work in this country at that time, when we state that, one winter, provisions having ran out at one of Mr. Sifton’s camps, he had to send supplies by dog-trains 160 miles, and then have it carried on men’s backs, 60 miles further, making it to cost twelve cents per pound freight from Winnipeg to the camp, and at no time during the best part of the season could he deliver the same goods at their destination for less than five cents per pound freight. In 1875, the firm of Sifton, Ward & Co. were awarded the contracts for sections thirteen and fourteen of the Canadian Pacific Railway, and Mr. Sifton, the senior member of the firm, undertook charge of section fourteen, which commenced at Red River, and extended a distance of seventy-seven miles to Cross Lake. During this time he removed to Manitoba, settling at Selkirk, and here he remained until the completion of his telegraph and railroad contracts. The money involved in these two operations amounted to about a million and a half dollars. In 1879, he took up his abode in Winnipeg, where he purchased some real estate outside the city limits, and erected for himself a fine residence. Taking advantage of the “boom of 1881,” he sold out this property and moved to Brandon, where he now resides. Here he has invested a considerable sum of money in farming lands, and for four years succeeded in raising in each year from 10,000 to 18,000 bushels of grain. But the years of frost (1883, ’84, ’85) having made the raising of wheat or grain in large quantities a risky business, and the collapse in values of all kinds of property, especially real estate, have forced Mr. Sifton to suspend business operations in this direction for the present. However, from his experience of over twelve years in the North-West country, and a thorough practical knowledge of farming, he thinks that although extensive farming has been in the past, and may prove in the future from certain causes, a failure, when compared with Ontario, yet he is impressed with the idea that it cannot be equalled on this continent for fertility; always providing, however, that the present hindrances to its prosperity be removed. What Mr. Sifton wants for his country is fair competition in freights; the abolition of all monopoly; readjustment of our present tariff, so that it may have the same chance as Ontario; a reasonable homestead law that will not be changed every year, and pre-emptions at such a price that the settler can meet it in a reasonable time. If these concessions were made, he thinks the North-West would make such strides onward that the most sanguine of us would fail to realize. Mr. Sifton, during his busy life, has devoted time to other things besides purely business matters. In 1852, he became a member of the Order of the Sons of Temperance, and in 1854, he also joined the Good Templars, and has kept up his connection with these active temperance organizations to the present time. In 1867,