In this region wonderful blasting operations are performed by charges of solidified oxygen and hydrogen.  The charges are placed at the bottom of a 40 foot bore and exploded by a powerful electric spark.  The effect is very different from that of other explosives which usually rend the rock into large fragments that have to be blasted again in detail before a clearance is made, for the oxyhydrogen charge has such terrible force that it completely pulverizes the rock, scooping out, even in granite, a deep wide pit of parabolic section of which the spot where the charge was is the focus.  The dust is blown out in a cloud high in the air.

Our finest and largest cities are Halifax, St. John’s, Rimouski, Quebec, Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, Hamilton, Saulte Ste Marie, Port Arthur, Winnipeg, Brandon, Edmonton, New Westminster and Victoria.  Toronto, Montreal and Winnipeg each contain more than 2,000,000 inhabitants, while the others range between 500,000 and a little over 1,000,000.  At Halifax is one of the greatest car depots in the world, and here the traveller can step on board a car for London, Rome, Jerusalem, Bombay, Cape Town, Melbourne, Sydney, Auckland, etc.  St. John’s, Fredericton and Campbelltown are large cities, the latter being a great rendezvous for pleasure-seekers in summer.  Rimouski is a manufacturing centre and a large car depot.  Cars spring from here to Tadousac, Lake St. John’s, Lake Mistassinie and Hudson Bay ports.  Quebec retains much of its old-world picturesqueness while keeping up well with the times; its inhabitants number about 700,000.  Montreal and Toronto are without doubt the most magnificent cities in the Dominion, perhaps in the world.  They are both famous for the grandeur of their buildings.  In them, for the most part, each block is a complete structure and not a conglomeration of little buildings of all shapes and sizes, a two-storey house next to a four-storey one, and so on.  Thus, among a number of blocks a pleasing harmony in architectural styles is obtained, which is a golden mean between the rigid uniformity of some new cities and the antique irregularity of old ones.  Winnipeg is generally reckoned to contain the finest brick buildings to be seen anywhere; many blocks in brick may be seen of eight and nine storeys in the grandly decorated modern style.  Victoria has grown into fame by its immense trade with the old Asiatic countries.  The ancient Orient and the modern West here combine.  The broad busy streets are thronged with a motley crowd, in which representatives of Asiatic races mingle with Anglo-Saxons and representatives of European nations, all speaking the universal English language.  New Westminster increases its attractions every year.  It contains the noted observatory with the splendid telescope through which living beings have been observed in the countries in Mars and Jupiter.  In its Hall of Science is the great microscope which magnifies many million times, and shows the atomic structure