BY THE GOLDEN WAVE TO THE FAR WEST.
Our journey to the Far West, through golden wheat, began at Fort
William; from there the Canadian Pacific takes us across to the ocean.
The C.P.R., with its 2990 miles of railway, is the iron girdle that
binds Canada together from the Atlantic to the Pacific Oceans. She
gives cohesion to this conglomerate whole, with its varieties of
climate and production. Every mile of the line is worth a mile of gold
to the country, for at every place where she lays down a station, that
place becomes a town, a centre of population, civilization, and wealth
to the surrounding district. This railway has been the great explorer,
the great colonizer, the great wealth producer of Canada. It is the
artery of the body of the Dominion.
One has constantly to remember that six or seven years ago all this
country through which we are passing was an unexplored wilderness. A
little band of plate-layers, headed by a surveyor, true pioneers, must
have forced their way through, hewing trees, blasting rock, and making
the silent woods resound with the voice of civilization, occasionally
coming across the track of some Indian encampment or the marks of a
bear. It must have required great forethought and organization from
headquarters to have the plant and stores ready to push on day by day,
whilst the railway in rear acted as the pioneers' single communication
with the outside world, as they plunged deeper and deeper into the
forests. The average speed of construction was about five miles a day,
and the greatest length laid in one day was twelve and a half miles.
The portion of line between Port Arthur and Fort William was the most
difficult to devise. Indeed, several times the engineers despaired. The
railway is divided into divisional sections, with a superintendent at
each. These again are divided into sections, with a surveyor in charge;
and we frequently pass their lonely section houses. Every portion of
the line is inspected once a day, the workmen using a trolly, which can
be lifted on and off the track. It is a single line, and there is only
one passenger train daily east and west.
The trains are very long and heavy, often consisting of eight or nine
cars some eighty feet in length, weighing as much as fifty tons each.
They would jump the track if lighter. Our train to-day was of this
length, and carried a human freight of 286 persons, exclusive of the
numerous officials. The sleepers or sleeping-cars are most elegant,
with their polished pine wood inlaid with mother-of-pearl, and their
pale sea-green brocade hangings.
The colonist cars on these trains are excellent, and always, we
noticed, well filled. They have berths like the sleeper, only with no
upholstery, but the colonist can buy a mattress and pillow at Montreal
for a dollar or two. They have a stove where they can cook their own
provisions, and on landing from the ocean steamers they get into this
car, live in it, and come as far west as they want to without change or
stoppage.
From Fort William we passed through a wild, rocky country, following
the line of the Kaministiquia, a shallow river scrambling over a rocky
course. There are a few of these soft liquid Indian names, embodying
some symbolical or romantic ideal, still left; but they are fast dying
out, and the practical settler is changing them to a more prosaic but
pronounceable nomenclature.
It was through this lonely district, then, unexplored by white man,
that for ninety-five days Wolseley, in 1870, led his troops against
the Indians. They marched 1000 miles from Fort William to Fort Garry,
utilizing the waterway of the lakes and rivers where possible. At
Savanne we see two of his flat-bottomed boats, lying rotting in the
stream near an Indian village.
We have dinner in the private car of Mr. Howland and Mr. Wilkie, the
chairman and general manager of the Imperial Bank of Toronto. Seated
at the end of the train, we watch the twin lines of railway uncoiling
themselves in a straight line for mile after mile. An occasional
section-house, a station, which is often only a wooden shed on a
platform, a board with the number of the section on it, and, at long
intervals, a huge red tank for watering the engine, is all we see.
Night closes in on this lonely country, and we sleep in our berths,
while the engine steams and pants along into the darkness, hour after
hour through the long, long night.
In the cold early morning we reach Rat Portage, passing from the state
of Ontario into Manitoba. Rat Portage is a wooden village of 1400
inhabitants (this is considered quite a goodly population for this
sparsely-peopled country); and has the largest flour mill in Canada. It
lies at the outlet of the beautiful Lake of the Woods, which is forty
miles long and studded with islands.
