SETTLING ON THE LAND
The largest proportion of emigrants to Canada go with the intention of
settling on the land. The villages of England, Scotland, and Wales are
sending out tens of thousands of labourers’ and farmers’ sons dreaming
golden dreams of success in the mixed farming of Nova Scotia, New
Brunswick, Quebec and Ontario, in the wheat growing and cattle raising
of the Prairie Provinces, or in the fruit farming of British Columbia.
They have been brought up in British methods of agriculture in a country
where land is monopolised by the few, is rented by the cultivators, is
subject to heavy taxation, and in which the drain upon the land for
centuries has been so heavy that the soil has to be continually enriched
with expensive fertilisers, and even then there must be rotation of
crops. British agriculture is a most hazardous speculation in view of
the uncertainty of our seasons, the increasing importation of foreign
supplies, the fluctuation of prices, the nature of the soil, our
climatic conditions, and our methods of agriculture. Of late years the
tendency has been towards intensive cultivation and cultivation of early
crops and fruit and vegetables under glass. We are naturally a
conservative-minded people, and nobody is so conservative as the man
bred on the land. The first thing to be impressed upon the British
emigrant deciding to settle on the land in Canada is that he should keep
on assuring himself that he knows nothing about farming at all, that
when he reaches Canada he will have everything to learn and a very great
deal to unlearn. This is a primary and essential condition of success. I
was told many stories of immigrants from the Old Country who have
arrived full of assurance, prepared to “knock spots” off the Canadians
with their primitive methods of agriculture. They took a farm, they
refused to ask or to take advice, and at the end of the first year they
were poorer and sadder but wiser men. A good many of this type dropped
farming altogether when their small stock of money was exhausted, and
they were at their wits’ end to know how to carry on. They got a job on
the railway, in a business house, or in some other occupation and had
time to think about their mistakes, and if their desire was to resume
farming they resumed it when they had saved a little money with the
profitable wisdom of their past experience.
[Illustration: EVANGELINE’S WELL, ANNAPOLIS VALLEY, NOVA SCOTIA.]
Canada is a land of inconceivable distances. This alone means much
modification of English methods of marketing produce, and every wise
farmer knows that skilful marketing is as essential as skilful growing.
The English farmer hates nothing more than co-operation with other
farmers. Almost every attempt to induce the English farmer to co-operate
has failed in the face of his invincible objection to “allow anybody to
come round ordering him what to grow and how to grow it,” what breeds of
cattle, sheep, pigs, and poultry he should raise and how he should feed
them, when and how he should milk his cows and so on. His father and
grandfather made their own butter and cheese in their own way, and he is
going to make his in his way—he will be hanged if he will send his milk
to a co-operative dairy for the butter and cheese to be made by these
new-fangled methods. The Canadian farmer realises that apart from a
considerable co-operation he is going to fail. He belongs to a little
district commonwealth of farmers and is prepared to fall in with the
commonwealth view of things.
Then the climate of Canada completely nonplusses the Britisher until he
has learned to understand it. What are you to make of a temperature of
forty below zero in winter and a foot and a half of snow frozen to the
solidity of marble on the ground for three months at a time? And what
are you to think of summer heat waves with the temperature mounting up
beyond a hundred in the shade until you feel as if you were in a baker’s
oven; and on the prairie, from 1,500 to 4,000 feet above sea level, the
atmosphere for long periods is so dry that the surface soil is like dust
and you have such incidents as hail-storms with stones from the size of
a pea to the size of an egg, and “electrical storms” with an occasional
cyclone thrown in? The agriculture of the prairie is “dry agriculture,”
which is a science in itself. Canadian farmers accustomed to the
conditions know how to deal with the conditions and make profits at
which the British farmer’s mouth would water, and all they have to pay
out of the profits beyond the cost of the growing is the cost of sending
the produce to the nearest elevator or railway siding. Rent and rates do
not worry them. The seasons are remarkably alike. Once in a dozen years,
there may be a too dry or too wet summer with serious consequences to
the quantity and quality of the corn they raise. There is practically
little fluctuation in prices to worry them, for the more corn Canada
produces the greater appears to be the world demand, and prices are much
more likely to advance than to recede.
