Melodious sounds are echoing through the woods—“Comin’ through the rye,” sung in unison by two robust young voices, and jingling tug-chains for accompaniment.
With that music echoing in our ears, and the “three cheers” of the whole happy family as we take off, we sail away down the middle of the Province to the South.
There’s the Okanagan Valley, with its beautiful houses, set gem-like in their gardens, looking out on battalions, brigades, whole army corps of apple and cherry and plum and peach and apricot trees, knee-deep in vetch and alfalfa; on spreading fields of tomatoes, onions and celery, and potatoes; all watered from the mountain streams close by. And this is only one, though the chief, among the fruit valleys of this rich and corrugated Province.
“They used to laugh at us,” an English orchardman says, “and what they called our ‘style’—‘Piccadilly in the Wilds,’ and all that—but we know how to work.” No, if we ever laughed we stopped when we saw 3,400 men—3,400 from a total population of 15,000—pouring out of this valley to fight for our common cause. When those thousands hurried off to the War, those who were left doubled up and did their work for them, as far as human beings could. . . . Of the 590,572 men in the Canadian Expeditionary Force, we do not forget that 200,569 came from these four Western Provinces, [a]Mountain Marvels] besides 2,327 from Yukon. British Columbia sent 51,438, Alberta 45,146, Saskatchewan, 37,666, and Manitoba 66,319.
Turn east again, across a labyrinth of mountain and forest. A blast of hot air rises from one spot—a highly effective kind of hot air, too. That smelter pours out sixty million pounds of refined zinc in a year—nearly the whole zinc production of Canada.
That broad valley where two rivers meet, the Columbia and the Kootenay, was filled with dense jungle a few years ago. It has been transformed into a garden, by the co-operative industry of the Doukhobors. This is the headquarters of their community. That black snake winding for miles up to the head of a waterfall is their new irrigation pipe-line, and that big building beside the railway is their jam factory.
Higher, now! Ten thousand feet up, and still we have to twist and turn to avoid the higher peaks. We are nearing the Great Divide of the Continent. A sea of Rocky Mountains, piercing the azure sky with spires and domes and pyramids of white and grey, till sunset magic changes all to flaming red; mountains towering over glaciers and snowfields, which pour their torrents down through pine-clad glens and dark ravines. A lake of brilliant blue, set in a royal ring of snow-soft pearls and glacial diamonds. That is Lake Louise: many travellers call it the most beautiful spot in this rich land of beauties. More lakes, more cataracts, more glaciers, more peaks that pierce the sky; a land of myriad marvels; a treasure house of all that is grand and beautiful.
The crack of a rifle, and a mountain lion rolls down the slope, as the echo volleys from cliff to cliff. The [a]The Fire Patrol] big-game hunter’s paradise, this; the paradise of tourists, alpine climbers, artists, and all who cannot be satisfied with anything short of perfection.