possessions that have come to us by the sacrifice of men in the ways of necessary industry or in the struggles of unavoidable war. As the work proceeded on the North Shore, some new methods were introduced rather unexpectedly. We say unexpectedly, because there had been very little work done before that time in Canada over similar territory. The process of levelling rocks down was found to be practically impossible, on account of the great expense and time involved in the effort. So the plan of levelling up was tried with excellent results. Wooden trestles were built in a great many places between the rocks. Then the construction trains came over and dumped broken stone until the space below was filled up with the best possible material out of which to make a safe and durable road-bed. In order to get the material for this process, great quarries were opened up all along the line, whence crushed rock was taken to find the new and excellent use just mentioned. Of course all this tremendous expenditure of labour and capital on the North Shore gave the critics of the whole Canadian transcontinental railway idea a new opportunity. Capt. Palliser’s report as to the impracticability of a railway across the continent on British soil, Mackenzie’s idea in regard to using the water stretches for transportation as links in a trans-continental system, as well as the early Stephen-Hill plan of linking up with Hill’s line at Sault Ste. Marie, and thus having traffic between East and West in Canada go for some few hundred miles through the States—all these arguments were brought out to support the statement that Canada would be ruined by such wild schemes as building a railway section across the barren waste of rock on the North Shore. These persistent endeavours to block the work of construction were having their pernicious effect in sowing the seeds of discontent throughout the Dominion. And, what was much more serious, these statements, sown broadcast in the Old Country, made London centres of finance dubious in regard to the judgment of the railway directors who would undertake such an exceedingly difficult piece of work. This means that the raising of money in London was practically impossible. British investors have always been venturous enough and will, when Empire interests are in the balance, be ready, for patriotic motives, to take some special hazards. But in this case they were being told by mischief-makers, not only that the North Shore section was outrageously expensive, but that, according to the honest opinion of as great an authority as Sandford Fleming, it should not be constructed with the hope of making running expenses until the West had a population of three millions. It had then not many thousands. And the British investors were being also informed by opponents and rivals of the Canadian Pacific that no Imperial interests would suffer if the North Shore construction was