost structures of contemporary achievements. The Victoria Tubular Bridge which it replaced was built in 1860, and was at that time considered the eighth wonder of the world; but it became insufficient to meet the increase of traffic, and in October of 1897 the work of building the present stupendous structure was inaugurated. The chief engineer was Mr. Joseph Hobson, whose ingenuity and skill contrived to utilise the tube of the old bridge as a roadway, on which a temporary steel span was moved out to the first pier, the new structure being then erected outside the temporary span. Begun in 1897, it was completed in 1899, and during its construction the enormous traffic of the Grand Trunk System was delayed very little, a remarkable fact when it is realised that while the old bridge weighed nine thousand and forty-four tons, the new one weighs twenty-two thousand tons, and while the width of the former was but sixteen feet, the width of the new bridge is sixty-six feet, with a height of from forty to sixty feet, while the one it replaced was but eighteen feet high. The old bridge was built for seven million dollars, while the new one cost two million pounds. The latter carries trains in both directions at the same time, trains with two consolidation engines and tenders, coupled, whose average weight is five thousand two hundred pounds to each foot of length, with a car-load of four thousand pounds to the foot; and a moving load on each carriage way of a thousand pounds a foot. Nor is there any limit prescribed for the speed of either railway trains or carriage and motor car crossings.

This magnificent structure is, indeed, a marvel of the age. There was a pretty scene that lives in memory which marked the date of October 16, 1901. On the very spot where the Prince of Wales (later King Edward) stood when he drove the last rivet in the old Victoria Tubular Bridge in 1860, stood their Royal Highnesses the Duke and Duchess of Cornwall and York (now King George and Queen Mary), with a group of the officials of the railway, thus linking into succession notable events separated by more than forty years.

As one of the wonderful achievements of the opening year of the twentieth century, this bridge draws thousands of sightseers, every year, to study its beauty and marvellous efficiency.

The scenes that Cartier saw fade from the eye, and one sees the solid and splendid business quarters of Montreal, the charming and enticing residential sections. Yet again an anomaly—a mountain in the heart of a city! And it is ascended, not by climbing over perpendicular rocks, but by an easy gliding car that makes its ascent as much a part of a pleasure drive as might be the drive in Hyde Park or in the Bois du Boulogne. Mount Royal suggests in some way the Monreale of Palermo, save that it is crowned by no cathedral, but from its height of a thousand feet it offers a panorama of city and river and wood and mountain ranges that is indescribable. What must be the influence on a city's life of having such a resort as this? It is in itself a prospect of unique and unrivalled beauty; it is a playground for all forms of recreation, al fresco; it is spiritual sanctuary. Again, the mystic vanishers beset one's footsteps, and signals beckon from the vast azure sea of the air. The sunset splendours glow and deepen over Westmount, Montreal's most beautiful suburb, which climbs up the mountain side, with such views, such charm of outlook, as one might well travel many a league to find.

It is again in that realm where nothing is but what is not, that one is led to that haunt of the student and the antiquary, the Château de Ramezay, built more than two hundred years ago by Claude de Ramezay, then governor of Montreal. And if the American Congressional Commission, comprising Franklin, Chase, and Carroll, who sat there for days and nights arguing, pleading, insisting that Canada should unite with the thirteen states in their rebellion and defiance of King George, had prevailed, had the Canadians yielded, what would the course of history have been? How would its trend of events have contrasted with the present? It is an interesting and curious speculation not without historical value of its own.

The Antiquarian and Numismatic Society of Montreal acquired the Château de Ramezay in 1895, after the building had passed through several vicissitudes of ownership, to make of it an Historical Portrait Gallery and Museum. One finds here a copy of the old painting in oils of the first Ursuline Monastery in Quebec, which was built in 1640, and destroyed by fire a year later, the original work being in the Ursuline Convent in Quebec. In the foreground of the picture is the house that was occupied by Bishop Laval in 1699. A large number of interesting old portraits are here, the gifts of the descendants or adherents of the sitters themselves; and coats-of-arms, antiquities, documents, and other matters of interest make up a valuable historical museum.