Let it be repeated, then, that the British labourer or farmer’s son or
townsman impatient to adopt the simple life had better go out with a
perfectly open mind, prepared to learn from those who know. I had many
talks with farmers, business men who know the conditions of the country,
and with the Ministers and Assistant Ministers of Agriculture of two of
the Prairie Provinces. I wanted them to give me the best advice that I
could pass on to different types of men thinking of emigrating from the
Old Country and settling on the land in Canada. They were unanimous that
the only wise course to adopt, whether the man were at home a
wage-earning labourer or a farmer’s son whose father could give him a
little capital, was to take the position of a farm hand under a Canadian
farmer for at least a year. This would give him an insight into the
conditions, and there need be no sense of humiliation, even to the son
of a prosperous farmer at home, in taking the position of farm hand. The
distinction between classes in Canada is almost obliterated. Most of the
well-to-do farmers themselves started as farm hands. The independence of
the working man is so developed that he thinks himself as good as the
man who employs him. It is not considered a privilege conferred upon a
farm hand to employ him, a privilege so great that he should regard his
employer as an awful being holding his men’s fate in his hands. I heard
of University men, young barristers, young journalists, young doctors,
who had got tired of waiting at home for an opportunity that was slow to
come, or who found themselves of too energetic and restless a temper to
settle down under the conditions of British life, who had gone out to
Canada and hired themselves to farmers in Ontario or the Prairie
Provinces and were soon working on the land as to the manner born. It is
the man with this willingness to learn and adapt himself to the
conditions of work cheerfully, not counting the hours or the
strenuousness of his labour in busy times, who is bound to get on as a
settler on the land in Canada.
Let me take first the prospects of an English farm labourer. Of course,
if he is a haunter of the public-house, if he only works because he
must, if he has in him the soul of a slave, if he is a born shirker, he
is not likely to do in Canada unless a moral transformation should take
place and change him to a new man altogether. The ideal labourer
emigrant is the man who works in his own garden and in his allotment in
his own time, who lives a decent life, keeps away from the drink, and
out of his wages and what he grows in his garden and allotment contrives
all the while to be putting a little by. Such a man, revelling in work,
with a fair amount of intelligence and some ambition, can scarcely fail
in Canada. He is the man who will be received and welcomed with open
arms by the farmers competing with each other for competent, willing
labour. I was told in the Ministries of Agriculture at Winnipeg and
Regina that lists are kept of hundreds of farmers who are applying for
such men and are willing to guarantee them work during the six months
between sowing time and the gathering in of the harvest. The Ministries
of Agriculture are more than willing to assist such men in every way to
find suitable situations. Many of the farmers are prepared to advance
the passage money to really good men willing to sign on for the season.
They are boarded and fed and receive a wage equal to £4 or £5 a month.
The difficulty, of course, will be with the married man, having a wife
and children. It would be best for him to make arrangements to leave the
wife and children at home for a year if he can possibly manage it. By
the end of a year, if he is the right sort of fellow, he will see his
way and perhaps be able either to take a homestead or to enter on an
arrangement for a year or two of continuous employment and to make a
home for the wife and children. Such a man, with the money he may save
in a couple of years, would find it quite easy, if he does not desire to
take a homestead which may be in a lonely district and may mean
considerable hardship for two or three years, to take on easy instalment
terms a ready-made farm within an area that affords a certain amount of
society. It is the woman rather than the man who finds the loneliness of
the homestead on the fresh-broken prairie almost unbearable. She cannot
live without the company-keeping and social gossip of the village. The
man is busy on the land; he has the inspiring sense that his foot is on
the ladder of success; he dreams of going on from little to more, and
from more to much, and of ultimately becoming a very substantial man. It
is not always so with the woman. She finds it far more difficult to
reconcile herself to the lonely conditions. Of course, if she is the
right sort of woman to be a farmer’s wife, and can find her interest in
raising chickens and such occupations, she will, after settling down, be
happy enough; but there is always the risk, and if the man can possibly
secure a ready-made farm he considerably reduces the risk of the woman’s
moping and wanting to return to the familiar village in the Old Country
again, even though it may mean returning to 15_s._ a week and no
prospect but the old age 5_s._ a week at seventy.
