"Isn't It Wonderful?"

Last week King George and Queen Elizabeth left Toronto and the long-settled Europeanized East of Canada for the dark forests, sparkling lakes, limitless plains and rugged mountains of the West and purely American Canada. But the welcome they received, whether in small towns or cities, was, if anything, more sincere, more enthusiastic than they had previously experienced. As the royal party rolled across the country, there rose a militant nationalism, a recognition that the British monarchy is as much Canadian as British. All this must have been gratifying to the King and Queen, as well as the gentlemen of Downing Street, but it was also cruel punishment for Their Majesties, who worked hard, did not let the crowds down once.

King's Mayor. Monday night and Tuesday the royal couple traveled through the pine-shadowed lakes of western Ontario. If it was late at night when the King and Queen passed through a hamlet, crowds that gathered to see the shuttered cars flash by waved their flags, but kept silent lest they disturb King George and Queen Elizabeth's sleep. At White River, "coldest spot in Ontario," the train stopped to service the locomotive. On the snow-sprinkled platform Indians, school children, townspeople hoping against hope that they might glimpse their sovereigns, were overjoyed when Queen Elizabeth, motioning the King to follow, stepped from the train. Flustered aides rushed to the welcoming committee, demanded that the mayor appear to greet Their Majesties. White River has no mayor, so the Committee quickly chose one, who escorted the royal visitors down to meet the locomotive crew. After the usual ceremonies at Port Arthur and Fort William, the train proceeded.

Winnipeg. Despite a drizzling rain, the Queen ordered the top of their automobile lowered, smiled bravely though wetly during the 26-mile drive through Canada's wheat city. Dignitaries were warned against too hearty handshaking, for the King had pinched two fingers in a train door. It was Queen Victoria's Birthday--Empire Day--and the King, after listening to professions of loyalty broadcast from every colony and Dominion of the Empire, replied with his best speech of the trip.

Of nothing are the British fonder than a carefully cultivated anachronism. In Winnipeg the Canadians were proud to produce a quaint ceremony of their own. Before the loopholed gate of old Fort Garry, Governor Patrick Ashley Cooper of the Hudson's Bay Co. paid to the King the rent established when King Charles II granted its charter: "Two elkcs and two Black beavers whensoever and as often as Wee our heires and successors shall happen to enter into the said Countryes Territoryes and Regions hereby granted." The King was willing to relax the requirements, and instead of a ton of meat on the hoof and a pair of rambunctious rodents, accepted two mighty-antlered mounted heads and the choicest pair of beaver pelts from the Company's London auction rooms. Late that night the train stopped for the trip's most unusual welcome at Brandon, Manitoba, where 10,000 children in a floodlit natural amphitheatre cheered and sang. The King and Queen stepped into the crowd to be hugged and kissed (he had been backslapped at Ottawa), as well as cheered. Tears were in the Queen's eyes as she returned to the train, murmuring, "Isn't it wonderful?"

Wheat Country. West of Winnipeg stretches the depressed, marketless wheat country, where once-prosperous farmers have replaced their Fords and Buicks with "Bennett buggies."* Their Majesties got into close touch with the prairies by climbing off and running and walking a mile down the right of way outside of Broadview, Saskatchewan, their train following at a respectful distance.

The farmers of Saskatchewan may be poor but they have spirit and imagination; concerts, dances, bazaars scraped up the money to send thousands of boys and girls in overalls and homemade dresses from schools within a radius of 200 miles to Regina, the provincial capital, for a glimpse of their King and Queen. Lacking the money for the fancy decorations of the East, the resourceful townspeople decorated the lampposts with sprays of wheat. Doubly welcome were the King and Queen for with them came rain for dusty fields. That night at little Moose Jaw, despite rain and the exhausting ceremonies in Regina, the Queen insisted on making an eight-block parade through muddy cheering streets. After the departure of the royal party, Moose Jaw went on the biggest binge in its history.

Cow Country. Leaving the wheatlands for the cow country, the royal train stopped briefly next morning at Medicine Hat, Alberta, where the Queen became so interested in a girl band from Big Sandy, Montana, 350 miles away, that the King was obliged to remind her that the train was waiting. At Calgary 200,000 Canadians and U. S. citizens up for a good time gave the royal couple a rousing western welcome. Two thousand Blackfeet, Sarcees, Piegans and Stonys whooped and hollered in their most intimidating manner while their chiefs conferred on George VI a new title: "Great Chief Albino."

That evening the royal train pulled into Banff, in time for the King and Queen to see the sun set behind the great purple mountains. Half an hour after arriving at the Banff Springs Hotel, opened especially for the royal visit, they left their suite for a walk by the falls of the Bow River. One of the Royal Canadian Police stationed every 50 yards around the hotel began to trail them watchfully. The King halted and smiled. "Please don't follow us," he said, "we are quite all right."

Rest Day. At Banff for one day King George and Queen Elizabeth could relax. Dressed in sports clothes they drove about, peeked at peaks, climbed a small mountain, photographed a deer and a cub bear, took a ride in an old-fashioned buckboard, dined on fresh trout caught by Lord-in-Waiting Lord Eldon, and chatted with correspondents in the evening.

Next day, snaking through the grandest mountain scenery in North America, the King and Queen enjoyed another royal prerogative, that of riding in the cab of the lead locomotive of the train's snorting "triple-header." Ahead lay three days of full-dress dignity in Vancouver and Victoria, before the swing back to the East for their visit to the U. S.

* A horse-drawn vehicle constructed from an old automobile, facetiously named for former Prime Minister Richard Bedford Bennett who boasted that he gave Canada "a New Deal."

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