some time runs along Burrard Inlet, on which is situated Fort Moody,
another town which had hoped to be chosen as terminus, and actually
did enjoy that privilege for a short time. The shores of the Inlet
are beautifully wooded, and some of the trees are of enormous size.
At the crossing of Stave River a fine view is obtained of Mt. Baker,
looking forward to the right, and the bridge over the Harrison River,
where it meets the Frazer, also affords a picturesque view. For the
next fifteen or sixteen hours the train follows the banks of the Frazer
River and its tributaries, and this is one of the grandest sections of
the route. At the first the Frazer is a muddy, yellow river, about the
size of the Willamette above Oregon City, but more rapid and winding,
and an occasional steamer may be seen floating along with the current,
or slowly making headway against it. In some places the railway runs
so close to the precipitous bank of the river that a handkerchief
might be dropped from a car window into the swirling eddies fifty feet
below. At other places it leaves room—and just room enough—for the old
wagon road between the track and the river; but it would take a cool
driver, with much confidence in his horses, to remain on his wagon here
when a train passes. At last the road itself becomes frightened and
crosses the river on a bridge, whereupon it winds along the hill-side
above the opposite bank, at a safe distance. This road was made during
the Frazer River gold excitement in 1858, when twenty-five thousand
miners flocked into this region, and wages for any kind of work were
ten to eighteen dollars a day. To-day the metal no longer exists in
what white men consider paying quantity; but Chinamen may still be
seen along the river washing for remnants, their earnings being about
fifty cents a day. There is also a “Ruby Creek” in this neighborhood,
and some Indian habitations, and salmon-fishing places. Shortly before
reaching Yale, which for a long time was the western end of the road,
there is a slight intermission in the scenic drama, represented by some
rich, level, agricultural lands—as if to give the passengers a moment’s
rest before the wonders of the Frazer Cañon begin to monopolize their
bewildered attention till darkness sets in and drops the curtain on the
superb panorama.
[Illustration: FRAZER CAÑON.]
Yale, which is so completely shut in by high, frowning mountain walls
on every side that the sun touches the village only during part of the
day, has lost its importance since it ceased to be a terminus, and
seems at present to be inhabited chiefly by Indians and half-breeds.
The train is invaded by a bevy of half-breed girls with baskets of
splendid apples and pears, which could not be beaten for size and
flavor in any of our States, and indicate a possible use for these
mountain regions in the future. And now the train plunges into the
midst of the series of terrific gorges which constitute the Frazer
Cañon, and which make this railway literally the most gorge-ous in the
world. Here were appalling engineering difficulties to overcome, which
no private corporation without the most liberal government support
could have undertaken. Yet the builders had to be thankful even for
this wild and rugged cañon dug out by the Frazer River, without which
the Cascade range would have been impassable. The palace cars of the
Canadian Pacific, which contain all the best features of the Pullman
cars, with home improvements, have a special observatory, with large
windows, at the end of the train, whence the cañon should be viewed;
but to see it at its best one must sit on the rear platform, so as to
see at the same time both of the wild and precipitous cañon walls,
between which the river rushes along as if pursued by demons. At every
curve you think the gorge must come to an end, but it only grows more
stupendous, and the river, lashed into foam and fury, dashes blindly
against the rocks which try to arrest its course. These rocks, ten to
thirty feet wide and sometimes twice as long, form many pretty little
stone islands in the middle of the torrent, and are a characteristic
feature of the cañon scenery. Numerous tunnels, resembling those on
the Columbia River, are built through arches seemingly projecting over
the river. The train plunges into them recklessly, but always comes
out fresh and smiling on the other side, although it seems that if the
bottom of the tunnel should by any chance drop out, the train would be
precipitated into the river below.
Once in a while the river takes a short rest, and in these
comparatively calm stretches hundreds of beautiful large red fish can
be seen from the train, in the clear water, struggling up stream. With
their dark backs and bright red sides they form a sight which is none
the less interesting when you are told that they are “only dog-salmon,”
which are not relished by whites, though the Indians eat them.
The train stops for supper at North Bend, and here we are once more
impressed with the fact that although we are in America, we are not
in the United States. At our own stations, as soon as the train
stops, there is a grand rush for the dining-room, the waiters dump
half-a-dozen small dishes before each passenger, who attacks them
nervously, with one eye on the door and his ears pricked up for the
bell. It would be useless to extend the dining-time more than fifteen
or twenty minutes, for in five minutes most of the small dishes are
empty and in ten or twelve minutes not a soul is left at the tables,
though the _restaurateur_ has called out repeatedly, “Plenty of time,”
“Departure of the train will be announced.”