Montreal is enshrined in legendary lore. The Ile de la Cité, in Paris, is hardly more entangled in mystic story than is the metropolis of the Dominion. The tale that has come down the ages that the martyred preacher Saint-Denis walked from the heights of Montmartre, near Paris, to the Ile de la Cité, carrying his severed head in his hands, does not more challenge one's confidence in its authenticity than do many of the legends that haunt the imagination of the visitor in Montreal. About the middle of the seventeenth century a permanent settlement was founded in La Place Royale, near where the old Customs House now stands. Upon a warehouse in close proximity is placed a tablet with an inscription to the effect that on this site stood the first manor-house of Montreal, which from 1661 to 1712 was the seminary of St. Sulpice.

The story of the settlement of La Place Royale is one of the mystical tales to be found in the Relations des Jésuites, and it tells that Jean Jacque Olier, an Abbé of France, suddenly experienced a deep religious re-awakening, and gave himself with ardour to devising and carrying out new projects in connection with the education and training of young priests in St. Sulpice, Paris. Hearing of the settlement on the island of Montreal he conceived the idea of founding a mission there. The Sieur de la Dauversiére, of Brittany, had conceived a similar project, and the two men met, by chance, as strangers at Meudon. Although they had never seen each other before, they fell into each other's arms and related their plans; they obtained the aid of Madame de Bullion and other influential leaders at court, and formed a society known as the Compagnie de Notre Dame de Montreal. It is further related that about this time a young nun, Jeanne Mance, had a vision in which she was called to go to the same place and found a convent. A French writer records that then a miracle took place: "God, lifting for her the veils of space, showed her while yet in France the shores of the island and the site for Ville Marie, at the foot of the mountain." The little company landed from the St. Lawrence on May 18, 1642, and at the first religious service held, Father Vimont said, "You are a grain of mustard seed that shall rise and grow till its branches overshadow the earth. You are few, but your work is the work of God. His smile is upon you."

Thirty years later the first streets were laid out in Montreal. Religion and education went hand in hand. In 1721 the population had increased to three thousand; steam navigation was initiated in 1809 by the second steamboat built in America (the first being that of Robert Fulton which plied on the Hudson in 1807) and the steam river traffic between Montreal and Quebec was thus begun. Navigation across the Atlantic from Canada opened in 1831; the first railroad was successfully started in 1836; and Montreal was incorporated in 1832. The Lachine Canal had been completed in 1825. From the first, Montreal has been prosperous, and the present metropolis, rapidly nearing a population of three-quarters of a million, with its nine miles of river front, its fifty public parks, its admirable municipal improvements in all modern appliances, stands as a monument to the faith and devotion of its early founders led to the wilderness as by vision.

Montreal has an Art Gallery, of Greek Ionic architecture, built of Vermont marble, the entrance hall lined with Bottichino marble, with handsome staircases, and numerous salons. The collection of pictures and sculpture is already an interesting one, and an annual Loan Exhibition is made possible by the generous enterprise of the citizens, many of the private collections being very rich in artistic treasures. Nor is music neglected in Montreal. The organ recitals at Christ Church Cathedral are famous far beyond the city.

Women's work in Montreal is a very prominent and valuable feature of the city's life; including much social service work and the promotion of guilds of various orders. The Canadian woman, indeed, plays an important part in the entire life and progress of the Dominion. The churches of Montreal include many of great beauty, such as Notre Dame, St. James' Cathedral, Christ Church Cathedral, and others. The Grey Nunnery, covering an entire block, and the Royal Victoria Hospital are impressive buildings; and the banks and office structures of the city are in many cases very imposing and seem to duplicate the stately and impressive architecture of London.

There is no Canadian industry that is without representation in Montreal markets, and her manufactures have a world-wide repute. Montreal is the greatest grain port of America, taking precedence of New York in the quantity of grain handled at her port.

Situated on an island thirty-two miles long and from four to eight miles wide, at the junction of the St. Lawrence and Ottawa rivers, Montreal is a seaport, although a thousand miles from the sea; for the construction of a thirty-foot channel enables the largest ocean vessels to sail to her docks. The Canadian canals enable the steamers of the Great Lakes to sail to the harbour of Montreal, where they transfer their cargoes to the ocean steamers. Montreal has, indeed, almost unrivalled facilities by both rail and water. Her harbour is under the control of a Board of Commissioners appointed by the Government of the Dominion, and twenty-seven millions of dollars had been spent in providing the most approved modern facilities up to the beginning of 1916, with nine millions more for the same purpose already available. Both her export and import trade have been increasing so rapidly that even these liberal endowments are taxed to the utmost.

