[Illustration: ENGLAND AND CANADA.--_A Journey between OLD and NEW
WESTMINSTER, by Sandford Fleming, C.E., C.M.G. etc._
_Eastern Journey- - - - - - - - Western Journey------------_
George Philip & Son London & Liverpool.]
ENGLAND AND CANADA.
A SUMMER TOUR
BETWEEN
OLD AND NEW WESTMINSTER
WITH HISTORICAL NOTES.
BY
SANDFORD FLEMING, C.E., C.M.G., ETC.
MONTREAL:
DAWSON BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS.
1884.
Entered according to Act of Parliament of Canada, in the year 1884,
by SANDFORD FLEMING,
in the Office of the Minister of Agriculture.
GAZETTE PRINTING COMPANY, MONTREAL.
TO
The Right Honourable the Marquis of Lorne, K.T.
G.C.M.G., P.C., &C., &C.,
ONE OF CANADA’S TRUEST AND WARMEST FRIENDS,
WITH SINCERE RESPECT
THIS RECORD OF A JOURNEY FROM THE IMPERIAL CAPITAL TO THE
PACIFIC OCEAN, THROUGH CANADIAN TERRITORY,
IS DEDICATED.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
_INTRODUCTORY._
CHAPTER II.
_HALIFAX TO LIVERPOOL._
Halifax--Cunard Line--Intercolonial Railway--Truro--Travelling
by Pullman--New Brunswick--Miramichi--Great Fires in New
Brunswick--Salmon Fishing--Micmac Indians--Rimouski--S.S.
Parisian--The first Ocean Steamer the Royal William--Incidents
of Ocean Voyage--Arrival. Page 11
CHAPTER III.
_ENGLAND._
Willie Gordon--Custom House Annoyances--Cable Telegram--Post
Office Annoyances--London--Spurgeon’s Tabernacle--An Ancestral
Home--English and United States Hotels--English Reserve--A
Railway Accident--The Land’s End--A Deaf Guest. Page 33
CHAPTER IV.
_ENGLAND (Continued)._
Marquis of Salisbury--Classical Studies--Henley Regatta--Red
Lion--London Dinner to Lord Dufferin--His Speech--Greenwich--
Fisheries Exhibition--Bray--The Vicar--The Thames--Minehead--
The Polynesian. Page 58
CHAPTER V.
_ENGLAND TO CANADA._
The Ocean Voyage--Its Comfort--Moville--Mail Coach Road of Old
Days--Impressive Service on Deck--Comfort on the Vessel--
Rimouski--Halifax. Page 84
CHAPTER VI.
_NOVA SCOTIA._
Early Colonization--De Monts--Champlain--Sir William Alexander--
Capture of Quebec--The Treaties--The Acadian Evangeline--
Louisbourg--First Capture--Peace of Aix la Chapelle--Boundary
Disputes--The Final Struggle--Deportation of the Acadians--
Nova Scotia constituted a Province. Page 102
CHAPTER VII.
_HALIFAX TO QUEBEC._
Home in Halifax--Start for the Pacific--The Intercolonial
Railway--Major Robinson--Old Companions--The Ashburton
Blunder--Quebec--The Provincial Legislature--Champlain--The
Iroquois. Page 119
CHAPTER VIII.
_QUEBEC, MONTREAL, OTTAWA._
Montreal--Ship Channel--Hon. John Young--St. Lawrence Canals--
Indifference of Quebec--Quebec Interests Sacrificed--Need of a
Bridge at Quebec--Montreal Trade in Early Times--Beauty of the
City--Canadian Pacific Railway--Ottawa--The Social Influence
of Government House--Kingston. Page 131
CHAPTER IX.
_TORONTO TO LAKE SUPERIOR._
Toronto--Collingwood--Georgian Bay--The Sault St. Mary--
Navigation of the Great Lakes--Manitoulin Islands--Lake Huron--
Arrival at the Sault. Page 147
CHAPTER X.