The Provincial Governments, agricultural associations, and a number of
financial corporations are very willing to give every assistance to a
_bona-fide_ settler on the land. When he has established the fact that
he is a safe man to trust, he may get his stock and implements on
credit, and the land will be broken at a nominal charge to lessen the
burden of his first effort.
A Canadian writer says he knows of specific cases in which English
immigrant buyers paid $30 and $15 an acre respectively for farms.
“One case was a very choice piece of land near to the social and
educational advantages of a large town, and another enjoyed the same
favourable position but was not quite such good land throughout, but had
the very best grazing where it could not be used for cereals or root
crops. In the one case the payments ($30 an acre) were completed in
seven years, and in the other ($15) five years were found sufficient to
acquire a clean bill of the rights to the property, and both men are
wealthy citizens to-day. This does give assurance that is certainly
needed in the face of the misrepresentative and conflicting statements
which have been circulated in the Motherland, where it is impossible to
verify on the spot one account or another. It provides an opening at
once for the family or for the young couple without children, who are
rightly advised that they should not take up a homestead at a point far
distant from social life, at least until they have had experience, which
they can only acquire by living in close touch with neighbours who are
farming to some purpose.
“Candidly, the homesteads now available, and until the railway system
has been further developed, are too far away from the railway track. But
it is only a question of a few years of legitimate development until
these points have been opened up, where some of the finest land on the
continent will be brought within easy reach of the world’s markets. In
the meantime, and while the new-comer is gaining experience and paying
by his labour for a piece of land that can never depreciate in value, he
is not precluded from selecting and acquiring his homestead. But the
writer cannot advise penniless individuals to come out in the hope of
taking up homestead duties at a remote point from the railway with the
expectation of making good on it right away. The man with a bit of
capital cannot fail to employ it to far better purpose in Canada than he
is ever likely to use it at home. He need not ‘risk’ it until he has had
every opportunity to test his investments on the spot. It is broadly on
the land, the value of which by the legitimate process continues to
increase with every season in which it has come under the hand of the
cultivator. In the more thickly populated centres land values have
increased enormously within the short period of five years; many of
these, no doubt, have been rushed up to a fictitious figure by real
estate jobbers, but where large manufacturing and wholesale houses have
been compelled to establish themselves in response to a demand that is
almost unprecedented in its all but instantaneous growth, these values
are at once legitimate and permanent.”
From a very informative booklet issued in connection with the
“International Dry Farming Congress” at Lethbridge, Alberta, in October,
1912, I extract these interesting particulars about the conditions of
prairie settlement and farming:—
“Settlement progresses so rapidly that pioneering is shorn of its
desolation. It is no uncommon event to find a whole township or an
entire district taken up in a single summer. The pioneer will always
have neighbours in his new Alberta home. Roads and schools follow in due
course. Recent legislation has established a system of local government
which affords all the machinery necessary to a local community to carry
out public improvements. Commercial life develops very rapidly. The
settlement of a district is invariably followed by the extension of the
telephone and the railway.
“Land is cleared and prepared for cultivation at comparatively small
cost. In the southern part of the province no clearing is necessary. In
the central and northern part, where there is considerable scrub and
timber, the cost of preparing the land for crops is higher and will vary
from $5 to $10 per acre. The trees are nearly all surface rooted, and in
a few years the most thickly wooded farm will be as free from roots as a
market garden. Raw homesteads in a year or two become profitable farms.