A brake has broken and the train is divided, the first half taking on
the dining-car. Hungry and impatient, the passengers wait for another
to be attached, and stand on the carriage platform ready to rush on
board. But, as it passes, a howl of disappointed hunger goes up, for
some knowing ones have jumped off the cars, and filled it before it
leaves the siding.
We are still travelling through the same rock-bound country, ungainly
masses of rock protruding through a scrub growth of dwarf trees. We
continually pass beautiful lakes, placid sheets of water hidden away
in hollows. This is succeeded by a run through some "muskeg" or black
peaty bog land, where flourish rank grasses against a background of
bushy poplar trees.
Thirty or forty miles from Winnipeg the country opens out and gradually
assumes a prairie character. The land is quite flat now, covered with
coarse yellow grasses, and sprinkled with wild flowers. It is a rich
feast of colours. There are great patches of gorgeous wild sunflowers,
masses of purple and white michaelmas daisies, growing more plenteously
here on the open prairie, than when cultivated in our cottage gardens
at home; there are bluebells and lupins, blue, pink, and white, marsh
mallows, cyclamen, and acres of that weed-like growth, the golden
rod. Isolated houses, becoming more frequent, tell us we are nearing
Winnipeg. We cross the Red river and are in the station.
Winnipeg is the old Fort Garry settlement of the Hudson Bay Company.
Twenty years ago, or in 1871, population was 100, now, in 1891, it is
30,000.
The town is set down in the midst of the prairie. Main street
follows the winding of the old Indian trail which takes in the deep
bend of the Red river. The City Hall in this street, or "on" as the
Canadians would say, is a very handsome new-looking structure. It
front of it stands the column erected to the memory of the soldiers
who fell in the North-West rebellion of 1870. It is surmounted by a
volunteer on guard, wrapped in his fur coat, and with his fur cap on
his head. The streets are paved with blocks of wood, but the foot
pavements are still boarded; indeed Winnipeg is a strange mixture,
with Eastern civilization meeting in this border city, the Western or
rough-and-ready methods of the settler. It is only interesting on this
account.
In the streets there are bullock carts bringing in cradles of hay from
the prairie; sulkies, which are constructed of two wheels and a tiny
board for a driver's seat; and buckboards, used for purposes of all
kinds. Nor must I forget the little carts with their tandems of dogs.
These are a mongrel breed, and are much used, especially in winter,
when they are driven four, six, or a dozen in hand in sleighs. As we
get further west, the breed of horses improves. There are country
yokels with burnt faces, coarse straw hat, and flannel shirt, gazing
open-mouthed at the store windows, for Winnipeg is to them what London
is to our country lads. Here is a family party of Indians emerging from
a shop with numerous parcels, to the evident joy of the squaw. But what
strikes you so much is, that you may pass from this handsome street of
fine stores, straight out on to the broad expanse of prairie.
On the block of Government land stands the fine group of stone
buildings of the Parliament House, together with the Ministerial
offices for the Province of Manitoba, the Governor's residence, and the
wooden barracks enclosed in a square. We stayed at the Clarendon Hotel,
whose days are I fear numbered, as the Northern Pacific Company are
just completing a magnificent red sandstone hostelry. It is shown as
one of the sights of Winnipeg.
Mrs. Adams, wife of an old Royal Welsh brother-officer of my
husband's, kindly took me for a drive in the afternoon. On the
outskirts of the town the Assiniboine river takes a deep bend, in
which there is some woodland. Trees are scarce on the prairie, and
what there are--poplar, oak and maple--are all stunted in their growth
from exposure to the north-west blast, which sweeps in winter across
the great waste, a piercing, biting wind blowing from over acres and
acres of snow. In this green belt there are many handsome houses, built
in an ambitious style of architecture, with towers and porticoes and
balustrades. They were chiefly constructed during the great "boom" of
nine years ago, a disastrous event that has left its mark. The town
still suffers from the troubles which quickly followed. Families are
yet living under the cloud of the financial bankruptcy which then
overtook them.
