The problem of colonisation in the north-western portion of British
America is fast working itself out. The same destiny which pushed
forward Anglo-Saxon energy and intelligence into the rich plains of
Mexico, and which has peopled Australia, is now turning the current of
emigration to another of the "waste-places of the earth." The discovery
of extensive goldfields in the extreme west of the territories now
occupied by the Hudson's Bay Company, is a great fact. It no longer
comes to us as the report of interested adventurers, or the exaggeration
of a few sanguine diggers, but with well-authenticated results--large
quantities of gold received at San Francisco, and a consequent rush of
all nations from the gold regions of California, as well as from the
United States and Canada. The _thirst for Gold_ is, as it always has
been, the most attractive, the strongest, the most unappeasable of
appetites--the impulse that builds up, or pulls down empires, and floods
the wilderness with a sudden population. In those wild regions of the
Far West men are pouring in one vast, gold-searching tide of thousands
and tens of thousands, into the comparatively unknown territory beyond
the Rocky Mountains, for which our Legislature has just manufactured a
government. How strange is the comparison instituted by the _Times_
between the rush to Fraser River and the mediaeval crusades, which
carried so large a portion of the population of Europe to die on the
burning plains of Palestine! At Clermont Ferrand, Peter the Hermit has
concluded his discourse; cries are heard in every quarter, "It is the
will of God! It is the will of God!"; Every one assumes the cross, and
the crowd disperses to prepare for conquering under the walls of the
earthly, a sure passage to the heavenly, Jerusalem. What elevation of
motive, what faith, what enthusiasm! Compare with this the picture
presented by San Francisco Harbour. A steamer calculated to carry 600
persons, is laden with 1600. There is hardly standing room on the deck.
It is almost impossible to clear a passage from one part of the vessel
to the other. The passengers are not knights and barons, but tradesmen,
"jobbers," tenants, and workmen of all the known varieties. Their
object in of the earth, earthy--wealth in its rawest and rudest form--
gold, the one thing for which they bear to live, or dare to die.
Although in the comparison the crusades may have the superiority in many
points, yet so little have ideal, romantic, and sentimental
considerations to do with the current of human affairs, that while the
crusades remain a monument of abortive and objectless folly, fatal to
those who embarked in them, and leaving as their chief result a tinge of
Asiatic ferocity on European barbarism, the exodus of San Francisco,
notwithstanding the material end it has in view, is sure to work out the
progress of happiness and civilisation, and add another to the many
conquests over nature, which the present age has witnessed.
In a year more than ordinarily productive of remarkable events, one of
the most noteworthy, and that which is likely to leave a lasting
impression on the world, is this discovery of gold on the coasts of the
Pacific. The importance of the new region as a centre for new
ramifications of English relations with the rest of the world cannot
well be exaggerated either in a political or a commercial point of view.
It will be the first really important point we shall have ever
commanded on that side of the Pacific Ocean, and it cannot but be of
inestimable value in developing our relations with America, China,
Japan, and Eastern Russia.
This new discovery must also tend to make the western shore of the
American continent increasingly attractive, from Fraser's River down to
Peru the rivers all bear down treasures of a wealth perfectly
inestimable. Emigration must necessarily continue to flow and increase.
Gold digging is soon learned, and there will be an immense demand for
every kind of labour at almost fabulous prices.
It is further valuable as tending to open up a direct communication from
the Atlantic to the Pacific, and from Europe across the continent of
America to India and China. This is a grand idea, and the colonial
minister who carries it out will accomplish a greater thing than any of
his predecessors, for he will open up the means of carrying English
civilisation to the whole of that vast continent and to the eastern
world.
The pioneers in this movement will conquer the territory not with arms
in their hands, but with the gold-rocker, the plough, the loom, and the
anvil, the steam-boat, the railway, and the telegraph. Commerce and
agriculture, disenthralled by the influences of free institutions, will
cause the new empire to spring into life, full armed, like Minerva from
the brain of Jupiter. Its Pacific ports will be thronged with ships of
all nations, its rich valleys will blossom with nature's choicest
products, while its grand rivers will bear to the sea the fruits of free
and honest labour. Great as have been our achievements in the planting
of colonies, we have never entered upon a more magnificent work than the
one now before us, in which the united energies of the two great
branches of the Anglo-Saxon race will be engaged, heart and hand.
While the present volume is intended chiefly for those desiring
information on the subject of the gold discoveries, it also addresses
itself to the general public, for the condition and character of the
country and its inhabitants cannot fail to be a subject of inquiry with
all who can appreciate the importance of its situation. The book lays
claim to no merit but that of careful collation. Little information is
given but what is derived from sources of general access; but it does
profess to set forth the truth as far as that could be obtained from the
conflicting statements of different parties.
