able form which their contribution can take. It certainly will not take the form of a cash subsidy of a size worth discussing. It probably will take the form of Canada increasing and improving her land forces, and possibly of her building and manning ships to form part of the British fleet. The last is clearly the line upon which every effort should be concentrated. The country is rich in raw material, and would gladly foster some, at any rate, of the highly-specialized industries upon which modern shipbuilding depends; and she would not require the fleet so built to dance attendance at Halifax or Esquimalt, but would realize that it might defend Canadian interests better if stationed in the North Sea or the Mediterranean. This is looking a little ahead, but preferential trade is a present issue, and on this the country is unanimous. Mr. Foster recently told the American Economic Association at Chicago: 'Public sentiment in Canada is overwhelmingly in favour of the preferential system. As a theory it was advocated by the leaders of both parties previous to 1896, and has been supported by both parties since its enactment in 1898. In the press and on the platform it receives general commendation and support.' That certainly is a moderate statement. So unanimous is the country that little argument is required, and consequently a much larger space in party controversy was occupied by the new Transcontinental Railway. On this it was possible to take sides, and the whole country from east to west proceeded to do so. But as a rule it was debated as a local question, and it required the constructive imagination of Sir Wilfrid Laurier to show the Imperial idea underlying it—to see the produce of the East pouring along it into Canada, and through Canada to Europe, and the goods of Canada and Europe flowing back through the same channel to the East.
And yet to anyone acquainted with Canadian economic history the project requires no pictorial illustration to bring it into relation with great Imperial