How differently they manage things on British soil! There passengers
sit down, unfold their napkins leisurely, while the waiter-girl brings
on the soup. There is a regular _menu_, of so many courses, each of
which is brought on separately. The conductor, after disposing of his
share of the feast, waits at the door till the last passenger has of
his own free will left the table, picking his teeth, and then calls out
“All aboard.” Time, forty-five minutes; and at other stations similar
scenes are enacted, with never less than half an hour for a meal. Yet
the train is always on time.
It must be admitted that it is not very difficult to be on time when
the average speed for the first day is only seventeen miles an hour.
There is danger from the boulders which may roll on the track from the
steep cañon sides, and occasionally you see a sign along the track
telling the engineer to “GO CAUTIOUSLY—FOUR MILES AN HOUR.” All the
dangerous ground, however, is covered by walkers, who go over the track
an hour before each passenger train.
During the night east-bound passengers will inevitably miss the fine
scenery along the Thompson River, with the Thompson and Black cañons;
but it should be stated that the time-table in both directions has
been so arranged that the best part of the route is traversed in the
daytime; and that consequently no radical change will perhaps ever be
made. Passengers who are willing to get up at six may still see part
of the Thompson River and get some fine views of Shuswap Lake as the
train skirts its shores. Here, obviously, would be the place for lovers
of sport to get off, for vast flocks of ducks and geese rise from the
water as the train rushes past. About ten o’clock the train arrives at
Craigellachie, which is notable as the spot where the rails from the
east and west met, and where the last spike on this great continental
road was driven in, on November 7, 1885.
Scenic wonders now succeed one another with bewildering rapidity
throughout the day. This second day, in fact, represents the climax
of the trip, and the attention is not allowed to flag for a second.
However much such a confession may go against the grain of patriotism,
every candid traveller must admit that there is nothing in the United
States in the way of massive mountain scenery (except perhaps in
Alaska) to compare with the glorious panorama which is unfolded on this
route. Within thirty-six hours after leaving Vancouver we traverse
three of the grandest mountain ranges in America,—the Cascades,
Selkirks, and Rockies,—all of them the abode of eternal snow and
glaciers, and all of them traversed through by cañons which vie with
each other in terrific grandeur.
Before the Selkirks are reached the train passes the Columbia or Gold
range, through the Eagle Pass, so called because it was discovered by
watching an eagle’s flight. Eagle Pass is a poetic and appropriate
name, and yet I think it would be well to re-name this mountain pass
and call it Mirror Lake Cañon, because that would call the attention
of tourists to what is its most characteristic feature, which may
otherwise be overlooked. There are four lakes and many smaller bodies
of water in this valley, in whose placid surface the finely sloped
mountain ridges and summits of the pass are reflected with marvellous
distinctness, so that here, as in the Yosemite Mirror Lake, the copy is
more lovely than the original. Some of the mountain sides reflected in
these mirrors are naked rocks, others are covered with living evergreen
trees, and others still with dead trees. In the mirror these dead
forests look hardly less beautiful than the living ones; but in the
original the eye dwells with more pleasure on the green forests which
here, and almost everywhere in British Columbia, grow with the rank
luxuriance of a Ceylon jungle. The soil under these dense tree-masses,
consisting of decayed pine and fir needles, a foot deep and always
moist, makes a paradise for lovely mosses and ferns. Here, also, is the
home of the bear, and one would not have to walk far in this thicket to
encounter a grizzly, black, or cinnamon bruin.
On emerging from the Mirror Lake Cañon, a great surprise awaits the
passengers. The Columbia River—to which they had fancied they had said
a final farewell when they were ferried across it on the way from
Portland to Tacoma—suddenly comes upon the scene again, as clear and as
picturesque as ever; and even at this immense distance from its mouth
still large enough to require a bridge half a mile long to cross it.
