Page:The empire and the century.djvu/400

 In the North-West a new competitor has arisen in the shape of the Canadian Northern Railway, a line begun only ten years ago, which runs westerly from the head of Lake Superior, and already has about 1,400 miles of railway in operation. It is pursuing an aggressive policy of extension, and hopes within a short time to find a new outlet for the products of the West from a port upon Hudson's Bay, from which point steamships will reach Liverpool by an ocean voyage as short as that from the City of Montreal.

Altogether, the work of Canada in railway building must be admitted to constitute a creditable record. Starting at confederation with a length of 2,278 miles, she now has a system of 19,408 miles in total length; and when the works now actually provided for and definitely undertaken are completed, somewhere about the year 1911, the sum total will be not less than 23,000 miles, without account of the many shorter lines and branches which will, in the ordinary course of events, add greatly to the total.

Canadian waterways are upon a magnificent scale, and their improvement has always occupied a considerable share of public attention. The main system extends from the Straits of Belle Isle to the head of Lake Superior, a distance of about 2,400 miles. But rapids, shoals, rocky shores, sand bars, and waterfalls intervened to check and hinder the early navigator. Very large sums of money have been spent to construct canals, to deepen channels, to remove shoals, and to light and buoy the route in order to assist navigation. It is impossible to state accurately the amounts of money that have been so expended, but it is far within the mark to say that the work up to the present time represents a total outlay exceeding $80,000,000. As a result we have 14 feet of water from Lake Superior to the sea, easily the finest system of fresh-water navigation in the world. The total number of vessels in the registry books of the Dominion is about 7,500, with a tonnage of about 800,000 tons, approximately one-third that