Next time you travel westward through Brandon, watch the Assiniboine valley as the train begins to climb away from the spacious station. You will see the Experimental Farm in and across the valley, west of the main road to the north, which crosses the river by the steel bridge. It is a lovely sight, of perfectly developing crops, trees flourishing with luxuriant foliage, and buildings which belong to yourself as much as they belong to anybody. As you reflect that the Dominion Government, in the year of Manitoba’s record crop, bought that three hundred and twenty acres of land and buildings on it for twelve hundred dollars, you will know that, in terms of money at least, the West was cheap--to those who had the money. It must not be supposed that because the crop of 1887 was extraordinarily good, farm returns were not fluctuous. Eighty-seven was perfectly fine. Eight-eight was also fine--up to the second week in August. Then came a frost, a killing frost, and thousands of acres of splendidly-grown straw and half-filled heads were plowed in. To those whose grain was far enough advanced not to be utterly spoiled by one awful night, the fall brought a marvellous comfort. It was the time of Old Hutch’s corner of wheat at Chicago; and Western farmers with a pretty fair sample could sell for up to a dollar and twelve cents a bushel. The high prices did not last long, but they were a godsend to those who received them. The fluctuation had its influence on the tendency towards farmers’ organizations which quickly became discernible in the West, and which had already found expression in the Farmers’ Union, the inspiring spirit of which was a Mr. Purvis, a true forerunner of the Motherwells, Crerars, Woods and Morrisons. The Union men objected that, as to grades and prices, the wheat buyer, was a dictator to the man who had driven into town with his load, and must take what was offered, or haul his stuff home on the chance that next week prices would still further be down. The C.P.R., under its monopoly charter, was in a very strong position, and was also under persistent imputation of being in collusion with the grain buyers. Perhaps nothing is more remarkable in modern Canadian life than the suspicion that the railways are at the bottom of every sharp practice which the public believes it has seen, or knows it has endured. In the eighties it was notoriously undeniable that Manitoba farmers, near the boundary, received several cents a bushel less for their wheat than was paid across the line, for exactly the same grade, the price of which was understood to be finally determined by exactly the same final condition--the European market. With the Canadian Pacific enjoying a virtual monopoly, it was easy to assume that the whole trouble was with the magnates of Montreal. But it wasn’t.