In 1872, Winnipeg, with a sudden awakening, realized the immense future
before her as the capital of the Far West. Land was quickly bought up.
Large prices given and realized. Houses were built on a magnificent
scale. Crowds flocked in from all parts of Canada to share in the
coming prosperity, A complete collapse followed. The bubble had burst.
The meaning of a "boom" may be thus simply exemplified. A buys a piece
of land from B, and pays half the price down as a first instalment. He
sells to C at an increased price, who, in his turn, does ditto to D. At
length B, the original seller, calls for payment. C and D are unable to
meet the call, and are ruined in endeavouring to do so, and the land is
thrown back on A, who is in the same position, and B has it thrown on
his hands, and never having in the first place received full payment,
is also ruined, for he has speculated with the money. All classes had
taken part in this "wild land speculation," and all were involved in
the collapse. Houses were closed (for they could not be sold, as there
were no purchasers) or are only, as we now see them, partially lived
in. Winnipeg is slowly recovering from this "boom," and with the youth
and energy of a young city will renew her prosperity.
Passing the ruined gateway of the old Fort Garry, we appropriately come
to the Hudson Bay Store. It is contained in a large block of buildings,
and is a new departure in the trade once absorbed by that great and
powerful fur-trading company. They first explored the country, owned
it, and kept up friendly relations with the Indians. It was one of
those great trading monopolies, owned by merchants, and which have done
so much for the wealth and commerce of England. The Hudson Bay Company
has accomplished in a minor degree for Canada, what the East India
Company did for India. This shop may truly be called the Army and Navy
stores of the West, for it contains everything from brocades and Paris
mantles (which are bought by the squaws) furs, carpets, groceries, to
Indian blankets, pipes and bead work. In this bead work the blending of
colours is exquisite. At the last Louis Riel rebellion, the wholesale
department outfitted and provisioned at twenty-four hours' notice, 600
soldiers for thirty days.
We then visited the tennis club. I am impressed with the immense
utility of this popular game, which, if useful in England, performs
a large social duty in all Canadian towns. It forms a mild daily
excitement, and a meeting place for all, and is especially useful
in a country where, with the impossibility of obtaining servants,
entertaining is a difficult matter.
Canon O'Meara took us one morning to the outskirts of the city to see
the cathedral. Lying out in the country and built of wood, it resembles
a simple village church. The surrounding cemetery is full of handsome
monuments, and here lie many victims of the boom. The most interesting
monument is the granite sarcophagus, engraved with seven names,
surrounded by laurel wreaths of the victims of the last rebellion.
Their remains were brought back here to be buried, with an impressive
public funeral.
We visited the Bishop of Rupert's Land in his adjoining house. He is
Metropolitan of eight bishoprics, and has an enormous diocese reaching
into the unexplored regions of the Mackenzie River. He has organized
a college on the model of an English University, and which confers
degrees.
Studying the working of the Church in Canada, one recognizes some
arguments in favour of Disestablishment. In Canada there is no State
endowment, and the clergy are supported by voluntary contributions.
This money comes partly from pew rents, and is greatly assisted by
the envelope system. By this method the parishioner covenants to give
a certain sum a year for the maintenance of his church, by fixed
weekly Sunday instalments. He is furnished with fifty-two envelopes,
on which his name is printed, and these contributions are entered in
a book. There appears to be no difficulty in raising funds by these
means, particularly if the clergyman is popular. If he is unpopular,
or his doctrines unacceptable or extreme, he suffers by the falling
off of his income. This system, moreover, has the advantage of giving
every man an interest in his church. A clergyman observed that several
members of his congregation appeared at church for the first time on
the establishment of this envelope system. "Oh, yes," they said, in
response to his remark, "we have got some stock in this concern now."
It works particularly smoothly where the bishop, adapting himself to
the needs of a new country, admits the principle that those who pay
must choose. They require, however, a Clergy Discipline Act as much as
we do.