While the following pages will be found to contain ample proof as to the
extent and richness of the gold fields; as well as the salubrity of the
climate, it is satisfactory to be able to state here that the country is
proved to be easily accessible both for English and American
merchandise. The public have now certain, though unofficial news, of
the journey of the Governor of Vancouver's Island as far as Fort Hope,
about one hundred miles above the mouth of the Fraser River and seventy
above Fort Langley. This voyage has established the extremely important
fact, that the river is navigable for steamers at least up to this
point, where the mines are now known to be of extraordinary wealth,
although it is reported that their yield regularly increases as the
stream is ascended. It is now proved that these districts are actually
within from fifteen to twenty-three hours steam of Victoria, the
principal town of the Vancouver's Island colony. It is difficult to
exaggerate the importance of this fact. It is true that the same voyage
which the steamer carrying the Governor of Vancouver's Island
successfully performed, was attempted without success by another steamer
about the same time--a fact which probably indicates that the river will
be navigable only for vessels of small draught, and possibly, perhaps,
not equally navigable at all seasons; for we must remember that in the
early part of June, when this attempt was successfully made, the waters
of the river had already begun to rise, in consequence of the melting of
the snow from the Rocky Mountains, from which it springs. But they were
then by no means at their full height; and even if the river be only
navigable by vessels of small draught, that is a fact of very little
importance as compared with the certainty that it is navigable at all to
so considerable a height. Fort Hope is, as we have said, about one
hundred miles up the river--that is to say, about one hundred and ninety
from Victoria in Vancouver's Island, the voyage across the Gulf of
Georgia being about ninety miles. The rich diggings between Fort Yale
and Fort Hope are, therefore, not so far from the fertile land of
Vancouver's Island as London from Hull and the distance from Victoria to
the mouth of the river, where gold is at present found inconsiderable
quantities, is not so great as the distance from Liverpool to Dublin.
Now, as almost all the importance of a mining district depends on easy
communication with a provision market--and the very richest will be
rendered comparatively insignificant if provisions can only be carried
thither at enormous cost and labour--no fact has yet been established of
more importance than the easy navigability of the Fraser River.
Immediately above Fort Yale, which is twelve miles higher up the river
than the point reached by the steamer, a succession of cataracts begin,
which, of course, interrupt all navigation, but thence even to "the
Forks," or junction between the Fraser and Thompson Rivers, there is
certainly not more than one hundred miles of road, which, as we learn
from the government map, are mostly practicable for loaded waggons.
Hence it is evident that the new gold district will be easily accessible
both for English merchandise from England, and for the provision market
of Vancouver's Island.
In explanation and refutation of the prejudice which almost universally
exists against the climate and soil of North America generally, but
especially of the divisions included in the Hudson's Bay Company's
Territories, we cannot do better than quote the following just remarks
from the Reverend Mr Nicolay's treatise on Oregon. He says:--
"A predisposition towards one opinion, or bias to one side of an
argument, too often warps both the judgment and the understanding; and
one man in consequence sees fertile plains where another could see only
arid wastes on which even the lizards appear starving, while the other
looks forward to their being covered with countless flocks and herds at
no very distant period of time. Both Cook and Vancouver, having
previously made up their minds against the existence of a river near
parallel 46 degrees, passed the Columbia without perceiving it, and the
former even declared most decidedly that the strait seen by Juan de Fuca
had its origin only in the fertility of the pilot's brain. As they were
discovered to be in error, so it is not impossible that others not less
positive in their assertions may be convicted of the same carelessness
of examination as those navigators, so remarkable in all other respects
for their accuracy, and so indefatigable and minute in their researches,
that little has been left to their successors but to check their work.
"With respect, however, to the attributed barrenness of great part of
the territory, so peremptorily insisted on by many, there is some excuse
for the earlier travellers from whom that opinion is derived. Ignorant
of the best routes, and frequently famishing in the immediate
neighbourhood of plenty, they most justly reflect back to others the
impressions they received; but in so doing, though they speak truth,
they give very erroneous ideas of the country they think themselves to
be describing most accurately, and of this very pregnant examples are
found in the travels of Lewis and Clarke, and the party who came
overland to Astoria: both struck the head waters of the Saptin, both
continued its course to its junction with the main stream, both
suffered--the latter party intensely; but had they, by the fertile
bottoms of Bear and Rosseaux Rivers, found access to the valley between
the Cascade and Blue Mountains--or, keeping still further west, crossed
the former range into that of the Wallamette, they would have found
game, been banished from their pages, and the Oregon would have appeared
in her holiday attire--
"A nymph of healthiest hue--"
and the depth of ravines and the elevation of rocks and precipices would
have been changed into the unerring evidences of fertility and
luxuriance of vegetation afforded by the dense forests and gigantic
pine-trees of the coast district. We can scarce estimate the transition
of feeling and change which would have been produced in their estimate
of the country, if they could have been suddenly transported from their
meagre horse-steak--cut from an animal so jaded with travel as to be in
all probability only saved from death by starvation and fatigue, by
being put to death to save over-wearied men from famine, and this cooked
at a fire of _bois de vache_, with only the shelter of an overhanging
rock--to the fat venison and savoury wildfowl of the woods and lakes,
broiled on the glowing hardwood embers under the comfortable roof of
sheltering bark, or the leafy shade of the monarch of the forest; while
the cheerful whinny of their well-fed beasts would have given joyful
token that nature in her bounty had been forgetful of nothing which her
dependent children could desire.
"While such and so great is the power of circumstances to vary the
impressions made upon the senses, some hesitation must be used in their
reception until fully confirmed, or they must be limited by other
accounts, as unbiassed judgment may direct, especially as the
temperament of individuals may serve to heighten the colouring, whether
sombre or sunny, in which circumstances may have depicted the landscape.
It is not every traveller who can, with Mackenzie, expatiate on the
beauty of scenery while in fear of treachery from fickle and bloody
savages; or like Fremont, though dripping from the recent flood, and
uncertain of the means of existence even for the day, his arms, clothes,
provisions, instruments, deep in the whirlpools of the foaming Platte,
stop to gaze with admiration on the `fantastic ruins' Nature has `piled'
among her mountain fastnesses, while from his bare and bleeding feet he
draws the sharp spines of the hostile cacti. Truth from travellers is
consequently for the most part relative. Abstractedly, with reference
to any country, it must be derived from the combined accounts and
different phases of truth afforded by many."