A few hours later the train again crosses the Columbia, at Donald,
where the river has become much smaller than it seems that it should
in such a short distance. To get an explanation of this circumstance,
it is interesting to glance at the map, and notice what an immense
curve northward the Columbia has made in this interval in order to
find a passage through the Selkirk range; and in thus encircling the
snowy Selkirks it has, of course, added to its volume the contents of
innumerable glacier streams and mountain brooks. Its real sources are
southeast of Donald, on the summit of the Rockies, separated by but
a short distance from springs which run down on the eastern side and
find their way through the Mississippi into the Gulf of Mexico. Thus
do extremes meet. It would be difficult to find anything so curious in
the course of any other river as this immense, irregular parallelogram
which the Columbia here describes from its sources to Arrow Lake.
Fortunately, railroad builders are not quite as dependent as rivers on
deep cañons for getting over mountain barriers; hence our train is not
obliged to follow the Columbia in its great sweep around the Selkirks,
but proceeds comparatively straight across this range towards the
Rockies proper, via the Albert Cañon, at an elevation of 2845 feet, in
which the train makes a brief stop to enable passengers to look down
into a flume in which the river, narrowed by the walls to twenty feet,
rushes along three hundred feet directly beneath them.
The snow-peaks of the Selkirks are now looming up on all sides, and the
atmosphere becomes more bracing and Alpine as the train slowly creeps
up the mountain side, doubling up on itself in a loop. The Glacier
House is reached before long, and here every tourist who has time to
spare should get off and spend a day or two, since next to Banff, in
the National Park, this is the finest point along the whole route,
scenically speaking, while the air is even more salubrious, cool, and
intoxicating than at Banff, owing to the nearness of the glacier. It
would be difficult, even in Switzerland, to find a more romantic spot
for a hotel than the location of the Glacier House. High peaks rise
up on every side, so finely moulded, so deeply mantled with snow, and
presenting such various aspects from different points of view, that we
forget our disgust at the fact that, as usual in the West, these grand
eternal peaks have been named after ephemeral mortals,—Browns, Smiths,
and Joneses. The Grizzly and Cougar mountains are more aptly named,
as these animals will long continue to abound in the impenetrable
forests which adorn these peaks below the snow-line. Looking from the
hotel towards the glacier, to the left is a peak which looks like the
Matterhorn, the most unique mountain in Switzerland; and what is still
more striking, at its side is another, smaller peak, which is an exact
copy of the Little Matterhorn.
The greater part of the Selkirk region is still entirely unexplored;
and good mountain climbers who scorn to reascend the Swiss peaks,
which have long since all been measured, named, and labelled, may here
have their pick of first ascents. But they will miss the conveniences
of the Swiss Alps,—well-informed guides, and hotels with all modern
conveniences. Not even a satisfactory map has existed heretofore, and
an Englishman, W. S. Green, who published a book called “Among the
Selkirk Glaciers” (1890) was obliged to make his own map which is added
to his volume. It is tantalizing to read of Alpine paradises, “which
no being higher than a bear had entered before” Mr. Green and his
companion, and of “a perfect ocean of peaks and glaciers,” etc., which
they could see on elevated points. Who knows but that a hundred years
hence there will be as many visitors to the Selkirks every summer as
now crowd into Switzerland?
The Glacier Hotel will always remain a popular point, because it is so
near a great glacier of almost Alaskan dimensions. It is only about a
mile thence to the foot of the glacier, which has the moraine of huge
boulders, the gaping crevasses, the stream at the end, and all the
other accessories of ice-rivers. At noon, on a warm day, when the ice
melts rapidly, the roar of the glacial stream can be distinctly heard
far away; but as the sun sinks lower, the water flows more scantily,
and at night the brook is silent or merely whispers.
The principal difference between the Swiss Alps and the Selkirk range
lies in the aspect of the mountain sides below the snow-line. These, in
Switzerland, are green meadows dotted with browsing cows; while here
they consist of superb forests of giant cedars, with bears in place of
cows, and presenting one unbroken mass of dark green, except where an
avalanche has tobogganed down and opened what seems at a distance like
a roadway, but is found to be a battle-field strewn with the corpses of
cedars three and four feet in diameter.
The most imposing view of such a mountain forest, unbroken by a single
avalanche path, is obtained from the snow-sheds just above the hotel.
