category of investment. Jonathan makes the ideal pioneer; John Bull,
the ideal permanent settler who comes in and buys from the pioneer.

If this, too, be "the Americanizing of Canada," it has been a good
thing for the country.

To be sure, there have been hideous horrible abuses. The real estate
boom reached the proportions of a fevered madness before it collapsed.
Americans bought r_an_ches for five dollars an acre and resold them as
r_awn_ches for fifty dollars to young Englishmen who will never make a
cent on their investment; chiefly because fruit trees take from five to
ten years to come to maturity, and because fruit must be near a market,
and because only an expert can succeed at fruit.

If ever wildcat flourished in a gold camp or gambling joint, and that
wildcat did not hie to Canada when the real estate boom broke loose,
the wildcat species not in evidence was too rare to be classified.
Property in small cities sold at New York and Chicago values. Suburban
lots were staked out round small towns in areas for a London or a
Paris, and the lots were sold on instalment plan to small investors,
many of whom bought in hope of resale before payments could accrue.
City taxes for these suburban improvements increased to a great burden.
Fortunes were made and lost overnight. Railroad bonds were guaranteed
plentifully enough to pave the prairie. All this applies chiefly to
city real estate. Inflation beyond investment basis never touched farm
lands; but as a prominent editor remarked, "No fool thing that ever
failed was half as improbable as the fool things that have succeeded.
Men have literally been kicked into fortunes; and the carefulest man
has often been the biggest fool by not biting till the last."