CORRESPONDENCE.
Salt Lake Gay, August 27, 1871. Sin,—As I have been for the last month almost constantly in the company of emigrants for the Far West, and am now in the heart of the country they are opening up, I think I can scarcely do better than give my impressions of the changes now going on. England is scarcely less interested than America in knowing in what directions the surplus population of the world is about to drift.
In the first place, let me say that I was perfectly startled at the rapidity with which new country is being taken up. I travelled along this line three years ago, and can scarcely believe my own eyes when I see what a transformation has been effected. Then the country between Omaha and Fort Laramie was little better than a desert ; every station was fortified against the Indians, and we travelled with a pilot engine ahead of us to secure us from surprises, and with rifles in ovary carriage to be used in case we were attacked. Now from Omaha to Ogden there is almost an unbroken line of settlement, by which I do not mean that there are farms and houses everywhere, but that all the waste laud is being used for cattle-runs, and at least half the stations are little townships. Indians are no more a danger than gypsies in Eng- land. We passed some hundreds of thorn in their bright scarlet blankets coming back from a buffalo-hunt, and they barely turned to look round stolidly at us. We carried no arms and took no precautions. But the emigrants do not content themselves with the lands which a single line of railway has opened up. They are pouring oven into Oregon, where I thought a climate with six months' rain would have secured the territory from invasion for twenty years to come. As for the fertile country of Manitoba, to which the Dominion of Canada is inviting emigrants, it is said that the whole extent of it is already claimed several times over, though it is five days' journey from a railway-station. Of course these claims, set up by Indians, half-broods, squatters, and land-jobbers, are more or less what is called bogus, and it is quite possible that no real titles can be proved to more than a tenth of the territory. Still they serve to show that the keen-eyed land-jobbing class believes the time to have come when Manitoba is about to be
peopled. By this time every nationality has its favourite line of settlement.
A great many English and North Irish stay in Canada ; Germans, Danes, and Swedes go to Milwaukee, and thence scatter westward. Emigration agents have been at work in France hoping to make capital out of the disordered state of the country ; but I arn glad to hear that they have failed to attract settlers to Canada, and that the French know enough of America to prefer the parts round St. Louis, where there is a large French colony. In fact the province of Quebec has little to offer the emigrant ; much of its land is taken up, and the climate is so rigorous that for some time past the dock labourers have demanded double wages on the ground that they can only work half the year. Were it not for the growing demand for Canadian lumber in Europe, Quebec would scarcely exist as a commercial port.
I wish the English emigrants were as wise as the French ; but the predilection our countrymen show for Canada strikes me as, on the whole, unwise. Canada was never more prosperous than it is to-day, yet its towns, except Montreal, scarcely show any signs of growth. The great intercolonial railway traverses a country which I was told nothing can render populous. It is true the new territory obtained from the Hudson's Bay Company turns out to be even better than was believed. But the government of the Dominion is taking no steps to develop it. A letter which I have just received from a friend who has spent the summer there gives an account which is borne out by all I have learned in Canada :— " The Canada Government seem determined to make a muddle of the Rod River business. Thoy play into the hands of the French party who rebelled, and slight the loyalists who stood up for them. I suppose it is not altogether unnatural, but they will find loyalty at a discount if they over have another row. They have shamefully delayed surveying the country, and are only now treating with the Indians, so that people do not know where to settle; and at the same time, they are forwarding immigrants and making no provision for them. What on earth those are to do I cannot toll, as it is impossible for them to make preparations for the winter. And the way in which they are sent on is disgraceful. The road from Thunder Bay is rough enough any how ; but the unfor- tunate immigrants have to carry all their goods and the boats' contents over between harbours, and when they come to the end of the lakes they have to walk the hundred and odd miles to Fort Garry. There are, of course, carts, as is announced, but they are only enough to carry the luggage. In the last batch a sick man had to walk thirty-five miles in a day. There is a good deal of ill-feeling in the settlement, though I hope matters are not too bad to quiet down in time."
Nevertheless, I incline to think that the home labourer will do better in emigrating to Canada than in not emigrating at all. Just now there is an ample demand for labour and at really high prices. The railways are advertising for hundreds of hands, and the farmers complain that they cannot find men. With the prospect of three months' certain employment before him the labourer may safely risk his future. At the worst, he can cross into the States, which, in my opinion, he had better do at once. The golden days of emigration are not yet over, but are, I think, surely numbered. I am told that the price of State lands is being doubled out in the West. Two dollars is beginning to be the minimum price of the acre, and only inferior land can be got at this rate. Those who know the reckless liberality with which land in America is given away to railways or set aside for school endowments will understand that the State domain is no longer
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