The loops which the line makes are another thing to notice. Far up we can see another train crawling about on the mountain-side, which seems impossible! How did it get there? The negro attendant sees us staring, and grins, showing his set of splendid white teeth, "Soon see him below," he says, and he is right; in a comparatively short time we have passed that train at a siding, and afterwards, on looking down, see it deep below us in the valley. The line makes the ascent in a series of great loops, and the sides of these, seen from above or below, appear to be straight lines.
Revelstoke is one of the interesting places we pass; here a branch goes off to the Kootenay country, where there is splendid land and climate for fruit-growing alongside the great lakes.
You ought to be beginning to know something about Canada now. First the salmon-fishing, then the lumbering, next the cattle-export, and now the fruit-growing. It is a fine and prosperous country.
It is the wrong time of year for the fruit, or we might have made an excursion to the south to get a look at it, for we could go down the great lakes, through the Crow's Nest Pass, and back again to the main line in a loop. But the blossom will all be over, of course; in spring it is as great a sight as it is in Japan, with the flowers springing out all along the trunk and branches like the hackles of a cock! Cherries are one of the chief exports, and then there are peaches, pears, apples, and plums, with other things such as strawberries and potatoes to fill in. But many a man's heart must sink when he comes out first from the old country and sees the wilderness he has to start on, for even if it is "cleared" there may be stumps of huge trees sticking up all over, and stones everywhere; it is all much rougher than our neat, tidied-up country. But then, on the other hand, the land is far cheaper, the soil is much more fruitful, and consequently the yield greater. After Revelstoke we pass Glacier, where the line runs round in a kind of amphitheatre, showing a magnificent range of peaks in solemn grandeur rising above the fringe of fir trees.
We have come down from the Selkirk range and now rise to the Rockies, where the track is even steeper and more twisted; here the snowy peaks lifted into the region of eternal snow are higher, but the scenery is not so easily seen, as we are more hemmed in by even narrower cañons. The main interest is in going through Kicking Horse Pass; but here even the negro attendant fails—he cannot tell us how the name arose! His spirits droop, but rise again when he comes eagerly to tell us we are approaching the "Great Divide." We have been running through many tunnels in and out of the "Cathedral Rocks," and now we reach the water-shed of the country, where sparkling streams fall away in opposite directions, one running down to the Pacific, and the other to Hudson's Bay in the north-west. At last we reach Banff, a well-known place, with a huge hotel of the most luxurious kind, belonging to the Canadian Pacific Company. Near Banff is the Canadian National Park, a park indeed, of 5732 square miles, including mountains and forests! You simply can't imagine it; it is a great tract of country, preserved in its natural state, and the haunt of wild things. Here are herds of the buffalo of the West, the bison, a very different fellow from the domesticated Eastern buffalo who so rudely chased you and Joyce. The bison are fine to look at, with their extraordinarily large chests and heads, out of all proportion to the rest of their bodies. Their great shaggy fronts and humped shoulders make a peculiar outline. In years past they were cruelly hunted and killed, but are now protected and encouraged. Now the Government is doing its best to save the remnant.
The amount of land yet wholly untrodden in the heart of these great mountains is difficult to realise; even the Indians only pass through some of it, and no white man's foot has ever touched more than a tithe. Grizzly bears, cinnamon bears, deer, wild sheep, and goats live still in these fastnesses, quite undisturbed by the little line that threads through from sea to sea.