Towns spring up along the railway as if by magic, and the erstwhile
wilderness is transformed into a populous and prosperous community.
“From the earliest times explorers have expressed the greatest hope in
the future of Alberta. It was the home of the most powerful and
civilized Indian tribes of the whole North-West. Its luxuriant pastures
supported vast herds of antelope, deer and buffalo, while its mountains,
lakes and canyons comprised the richest territory exploited by the fur
companies.
“Ninety-six different varieties of wild grasses have been identified, of
which forty-six make excellent hay. Of the sedges and rushes there are
at least ninety-four varieties, many of which make good hay, and all
make splendid pasture during the spring and the early part of the
summer. The sedges grow on the lower lands and marshes, and are
diligently sought for by stock in the early spring, and during those
seasons when the upland grasses harden. Cultivated grasses also do well,
timothy, alfalfa, western rye grass, and blue grass having been
introduced and all proving very successful.
“The establishment of agriculture depends upon many natural resources,
such as extent of fertile soil, rainfall, and energy of the people. All
these elements are compounded in the case of Alberta. The soil is deep
and black, composed of a covering of vegetable humus which sits
undisturbed since it was laid down many centuries ago. The chief
nutriments are nitrogen, potash and phosphoric acid, but what is of
principal importance is the lime contained in the soil whereby the
nitrogen is set free and ready to be absorbed by vegetable organism. The
richness of the soil is illustrated in the number of grains in the
cluster found in the heads of the wheat plant. Three, four and five
grains occur in each spikelet, a fact which explains the large average
yield of the Alberta wheat fields.
“The rainfall is sufficient to nourish crops, and the climate is dry and
equable for long seasons. The rainy season coincides with the growing
season. There is abundance of rain and heat during June and July. As the
weather cools the rainy season ceases, the air becomes dry, hardening
the grain and giving it a colour and hardness which accounts for the
splendid quality of Canadian wheat. Even the frost of winter exerts a
beneficial influence, as it pulverizes the ground and puts it in ideal
condition for the rains of the following season. A prominent scientific
authority says: As long as the West is blessed with winter frosts and
summer rains, teeming crops will be the product of her soils.’”
[Illustration: STEAM PLOUGH IN ALBERTA.]
On the question of wages a publication of the Ontario Government
says—and the wages will not vary much from this rule in the Prairie
Provinces:—
“The standard of wages at present for a twelve months’
engagement is as follows:—
“_Experienced Men._—Farm labourers, well able to plough, to
milk, and to do general farm-work, £4 to £5 and over per month.
“_Partly experienced._—Eighteen years of age and upwards,
strong, well able to handle horses, £3 to £4 and over per month.
“_Inexperienced._—Eighteen years and upwards, strong, unused to
any kind of farm work, £2 to £3 per month, according to ability.
“Each class is supplied with board, lodging and washing free.
“Families, as a rule, are provided with cottages and such extras
as milk, firewood and vegetables in season. They are expected to
board themselves and sometimes the hired men, but getting
payment for the latter. The man accustomed to farm work receives
from £50 to £70 per year. Where the wife assists the farmer in
housework, milking, &c., she is paid in proportion to her
services. Part experienced and inexperienced married couples are
paid according to the scale. Children are often more of an asset
than a liability, and receive payment when able to render any
assistance in the work of the farm.”
Per month.