Sitting outside these sheds and looking toward the left, you see a
vast mountain slope covered with literally millions of dark green
trees. Why has none of the world’s greatest poets ever been permitted
to gaze on such a Selkirk forest, that he might have aroused in his
unfortunate readers who are not privileged to see one, emotions similar
to those inspired by it? But I fear that neither verse nor photographs,
nor even the painter’s brush, can ever more than suggest the real
grandeur of such a forest scene. This mountain is not snow-crowned in
September, but its wooded summit makes a sharp green line against the
snow-peaks beyond and above. From this summit down to the foot stand
the green giant cedars, as crowded as the yellow stalks in a Minnesota
wheatfield. But in place of the flat monochrome of a wheatfield,
our sloping forest presents a most fascinating color spectacle. The
slanting rays of the sun tinge the waving tree-tops with a deeply
saturated yellowish green, curiously interspersed with a mosaic of
dark, almost black streaks and patches of shade, due to clouds and
other causes, and the whole edged by the dazzling snow.
If we descend and enter this forest, a cathedral-like awe thrills the
nerves. Daylight has not the power to penetrate to the ground hidden by
this dense mass of tree-tops rising two hundred to three hundred feet
into the air—except that an occasional ray of sunlight may steal in
for a second, like a flash of lightning. And the carpet on which this
forest stands! In America we rarely see a house, even of a day-laborer,
without a carpet: why, then, should these royal trees do without
one? The carpet is itself a miniature forest of ferns and mosses,
luxuriating in riotous profusion on an ever-moist soil, the products
of thousands of generations of pine needles. Nor is this carpet a
monochrome, for the green is varied by numerous berries of various
kinds, most of which are red, as they should be—the complementary
color of green. But there are also acres of blueberries as large as
cherries; and if you will tear off a few branches of these and bring
them to the young bear chained up near the Glacier Hotel, he will be
very grateful, and you will find it amusing to watch him eating them.
[Illustration: THE SELKIRK GLACIER.]
There is music, too, in this Forest Cathedral, which is heard to best
advantage from the elevated gallery occupied by the snow-sheds. It
takes a trained ear to distinguish the steady, rippling _staccato_
sound of a snow-fed mountain brook from the prolonged _legato_ sigh of
a pine forest, swelling to _fortissimo_, and dying away by turns. In
the romantic spot we have chosen, these sounds are blended, the music
of the torrents being caught up by the sloping forest as by a huge
sounding-board, and increased in loudness by being mingled with the
mournful strains of the tree-tops, as orchestral colors are blended by
modern masters. Those err who say there is no music in nature. It is
not in “Siegfried” alone that the _Waldweben_ is musical, that leaves
sing as well as birds, while the thunder occasionally adds its loud
_basso profundo_.
The æsthetic exhilaration which we owe to these poetic sights and
sounds is intensified by the salubrious breezes which waft this music
to our ears. Born among the clouds and glaciers, they are perfumed
in passing across the forests, warmed by the sun’s rays in passing
over the valley; and every breath of this elixir adds a day to one’s
life. It is not surprising that mountains should make the best health
resorts; for do they not themselves understand and obey the laws of
health? They keep their heads cool under a snow-cap, their feet warm in
a mossy blanket, and their sides covered with a dense _fir_ overcoat.
In comparing the Alpine scenes of British Columbia with those of
Switzerland, I should have noted one more advantage in favor of the
former, namely, the rows and groups of giant cedars through the spaces
between which glimpses of the snow ridges and peaks, and of the green
slopes leading up to them, are caught. This always adds a lovely frame
to the picture, and gives infinite variety. Even the stumps and fallen
trees in the foreground, whether they are the result of an avalanche or
left there by the builders of the railroad, add an element of wildness
and desolation which harmonizes better with Alpine scenery than
meadows, cows, and dairy huts.
But we must not linger too long at the Glacier House and amid the
Selkirks, for another range of the Rockies, equally grand, awaits us
beyond. I have mentioned the curve on which the snow-sheds are built,
just above the hotel, whence such a fine view of peaks and forests is
to be obtained. We who have been able to stop over a day have had time
to enjoy this view at leisure. But those who are unable to interrupt
their journey would have missed one of the finest sights in America
had it not been for the most commendable wisdom and liberality which
prompted the builders of the Canadian Pacific Railroad to construct a
second track outside of the snow-sheds, which is used in summer, so
that every passenger can, for a moment at least, feast his eyes on
this incomparable scene. Of all commendable features of the Canadian
road which I have had occasion to praise, this one most merits
imitation on some of our “American” railways, unless an exception be
the delightfully convenient “Time-Table,” in form of a forty-four page
booklet, which is given free to passengers, and which contains brief
notes on all the stations and principal scenic points, while the hour
at which the train arrives at each is printed in the margin, both for
east-bound and for west-bound trains.
