self a western man, at once began an immigration campaign which has
never been equaled in any country for vigor and practical efficiency.
Canada had hitherto received few settlers direct from the Continent.
Western Europe was now prosperous, and emigrants were few. But eastern
Europe was in a ferment, and thousands were ready to swarm to new homes
overseas.

The activities of a subsidized immigration agency, the North Atlantic
Trading Company, brought great numbers of these peoples. Foremost in
numbers were the Ruthenians from Galicia. Most distinctive were the
Doukhobors or Spirit Wrestlers of Southern Russia, about ten thousand of
whom were brought to Canada at the instance of Tolstoy and some English
Quakers to escape persecution for their refusal to undertake military
service. The religious fanaticism of the Doukhobors, particularly when
it took the form of midwinter pilgrimages in nature's garb, and the
clannishness of the Ruthenians, who settled in solid blocks, gave rise
to many problems of government and assimilation which taught Canadians
the unwisdom of inviting immigration from eastern or southern Europe.
Ruthenians and Poles, however, continued to come down to the eve of the
Great War, and nearly all settled on western lands. Jewish Poland sent
its thousands who settled in the larger cities, until Montreal had
more Jews than Jerusalem and its Protestant schools held their Easter
holidays in Passover. Italian navvies came also by the thousands, but
mainly as birds of passage; and Greeks and men from the Balkan States
were limited in numbers. Of the three million immigrants who came to
Canada from the beginning of the century to the outbreak of the war,
some eight hundred thousand came from continental Europe, and of
these the Ruthenians, Jews, Italians, and Scandinavians were the most
numerous.

It was in the United States that Canada made the greatest efforts
to obtain settlers and that she achieved the most striking success.
Beginning in 1897 advertisements were placed in five or six thousand
American farm and weekly newspapers. Booklets were distributed by the
million. Hundreds of farmer delegates were given free trips through
the promised land. Agents were appointed in each likely State, with
sub-agents who were paid a bonus on every actual settler. The first
settlers sent back word of limitless land to be had for a song, and of
No. 1 Northern Wheat that ran thirty or forty bushels to the acre. Soon
imm