Female domestics (General servants) £2 to £3
” ” (Cooks) £2 9_s._ to £5
” ” (Housemaids) £2 1_s._ to £3
” ” (Tablemaids) £2 9_s._ to £4
The man who should take up a homestead, prepared to rough it for a year
or two, is the young, unmarried man, steady, determined, with a strong
inclination for the life on the land. To him, even if he goes out
penniless, the Provincial Governments offer the position of a farmer on
his own land—land for which he need not pay a penny piece. He has only
to conform to certain regulations as to living on the land for part of
the year, building some sort of a shanty in which he can sleep, and
bringing a stipulated number of acres under cultivation, and at the end
of three years the land becomes his freehold. In addition to that there
are many districts in which, having secured the freehold of his
homestead, the homesteader is permitted to pre-empt a second 160 acres
at the nominal price of $3 an acre. For the benefit of such a man I
quote a synopsis of the Canadian North-West Land Regulations, for which
I am indebted to a pamphlet issued by the Grand Trunk Railway:
“1. Any person who is the sole head of a family, or any male over
eighteen years old, may homestead a quarter section (160 acres, more or
less) of available Dominion land in Manitoba, Saskatchewan or Alberta.
The applicant, who must be a British subject or declare his intention of
becoming one, must appear in person at the Dominion Lands Agency or
Sub-Agency for the district. Entry by proxy may be made at any agency,
by father, mother, son, daughter, brother or sister of intending
homesteader, when duly authorised on proper form.
“2. A widow having minor children of her own dependent upon her for
support is permitted to make homestead entry as the sole head of a
family.
“DUTIES.—Six months’ residence upon and cultivation of the land in each
of three years. A homesteader may live within nine miles of his
homestead on a farm of at least 80 acres solely owned and occupied by
him or by his father, mother, son, daughter, brother or sister.
“3. In certain districts a homesteader in good standing may pre-empt a
quarter-section alongside his homestead. Price $3 per acre.
Duties.—Must reside six months in each of six years from date of
homestead entry (including the time required to earn homestead patent)
and cultivate 50 acres more than required on his homestead, which
cultivation may be on both his homestead and pre-emption or either.
“4. A homesteader who has exhausted his homestead right by already
homesteading and cannot obtain a pre-emption may acquire a homestead by
purchase in certain districts. Price $3 per acre. Such homesteads may be
acquired on any available lands on either odd or even numbered sections
south of township 45, east of the railway from Calgary to Edmonton, and
the west line of range 26, and west of the third meridian. Duties.—Must
reside six months in each of three years, cultivate 50 acres, and erect
a house worth $300.
“The entry fee for a homestead is ten ($10) dollars.
“Low rates for settlers’ effects apply from Eastern Canada and many
United States points to Winnipeg and West.”
The best thing an unmarried man settler can do is to go out with one or
more settlers similar to himself who shall take up neighbouring
homesteads. If they go out from the same village or district they will
immediately form a congenial society and will have the common interest
of old acquaintance and of common knowledge of the people among whom
they have been brought up. A great number of homesteads have been taken
up by such companions, who, when they have “made good,” have sent for
their brothers and friends to come and do likewise, with the result that
a neighbourhood becomes in a sense a replica, as far as the settlers are
concerned, of the familiar village or country-side out of which they
have gone.
As has been said, if they are the right sort of men, they will find it
quite easy to get the first 30 acres, which is a condition of taking the
homestead, ploughed for them, either by a neighbouring farmer or by the
Farmers’ Association of the district. Such homesteaders usually work for
a neighbouring farmer during their first year, saving money, learning
the business, and putting in odd time on their own land. The requisite
first home, which is also a condition of the tenure, may be simply a few
rough boards knocked together or a turf hut. This is the familiar
“shack.” The shack serves very well for a single young fellow whose
necessities are reduced to the barest minimum. If he is an adventurous
spirit with a dash of humour he relishes his life, and if he has two or
three companions settling at the same time as himself on neighbouring
homesteads they will work together and tide each other over the roughing
period. The shack at the end of the second year will give place to a
wooden house—small it may be, just a combined living-room and kitchen,
a washing-up place and one or a couple of bed-rooms, but if there is a
“girl he has left behind him” this will be sufficient to warrant sending
out for her, and a sensible practical wife is a very valuable asset to
the homestead if she is prepared to accept the conditions. Some of the
largest farmers in the Far West began in this way less than a dozen
years ago. They have added “quarter section” to “quarter section” to the
original homestead, until now they may be farming a square mile or a
square mile and a half and making money enough every year to allow them
to spend three months in the Eastern Provinces or to visit the Old
Country, putting up at the best hotels, and spending money with a free
hand.
