Western Canada and its Great Resources
The Testimony of Settlers, farmer Delegates and high Authorities

32 'western CANADA wheat-growing or stock-raising. The reports given in this pamphlet of those who have visited the country will doubtless satisfy most persons on this point, but should there still be any doubt in the mind of any we would refer to an able and exhaustive letter from the gifted pen of no less an authority than the late United States consul at Win- nipeg, the Hon. James W. Taylor, which was published iirtheNew York Sun. In this letter the esteemed consul proved that in. the great northern and western country of which tbe pamphlet treats not only is there millions of acres of rich arable land, but that because of its northern latitude it is more especially adapted to wheat-raising than the more southerly situated lands. Space will not permit a full publication of the Hon. Consul Taylor s letter, but we give below a few extracts from it, which perhaps will be of value to the reader. The consul opened his letter with the following significant paragraph :— “ The area of the wheat district of Central Canada, between Hudson’s Bay and Lake Superior for its eastern and the Rocky Mountains for its western boundary, and latitudes 50° to 60°, has been ascertained' to be of uniform productiveness; and by no means a narrow selvage beyond the international boundary, as intimated by Mr. C. Wood Davis in a recent contribution to the Arena. The summary of this grand paral- lelogram of cereal growth and matui'ity is a series of facts and inferences which is the result of considerable experience and observation as a United States consul at AV innipeg. Let us first consider the broader area of north-west America extended beyond the prairie division to the Arctic and Pacific Oceans, and trace on the map of North America the area enclosed between longitudes 100° and 170° west of Greenwich and latitudes 50° to 70°—a fourth of the continent—embracing the Canadian provinces, present and prospective, of Manitoba, Assiniboia, Saskatchewan, Keewatin, Mackenzie, Athabasca, Alberta and British Columbia, and the American territory and future State of Alaska. How little conception have we from present developments of what the twentieth century will witness over this vast realm of nature. . It will assist our prophetic vision to compare an equal area on the map of Europe identical in climate and other natural manifestations. Trace 70° of longitude—60 east and 10 west of Green- wich—and from latitude 50° to 70°, and mark the relations of man to earth. The European parallelogram includes England, Ireland, Scotland, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Belgium, Holland, and most of Germany and Russia in Europe, represented by the cities of London, Liverpool, Dublin, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Berlin, St. Petersburg, Moscow, Nijni Novgorod and Archangel.” And then, after citing a large number of important facts, and giving the experience of the highest author ities in the country as to the fertility of the soil, the nutritiousness of its gras es, its pre-eminent adaptability to wheat-raising, the consul gives the opinion of the late Dr. Samuel Forry, a writer of eminence in the American “ Journal of Geology,” as follows :— “ He states as a universal fact that the cultivated plants yield the greatest product near the northernmost limit at which they will grow. His illustrations embrace nearly every plant known to commerce and used either for food or clothing. Cotton, a tropical plant, yields the best staple in the temperate latitudes. Flax and hemp are cultivated through a great extent of latitude, but the lint in southern latitudes, forced into pie- mature maturity, acquires neither consistency nor tenacity, and we must go to the north of Europe to find these plants in perfection. Rice is tropical, yet Carolina and Florida grow the finest in the world. Indian corn is a sub tropical ^)lant, but it produces the heaviest crops near the northernmost limits of its range. In the West Indies it rises 30 feet, but produces only a few grains on the bottom of a spongy cob, and is regarded only as a cough provender for cattle. In the rich lands of the middle Statesit will often produce 50 to 60 bushels to the acre, but in New York and in New England agricultural societies have actually awarded premiums for 125 bushels to the acre. Wheat is a more certain crop in New York, in northern parts of Pennsylvania and Ohio, and the Baltic districts of Europe, than in the south, either of Europe or America. In the spring it is not forced too rapidly into head before it has time to mature fully or concoct its farina. Oats grow in almost every country, but it i-s in northern, regions only, or very moist or elevated tracts, that they fill with farina suitable for human sustenance. Rye, barley, buckwheat, millet, and other culiniferous plants might be adduced to illustrate the