Page:Robert Barr - Lord Stranleigh Philanthropist.djvu/241

 question, brings steady prosperity to our dominions over sea, while at the same time it places our industries at home upon a solid foundation."

"Great heavens!" murmured Stranleigh under his breath, but not loud enough for his confident visitor to overhear. "I'm not a man who looks upon merely one item in a programme. No design stands by itself. It interlocks with others, and our narrow-minded politicians make the mistake of concentrating their attention on one link in the chain, whereas the statesman views the chain as a whole. Now, perhaps you do not know that a Canadian farmer is prosperous if he receives a dollar a bushel for his wheat. If you eliminate the middlemen, and deal direct with the farmer, you can give him his dollar a bushel, and sell wheat in England at a price that will produce the cheapest loaf we have consumed during the past century; thus, with one hand you bestow prosperity upon the Canadian farmer, while with the other you pass on a loaf to the British consumer at the lowest rate he has ever enjoyed. Our manufacturing industries are placed on the solid foundation of the best and cheapest food, while the agitation on the tariff is, in consequence, crushed.