A word on the changes which have come over the East will not be inappropriate, lest we should be tempted to boast too much of the progress of Canada.  Ever since the conquest of Egypt by the British, as long ago as 1882, Anglo-Saxon institutions have been gaining ground from the Nile to the Euphrates, and from the Euphrates to the Indus.  Soon after the great stroke of diplomacy in 1887, by which Great Britain practically became ruler of all this vast territory, the railroad was introduced, and before many years had passed the railroad system of Europe was linked with that of India.  The pent-up riches of the fertile Euphrates valley thenceforth began to find channels of commerce, and to be distributed through less fertile regions.  The ancient historic cities of these lands, Damascus especially, began at once to increase.  Jerusalem, as soon as the Turk departed and the Anglo-Saxon entered, was purified, cleansed, and finally rebuilt.  Great numbers of Jews from all parts of the world then returned and gave the city the benefit of their wealth, but all the commerce of the East keeps in the hands of Britons and Americans.  English is, therefore, the chief language spoken from Beyrout to Bombay.

There is, however, a great cloud hanging over the East which causes dismay to thinking men, and threatens to mar the general prosperity of all the lands.  Great as has been the increase of the Anglo-Saxon race, the numbers of the Sclavonic race have kept pace.  The Sclavs, unfortunately, retain much of their old brutish disposition and ferocity in the midst of all the civilizing influences of modern times, so that statesmen foresee an inevitable collision in the not distant future between the Sclav and the Anglo-Saxon.  It is disheartening in these days of splendid progress, when we had hoped that war was for ever banished from the world, to find that humanity has yet to endure the old horrors once more.  How fearful these horrors will be, and how great the destruction of life, it is hardly possible to conceive, so terrible are the forces at man’s command nowadays, if he uses them simply for destructive purposes.  The Sclav has spread from South-Eastern Europe and multiplied greatly in Asia, till his boundaries are coterminous with British territory, and it is his inveterate aggressive disposition which causes all the gloomy forebodings.  Before we return to our own happy Canada, let us glance at Africa, the “dark continent” of the last century.  Civilization has long penetrated to the upper waters of the Nile, and to the great fresh water lakes which rival our Huron and Superior.  The beautiful country in which the mighty Congo and the Nile take their rise, is all open to the world’s commerce, and highways now exist stretching from Alexandria through these magnificent regions to the Transvaal and the Cape.  Madagascar, fair, fertile and wealthy, has developed, under Anglo-Saxon influence, her wonderful latent resources for all men’s good.  In addition to mineral treasures she had wealth to bestow in the shape of healing plants, whose benefits were greater to suffering humanity than tons of gold and silver.  The botanical gardens at New Westminster, and the conservatories at Churchill, are greatly indebted to the flora of Madagascar.  But let us now return to Canada and continue our contrasts.