Some of the Indian tribes of Canada are self-supporting. This is true of many of the Siwash and other west coast tribes, who live by fishing. At Lytton, on the upper Fraser, I saw a village of the Siwash civilized enough to live in houses, wear our dress, and earn their living by working on the railway, fishing, etc. The Indians have done a good deal of work on the railway, and many of them are still employed on it. The coast Indians are a different race from the plains Indians, and have a marked resemblance to the Chinese and Japanese. The polished carvings in black slate of the Haida Indians bear a striking resemblance to archaic Mexican work, and strengthen the theory that the coast Indians crossed the straits from Asia, are related to the early occupiers of Arizona and Mexico, and ought not to be classed with the North American Indian. The Dominion has done very well by its Indians, of whom it has probably a hundred thousand. It has tried to civilize them by means of schools, missions, and farm instructors, and it has been pretty successful in keeping ardent spirits away from them. A large proportion of them are still fed and clothed by the Government. It is doubtful if the plains Indians will ever be industrious. The Indian fund from the sale of their lands has accumulated to $3,000,000. There are 140 teachers and 4000 pupils in school. In 1885 the total expenditure on the Indian population, beyond that provided by the Indian fund, was $1,109,604, of which $478,038 was expended for provisions for destitute Indians.
At Cochrane’s we were getting well into the hills. Here is a large horse and sheep ranch and a very extensive range. North and south along the foot-hills is fine grazing and ranging country. We enter the mountains by the Bow River Valley, and plunge at once into splendid scenery, bare mountains rising on both sides in sharp, varied, and fantastic peaks, snow-dusted, and in lateral openings assemblages of giant summits of rock and ice. The change from the rolling prairie was magical. At Mountain House the Three Sisters were very impressive. Late in the afternoon we came to Banff.
Banff will have a unique reputation among the resorts of the world. If a judicious plan is formed and adhered to for the development of its extraordinary beauties and grandeur, it will be second to few in attractions. A considerable tract of wilderness about it is reserved as a National Park, and the whole ought to be developed by some master landscape expert. It is in the power of the Government and of the Canadian Pacific Company to so manage its already famous curative hot sulphur springs as to make Banff the resort of invalids as well as pleasure-seekers the year round. This is to be done not simply by established good bathing-places, but by regulations and restrictions such as give to the German baths their virtue.
The Banff Hotel, unsurpassed in situation, amid magnificent mountains, is large, picturesque, many gabled and windowed, and thoroughly comfortable. It looks down upon the meeting of the Bow and the Spray, which spread in a pretty valley closed by a range of snow-peaks. To right and left rise mountains of savage rock ten thousand feet high. The whole scene has all the elements of beauty and grandeur. The place is attractive for its climate, its baths, and excellent hunting and fishing.
For two days, travelling only by day, passing the Rockies, the Selkirks, and the Gold range, we were kept in a state of intense excitement, in a constant exclamation of wonder and delight. I would advise no one to attempt to take it in the time we did. Nobody could sit through Beethoven’s nine symphonies played continuously. I have no doubt that when carriage-roads and foot-paths are made into the mountain recesses, as they will be, and little hotels are established in the valleys and in the passes and advantageous sites, as in Switzerland, this region will rival the Alpine resorts. I can speak of two or three things only.
The highest point on the line is the station at Mount Stephen, 5296 feet above the sea. The mountain, a bald mass of rock in a rounded cone, rises about 8000 feet above this. As we moved away from it the mountain was hidden by a huge wooded intervening mountain. The train was speeding rapidly on the down grade, carrying us away from the base, and we stood upon the rear platform watching the apparent recession of the great mass, when suddenly, and yet deliberately, the vast white bulk of Mount Stephen began to rise over the intervening summit in the blue sky, lifting itself up by a steady motion while one could count twenty, until its magnificence stood revealed. It was like a transformation in a theatre, only the curtain here was lowered instead of raised. The surprise was almost too much for the nerves; the whole company was awe-stricken. It is too much to say that the mountain “shot up;” it rose with conscious grandeur and power. The effect, of course, depends much upon the speed of the train. I have never seen anything to compare with it for awakening the emotion of surprise and wonder.
