Bain, a long-headed Scotsman, pronounced dead against the St Michael's route. The idea of journeying 1800 miles up the Yukon, after the long and dangerous voyage of 2750 miles by ocean steamers across the Gulf of Alaska into Behring Sea, was absurd, he thought, especially as he averred that the river is only open for about three months, from July to October, and was then so full of bars, sandbanks, and shallows, snags and currents, that it is a most hazardous stream to navigate.
When they came up, they were several times nearly being wrecked, and they passed half-a-dozen boats and scows fast on sandbanks, where they most probably still remained.
I had fully described the way Meade and I, with our two Indians, had reached the Klondyke. A road over the White Pass I knew could be made with comparative ease, and from what we had heard of the Chilcoot Pass, that, too, might be made available for traffic.
Skagway, the landing-place for the White Pass, was on tidal water, open always; it was easy to land people and goods there. Then the distance across the pass being only about forty-three miles to the head waters of the Yukon, say Lake Bennet, it did appear that must be the best road in. As for the Miles Cañon and the White Horse Rapids—the only serious obstacles on the way thence to Dawson—we considered that with very little engineering skill, and but small outlay, they would be overcome, either by tramways or short canals. Seeing that the distance from Victoria, on Vancouver Island, to Dawson viâ St Michael's is altogether about 4500 miles, and viâ Skagway and the White Pass is but 1600, this did seem common-sense.
We had amongst our acquaintances on this diggings one or two Canadians who had been about this region for years. They were always talking about a route "all Canadian." All these landing-places I have mentioned are in American territory. We dispute that certainly. However, the Yankees are in possession, and it is quite possible that they will continue to be so.
But it seemed to Bain—and I certainly agreed with him—that the Canadian route they talked of had very little advantage, if any, over the White or even the Chilcoot Pass. Their idea was to make Telegraph Creek, which is in Canada, 150 miles up the Stickeen river from Fort Wrangel, the port for this country. They said that it had been already long used for traffic with the Cassiar gold mines, and asserted that there is a trail from it to Teslin Lake, down which there is good navigation to the Hootalinqua river, and so to the Yukon and Dawson. The distance from Victoria they supposed to be about 1500 miles.
But here, it seemed to us, were exactly the same difficulties, if not greater ones, than on the other routes.
Bain, who appeared to have studied the geography of this region before they entered it, having had the opportunity of examining the best maps available in Victoria, was strong in the opinion that the Canadian Government should, and would ultimately, build, or cause to be built, a railway from a really undoubted Canadian port, all through Canadian territory, to Dawson.
If this goldfield proved to be what we expected, it would have to be done some day. His idea was that there should be a railway from Fort Simpson, in Canada, where there is open water all the year round for ocean ships, to Teslin Lake, about 400 miles in. Indeed, he went so far as to maintain that this railway should be continued right down to Dawson, for only by this means could the country be properly developed.
No roads for teams could ever be satisfactory. The forage for cattle having all to be imported would alone cause this to be so. On the long journey animals could do little more than haul their own food.