Mr. Robinson took us in the afternoon for a drive across the prairie
to Sir Donald Smith's model farm at Silver Heights, where there are
three splendid specimens of the now extinct buffalo, some of the few
left of those vast herds that used to roam the prairie. The farm takes
its name from the adjoining wood of silver poplar trees.
C. visited the venerable French Archbishop Taché. He told him that he
came out forty-six years ago, and that it took him then sixty-two days
to travel from Montreal, what he can now perform in sixty-two hours. He
showed the inkstand from which his uncle, the Premier of Quebec, Sir
Etienne Taché, signed the Confederation Act of Canada.
_Thursday, August 27th._--Before leaving Winnipeg Major Heward gave us
an early inspection at the barracks of the Mounted Infantry. They are
smart and well-mounted on brancho horses, reared in the west. We also
inspected the chief of the three fire stations. They have a chemical
steamer. In this the water is mixed with carbolic acid gas. Fire being
supported by oxygen, the carbolic gas, when thrown on it, extinguishes
the supply of oxygen, and with it the fire. The fire bell, in sounding,
throws open the stable door and the horses trot out by themselves and
place their necks under the suspended collar, which descends and is
fastened by a patent bolt.
The west-bound trains all stop at Winnipeg for five hours to allow
time for the colonists to visit the Railway and Dominion Land Offices,
and to obtain information respecting selections of lands. The land in
the North-West Provinces has now been surveyed and allotted thus for
twenty-four miles each side of the line. In a township of thirty-six
sections of 640 acres, or one square mile to each section, the Dominion
retains roughly one half, whilst the C.P.R. retains the other. There
are two sections reserved for school purposes, that the value of the
land may make the schools free and self-supporting, two sections
for the Hudson Bay Company, and the Canada North-West Land Company
have bought others. The diagram on page 53 will show the division of
sections.
The station was crowded with large parties of emigrants, as many
settlers leave their families here, whilst choosing their sections
further west. There are bundles of bedding, tin cooking utensils, with
bird cages and babies in promiscuous heaps.
As we pass out of the station we see the enormous plant and rolling
stock of the C.P.R., which has here its half-way depot between Montreal
and Vancouver. They have twenty miles of sidings, which are now full of
plant waiting to be pressed forward, to bring down the harvest to the
coast.
[Illustration: TOWNSHIP DIAGRAM.
The above diagram shows the manner in which the country is surveyed.
It represents a township--that is, a tract of land six miles square,
containing 36 sections of one mile square each. These sections are
subdivided into quarter sections of 160 acres each.]
We are out on the prairie at once, on that great billowy sea of brown
and yellow grass; monotonous it is, and yet pleasing in its quiet,
rich, monotones of colour. The virgin soil is of rich black loam. The
belt of unsettled land round Winnipeg is caused by the land being held
by speculators, but after that we pass many pleasant farms, clustering
more thickly around Portage le Prairie, a rising town. We pass a
freight train entirely composed of refrigerator cars, containing that
bright pink salmon from British Columbia, which is a luxury in the east
and a drug in the west. The engine bears a trophy of a sheaf of corn,
to show that the harvest in the west has already begun.
Out of the whole year we could not have chosen a more favourable moment
for visiting the North-West, as the harvest is in full swing. We are
at this moment passing through a sea of golden grain, acre after acre
extending in an unbroken line to the horizon. Indeed we are told that
these wheat fields form a continuous belt some forty miles deep on
either side of the railway.
It would be difficult for anyone living even in the east of Canada,
to realize the enormous interest shown in the crops and weather out
here. For months and weeks beforehand it forms a general topic of
conversation, but, as August closes in, it becomes the one and all
absorbing concern. The newspapers are scanned for the daily weather
reports. Warnings are telegraphed broadcast through the land. As
Professor Goldwin Smith says, in his book "Canada and the Canadian
Question," "Just before the harvest the weather is no commonplace
topic, and a deep anxiety broods over the land."