With this commercial supremacy, the City of the Royal Mountain offers educational advantages and scientific culture of the highest order. The great value of the McGill University is not only the distinction of its intellectual position, or the high quality of its work, but also its guarantees of equality of educational opportunity to all whose career comes within the sphere of its influence. The princely endowments of the late Lord Strathcona and of Sir William Macdonald provided a foundation whose far-reaching value can hardly be estimated, and the university has been singularly fortunate in the character and endowments that have graced her staff of professors. While McGill offers special training of the most advanced type in preparation for the various professions, and for the acquirement of technical qualifications, she has never yielded to any purely utilitarian standards. She has held to the ideal that Education is primarily for the soul herself, and not, as said the Grecian philosopher of old, "to be undertaken in the spirit of merchants and traders, with a view to buying or selling." It is the glory of McGill that she sends forth, not only culture and trained skill, but men prepared for the duties of citizenship, and the obligations, the privileges, the responsibilities that await them as members of society.

Montreal City

"Manners are formed and personality is built up in the school of life,—even the student school. Honesty, purity, reverence,—all the moral virtues, in fact,—are just as important for the youth of the country as are learning and scholarships. We want to have a hall-mark for McGill men by which they may be known and recognised the world over. It lies with our students themselves to set the standard. 'How truly it is in man,' as Mr. Gladstone said to the students in Edinburgh, 'in man, and not in his circumstances, that the secret of his destiny resides. For most of you that destiny will take its final bent towards evil or towards good, not from the information you imbibe, but from the habits of mind, thought, and life that you shall acquire during your academic career. In many things it is wise to believe before experience; to believe until you may know; and believe me when I tell you that the thrift of time will repay you in after life with an usury of profit beyond your most sanguine dreams, and that the waste of it will make you dwindle, alike in intellectual and in moral stature, beneath your darkest reckonings.'"

There was one little incident in the scientific history of McGill that is not without its special interest to-day in the safe-guarding of human life. This was the first application of wireless telegraphy to the operation of moving trains. Many people now believe that in the wireless control of moving trains lies in the future the most effectual protection against railway accidents. It was in 1902, just six years after Marconi made his successes in England, that the experiment was first tried. Professor Ernest Rutherford, now of the University of Manchester, and Professor Howard T. Barnes, both of the Macdonald physical laboratory of McGill, were invited to accompany the American Association of General Passenger and Ticket Agents, who in that year held a convention in Portland. The Grand Trunk provided a special train from Chicago to Portland, and on this train, when moving at fifty miles an hour, signals were exchanged with a given station, and with the comparatively simple apparatus installed it was found possible to keep the train in communication with a station for a distance of eight or ten miles.

Ottawa was obviously created to be the capital of the Dominion. Her interesting history, initiated by the choice of Queen Victoria, the glory of whose long reign is a priceless possession of the Dominion, attracts careful study; and the first view over the charming city and its equally charming environment, is one to linger for a lifetime. The majestic beauty of her Parliament Buildings

"Set on the landscape like a crown;"

towers and bastions and buttresses clinging to the height on which they are built above the river; and the exquisite outline of the turrets and high-pointed tower of the magnificent Château Laurier all silhouetted against the western sky—

"Dim in the sunset's misty fires,"

offer a pictorial enchantment to linger in the memory. This young city, with hardly more than half a century's life behind it, has made itself a distinctive point in the States as well as in the Dominion.