_LAKE SUPERIOR TO WINNIPEG._
Lake Superior--Early Discoverers--Joliet and La Salle--
Hennepin--Du Luth--Port Arthur--The Far West--The North-West
Company--Rat Portage--Gold Mining--Winnipeg. Page 161
CHAPTER XI.
_WINNIPEG, HUDSON’S BAY COMPANY, LORD SELKIRK._
Early Explorers of the North-West--Du Luth--De la Verendrye--
Mackenzie--Hudson’s Bay Company--Treaty of Utrecht--North-West
Company--Lord Selkirk--War in the North-West--Union of the
Rival Companies--The North-West Annexed to Canada. Page 179
CHAPTER XII.
_WINNIPEG TO CALGARY._
Winnipeg--Great Storm--Portage-la-Prairie--Brandon--Moose Jaw--
Old Wives’ Lakes--The Indians--Maple Creek--Medicine Hat--
Rocky Mountains. Page 201
CHAPTER XIII.
_CALGARY TO THE SUMMIT._
Start for the Mountains--The Cochrane Ranche--Gradual Ascent--
Mount Cascade--Anthracite Coal--Sunday in the Rockies--
Mountain Scenery--The Divide. Page 221
CHAPTER XIV.
_DOWN KICKING-HORSE VALLEY._
The Descent--Summit Lake--The Kicking-Horse River--Singular
Mountain Storms--An Engineering Party--A Beaver Meadow--A
Dizzy Walk. Page 237
CHAPTER XV.
_TO THE SUMMIT OF THE SELKIRKS._
The Eagle Pass--Kicking-horse River--Valley of the Columbia--The
Selkirk Range--The Columbia River--Summit of the Selkirks--
Major Rogers’ Discovery. Page 252
CHAPTER XVI.
_DOWN THE ILLE-CELLE-WAET._
The Descent of the Selkirk Range--Glaciers--The Last of our
Horses--Devil’s Clubs--The Ille-celle-waet--A Rough Journey--
A Mountain Storm--Slow Progress--A Roaring Torrent--Skunk
Cabbage--Marsh--A Long Ten Miles’ Journey. Page 271
CHAPTER XVII.
_DOWN THE ILLE-CELLE-WAET.--Continued._
A Difficult March--Cariboo Path--Organization of Advance--
Passing Through the Canyon--Timber Jam--A Gun-shot heard--
The Columbia again--Indians--Disappointment--The Question of
Supplies becomes Urgent--No Relief Party Found--Suspense. Page 284
CHAPTER XVIII.
_THROUGH THE EAGLE PASS._
The Kamloops Men at Last--No Supplies--On Short Allowance--An
Indian Guide--Bog-wading--The Summit of the Pass--Bluff Lake--
Victoria Bluff--Three Valley Lake--Eagle River--Shooting
Salmon--The _Cached_ Provisions--Pack-horses again--Road
Making--The South Thompson--Indian Ranches. Page 295
CHAPTER XIX.
_KAMLOOPS TO THE COAST._
Lake Kamloops--Savona’s Ferry--Irrigation--Chinese Navvies--
Chinese Servants--Lytton--The Fraser River Canyon--Old
Engineering Friends--Sunday at Yale--Paddling Down the Fraser--
An English Fog at New Westminster. Page 311
CHAPTER XX.
_ON PACIFIC WATERS._
New Westminster--Enormous Forest Trees--English Broom--Port
Moody--Down Burrard Inlet--Sea Fog--Navigation by Echo--
Straits of Georgia--The St. Juan Archipelago--Seamanship--
Victoria. Page 329
CHAPTER XXI.
_BRITISH COLUMBIA._
Sir Francis Drake--Mears--Vancouver--Astor--Hudson’s Bay
Company--Gold Discoveries--Climate--Timber--Fisheries--
Minerals--Mountain Scenery. Page 340
CHAPTER XXII.