I come now to the farmer’s son or to the enterprising young fellow with
a bit of money, say £100 to £500, at his disposal. As I have said, if he
is a wise man, he will start as a farm hand and get his experience in
the only certain way before he disposes of his money in taking a
ready-made farm, or even in taking a homestead and spending his money on
the machinery and stock required to work it. The Canadian Pacific
Railway, the Grand Trunk Pacific, the Hudson’s Bay Company, and a number
of land companies offer ready-made farms of various sizes under the most
attractive conditions. The land has been broken, a house has been built
upon it. It has been fenced and irrigated, if irrigation is necessary.
The man can step on to the farm, occupy the house and immediately
commence operations, making the profit of the harvest the very first
year. Suppose a man with a bit of money wants to buy a farm ready for
cultivation. Mr. E. S. Bayard, editor of _The National Stockman and
Farmer_, Pittsburg, Penn., a famous American breeder of prize cattle,
who studied the question along the line of the Grand Trunk Pacific,
says:—
“Much of the farm land is now selling at from $15 to $25 per acre. Lands
can be found, well-improved and favourably located, which sell from $40
to $60 per acre. And homestead lands can also be found within reasonable
distance from the Winnipeg-Edmonton line of the Grand Trunk Pacific and
the branch lines of this road. In the spring of 1911, there were still
available for homestead some 8,000 farms of 160 acres each. Many of
these were settled on during the spring and summer of 1911.
“One method of selling land in this new country is the payment of a
certain amount per acre down and the balance of the purchase price is
extended over a period of years. One typical illustration is cited. A
farm of 320 acres, unimproved, was purchased with a payment of $3 per
acre down, or $960. For breaking and discing the land the cost was $5
per acre, or $1,600. That is what it costs when the buyer hires it done.
The second payment and interest amounted to $1,170, and the buildings
complete are estimated to cost about $2,000. This made a total outlay
the first year of $5,730. Over against this the first year 300 acres of
wheat yielded thirty bushels to the acre, or 9,000 bushels at 60 cents
per bushel, or $5,400. And 20 acres of oats produced 70 bushels to the
acre, or 1,400 bushels at 25 cents per bushel, amounting to $350, or a
total from the farm of $5,750. Thus the farm the first year more than
paid for its original cost and the profits the second year more than
paid for the improvements and all other expenses, leaving a goodly
profit.
“Thus it is that the low prices asked for this productive land are one
of the conditions which strike a man from the States most forcibly. He
comes from a region where the farm lands sell from $100 to $200 per
acre, well improved, productive and favourably located to be sure, but
to find such a vast area of wonderfully productive land, with good
markets available and prices as high on the average as in the States, is
positive proof that there are big opportunities for money-making in
Canada.
“These lands are advancing in value quite naturally. With the tremendous
immigration into Western Canada, the great railroad development and the
money which is being invested in this new country, the vast prairie
region is developing not alone rapidly but substantially. This of course
means increased land values, and when it is remembered that the land is
now very low in price, it is readily seen that there is every reason why
it will advance steadily from year to year.”
Having got his land the farmer will, of course, require machinery,
stock, seed, &c., to work it. If he has, say, £200, he can purchase a
farm quite as large as he will be able to manage at first on the
instalment plan, the payments to cover, say, a period of five to ten
years. He may have to learn the art of doing without a good many things
to which he has been accustomed during the first year or so, but if he
reduces his wants, uses “elbow grease,” and is not ashamed to earn a
hundred or couple of hundred dollars by working for established farmers,
he will win through, and after the first year he will see daylight and
be the stronger man for the endurance of a little hardship. I quote an
expert estimate of the minimum amount required to start farming right
away with the best prospects:—
$
1 team of horses 350
1 set harness 32
1 farm waggon 75
1 sleigh 25
1 breaking plough 25
1 stubble plough 18
1 3-section harrow 15
1 disc harrow 25
1 seeder 85
1 mowing machine 50
1 harvester 135 to 155
Other implements and tools 50
4 good cows at $40 160
4 good pigs at $15 60
4 good sheep at $5 20
Poultry 10
------
Total
$1,155
------
= £235
------
Let me close this chapter by quoting the stories told by some sample
settlers from the Old Country who went out within the last seven years.
