THE PAS: GATEWAY OF THE GREAT NORTHLAND.
_Romantic Canada is...._
[Illustration:
KASLO AFTER RAIN.]
[Illustration:
MOUNTAIN GOATS,
SNOWFLAKES AGAINST THE BLUE SKY.]
Romantic Canada is never halted by natural obstacles. Like the true
diplomat, she wins over hindrances to become aids. High mountains, large
rivers with swirling rapids and falls, immense lakes, inland seas, have
thus become to Romance, mere stepping-stones. So the cold of the Great
Northland, from being a barrier of conquest, has simply inspired Madame
Romance to call for her heaviest and finest furs, her dog-team and sled,
her snow-shoes, and a supply of good pemmican. Snow is to her but
Nature’s cosmetic for rosy cheeks.
“Trade” long ago, claimed The Pas, in Manitoba, as “The Gateway to the
Great Northland” and at once Madame proclaimed that “solemn-faced
Business” was justified in this; but at the same time she herself
reserved the right to spread her pelts for a mat, and sit in this Gate
at all times. And Trade, which always walks hand-in-hand with Romance,
was very glad to hear her fiat, knowing that the Romantic and business
are so close interwoven as to be almost one and inseparable.
The Pas, as a town, is new; but its site was a Trading Post ages upon
ages ago. Old in this particular, to the Indians before the advent of
the Hudson’s Bay Company in these parts, it was an objective of the
Crees, perhaps before Leif coasted from Greenland to Newfoundland. The
Pas is still remarkable for the absence of ordinary roads. To get to and
from the Pas of old there was only the broad bosom of the Saskatchewan
inviting the canoe. But of late years advancing civilization has pushed
northward the Hudson’s Bay Railroad. Pioneer wit and humour, with its
gift for nomenclature, at once personified the trains for this romantic
adventure in rails. The train from the South was christened the
“Tamarack”. The sub-Arctic Explorer conquesting to the North they aptly
called the “Muskeg”. These two names speak for themselves concerning the
nature of the country.
Anyone, who has watched the indomitable “Muskeg” go forth from the Pas
station in the thick of a driving snowstorm, knows, beyond doubt, that
Canadian courage is a driving force practically at work to subdue to the
service of the nation all that vast coastline of Hudson’s Bay which has
hitherto been allowed to run to waste.
For all this great enterprise “The Pas” is the “Gate”. Nevertheless when
one goes down to the bank of the Saskatchewan and looks up and down the
silvery bosom of this ribbon of water, which makes its start somewhere
out there in the Rockies, one knows that The Pas has a waterway which
must always place it in the first ranks among the busy centres of the
country. The river is to The Pas what the Grand Canal is to Venice. The
gondola here is the canoe or the old stern-wheel passenger boat, tapping
the neighbouring country.
There was a time when The Pas knew that romantic flotilla, the York
Boats of the H.B.C., which periodically passed here with cargoes of
pelts between York Factory and the Old Stone Fort or Lower Fort Garry.
The York Boat has long ago “cleared” for her last long voyage and, with
her passing, passed also that old Character of the Canadian
Northland--usually come hither out of the Shetlands or the Orkneys--the
H.B.C. boat-builder. No more are heard either, the chansons of the
rowers. In the place of these old boats of the fur-trade there is now
the flotilla of Ore-boats; for The Pas, the gate to the fur-country, is
likewise the water gate for receiving the rich mineral wealth of
northern Manitoba. Copper comes down the river and steps ashore here,
destined for the smelter away off at Trail, B.C. This is indeed a long,
long trail for ore to take; but it is an admirable illustration of the
unity between widely separated parts of Canada. Today there is more
inter-provincial business, and more universal assistance from one
section of the same Province toward the development of some other
section, than has hitherto existed. In this, Canada has caught the
National stride with remarkable celerity. What helps one helps all. The
Pas is the natural gateway to the opening-up of the mineral wealth of
the New, Old North.
Sitting in this Gate a long caravan of prospectors files past, carrying
in their packs “supplies” furnished by the local out-fitting stores.
Strangely enough, Pas stores are among the finest in Canada. It is
claimed that in them anything from a miner’s shovel to embroidery-silks
is in stock. These things, though commonplace on Yonge or Saint
Catherine’s Streets, become romantic, indeed, in this far Gateway to the
Great Northland; the more so when the woman who goes to the H.B.C. or
any of the other stores, for a hank of embroidery-silk or cerise or
art-blue horse-hair, put up especially for her use, is a light-stepping
Cree, whose habitat is across the river, but who roams the vast
stretches of the hinterlands as other women walk in their gardens. The
Crees are especially artistic. They take beads, embroidery silks and the
horsehairs in hand as other women take pen or brush. But their
embroidery is not wrought on cambric or linen, but on skin of moose or
caribou shot by their family hunters and cured and tanned or “smoked” by
their own hands.
The Factor will tell you that it is one of the interesting sights of the
Christmas Season at this northern town to see the young braves turn out
to the English Church, adorned in richly embroidered skin-gloves, edged
perhaps with a border of plucked-beaver, the gift of their fiancees.