"Have you seen Ottawa? Have you stayed in Château Laurier?" are interrogations not unusual among us in the States when Canada is discussed. Is Ottawa, with its artistic Château Laurier, the Carcasonne of the newer world? For surely no guest of the Château Laurier quite dreams of classing it among ordinary hotels; in it he tastes a flavour of something a little apart, of life in an artistically appointed palace which he enters from his railway train through a brilliantly lighted marble corridor reminding him of the entrance to Bertolini's on the terraced hills of Naples. The Ottawa Grand Trunk Station itself, built of white marble with its pillared façade, is like a Greek temple, and the richly decorated corridors and salons of the Château are as reminiscent of Venice as of France. This magnificent hotel was of course named after Canada's great statesman, the Right Honourable Sir Wilfrid Laurier, G.C.M.G., whose bust in marble adorns the entrance corridor. The decorations are of the François I. period; the building is absolutely fireproof, and the luxurious furnishing suggests that of private palaces rather than of an hotel.

One of the most interesting places in Ottawa is the Archives, a handsome stone building completed in 1906. The extensive records of Canadian history under the able and courteous administration of Dr. Arthur Doughty, Keeper of the Archives, are made accessible to scholars and research students; and this building has become one of the haunts of the savant. Numerous glass cases are filled with valuable manuscripts and documents; historic souvenirs abound; the library contains over twenty thousand books; and there are many beautiful paintings and engravings in the various rooms, illustrating important epochs in the history of the Dominion and also including many portraits of value and interest.

Ottawa—showing the Parliament Buildings and Château Laurier

The Experimental Farm, three miles out of Ottawa, covers nearly five hundred acres of land, and it is one of the chief attractions, offering, as it does, so much efficient instruction in the seeding, culture, and harvesting of agricultural products, and the care of live stock. Not far from this Farm is the Royal Astronomical Observatory, built in Romanesque style, with a central octagonal tower under a revolving hemispherical dome, containing the telescope. The Observatory comprises an astronomical library, photographic and lecture rooms, and a reading-room.

Ottawa is a growing city and is one of the beautiful capitals of the American continent with the population now approaching the one hundred and fifty thousand mark. There is much of old-world ceremony in the city.

Rideau Hall, the residence of the Governor-General (at the time of writing, the Duke of Devonshire, who succeeded His Royal Highness the Duke of Connaught and Strathearn), is a rambling grey stone structure, with ample grounds, comprising some eighty-five acres. The gracious character of all ceremonial courtesies and hospitalities at Rideau Hall are deeply appreciated by the people of the Dominion. The Duke of Devonshire is the head of one of the greatest of English families, the Cavendishes, and his appointment was a popular one with Canadians. The Duchess of Devonshire is the daughter of a former Governor-General of Canada, the Marquis of Lansdowne, and is no stranger to Canada.

In an address given by the Duke of Connaught before the Canadian Club, his Royal Highness thus alluded to the position of Governor-General of the Dominion:—

"I do not know of a prouder position for any Englishman to hold than that of his Majesty's representative as Governor-General of Canada. When my late brother, King Edward the Seventh, asked me to accept this high post, an offer which was renewed after his death by our present gracious Sovereign, I felt great doubt as to whether I could do justice to so high a position. I had no doubt that I should be a friend of the Canadians to-day as I was forty-three years ago. Since I have been in Canada the last year and a half, I have felt more and more that I have been able to gain the keen sympathy and, I venture to say, the affection of the whole Canadian people. I am sure you will believe me when I say that I never spent a happier year and a half. To Englishmen who have not been in Canada, I say the sooner they go the better. It is moving with leaps and bounds."

The Parliament Buildings occupy a commanding site near the park in which the Château Laurier is built, thus sharing the advantage of all the lovely grounds. The Rideau Canal, with its locks, joins the Ottawa River in this park, under the very shadow of Parliament, offering a picturesque feature as it passes to the Rideau Lakes. The extensive Library of Parliament is, happily, open to the people, and its generous hospitalities and rich resources have been of themselves a signal attraction to scholars and literary workers. Fortunately the greater part of this library escaped destruction in the fire of 1916 that partially destroyed the Parliament Buildings, although as they will be restored with increased facilities, the calamity was not wholly evil in its results.

The Library of Parliament is built upon the lines of some of the famous old chapter-houses in England attached to a noble cathedral. The interior is circular, with a dome of forty-two feet in height, a vaulted roof and rich carvings. It is an interior rich in the revelation of all that is best in the realm of thought, all that touches human interests and makes for those nobler ideals which are the real resources of life.

