Page:The empire and the century.djvu/435

 those of the vast North-West (and the data are not very exact, full, or clear), I incline to the opinion that 200,000,000 bushels of wheat or its equivalent may be furnished for export from that region within the lifetime of the youngest farmer settled there. One must bear in mind the limitations of production per acre over periods of more than fifteen or twenty years where wheat is the only or chief crop, without such a system of rotation of crops as will hinder weeds from taking full possession of whole districts. That turns one to regard with increasing confidence the capacity of the undeveloped agricultural resources of the older half of Canada (lying between the prairies, or, rather, between the great Lakes Superior and Huron and the Atlantic seaboard) to supply the larger share of the requirements of the United Kingdom for imported foods. The exportation of wheat has played a minor part in the agricultural prosperity of the country. That is made evident by the following table of value of exports. I have put the average figures of five years into each of four periods during the last twenty years to eliminate the presentation of temporary fluctuations which might mislead, and I have held to the use of values rather than quantities in this article, as being the more serviceable means towards giving correct and clear impressions to the citizen of the Empire who reads it.