M ANITOBA.*
TEN years ago, the vast territory in North-West Canada, now known as Manitoba, was described with great felicity by Lieutenant-Colonel Butler as the Great Lone Land. The short space of time that has elapsed since then has sufficed to con- vert a wilderness into one of the most prosperous portions of the Canadian Dominion. Manitoba is now, in the judgment of
• Manitoba: its Infancy, Growth, and Present Condition. By the Rev. Professor Bryce, M.A., LL.B. With Mars and Illustrations. London: aunpson Low and Co.
Professor Bryce, the future wheatfield of the world; and the amazing progress which, thanks to the railroads, has been made in a few years, justifies the highest hopes as to the future of this extensive and fertile region. In 1869, the country was transferred to Canada by the Hudson's Bay Company. The surrender of the territory was not made without.
opposition, but it was completed at last, and now this fine country, which had been jealously guarded by traders, is thrown open to the enterprise of Canada and of the Mother-country.
What the future may bring forth we can but faintly guess, from what has been already achieved. In 1871, Winnipeg was a.
village of log-houses, with a population of 300 persons ; it is now a city, containing from 12,000 to 14,000 inhabitants.
More than 70,000 people have migrated to Manitoba during the last ten years, and "the railway is making such a trans- formation as to make the oldest inhabitant wonder whether he may not be in enchanted land." According to the Budget presented in February by Sir S. L. Tilley, in the Dominion House of Commons, the sales of land in the North-West will more than suffice to pay all the expenses of the pacific Railway, and this official assertion corroborates the state- ments made by Professor Bryce. Everywhere there are signs of progress, and signs, too, of that respect for law which is the surest indication of a society based on sound foundations. This, indeed, is said to be one of the most marked changes in the land. Under the rule of the Company, "the so-called law of the country was paralysed by mob-law ;"- but a firm rule has now restored public confidence, and as an illustration of the security of this wide-spreading territory, the author observes that at Humboldt, a telegraph station in the open prairie, and one hundred miles from the nearest settlement, two young women have in perfect safety kept the office for the last two years. From the Indians, even to the foot. of the Rocky Mountains, there is nothing to fear, and their con- fidence in the " Great Mother," Queen Victoria, and in Canada's faith, forms, we are told, a striking contrast to their feeling towards the Government of the United States. In the latter country they have greatly decreased in number, while in Canada there is every reason to believe they are as numerous as ever. It is evident that in order to live they must give up their wandering habits, and adopt an agricultural or pastoral life, and this many of them seem willing to do. They have learnt the advantages of education, and there are now about fifty schools for Indian children established in the Dominion. Professor Bryce is the head of Manitoba College, and his account of the progress of education in a country which was so recently a wilderness will interest and astonish every reader. There are already three colleges in Manitoba, and a Provincial University, which holds its annual examination, the students appearing in the distinctive costume of their several colleges. Sir Wilfrid Lawson would find himself at home in Manitoba, since a kind of Maine Liquor Law prevails throughout a large portion of the territory, and "the city of Winnipeg, and the two counties of Selkirk and Provenchez, in Manitoba, are the only three places in the whole Canadian North-West where liquor is allowed to- be sold."
Settlers in Manitoba flock from all parts. The Selkirk settlement of Highlanders, about which we shall have more to say, forms but one nationality among several, and while in laws, in language, in religion, the British element is in the ascendant, foreigners have also found here a welcome and a home :—
"Several thousands of repatriated French Canadians, who had left the province of Quebec to seek their fortunes in the United States, have left that country, and are now settled in Manitoba. Several thousands of the old Danish colony of Iceland, whose fathers were really the pioneers of western enterprise a thousand years ago,. have left their rocky island, and are now comfortably settled in Manitoba; and reports are, that on account of volcanic action, the whole island of Leland mast be deserted by its inhabitants, and that. their eyes are turned towards the broad acres of the North-West."
The concluding chapters of this volume, describing "Ten Years of Progress," and the "Attractions of Manitoba,' are, in one respect at least, the most interesting. They consist of important facts, simply stated. On the other hand, the long and curious history of the earlier settlers, the benevolent but to some extent disastrous enterprises of Walter Scott's friend, the Earl of Selkirk, the bitter lawlessness of the fur traders, the account of the Selkirk settlement of the Hudson's Bay Company, of the French half-breeds known as Bois-Brilles, and of the chaotic condition of the country are, in a great measure, spoilt in the telling. Captain Butler, by
the way, touches on the same subjects ; and his brief but masterly way of dealing with them forms a striking contrast to the laboured and unmethodical narrative of Professor Bryce. He has ample materials, but unfortunately does not know how to use them. He flits backward and forward in his narrative, repeats what he has said already, and breaks off from one subject to take up another, to the great discomfort and irritation of his readers. "Let us now see where we are in our story," says the author on one page, but this is what we are seldom able to see, and it is only by .constantly retracing our steps that we feel certain of the ground.
The truth is, that the author, owing to the lack of skill in arrangement, has produced a work which, from a literary stand- ing-point, must be pronounced a failure. And this is the more to be deplored, since he has a good subject, sufficient knowledge, and some original sources of information. Indeed, his incidents, had he known how to use them, coda not fail to attract general attention.
A main purpose of the book, and a highly honourable pur- pose, is to defend the memory of the Earl of Selkirk, who, at the beginning of the century, at great labour and cost and in the face of innumerable difficulties, planted a Scottish colony on the Red River. Selkirk had to deal with lawlessness, and was forced, in self-defence, to act with a high hand, but that he was right in the main, and his detractors shamelessly wrong, no one who reads these pages can doubt. What Scott thought of him is evident from a letter now first published, and dated June, 1819, the time, it will be remembered, when, under the strangest physical conditions, the great novelist composed The Bride of Lammermoor. It appears that Lady Katherine Halkett, Lord Selkirk's sister, had written to Sir Walter, asking him, as a warm friend of the family, to place fairly before the world the misrepresentations of her brother's enemies. After mentioning that the state of his health made him feel that he should be attempting an impossibility, if he tried to make himself master of the train of difficulties in which Lord Selkirk was involved, Scott adds :—" Most devoutly do I hope that these unpleasant transactions will terminate as favour- ably as Lord Selkirk's ardent wish to do good, and the sound policy of his colonizing scheme, deserve ; for I never knew in my life a man of a more generous and disinterested disposition, or whose talents and perseverance were better qualified to bring great and national schemes to conclusion." Such a testimony from such a man is worth much, and the facts collected by Mr. Bryce prove that it was well merited. It is the old story, which, under different aspects, is told of nearly all attempts to colonize and civilize a semi-barbarous country. In Canada, the North-West Company, whose head-quarters were at Montreal, wanted no settlers, foreseeing clearly enough that civilisation would curtail their power and endanger their trade. It was nothing to them that the legal rights of the colonists could not be questioned. They could not brook intruders, and if this band of peasants from Sutherland would not take the warning given them, foul measures must be tried. The power of the Company was irresistible, its agents were unscrupulous, and when murders were committed, it was found impossible to obtain justice. On the other hand, a charge was brought against Selkirk of a conspiracy to ruin the trade of the North-West :Company, and verdicts were obtained against him for acts -which the arbitrary and criminal conduct of the Company's agents had thrust upon him. All this is related with much detail by Professor Bryce, but we cannot follow his circuitous narrative. It is enough to say here that "the colony lived and grew for fifty years with varying fortunes," and that the descendants of the Highland refugees still maintain their exclusive position in the province, "with a separate history, separate traditions, and a separate life even from the native population around them."
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