Canadian Pacific Railway.

The only completed railway across the continent of North America is the Union and the Central Pacific, which connect Omaha with San Francisco (both these places are in the United States); but there are several other lines projected, the principal one of which is the Canadian Pacific, through British territory. This railway will connect the present railway system of Canada with a seaport in British Columbia on the shore of the Pacific Ocean. It will bring British Columbia within about a fortnight's travel from England. The Canadian Pacific railway line has extraordinary advantages over all other existing or proposed trans-continental railways in shortness, and in conditions of climate and description of country to be traversed. Under proper management it cannot fail to be a sound investment, while opening the brightest future to British Columbia, to the Dominion of Canada, and to the Empire.

The Canadian line will shorten the passage between Liverpool and China, in direct distance, more than 1000 miles. The sea-trips from its ends on both oceans will be much shorter than from the ends of the existing American line. The North American Continent also can be spanned by a much shorter line on Canadian soil than by the existing railway through the United States.

The distance from New York to San Francisco by the Union Pacific Railway is 3363 miles; but from Montreal to New Westminster it is only 2730, or 636 miles in favour of the Canadian line. The distance by the Canadian Pacific from New Westminster, British Columbia, to New York (by St. Lawrence and Ottawa, Ogdensburg and Rome, and New York Central) is 305 miles shorter than from San Francisco to New York (by the Union Pacific, Michigan Central, and New York Central). To Boston, the difference in favour of the Canadian inter-oceanic route is 335 miles. To Portland, the difference in favour of the Canadian route is 521 miles.

There can be little doubt that Europe, and particularly England, will derive vast benefit from the extended cultivation of the rich lands through which the page 73 Canadian Pacific Railway will pass. These lands, it is quite well known, contain the best unoccupied wheat-growing tracts in North America, and are very extensive. The comparative lowness of the surface makes the climate on the Canadian route, though farther to the north, less severe than the climate on the existing railway in the United States.

The Government of the Dominion of Canada is bound by the terms of union with British Columbia to begin the construction of this line within British Columbia before July, 1873, and to complete it before ten years, so as to connect the Pacific seaboard with the Eastern Canada railway system. The Dominion Government has prosecuted the preliminary surveys with energy and success. A chartered company has been formed, and there is no doubt that the railway will be at once begun and its construction pushed on.

More direct railway communication with Eastern Canada will supply the great want under which the province has laboured; but long before the line shall have been completed British Columbia will have derived benefits of the most substantial character from the work of construction alone, and the Canadian Pacific Railway will prove in many ways one of the most active and efficient agencies in adding to the population of the province.

The railway company is to receive a large money subsidy from Canada, but the work will be undertaken mainly on the Land Grant system, which has been a common method of providing the means to make railways in the United States. A few words describing the working of this system in the United States will enable the intending settler in British Columbia to judge of the probable effect of the passage of the Canadian Pacific Railway through the province.

In the United States the Government subsidises the railways by granting them immense tracts of land adjoining the lines finished and in operation. This liberality is more apparent than real. The grant extends generally, I believe, 20 miles on each side of the railway; but the Government reserves to itself every alternate section on this area, the price of which it at once raises. Thus its position as to the value of its property is just the same as before the railway was constructed; the Government grants the railway every alternate section over a certain area, and doubles the price of the half it retains. The traffic advantages afforded by the railway make the land well worth the increased price, and it settles up rapidly. Every settler brings to the railway a treble advantage. He is a consumer, and much of what he consumes must pay freight; he is a producer, and a large portion of what he produces must also pay freight; his mere settlement adjoining the railway increases the value of its land which lies all round him, for settlers are gregarious and like to have neighbours. By this system the Government, while parting with nothing in actual value, gives the railway a large subsidy, and the railway possesses two sources from which to reward its enterprising projectors—the usual source of goods and passenger traffic, and the exceptional source arising out of the increasing value of the land it obtains from the State. There are persons who object to the system on the ground that it gives away the "land of the people" to wealthy and powerful corporations; but the "lands of the people," when inaccessible, are useless to them or any one else, and unless the railways led the way, might remain unpeopled for generations to come. The railway bears the poor settler to land which he can buy for a few dollars an acre and pay for by instalments, which a little industry enables him to discharge by sales of his surplus produce; it bears the wood from the forest, where it is a nuisance, page 74 to the prairie, where it is a necessity; and it keeps up that constant stream of communication with the outer world, without which the settler might, indeed, live in rude abundance, but could get no market for his produce, could never amass wealth, and could not fail to lose many of his civilised habits to which his children would be brought up strangers. And all these advantages can be secured with incredible facility.

If there is any political danger in the existence of such powerful corporations in young countries, the law must be adapted to meet such danger. Economically, the advantages of railroad extension in these countries are apparent. Money and steam-power could not be more beneficently employed.