Protest

The Canadian Pacific Steamship Company last week notified the North Atlantic Steamship Conference that it would withdraw from that body. Inasmuch as it is through the conference that the steamship companies regulate their trans-Atlantic fares and keep equal the fees charged passengers for equivalent services, the Canadian Pacific's withdrawal is tantamount to a declaration, if not of war, then of protest against the practices of a competitor.

Said Walter Maughan, General Passenger Manager of the Canadian Pacific Railways (which own the steamship company), at Montreal last week: "It is not unusual among important enterprises when action occurs that is considered inimical by any one interested, for the decks to be cleared. . . ." What was such inimical action or by whom done, he, prudent, did not state. But it is well known in Montreal, as in Liverpool, that Canadian Pacific operators were vexed at the recent announcement of the Cunard Line that the Cunarders Athenia, Antonia, Ansonia, and Letitia would be reconditioned to carry only tourist third class and third class passengers (a type not very fussy) between English and Canadian ports. Thus the Cunard Line would attract some of the great Canadian Pacific traffic of immigrants from England to Canada. The situation a few years ago would have induced a rate war between transportation companies. Twenty years ago such a general war took place. First class fares between New York and Liverpool fell to $22.00 a person--but for a very short time. With trans-Atlantic travel as vast as it is now the companies are too discreet to initiate such a contest.