On passing the snow-sheds it is interesting to study their appearance
and note with what an apparently lavish waste of timber they have
been constructed. But it must be remembered that timber is more than
abundant here, and that the trees that had to be cut down to make room
for the track more than sufficed for all the sleepers, sheds, and
other protective bulwarks against snow, landslides, or avalanches. The
log-remnants, lying about on both sides of the track, will soon be
covered with mosses and ferns and add a new element of loveliness to
the scene. And there is another way in which the railway atones to the
vegetable kingdom for the damage caused by passing through the forests.
As the train speeds along, its suction whirls into the air, like
snowflakes, the light-winged seeds ripening along the track; and thus
it becomes a great distributer of herbs and flowers.
Twenty minutes after leaving the Glacier House the train reaches its
highest point on the Selkirks,—4275 feet. Then the descent begins,
and we leave the vicinity of the glaciers, though the snow-peaks that
give rise to them continue for hours to gladden the sight. What had
seemed more or less isolated peaks near by, are now seen to be merely
the highest points of a vast conglomeration of mountain ridges, which
are thrown into ever-new groups as the train winds along the mountain
sides. In rapid succession several bridges are passed, built over
brooks several hundred feet below. To the right, far below us, is a
long, narrow valley, painted a mellow golden yellow by the setting sun
(it sets here at three); and winding through it is the Beaver River,
which from this height looks as small as if it were seen through an
inverted spy-glass. Glimpses of the Rockies are now caught, and at
16.45 o’clock Donald is reached, where we once more cross the Columbia,
which starts out hence for its grand curve around the Selkirks. The
river here is about as large as the Rhine at Schaffhausen, and yet the
passengers discover to their amazement that even here it is navigable,
and that if they wish to make a hundred-mile trip, which is said to
equal in grandeur any part of the Columbia River, they need only stop
over at Golden City, two hours beyond Donald, and take the small weekly
boat which runs from that station up the river, charging six dollars
for the round trip. Golden City owes its name to a former mining
excitement, but its present appearance suggests that Golden Fizzle
would be a more appropriate name.
For the greater part of the two hours which the train requires to go
from Donald to Golden City it passes along the bank of the Columbia
River; and there is, perhaps, no part of the whole route where grandeur
and beauty are so admirably united as here, especially in the autumn.
The grandeur lies in the snowy summits which frame in this Columbia
valley—the Selkirks on one side, the Rockies on the other. The beauty
lies in the river itself and in the young trees and bushes along
its banks, dressed in fall styles and colors, some as richly yellow
as a golden-rod, others as deeply purple or crimson as fuchsias or
begonias, the yellow predominating. These colored trees occur in groups
and streaks along the river, and in isolated patches on the mountain
sides, where they might be mistaken for brown mosses or lichen-covered
rocks. There may be as beautifully colored trees in our Eastern
forests, but they are not mixed, as here, with young evergreen pines,
nor have they a framework of snow-mountains, like these, to enhance
their beauty. High up on the ridges there is another variety of trees
of a beautiful russet color set off by a deep blue sky. Talk of color
symphonies! Here they are—miles of them—long as a Wagner trilogy, and
as richly orchestrated! Even the masses of blackened logs and stumps—if
one can set aside for a moment all thought of pity for the poor charred
trees, so happy before the fire in their green luxuriance, and of the
sad waste of useful timber—enhance the charm of this scene by contrast.
I have said that the time-table of the Canadian Pacific Railway is
so arranged that the finest scenery is passed in daylight, in both
directions; but of course there must be exceptions, and, as a matter
of fact, as long as the road crosses the three great mountain ranges
of the Cascades, Selkirks, and Rockies, there is hardly a mile which
does not offer something worth seeing. Consequently, as darkness again
closes in soon after leaving Golden, east-bound passengers must resign
themselves to lose sight of the Kickinghorse Cañon, the Beaverfoot and
Ottertail mountains, the large glacier on Mt. Stephen, etc.,—which is
all the more provoking as they have to sit up anyway till midnight,
when Banff is reached; for of course, every tourist who is in his right
senses and not a slave to duty gets off here to spend a few days in the
Canadian National Park.