The station of Field, just beyond Mount Stephen, where there is a charming hotel, is in the midst of wonderful mountain and glacier scenery, and would be a delightful place for rest. From there the descent down the canon of Kickinghorse River, along the edge of precipices, among the snow-monarchs, is very exciting. At Golden we come to the valley of the Columbia River and in view of the Selkirks. The river is navigable about a hundred miles above Golden, and this is the way to the mining district of the Kootenay Valley. The region abounds in gold and silver. The broad Columbia runs north here until it breaks through the Selkirks, and then turns southward on the west side of that range.
The railway follows down the river, between the splendid ranges of the Selkirks and the Rockies, to the mouth of the Beaver, and then ascends its narrow gorge. I am not sure but that the scenery of the Selkirks is finer than that of the Rockies. One is bewildered by the illimitable noble snow-peaks and great glaciers. At Glacier House is another excellent hotel. In savage grandeur, nobility of mountain-peaks, snow-ranges, and extent of glacier it rivals anything in Switzerland. The glacier, only one arm of which is seen from the road, is, I believe, larger than any in Switzerland. There are some thirteen miles of flowing ice; but the monster lies up in the mountains, like a great octopus, with many giant arms. The branch which we saw, overlooked by the striking snow-cone of Sir Donald, some two and a half miles from the hotel, is immense in thickness and breadth, and seems to pour out of the sky. Recent measurements show that it is moving at the rate of twenty inches in twenty-four hours—about the rate of progress of the Mer de Glace. In the midst of the main body, higher up, is an isolated mountain of pure ice three hundred feet high and nearly a quarter of a mile in length. These mountains are the home of the mountain sheep.
From this amphitheatre of giant peaks, snow, and glaciers we drop by marvellous loops—wonderful engineering, four apparently different tracks in sight at one time—down to the valley of the Illicilliweat, the lower part of which is fertile, and blooming with irrigated farms. We pass a cluster of four lovely-lakes, and coast around the great Shuswap Lake, which is fifty miles long. But the traveller is not out of excitement. The ride down the Thompson and Fraser canons is as amazing almost as anything on the line. At Spence’s Bridge we come to the old Government road to the Cariboo gold-mines, three hundred miles above. This region has been for a long time a scene of activity in mining and salmon-fishing. It may be said generally of the Coast or Gold range that its riches have yet to be developed. The villages all along these mountain slopes and valleys are waiting for this development.
The city of Vancouver, only two years old since the beginnings of a town were devoured by fire, is already an interesting place of seven to eight thousand inhabitants, fast building up, and with many substantial granite and brick buildings, and spreading over a large area. It lies upon a high point of land between Burrard Inlet on the north and the north arm of the Fraser River. The inner harbor is deep and spacious. Burrard Inlet entrance is narrow but deep, and opens into English Bay, which opens into Georgia Sound, that separates the island of Vancouver, three hundred miles long, from the main-land. The round headland south of the entrance is set apart for a public park, called now Stanley Park, and is being improved with excellent driving-roads, which give charming views. It is a tangled wilderness of nearly one thousand acres. So dense is the undergrowth, in this moist air, of vines, ferns, and small shrubs, that it looks like a tropical thicket. But in the midst of it are gigantic Douglas firs and a few noble cedars. One veteran cedar, partly decayed at the top, measured fifty-six feet in circumference, and another, in full vigor and of gigantic height, over thirty-nine feet. The hotel of the Canadian Pacific Company, a beautiful building in modern style, is, in point of comfort, elegance of appointment, abundant table, and service, not excelled by any in Canada, equalled by few anywhere.