Nevertheless, the Cree women still make their infants’ little beds of
reindeer moss, carefully washed and picked clear of all grit, and on the
road they still carry their babies in a tikanagan strapped to their
backs. The “tikanagan board” is often decorated by the mother in stains
of reds, blues and browns, and the reindeer-moss nest, on which the baby
reclines, is held in place by facings of smoked moose-hide neatly
thonged together. This cradle of the Cree-baby is always provided with a
handle, so that the mother, unstrapping the contrivance from her back,
can hang it up in some tree and be sure that the gentle swaying of the
bough by the breeze will keep her baby asleep, while she herself fishes
or cooks a meal for the rest of the family. This Cree mother and the
Japanese woman in the salmon factories of British Columbia have never
heard of one another, yet it is interesting to note that both strap
their babies on their backs while at work.
The Hudson Bay Railway crosses the Saskatchewan on one of the finest
steel bridges in Canada. It is some 850 feet in length and of ample
width for vehicles and pedestrians, as well as for the railroad. It is a
bridge of the most up-to-date type, yet the tikanagan sways from the
trees on either bank where this Colossus plants its feet as it bestrides
the river. And when the “Muskeg” thunders by, it is a signal for Eskimo
dogs in the yards of the Big Eddy Reserve to set up a howl of protest
against the invader of their transportation-copyright in the great
Northland.
To the old-order-of-life represented by the tikanagan and the dog-team,
belongs the canoe on the river. Come the “Muskeg”, come the “Tamarac”,
come the automobile, the steamboat, the barge, ore-or grain-laden, the
canoe holds its own on the river. Playing with the paddle is an
inheritance. As has been said “A canoe represents not only Cree but
Creed in this Northern-Gate.”
But the Pas has many sweet as well as strong touches. Surprise awaits
the traveller in the beautiful flowers in the gardens of Pas homes.
Flowers are always a surprise in the Northland, and when encountered
they have an especial appeal created by their very rarity.
On a bluff of the river-bank stands the historic old Church of England,
first church in these parts. Dropping in to matins here of a Sunday
morning is to find one’s self surrounded by the “atmosphere” that is the
Northland’s Own. Here, the old pews, pulpit and reading-desk were carved
by men belonging to a Sir John Franklin Relief Expedition which wintered
in these parts and at Cumberland House, while they waited for the ice to
break up. Sitting in one of these old pews brings back to life all that
long stirring period of the Nation’s history involved in Arctic
Exploration. Sir John and Lady Franklin become personal to you sitting
here in a pew fashioned by the hands of men who adventured their lives
in noble effort to bring back news of England’s great Explorer.
The atmosphere of Arctic Exploration brought to life by the old pew,
appears mysteriously amplified and fulfilled in the Ten Commandments in
Cree on the right and left walls of the little Chancel. The Crees are
the children of that Northland into which the pew-carver ventured. Old
Chief Constant sits over there in the corner of one of these pews, the
Assomption belt, a gay dash of colour, about his portly waist,
attentively listening to the service, which is the tribal “Voice of
‘Mahneto’--The Great Spirit”.
In the wake of the church are the schools for the Crees. There is a
boarding-school at the Big Eddy under the management of Archdeacon
MacKay. The fine school building, with accommodation for eighty pupils,
was erected by the Government and opened in October, 1914. The Woman’s
Auxiliary of the Diocese of Ottawa furnished the parlor as a memorial to
their one-time Corresponding Secretary, Helen Josephine Fitzgerald. This
Body also built the pretty little stone church in the grounds; but the
fine hospital was the gift of the Government.
Archdeacon MacKay, the principal of this Indian School, is a Canadian
and an octogenarian, who has spent fifty-six years in Missionary work in
this North. The Archdeacon paddled us the five miles down the
Saskatchewan to The Pas in his canoe, with two of the Indian boys to
assist, as nonchalantly as any young man of twenty. All through his long
ministry, beginning between fifty and sixty years ago, he has been able
with the canoe’s aid, to carry the double Message of the Gospel and
Canada to a remote and savage people. He has lived to see The Pas become
the centre of the Northward-urge of Canadian life and development, now
so much a part of the national ambition.
On the North bank of the river, not more than halfway to the Big Eddy
boarding-school, is a little, whitewashed schoolhouse, which is kept by
a young Indian woman, a graduate of the Elkhorn School; and here all the
little local youngsters pursue “the Three R’s.” The school garden is
laid out in tiny beds; but the true atmosphere of the life is tellingly
indicated in the small bows-and-arrows which each little boy carries in
hand as he comes through the woods to the schoolhouse. The Cree is a
born hunter. These bows and arrows of childhood are, after all, but
stepping-stones like Readin’, ’Ritin’ and ’Rithmetic. It is as a
_hunter_ the Cree must make a living.
The Cree, having trapped the wary fox, or other furred animal, brings
the pelt to be smoked in the yard of the little homes that radiate in
the woods from the schoolhouse. In the smoking and curing the women take
the pelt in hand. A green and pliable branch is cut from a tree. The
skin is then turned under side out and stretched tightly over the green
and springy wood. The ears and legs are stuffed with hay. After the
process of stretching the skin, it is laid over a frame of sticks like
the ribs of a tepee, and a fire is made underneath and kept going with
half green wood to make plenty of smoke. The Indian woman keeps turning
the skin from time to time so that all parts are evenly cured, and,
every once in a while, the man comes out and takes a look, fingering the
skin, and then, when it is pretty well cured an old man or old woman,
grandfather or grandmother, a living manual of pelts, comes out, and
grunts a last opinion. Thus is cured the pelt, that, finding its way
from Cree hands to the fur-markets of the world, sooner or later graces
the shoulders of some lady of the land.