_HOME BY THE NORTHERN PACIFIC._
Puget Sound--The Columbia--Portland--Oregon and San Juan
Disputes--Arid Country--Mountain Summits--The Yellowstone--
The Missouri--The Red River--Chicago--Standard Time Meeting--
The British Association--Home. Page 355
CHAPTER XXIII.
_THE INDIANS._
Indian Population--The Government Policy--Indian Instincts--The
Hudson’s Bay Company--Fidelity and Truthfulness of Indians--
Aptitude for Certain Pursuits--The Future of the Red Man. Page 380
CHAPTER XXIV.
_THE CANADIAN PACIFIC RAILWAY._
Rapid Construction--Travelling Old and New--Beginning of Pacific
Railway--Difficulties--Party Warfare--The Line North of Lake
Superior--The United States Government--Mountain Passes--Soil
and Climate--National Parks--Pacific Terminus. Page 394
CHAPTER XXV.
_CONCLUSION._
England and Canada--Old and New Colonial Systems--Political
Exigencies--The High Commissioners--Lord Lorne’s Views--The
Future--The French Element in Canada--Colonial Federation--The
Larger Union. Page 420
ENGLAND AND CANADA.
CHAPTER I.
_INTRODUCTORY._
If we carry ourselves in imagination to that part of North America
nearest to Europe, we find that we have reached the most easterly coast
of the Island of Newfoundland, an outlying portion of the continent.
Standing on Cape Bonavista and looking from this promontory over the
waste of waters, we discover that between the Equator and Greenland
the Atlantic Ocean is generally of much greater width in every other
parallel than opposite our present position: that its breadth rapidly
increases as we proceed southward, if but a few degrees of latitude,
and that, in the parallels of New York or Philadelphia, the ocean is
more than double the width. Towards the continent of Europe the first
land the eye rests upon is that of the British Islands. Four centuries
back the first recorded discoverer of Newfoundland sailed from those
shores, and from the time of the Tudor monarchs this stretch of ocean
has been unceasingly traversed by European ships. It has thus been the
cradle of ocean navigation. Adventurous men, who planted the early
settlement of America, crossed to the new world on this narrow belt.
The vessels which carried them were indeed frail craft compared with
the creations of modern ship-building. But, step by step, they were
enlarged and developed to the magnificent clipper, which again has been
supplanted by the still more magnificent ocean steamer.
In old days, even in a sailing vessel of large tonnage, a sea voyage
was frequently accompanied with much misery. It was not uncommon
for emigrants to be detained at sea as many weeks as now days are
needed for the voyage. Ships might be retarded or driven back by
adverse gales, or they might remain in mid-ocean, becalmed in water
as unruffled as a mirror of glass. Steam has revolutionized these
conditions. Instead of ships being turned far from their course by
contrary winds, or with flapping canvas waiting for a fair breeze, we
behold on the waters of the Atlantic fleets of swift steamers, carrying
thousands of passengers to and fro with the regularity of the daily
post between two neighbouring cities. However formidable the voyage
once was, its greater drawbacks are now removed. A steam ferry has been
practically established between the two continents, and transportation
is effected with scarcely less regularity than between opposite banks
of a navigable river. The path of the ocean steamer has in reality
become, as it were, the Queen’s highway; and were anything wanting
to facilitate intercourse, we possess it in the telegraph. If this
belt of ocean has been the nursery of the ocean steamers, it has also
given birth to ocean telegraphy. In no part of the world are so many
submarine cables laid along the ocean bed as in this direction. We
live in a period when instantaneous communications from continent to
continent are as easily effected as from county to county. Year by year
the facilities of intercourse, both by steamship and by telegraph, are
increasing in a manner to bind closer than ever, by the ties of mutual
benefit and common interest, the different members of the British
family. On the one hand, the Canadian is enabled to visit the old land,
where his traditions have been gathered, and where there is a history
in which he can claim an inherited participation. On the other, it
provides the youth of the Mother Country with an outlet by which he
may gain a home with a kindred people, who revere the same memories,
and who will cordially welcome his labour and energies to aid in
strengthening and consolidating the institutions of that portion of the
Empire.