The interests at stake are enormous, involving as they do the question
to many of prosperity or ruin. One cold night, or one touch of frost
may destroy the labour of a year. This year the promise is exceptional,
and the prospect was bright until a week ago. Then there were ominous
whispers of frost. These early and late frosts are the scourge of the
farmer, and the lateness of the harvest, owing to an exceptionally
cold summer, increases the anxiety. Day by day, hour by hour, the
temperature is discussed with earnestness, increasing with intensity as
evening approaches. The other night there were people in Winnipeg going
up and down Main Street all night and striking matches to look at the
thermometer placed there. The interest to all was so vital that they
could not rest. There are warnings published in bulletins to farmers,
to light smudge fires to keep the frost from the wheat. These fires of
stubble, lighted to the north or north-west of the fields, by raising
the temperature two or three degrees, keep off the frost, and the dread
of smutted wheat. We see these smudge fires smouldering as we pass
along.
The virgin soil will yield as much as forty to fifty bushels of wheat
an acre, and from fifty to sixty of oats. Manures are unknown and
unwanted by these western farmers. The land has only to be "scratched
with a plough," and the field will often yield a rich harvest of 500
acres of wheat. The hum of the harvest is heard in all the land, and
we see for miles the golden grain waiting to be gathered, and the
"reapers and binders" hard at work. This machine is an ingenious
American invention, which cuts and binds at the same time. There is a
string inside which is given a twist, a knife comes down and cuts the
strings and throws out the sheaf. It is pretty to watch the rhythmical
precision with which sheaf after sheaf, thus cut and tied, is thrown
out on the track of the machine. The sheaves are then piled into
generous stacks and left for a fortnight to dry. Labour is at a premium
throughout Canada, and machinery, chiefly of American manufacture, is
more largely used than in England. Sometimes two chums will farm 200
acres alone. Nearly all this grain we see is the far-famed Manitoba No.
1 hard. It is the finest wheat in the world.
We are now approaching Brandon, which is a great wheat centre. This
town has the largest grain market in Manitoba, as is shown by five
elevators. "It is the distributing centre for an extensive and well
settled country." We should have stayed here, but were deterred by
accounts of the hotel accommodation. Then came the pleasure of an
orange sunset, gilding the grain into more golden glory. We passed the
celebrated Bell Farm at night where the furrows are usually four miles
long, and the work is done by military organization, "ploughing by
brigades, and reaping by divisions."
At five o'clock we are left cold and shivering in the just broken
dawn on the prairie side at Regina. We look wistfully after the
disappearing train, with the warm berths inside the car. Deceived by
the high-sounding designation of Capital of the North-West Provinces,
we had broken our journey at Regina. There is a frontage to the line
of some wooden houses and stores, which extends but a little way back,
for the population of Regina is only as yet 2000. The prairie extends
to the sky line on every side. It is a dreary prospect, and we are
mutually depressed.
There being nothing else to do, I retire to bed for some hours--the
Sheffield-born landlady giving us a true Sheffield welcome.
At one o'clock matters seem brighter, for Colonel Herchmer, commanding
the Mounted Police of the North-West Territory, has kindly sent a team
for us to drive two miles out across the prairie to the barracks. From
the distance, the dark red buildings look quite a town, surmounted by
the tower of the riding school. This force is organized on military
lines, and consists of 1000 men, who maintain order over the Indian
Reservations, and an area of 800 miles. Their uniform of scarlet
patrol-jacket and black forage cap, with long riding-boots is extremely
smart. You meet them in all parts of the North-West Provinces.
After lunching with Mrs. Herchmer, we inspected the officers' and
men's mess rooms, the canteen, store room, kitchens and forge, the
reading-room, bowling alley and theatre, and the guard room, where we
were shown the cell in which Louis Riel was kept after his capture. The
force is under strict military discipline. They have a football and
cricket team, and a musical ride equal to that of the Life Guards.
