res on the Atlantic all the way across to Vancouver and
Victoria. Every province and every territory of it, I know well. I
know the people, too, a people thoroughly democratic and honest to the
core. I would now plainly warn those who think that there is no such
thing as Canadian sentiment that they are completely mistaken. They
had better not reckon without their host. The silent vote is that
which tells, and though it will not talk, it will vote solid all the
time for those who represent national sentiment when the national life
is threatened. I am not a party man. In my day, I have voted about
evenly on both sides, for when I do vote, it is after consideration of
the actual issues involved at the time. Both sides therefore rightly
consider me unreliable, but, perhaps, both will listen when I point
out that the independent vote is increasing, and that it is the only
vote worth cultivating. The true Grit or Tory will vote with his
party, right or wrong. No time, therefore, need be given to him. Let
the wise candidate win the men who believe that the country is higher
than party, and there is, I think, only one thing that these men will
not forgive--lack of faith in the country. They have no doubt that it
is worth while to preserve the unity, dignity, and independence of
Canada.

We are quite sure of this. Are we as sure that it is our duty to pay
the price? The United States are paying three or four times our whole
revenue in pensions to those who fought to keep the country united.
They do not grudge this enormous price. They have besides a
respectable army, and a fleet that will soon be formidable. What means
do we find it necessary to use? In any trouble we simply call on the
Mother Country. The present system is cheap. No! it is dear and nasty,
and cannot last.

What should we do? First, let us remember what Britain has dared for
us within the last two or three years. Britain would fight the rest of
the world rather than the United States,--not because the Republic
could hurt her seriously, not because her trade with it is five times
as much as with us, but because she is proud of her own eldest child
and knows that a war between mother and daughter would be a blow
struck at the world's heart. Yet, for us she spoke the decisive word
from which there was no drawing back. For us, once and again, because
we were in the right, she dared a risk which she hated with her whole
soul.

Let us show that we appreciate her