From a multiplicity of causes, there are different shades of character
and thought to distinguish the several members of the British family.
They are called into being by geographical position, by race, by
climate and other influences. Diversities exist, and why should it not
be so? It is a shallow and unwise pretension which would ignore the
fact. The inhabitants of neighbouring counties, even the members of
one family, have not the same characteristics or identical likes and
dislikes. As in the family so in the state. It is natural, and in some
respects advantageous, that varieties of character and power should be
traceable; on the other hand, as the family likeness may be seen in
a group of individuals, however in many respects they may differ, an
essential unity of national life and sentiment may be found one and the
same amid characteristics the most divergent. The people of Canada and
of England differ as the current coin of the realm differs. While in
the currency there are dissimilarities of name, of value, of colour and
of metal, all are impressed with the stamp of the one sovereign; so in
the people there are diversities, but all can be recognized as British
subjects.
If we turn our eyes in the direction opposite to Europe, we find
Newfoundland situated as a barrier between the outer ocean and an inner
sea; the Gulf of St. Lawrence. Whatever its destiny, Newfoundland is
the one portion of British North America which has not allied her
fortunes with the Canadian Dominion. Geographically, the island stands
as a gigantic breakwater to shelter from the surges of the Atlantic the
continent to the west, and to protect the entrance of the St. Lawrence.
The Gulf of St. Lawrence has been compared to the Baltic, but, unlike
the Baltic, having but one narrow channel of entry, it is approachable
from the ocean by two wide navigable openings. These passages--the
Straits of Belle Isle and St. Paul--lie to the north and south of
Newfoundland. Around this inner Baltic-like sea we behold the Maritime
Provinces of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island, to
which may be added the eastern portion of Quebec. These Provinces
occupy an extensive coast line, indented with bays and capacious
harbours, presenting all the facilities for shipping, commerce and
fisheries. They are bound together, and to the other Provinces of the
Dominion, by one trade, one tariff and by one common nationality; on
the other hand, they have each distinct local institutions for their
own domestic government.
Continuing our glance westward, a thousand miles from Bonavista, beyond
the ancient fortress of Quebec, we behold Montreal, the commercial
metropolis of the Dominion. Here are seen ocean steamers of the largest
class discharging cargoes loaded twelve days back in Liverpool, Glasgow
and other parts of Europe. Advancing our view another thousand miles,
over cultivated fields and flourishing cities and lakes of unrivalled
magnitude, our vision carries us through deep forests beyond the
Province of Ontario to the confines of Manitoba, in the middle of the
continent. Still another thousand miles to the west, across prairies
abounding with a fabulous fertility of soil, we reach the foot-hills of
a snow-capped mountain range, concealing the country which lies beyond
it. To penetrate this barrier we must advance by the known passes, and
for hundreds of miles follow deep defiles, traversing further mountain
ranges, until we reach the wide grassy plateau interspersed with
picturesque lakes in the heart of British Columbia. We may still pierce
another serrated wall of mountains by a deep and rugged valley, and, by
following a tortuous and foaming river to its mouth, we meet the flow
of tide of another ocean far greater in extent than that which lies
behind us.
Carrying our vision beyond the shore of the western mainland, across
a strait similar to that separating England from Europe, we see the
Island of Vancouver, washed by currents warmed in the seas of Asia.
Vancouver Island is not quite so large as England, but it enjoys the
same climatic conditions, and possesses in profusion many of the same
mineral treasures.
British Columbia is the youngest colony of the Empire, and until
recently was practically the most distant from the Imperial centre.
Its chief city bears the name of Her Majesty. The sun does not rise
on Victoria, the capital of British Columbia, until eight hours after
it gilds the towers of Westminster. One-third of the complete circle
of the globe separates the Imperial capital from the capital of the
Pacific Province, but no land intervenes which is not British, and the
whole distance is under the shadow of the one national flag.
