IN CANADA TO-DAY.

Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 309, 31 December 1931, Page 12

IN CANADA TO-DAY.

The depression is very bad in British Columbia, just as it is everywhere, said Mrs. M. J. Monckton, a visitor from Victoria, who is staying in Auckland, and who is a sister-in-law of the Rev. W. G. Monckton, of Takapuna. "Some women who had good incomes have lost it all and are now going out scrubbing floors, running tearooms, or anything that they can get to do to keep themselves," said the visitor.- There was a wave of wild gambling speculation which went over Canada as it did over the United States, and glib-mouthed salesmen persuaded women who did not think things out for themselves to go in for stocks and bonds, which, when the depression came, were worthless. There was a big land boom, and those who were caught by the idea that money could be made without working put their capital into land properties, and now it was impossible even to give away a i house. Such people had lost every cent they possessed. Victoria, where Mrs. Monckton lives, is a very beautiful part of the Dominion, and a very English place, with its population containing numbers of retired army and navy English people, who have given it a feeling of English manners and ways of thought. One of the recent additions is a very fine cathedral. The island has great beauty in -the autumn, when the woods turn ' glorious colours. Mrs. Monckton said that when she looks out of. her windows the view contains maples, which are exactly the golden yellow of a rich daffodil, intermixed with the dogwood tree, which has a beautiful flower, and in autumn goes a rich scarlet from top to toe. These! gorgeous trees standing up amidst the delicate blue haze makes a picture of unforgettable beauty. I Just across the bay, within three and a half hours, lies Seattle, which is American and very gay. The steamers which travel thither are like palaces of luxury, but at the present .moment the would-be visitor has to undergo such a cross-examination in the Customs house, and the exchange is so high, that it has robbed the pleasure of all its. joy. Travelling is one of Mrs. Monckton's pleasures and she intends spending'the next six months seeing all she can v of New Zealand. She will visit both Christchurch and Dunedin, before returning to her home in Canada. ; -