I take them from a pamphlet issued from the office of the Dominion
Ministry of the Interior.
Arthur Newman went out to Alberta in 1907 from New Shildon, County
Durham, England, and at once took up a homestead. He writes:—
“My father and brothers came out and we were in partnership, but I
pushed ahead, as we had some drawbacks like all homesteaders. We had
everything to haul from Lloydminster, forty-two miles either way, but we
have a town twelve miles from us now. We have about 100 acres in crop
this year, 57 wheat, and about 43 oats, besides potatoes and a garden
patch. If the season permits, we hope to break about 100 acres more. Our
wheat turned out 35 bushels to the acre and the oats 70 bushels to the
acre. This was our second year’s crop; our first was hailed out. Our
stock is getting along finely. I lost a fine mare the first year, but am
still ahead. We have four oxen, four fine mares in foal, about fifteen
head of cattle, seven pigs, and about seventy hens. I might also say we
have all the machinery that is wanted for the farm, &c., and all of it
is paid for. So if our crops turn out well this year, we shall be all
right and making fine success. I often have letters from friends at home
asking me if I should not like to come back, and I always tell them just
for a holiday but not to stay. This is the home I prefer.”
W. Hordern, a native of Leicester, who settled in Saskatchewan,
writes:—
“I came out six years ago. The first three years were mostly spent in
learning by defeats. We earned very little at first, and my capital of
£400 disappeared after buying horses, &c., but I knew I was getting on
the right line. Then, with a family of six young children, we made a
comfortable living. Now I value my farm and stock little short of
£2,000. I have six work horses and three others, fourteen head of
cattle, twelve hogs, hens, and the full outfit of farm machinery, some
in double sets, and three waggons. By last summer we had 150 acres
broken and in crop. The total earnings were £460; total farm expenses
were £140, leaving a clear income of £320.
“I am now fifty-five, and was far gone towards being a worn-out man
before leaving Old England. The first year I broke 15 acres with a yoke
of oxen; had a one-room house, 14 feet by 16 feet of bought prepared
timber, cost £30, and dug a 23-foot well. Next year was in England eight
months and did little good here. Third year my eldest boy took up the
heavy work. I am practically a gentleman farmer in these days—ride
around in a light four-wheeler and do the errands to town and about. My
hobby is the school board, of which I am also the clerk and collector.
My second lad helps in stable work and odd jobs, and a third lad
assisted in the fall. Between them my lads earned £55 out, mostly
helping other farmers, which I have included in the income.
“Last year we raised 239 bushels of linseed, 1,030 bushels oats, 12
acres barley, 1,818 bushels of wheat. After keeping enough for seed,
sold the wheat for £300, freight cost £33 to Port Arthur, on Lake
Superior. My threshing bill was £45, twine for tying up sheaves £6,
rates, all told, £8 10s. My family have cost nothing yet in doctoring,
and we all have good health. We produce, free of charge, our own butter,
milk, fuel, water, stock and meat, and these items save us 25_s._ a
week. I have carefully kept a record of every cent coming in and going
out last year. My farm is now 415 acres. I bought 164 acres three years
ago, which is now worth twice what I gave for it. My son has 200 acres
also, worth £800, outside my own property.”
Joseph Williams, formerly of Abergele, came to Canada three years ago.
