, she
saw the goal more than ten years ago, and has been working the ball
toward it ever since. That is why her inaction at the last Imperial
Conference made people who were interested in the play wonder why she,
of all of us, chose to brigade herself with General Botha and to block
the forward rush. I, too, asked that question of many. The answer was
something like this: 'We saw that England wasn't taking anything just
then. Why should we have laid ourselves open to be snubbed worse than we
were? We sat still.' Quite reasonable--almost too convincing. There was
really no need that Canada should have done other than she did--except
that she was the Eldest Sister, and more was expected of her. She is a
little too modest.

We discussed this, first of all, under the lee of a wet deck-house in
mid-Atlantic; man after man cutting in and out of the talk as he sucked
at his damp tobacco. The passengers were nearly all unmixed Canadian,
mostly born in the Maritime Provinces, where their fathers speak of
'Canada' as Sussex speaks of 'England,' but scattered about their
businesses throughout the wide Dominion. They were at ease, too, among
themselves, with that pleasant intimacy that stamps every branch of Our
Family and every boat that it uses on its homeward way. A Cape liner is
all the sub-Continent from the Equator to Simon's Town; an Orient boat
is Australasian throughout, and a C.P.R. steamer cannot be confused with
anything except Canada. It is a pity one may not be born in four places
at once, and then one would understand the half-tones and asides, and
the allusions of all our Family life without waste of precious time.
These big men, smoking in the drizzle, had hope in their eyes, belief in
their tongues, and strength in their hearts. I used to think miserably
of other boats at the South end of this ocean--a quarter full of people
deprived of these things. A young man kindly explained to me how Canada
had suffered through what he called 'the Imperial connection'; how she
had been diversely bedevilled by English statesmen for political
reasons. He did not know his luck, nor would he believe me when I tried
to point it out; but a nice man in a plaid (who knew South Africa)
lurched round the corner and fell on him with facts and imagery which
astonished the patriotic young mind. The plaid finished his outburst
with the uncontradicted statement that the English were mad. All our
talks ended on that note.

It was an experi