The beauty of the Parliament Buildings in the early dawn has been celebrated by an Ottawa poet, Duncan Campbell Scott:

"Fair, in the South, fair as a shrine that makes
    The wonder of a dream, imperious Towers
Pierce and possess the sky, guarding the halls
    Where our young strength is welded strenuously;
While, in the East, the star of morning dowers
The land with a large tremulous light, that falls
    A pledge and presage of our destiny."

CHAPTER IV

TORONTO THE BEAUTIFUL

Toronto, city of education, culture, religion; a city of homes with all that makes for the beauty and the happiness of family life; Toronto, with her noble University whose enrolment of students exceeds in number that of Oxford, her conservatories of music, her impressive cathedrals and churches, her splendid Parliament Buildings, and her classic Public Library with its numerous branches—the capital of the rich province of Ontario, this beautiful and inspiring city of Canada provides, indeed, an ample basis for the enthusiasm and devotion of her citizens. No city could be more advantageously located, seeing that she commands the blue waters of Lake Ontario. Toronto is the centre from which radiate several of the most picturesque excursions into the western continent. The world-wonder of Niagara Falls is in her near neighbourhood. From Toronto all the summer "playgrounds" of Canada may be reached with the utmost convenience and readiness; or the tourist may make that picturesque sail down the St. Lawrence; or, again, would he be like Wordsworth's Stepping Westward, he may take train and embark at Sarnia for the tour of the Great Lakes, ending at the terminal of Fort William, whence again he may wander into all the scenic glories of Canada.

At Toronto the holiday-maker may board the luxurious train for Huntsville, where he takes the steamer for that idyllic cruise by the chain of lakes that lands him at the fascinating Hotel Wawa; or gives him access to any one of a myriad resorts in the unique Lake-of-Bays region. Algonquin Park, the Muskoka Lakes, all these "Highlands of Ontario" which are attracting throngs of summer wanderers, are within easy reach of Toronto, to all of which, indeed, the city is the gateway, and the distributing centre as well. The playgrounds of the Dominion are much appreciated by the great nation lying on her southern border. New England and the West have long been increasingly familiar with the allurements of a Canadian summer; and now the southern states, on and near the Gulf of Mexico, are sending out for information of the facilities for vacation sojourns amid the parks and lakes and shining rivers of Canada. Those far-famed Canadian resorts, comprising not only the Lake of Bays, Algonquin Park, and Muskoka, but Timagami, Kawartha Lakes, French River, Lake Nipissing, and Georgian Bay, all lie north of Toronto, and these resorts, some of them over eighteen hundred feet above sea-level, with their invigorating, balsam-laden air, are a revelation to the visitor from the heated South.

The Southerner finds himself especially enthralled by Canada's long summer days and lingering twilights, with their ethereal and almost unearthly beauty of amber lights and evanescent shadows, a beauty that has hitherto been rather exclusively associated with Scandinavia, the land of the midnight sun. What an hour for a twilight paddle across some crystal lake, in turning homeward after an idyllic day. Canada has been fortunate in keeping her wilds singularly unspoiled, for practically only one railway line extends into all these romantic regions, that of the Grand Trunk System, which has been the means of the multiplication of delightful summer hotels and rustic camps. These Canadian resorts (whose range of prices is so moderate as to amaze the people from the States) are as socially delightful as they are in scenic charm. They are characterised by the refinement of courtesy and generous hospitality that is the hall-mark of the Dominion.

Toronto is one of the most accessible centres of the North American continent, being only three hours from Buffalo, one night from New York and Boston, and fourteen hours from Chicago.

Does all this enumeration of her charms only have to do with getting away from them? The citizen of this beautiful city on the lake will assert that there is another equally spellbinding range of charms to be enjoyed without wandering far away from Toronto itself.

The harbour of Toronto is one of the most beautiful of any of the water-front cities. It has a rather curious configuration formed by a picturesque island of more than two thousand acres that forms a species of breakwater. In the summer the waters near the island are alive with craft. Every kind of sailing boat, canoes, and yachts, as well as motor and steam launches, may be seen riding the waves. The island itself is utilised in much the same fashion as Coney Island in the New York harbour, as a resort for popular amusement. With this inland sea of Lake Ontario at its doors, with its fine architecture, its development and culture of the arts, professions, and industries; with such picturesque treasure as that of the Rosedale ravines, the Humber valley, the Don River, and the gentle hills, Toronto is well calculated to be one of the embodied inspirations of the Dominion.