In imagination we first glanced across the ocean at its narrowest
limit. Turning our glance landward, we have looked across a continent
at its greatest width. All we have scanned, from sea to sea, is Canada.
The vast proportions of the Dominion, its varied features, its lakes
and rivers, mountains and plains, its sources of wealth and magnificent
scenery, are but little known to Englishmen. A country to be known must
be seen. It is not enough to examine a terrestrial globe or ponder over
maps and geographies in order to form an estimate of the character of
half a continent. They suggest but a faint idea of territorial extent.
You must traverse its different sections, and bestow time in examining
its fields and forests, its natural landscape, its cities and its
civilization.
There are few, indeed, who possess anything like an adequate conception
of the immense extent and resources of the Dominion. It is scarcely
possible even for Canadians themselves to conceive the wealth of
territory and the varied magnificence of scenery and the productive
capacity of the land, the destinies of which it is their privilege to
control.
During the past summer (1883), circumstances induced the writer to
visit England, to recross the Atlantic, and make a journey through the
whole extent of Canada to the Pacific coast. The railway took him to
the base of the Rocky Mountains. From thence he entered the passes, and
by pack-horse and on foot he followed the route proposed to be taken by
the Canadian Pacific Railway through British Columbia.
As is customary in such circumstances, the writer sent home, at
convenient opportunities, a diary of his daily progress. He is aware
that the notes of travel which have interest for a circle of intimate
friends, have often but slender claim to public attention. These notes,
however, give a sketch of the first continuous journey ever made,
indeed the only one yet attempted, through the whole longitudinal
extent of the Dominion by the route taken. From the interest which has
been attached to his notes of travel, the writer has been prevailed
upon to prepare them for publication, and, with the view of supplying
such information as the future traveller may desire, a few historical
notes have been included in the narrative.
Canada is certainly not within the actual geographical limits of the
Mother Land, yet it is no mere rhetorical phrase to say that this half
of the North American continent has become an integral part of the
Empire. Seventeen years ago, when the British North American Act of
1867, creating the Dominion, passed the Imperial Parliament, British
and Canadian statesmen laid the foundation of a great future for the
confederated provinces. From that date Canada has steadily, step by
step, done her part to realize all that was then foreshadowed of her
future. She undertook to establish a highway for commerce through her
forests, prairies and mountains, to connect the most distant Provinces.
In a short time the national highway will be opened from the Atlantic
to the Pacific, and Canada will become a recognized central commercial
link between England and Asia.
The writer ventures to think that the record of the journey he made,
will show how closely England and Canada are brought together by the
modern agencies of steam and electricity. Equally it will be obvious,
how easily the British subject in Canada may revivify old associations;
and how the denizen of the United Kingdom can, without discomfort,
visit the whole extent of the Dominion, to enjoy the varied scenery in
the many forms in which it is presented. The writer sincerely hopes
that what he ventures now to submit may be instrumental in leading
others to enjoy what proved to him a delightful summer tour by sea
and land. It is not without diffidence that he yields to the wish
expressed for the publication of his notes. He is desirous, however, of
establishing that such a journey as he has accomplished presents many
other points of attraction independent of the beauty of the scenery
and novelty of the associations. There is much to repay enquiry in the
examination of our system of government and of the institutions of the
several Provinces; in ethnological developments; and in geological and
kindred scientific researches. It will be found, too, that there is a
past history which gives attraction to many a scene, and in all that
constitutes and promotes the advance of nations there is presented much
of varied interest worthy of investigation.
The writer does not hide from himself the fact that, in describing
scenes and events, he may say much that is well known to many. He makes
no pretension to original research. His endeavour is simply to present
the notes of his journey side by side with some leading historical
facts, in a way which may admit of generalization and be useful to
the ordinary reader. Hence it is not impossible that the professional
_littérateur_ may, with a certain cynicism, consider that the following
pages contain much that is not worth the record.
The two voyages across the ocean and the journey over the continent
embraced a total distance travelled of about 14,000 miles, the eastern
and western portions of which began and ended at Halifax.