British Columbia felt this isolation keenly. All traffic had to be carried round the southern extremity of the American continent. To travel from London to Vancouver in the ’fifties was an heroic undertaking, involving a journey more than half-way round the globe. Some of the trade, however, was maintained overland. For instance, the provisions for the Hudson’s Bay post at Vancouver were dispatched from Montreal over a trail some 3000 miles in length. But it was a tremendous task, occupying several weeks. The pack train left Montreal in May, and the water route was followed so far as practicable to Fort Garry, where Winnipeg now stands. Here the rivers were abandoned in favour of horses, mules and wagons which trekked slowly across the prairies—the voyageurs living on the buffalo which roamed the plains in their thousands—threaded the terrible mountain rifts, and dropped down to the coast, reaching Vancouver about the end of September. The trail was ill-defined and the journey bristled with exciting incidents and adventures.
The disadvantages of this means of communication between the opposite sides of the continent were realised only too fully, so when the railway had become established in Eastern Canada and had demonstrated its tremendous possibilities, an iron link across the Dominion was advocated strenuously. But the vastness of the undertaking was deemed to be beyond the possibilities of the country; the cost was contemplated to be so huge that capitalists would not venture to commit themselves to the fulfilment of such a project. One of the advocates of the enterprise suggested that it should be built by convict-labour in order to reduce the expense of construction, and curiously enough he suggested that the line should be carried through the Kicking Horse Pass, through which the Canadian Pacific makes its way to the Pacific to-day.
It was in 1851 that the idea of a trans-continental railway first crystallised into a tangible project; but as it eclipsed in conception anything attempted in railway building up to that time, there was considerable timidity in launching out upon a line some 3000 miles in length. So matters drifted until the first trans-continental railway was thrown across the United States, and San Francisco was brought within a few days’ travel of New York. The agitation then broke out anew for a trans-Canadian line, and Sir Hugh Allan approached the Government with a definite scheme. However, he failed to enlist the practical assistance of financiers, and so the theme ranked as a perennial topic of discussion until the ratification of a project supported by the Government in 1881.
It is doubtful in the history of British North America whether any project of avowed benefit to the community has experienced such vicissitudes as the first trans-Canadian railway. It wrecked ministries, brought about the political extinction of more than one promising member of Parliament, provoked heated agitation, and involved the abortive expenditure of large sums of money.
The Government, however, decided to help private initiative sufficiently daring to attempt the undertaking in a liberal manner. In the first place a subsidy of £5,000,000, or $25,000,000, was granted to aid construction; the Government undertook to build 713 miles with its own resources, and made a free gift of 25,000,000 acres of land fringing its route. At that time the land was worthless, so its bestowal was not of immediate value, but to-day it represents an asset of incalculable value, and gives the company a sheet anchor of tremendous strength.
In the end the Government went very much farther. It made a free gift of the line it had constructed, which was worth at the very least,£7,000,000, or $35,000,000. While construction was in progress there was urgent need for further money. Financiers refused to provide funds, and as a result the Government stepped in and advanced a loan of £6,000,000—$30,000,000—which action was so bitterly criticised at the time that the Ministry was urged to wipe off the debt once and for all by making it a gift, for all the prospect there was of it ever being repaid. But the loan was redeemed, partly by an issue of stock, and partly by the Government buying back some 7,000,000 of the 25,000,000 acres which it had given to the company in the first place at 6 shillings per acre, representing to all intents and purposes a further gift of some,£2,000,000, or $10,000,000. Probably no railway undertaking has ever been treated with such prodigal liberality in the history of the iron horse; but at the time it was warranted fully, bearing in mind the magnitude of the scheme and the tremendous difficulties which confronted the company at every turn.
THE “GAP,” THE EASTERN ENTRANCE OF THE CANADIAN PACIFIC RAILWAY TO THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS
When construction commenced in grim earnest the builders found that the critics had not erred on the side of under-estimation in regard to the character of the difficulties to be overcome. The thin band of steel was driven through country of which practically nothing was known; where every succeeding mile revealed something unexpected. For instance, in following the shore of Lake Superior it was one desperate grapple with Nature for every yard. Mountains dropped sheer into the lake, and their humps were divided by stretches of wicked muskeg, the Indian name for swamp, where in many cases the bottom defied being discovered, and where thousands of tons of rock were swallowed up without showing any gratifying result.