The horses are all "bronchos," or prairie horses, bred chiefly from
Indian ponies. They cost 100 dols. to 120 dols. each, and are short
and wiry. They need to be strong, for the men must be five feet eight
inches in height, and measure thirty-five inches round the chest, while
the Californian saddles they use are very heavy. These saddles are
after the model of the Spanish South American ones, with a high pommel
in front and a triangular wooden stirrup. The horses are guaranteed
to go forty miles a day. There are many gentlemen in the ranks of the
force, some of whom have failed in ranching and other walks of life.
The wild roving life on the out-stations may be pleasant, but there is
no promotion from the ranks.
A drive of two miles further out on to the prairie brought us to
one of the Dominion Schools, kept for the children of the Indian
Reservations. Mr. Hayter Reed, the Government Inspector, who showed us
over the school, told us that they do not force the parents to give up
the children, but persuade them. It is uphill work at first, civilizing
and teaching English to the little brown, bright-eyed children, with
lank black hair, whom we saw in the schoolrooms. The bath and the
wearing of boots is a severe trial to these gipsy children at first.
The Government acknowledges in the building of these schools its
responsibility towards the natives. They made treaties with the
Indians, giving them rations, and setting apart certain lands or
Reservations for them, such as the Black Foot and the Sarcee. The
Americans did the same with their Indians, but did not keep their
treaties as we have done. However, like all other "indigenes," they
are dying out with the advance of the white man's civilization. We
drove home past Government House, and in the evening M. Royat, the
Lieut.-Governor, presided over an enthusiastic meeting of the United
Empire Trade League.
Since very early morning, and all through this interminably long hot
day, we have been crossing the great desert prairie. Hour after hour
has dragged wearily on, and still we look out from the car on to the
symmetrical lines of the rolling plains.
For over 400 miles, from Regina to Medicine Hat, this vast steppe
extends. There is no green thing on it--not a tree, or bush, or
shrub--but it is covered with coarse grass, burnt to a sere yellow.
The prairie is trackless as a desert; lonely as the ocean; vast
and colourless as a summer sky. And yet the prairie pleases, its
loneliness fascinates, its very monotony charms, the deep stillness
soothes, the tints are so pale and quiet. There is the faded yellow
of the grass, and the faint blue of the sky meeting on the horizon in
that never-ending undulating line, unbroken and uninterrupted. The
atmosphere is so clear that the blades of grass stand out alone, and a
distant sage bush is intensely blue. Occasionally the haze makes the
mirage of an ocean on the sky line. The only variety to this unvarying
scene are the great saline lakes we frequently pass. A blue haze hangs
over them, caused by the active evaporation, and now and again we see
a shining patch of pure white crystal, which is the crust of salt left
from an exhausted lake. At other times these dry basins are carpeted
with a rich red and purple weed, that forms an oasis in the wilderness
of burnt-out hues.
We see many buffalo trails, for though these animals have been extinct
for some years, their prancings beat the trail so hard, that they are
still in existence. As many as 160,000 were killed yearly, and with
them disappeared the chief sustenance of the Indians. The prairie is
strewn with their bleached skulls and carcasses. By the side of the
stations there are stacks of their gigantic bones, artistically built
up with the skulls facing outwards. Gophers start up and skurry away at
the noise of the train. They correspond to the prairie dog of America,
but are smaller and about the size of a rabbit.
We are impressed with the comparative fertility of the Canadian
prairie, when contrasted with the similar belt of saline desert in
America, for barren as this looks, parts of it are good for cattle
ranching. We do, later in the day, occasionally pass a few settlers'
dwellings, and presently the first of the Canadian Agricultural
Company's farms. There are ten of these farms, consisting of 10,000
acres each, and situated at intervals of thirty miles between this and
Calgary. We see on them frequent "fire breaks," or a ploughed acre left
bare to prevent a fire from spreading in the crops. There are men, too,
stationed along the line firing the grass, so that a spark dropped from
the engine should not, by blazing this grass, spread to the ripening
corn.
We inquire what is the use of the mounds by the tracks, and are told
these are snow brakes. In this flat country the smallest rise is
sufficient to make a drift, against which the snow piles to a great
height.
