I spent there a night on my return, and saw a marvellous change—even since my visit there a fortnight previously. Then people were hard at work putting up wooden shops; now those shops are fitted up with glass fronts, and already filled with merchandise from all quarters of the earth, though in many cases the upper parts of the building are in an incomplete state. Every day ships arrive from the American side; thus, within a couple of days previous to my arrival, 20,000 tons of coal had been landed. There are steamers of all sorts and sizes in the harbour, constantly coming in or going out. On one side a new elevator has been erected, on the other side is a great store of lumber and a saw-mill. Yesterday Port Arthur was a township, now it is incorporated as a city, and rejoices in a mayor. The place is full of hotels, which charge high prices, give very little for the money, and do a roaring trade. A very handsome English church is being erected; just by, the Presbyterians are building one equally handsome, only a little smaller. The Roman Catholics make quite a grand show with their brick church and convent and schools, while the Methodists have a very plain and ugly imitation of an English church, with its steeple all in wood and painted white, which attests, at any rate, if not their taste, their influence and wealth. I visited the school-room, which was filled with bright and well-fed boys and girls, where the children are taught free, as they are all over Canada—where they have, by-the-bye, a compulsory law, which is never enforced, as it is impossible to do so. And then I made my way to the best-looking building in the town—the emigrants’ shed—where already 3,600 emigrants have this season been lodged gratis by the Dominion Government previous to their passing onwards to the North-West. People tell me there is no room for mechanics in Canada. In Port Arthur I see them in constant demand. At one shop window I see a notice to the effect that 10 carpenters are required, at another a demand for painters, while a third shop window seeks to secure good tinsmiths. At the chief draper’s shop there is a notice stating four good assistants are required. What a pity the discontented men whom I left at Montreal, because work was not offered them immediately they landed, did not come thus far! As to rockmen and labourers, they are wanted by the hundred. Surely, Port Arthur must be a good place for the working man and the working girl. Even at Calgary they were paying the female helps at the hotel—as sour a set as I ever saw—and who were constantly quarrelling with John Smith, the Chinaman cook—as much as 40 dollars a month. But even out here a man must have brains.