After working in Eastern Canada for a while he went West. He writes:—
“I got a job at Yorkton which was the turning point to success. I may
say here that when I arrived at Yorkton I had the enormous sum of 3
cents (1½_d._) in my pocket. Six months later I started business there,
butchering, with my brother Arthur as a partner, and twelve months later
sold out at a good sum, and to-day I am pleased to say I can sit and
look at my crop growing, from which I hope to receive somewhere from
$2,000 to $3,000 (£400 to £600) next fall, besides being the owner of
three fine mares and foals, and all necessary farming implements.
“You can show this letter to all my old friends at Abergele, and if you
like you can send it to the press, if you think it will benefit any
young men or women who think of coming to Canada. I can say without the
least hesitation that this is a much better country than the Old
Country, and there is no reason whatever why a young man or woman could
not succeed here.
“I may say that there is a Welsh colony here, with about 200 Welsh
families, Welsh chapels, Sunday schools, and literary meetings, Welsh
store-keepers and restaurants, and plenty of land for sale right in the
centre of the colony. Anyone wishing to buy an improved farm can do so
with a small cash deposit, and the balance in yearly crop payments; or
there are homesteads, further West, in Alberta, which are available for
entry.”
J. G. Lindsay, a Saskatchewan homesteader, writes:—
“I belonged to Stonehaven, Kincardineshire, Scotland, came out here in
June, 1905. I used to work on a farm in Auchinblae district on Kennell
and Chapelton farm; average wages about £10 to £20. I arrived at Indian
Head, Saskatchewan, and worked on a threshing rig that year, receiving
7_s._ a day, and then came up here, took a homestead, and stayed here
ever since. I landed out on my land with about $300, or £60, built a
small shack, bought a team of horses, part on time, worked around here
during ploughing for new settlers the first summer to pay for the
horses. I now own five all paid for, all the necessary implements to
work a farm. I have 100 acres ready for crop this spring. I could never
have had an acre in Scotland in crop, let alone own the land, which is
worth $20, or £4, an acre. I am seven miles from town and a new railroad
from Saskatoon to Calgary. I would not take £700 for my rights to-day. I
find there are many here just the same. I will put a word for my
brother. He has done better than me. He came here with £20 and team of
oxen; now he has five horses and 130 acres for crop this spring. We were
well known in Rickarton, Stonehaven, as my father had a farm there. My
opinion of this country is to all get hold of land, work hard for two or
three years to start on, then all is right.”
Joseph Watson, who was head game-keeper and general manager to the late
Sir James Musgrave, County Donegal, Ireland, came to Saskatchewan in
1905. He writes:—
“I arrived at File Hills in the end of March, 1905, and the first thing
I did was to buy two good milk cows at the calving and a horse and mare.
I then commenced to build a log house, 30 feet by 14 feet inside, and
two stories high with a lean-to kitchen at back, and soon had a good
comfortable dwelling. I then built stables for cattle.
“In the fall I bought ten of the best yearling heifers I could get and a
few steers. The total outlay was about £140. From that number of stock I
have now fifty head of cattle and five horses, and if all goes well I
should have another twenty calves and two colts this spring. I think
anyone should be satisfied with that increase.
“I milked all my best cows, and the proceeds of butter practically paid
the household expenses for the last two years. Last year I made nearly
£80 off butter, and I expect to make as much this year, and besides I
hope to sell ten steers at an average price of £8 a head.
“I am well satisfied with the progress I have made, and I may say that I
am now independent, as my income is now much greater than the
expenditure. I have 160 acres of good grazing and hay land, and as
practically none of the company lands are occupied, there is plenty of
grazing for cattle on every side of me.
“I estimate the value of my farm, stock, buildings, &c., now to be
$5,000. I have done no cropping except a few acres of oats for feed and
the kitchen garden, but I intend to go in more for cropping in future.
The soil is rich and grows heavy crops.
“The climate is very healthy. I have enjoyed better health since coming
to Canada than I had for many years before leaving the Old Country.”
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