It is claimed that there are more homes, each with its green lawn and its garden—homes owned by their occupants—within the thirty-six square miles that comprise Toronto than in any other city on the American continent. Toronto is truly a thing of life in its expansion. The construction of streets and buildings is in constant progress and the residential limits are being carried many miles into the country. Within the past decade the city has crossed two rivers, marched up a hill, and clambered over two ravines, all of which give the residential region an aspect of romantic beauty. The architectural charm of the city impresses the stranger; especially the cathedrals of St. James and St. Michael and the University of Toronto, that great Norman pile, dignified and with its old-world atmosphere. Surrounding it are the colleges—Victoria, with its Gothic dining-hall and residences; St. Michael's, Knox, and Wycliffe. Soon Trinity will join the ranks of college settlements. McMaster, the Baptist University, is at the northern edge of the campus, and not far away are the great medical schools, the School of Science, the Conservatory of Music, the University Library, the Dental College, and the many college residences. The University of Toronto is perhaps the largest English-speaking University in the British Empire, and the year 1916 found two thousand five hundred of her sons fighting for the Empire. The Royal Ontario Museum, with its Oriental and Indian collection, lies to the north of the campus, and the great General Hospital as well as a special hospital for children are adjacent. Many of the churches are of real beauty—St. Paul's Anglican, a structure which cost one and a half million dollars; the Eaton Memorial on the hill; the Metropolitan Methodist, owning ground estimated as worth over two millions; and the parish church of St. James, with its tower over three hundred feet in height. The Margaret Eaton School of Literature and Expression is an institution of great value, attracting students from all parts of the Dominion. As a theatrical and a musical city, Toronto shares with New York, Boston, and Montreal many of the most noted dramas and musical entertainments. As a musical centre herself, Toronto ranks fourth among the large cities of the continent; and she has an annual average of four thousand musical students. Her own Mendelssohn Choir is not only conceded to be the finest in America, but one of the best in the world.

Nor are the graphic arts neglected in Toronto. There are already two leading organisations, the Ontario Society of Artists and the Canadian Art Club. A College of Art was founded in 1912; there is a Women's Art Association, an Arts and Letters Club, which has issued a very creditable Year Book of Canadian Art, as well as a Heliconian Club, composed of women engaged in artistic and literary work, and who, presumably, quaff the living waters of Helicon to reinforce their energies.

In her Public School System, with an enrolment of thirty-five thousand pupils, Toronto employs many of the most advanced educational methods of the day.

If the visitor in Toronto were to ask for what is perhaps the most really significant factor in the city's life, and one which is likely to be missed by the surface observer, the answer would be that this factor would be found in the Public Library System, so splendidly administered by the Chief Librarian, George H. Locke. A Canadian, a native of Toronto, Mr. Locke was allured for a few years by Harvard University and the University of Chicago; but fortunately for his own city, he has chosen to devote himself to her development and culture through the medium of library work, in a manner whose original genius for relating literature to the needs of the people, and more especially to the youth and the children, is making itself felt in the Dominion as well as in the city.

In many aspects of his manifold and remarkably adjustable system, Mr. Locke creates his own precedents. In any survey of the processes in many of the noted libraries of the past, the chief aim, if not regarded as the chief duty, of the keeper of books has seemed to be that of protecting them from popular contact. The books were to be safeguarded from too familiar approach as are the works of art in the great galleries and museums. In every case they did not, it is true, imitate the methods of the Laurentian Library in Florence and chain the books to the desks, but something of the spirit of the stern custodian was in them all. Mr. Locke at once outlined his policy on the basis of his conviction that books were made for the people, and not the people for books, and that opportunities for more knowledge and greater intelligence should be provided. More especially he held that books had indispensable messages for the youth of a great city. The adult readers were welcomed and accorded every possible opportunity and privilege; but the children were not to be merely welcomed, they were to be enticed by the very attractiveness of the surroundings to come in from the highways and the byways to the feast of literature provided so lavishly for them.