We pass Moosejaw. The name is an abridgment of the Indian one, which
literally means, "The-creek-where-the-white-man-mended-the-cart
with-a-moose-jaw-bone." At Maple Creek there are large stock yards,
where the cattle are brought down from far distant ranches, and even
from over the American border at Montana, and put on the train to
Montreal and exported to England.
The car had been up to 95°, but the intense heat was beginning to
subside. With the refreshing coolness and the sun declining, we are
also gladdened by the sight of a gradually rising slope on the dead
level of the plain. It is the beginning of the Cypress range. Then we
see a bush, some trees, some prairie flowers, and soon we are dropping
down into the comparatively fruitful valley of the South Saskatchawan,
and, crossing its broad river, we reach Medicine Hat.
It is delightful after the stifling atmosphere of the cars to get
out and stroll in the station garden, which is full of old-fashioned
English flowers, stocks, geraniums, verbenas, floxes, and mignonette.
There are a picturesque party of Indians with their squaws and papooses
on the platform. We have seen some at all the stations selling polished
buffalo horns, mocassins and bead work; but try and "kodak" them as we
often did--and the instant they saw the small black box, the men turned
away and the women put their shawls over their heads.
On leaving Medicine Hat, we ascended the valley above the river and
passed on to a more fertile prairie. There was just here a great
meeting-place for the buffaloes, and the ground is full of their
"wallows" or hollows made by the weight of their unwieldly bodies. Alas,
that the law against their slaughter came four years after they had all
been wantonly killed!
We reach Calgary at the atrocious hour of two a.m., and turn out of a
warm berth into a cold bed at the hotel.
_Sunday, August 30th._--We attended morning service at the pretty
little wooden church, the Bishop of Saskatchawan officiating.
Calgary is the capital of Alberta and is in the centre of a great
ranche country. Like all these towns out west it is an unfinished
conglomeration of houses, laid out in imaginary streets at right
angles, in which there are few houses and more gaps. The whole is
held together by a principal street, in which there are two or three
pretentious new stone buildings. From here the houses straggle away
into the country, the unoccupied lots being joined to them by a boarded
foot-path. These towns have no depth, they are all surface and length.
Laid down on the prairie there are no trees near them and they have a
bare unfinished ugliness, peculiar to their new growth.
You are reminded at every turn of the reason for Calgary's existence,
for its shops indicate the ranchers' wants. There are many saddlers,
displaying Californian saddles, stock whips and lassoos; others have
camp bedding and furniture; canned goods, that stand-by of the rancher,
are evidently in great demand. The dry-goods stores are full of flannel
shirts, slouching broad-brimmed hats and "chaps," or the cowboy's
leather leggings reaching to the thigh. Nearly everyone you meet is
English, there are few born Canadians.
The streets are full of cowboys riding their long-tailed, half-groomed
bronchos at a hand gallop, or of sulkies with the unmistakable rancher,
with shirt open at the throat, slouch hat, and tanned face. The chief
subject of conversation is the dimensions of the ranches, the number of
head of cattle and horses on each.
In the afternoon a Police team came with Mrs. McIllree, to drive us out
to see one of these ranches. Out here anything from a single horse to a
four-in-hand is called a "team," but this was one in our sense of the
term.
We galloped across a trail on the prairie, and then wound through a
"coolie," as they call the little valleys lying in between the rolling
hills, and which are so frequent in this country. There are hundreds of
gophers popping out of their holes, and as we see them close, sitting
up with their long bodies, they look like tiny kangaroos. We espy
coveys of prairie chickens, which are like our grouse.
As we reach the open ground there is a splendid country spread out
before us. Far as the eye can reach, extending into the foot-hills at
the base of the Rockies, there are miles and miles of rolling upland
pastures, that resemble our Wiltshire downs. The whole of this vast
area has been "taken up," and is a succession of ranches. We can see
the little wooden houses with their outbuildings, scattered at long
intervals. Those innumerable specks on the downs are the cattle and
horses, literally "feeding on a thousand hills." We are following the
sweeping bends of the Elbow river, which lies below us in a cool green
ravine, full of trees, in pleasant contrast to the brown hills around.
