[Illustration: BUILDING THE G.T.P.R.: THE TRACK-LAYING MACHINE AT WORK]
Meanwhile the Canadian Northern, following the example of the C.P.R., has inaugurated a superb trans-Atlantic steamship service between Bristol and Canada. A fleet of steamships on the Great Lakes is also controlled by the company that owes its greatness to the genius of three men.
The Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company, incorporated by an Act of 1903, is under agreements with the Federal Government for the construction and operation of a railway, wholly within Canadian territory, extending from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Its main line is to be of an estimated length of 3,600 miles, and there will be several branches of considerable length and importance.
This system, while traversing what is believed to be the richest mineral region of Eastern Canada, will open up an attractive area of Quebec Province and pass along the great clay belt in New Ontario (where a section has already been constructed, in connection with the Provincial Government’s line that affords access to the rich silver and nickel districts).
Concerning the prairie section lying between Winnipeg and the Rocky Mountains, Professor Thomas Shaw, formerly of Ontario Agricultural College, remarks: “The lands are of three kinds. They may be classed, first, as having special adaptation to the production of grain; second, as having such adaptation to mixed farming of which live-stock will form an important feature; and, third, as being mainly adapted to the production of live-stock only. The third class is not very large, the second is much larger, and the first is by far the largest.”
“The splendid native grasses,” observes Mr. E. S. Bayard (editor of _The National Stockman and Farmer_), “the good grain, the apparently favourable conditions for the growth of alfalfa and other clovers, peas, vetches and barley, and the abundance of water, all look good to a man who is interested in live-stock.” “The country pierced by the Grand Trunk Pacific in the Canadian West,” we learn from Professor E. E. Faville (editor of _Successful Farming_), “presents opportunities not to be excelled in any part of Canada.” And this is the testimony of yet another agricultural editor: “Conditions along the Grand Trunk Pacific are generally suitable for grain-growing, including a rich soil, reinforced with a vast quantity of vegetable mould, a sufficiency of rain during the planting and growing season, bright sunshiny days during the ripening season (hastening maturity), an absence of rust (due to the dry period at time of harvest), and an apparently total absence of all insect pests.”