[Illustration: The Ranche Pupil.]
The ranche we are going to belongs to Mr. Robinson, and used to
be called the Elbow Ranche, but has lately changed its name to the
Chippenham, in accordance with the idea of calling the ranches
hereabouts after the great English hunts. Messrs. Martin, Jameson, and
Gordon-Cumming (the latter of whom we met at the hotel with his pet
black bear), have called their ranche the Quorn. One ranche differs
not from the other, except in degrees of comfort. They are all built
of wood, generally with verandahs, and after the simplest model of
a square house, with a door in the centre and windows on each side.
There are no trees or shrubs, or creepers scarcely even an attempt at
a garden; a rough paling alone divides them from the prairie. Dogs
walk in and out and are part of the family. The plains are bare. Yet
what a world of romance lingers round the expression, "out ranching in
the West." We dream of sunrise and sunset on the open prairie, of wild
gallops in the early morning with the dew on the grass, of camping out
under the starlight. But I trow the reality is far removed from the
ideal, and that it ends with a bunk in the cowboy's hut wrapped up in
a blanket, with tough prairie beef and doughy bread for their fare. I
am sure if some fond mother could see her darling boy in his cowboy's
dress, and his quarters in the log hut, she would never be happy until
she had him by her side again. It is clearly a case of "where ignorance
is bliss," etc. But still, for a strong constitution there is nothing
to fear, and sobriety and industry may lead to fortune.
We look at the "corral" or wooden pen, subdivided into partitions,
where, after the animals have been driven in, the one required is
gradually separated by being shut off in pen after pen, until a narrow
passage is reached. Here wooden barriers are let down and he is thus
confined in a cage. They can then brand him with an iron stamped with
the mark of the ranche. If it is a colt to be broken, they saddle,
bridle and mount him before leaving the pen. Then comes the struggle,
in which the rough rider requires great skill, tact, and experience,
for a horse will do anything to unseat his rider the first time.
Unmercifully sharp bits are used, but the horse is guided more by
the rein on the neck. The boys ride loosely when galloping over the
prairie, leaving the horse to look out for the holes, and he rarely
makes a mistake.
The horses on this ranche are bronchos, but they have not sufficient
blood for the English market, and, added to this, the branding detracts
from their value. They are worth about 120 dols. each. This firing is
said to be a necessity, as the ranches are often 500 acres in extent.
The animals roam at will, with perhaps a couple of men, living in a log
hut twenty miles away from the ranche, told off to look after them.
Twice a year they "round up;" that is, the owners meet and appoint a
place, where the cattle are driven in and claimed by their owners, who
know them by their brands, and colts and calves are then marked. This
rounding up is done in the spring and the fall of every year, and is
beginning now. The brands are some of them very ingenious in device.
Settlers advertise in the newspapers for lost animals, giving their
brands, which are well known to all the country round.
Does ranching pay? They tell us it can and does, but, as in every
other walk of life, hard work, capital and experience are required.
Those who are wise, before beginning ranching on their own account, go
through a cowboy apprenticeship on some ranche. Our driver in Calgary
confided to us "that them young men didn't do no good to themselves
out here, but they did good to the country, for they freely spent the
remittances from home."
We came home by the Indian Sarcee Reserve. On an open space over the
river we saw some poles placed together with a suspended hook. It is
the place where the Indians "make their braves." In this terrible
ordeal their young men have this hook twisted into the muscles of
their chests and are drawn up by it. They must utter no cry of pain.
Indian encampments are met with all over the prairie. You know their
"topee" tents, by the poles sticking up in the centre, in distinction
to the ordinary tents of the half-breeds. They have numerous horses and
cattle, which are rounded up with others. They are kept by an inspector
within their reserves, and there is a large fine for anyone selling
them intoxicating drink. They appear innocent and harmless, and only
given to paltry thieving.