So comprehensive were Miss Field's convictions of the wide scope and resistless nature of scientific advance that she once remarked to a friend, "I look to see science prove immortality." Her faith in immortality was not wanting, but she believed it to be within that order of truth which might actually be demonstrated by science.
Victoria is only some six hours' sail from Vancouver—beautiful Victoria, worthy of the greatest queen of the ages whose name the city so proudly bears. Not only for its signal attractions, but as the capital of British Columbia, Victoria has especial interest, and the tourist who is wise will disembark and remain in this delightful city until the next steamer arrives continuing the voyage to Seattle. An English city dropped into the American continent is Victoria. It is neither Canadian nor yet of the United States, but it is practically an English city located on Vancouver Island. It is already an important port, and the equable climate attracts residents and visitors from the entire continent.
It is called, indeed, "the city of sunshine," and it has both wealth and health in measure to impress the visitor, if it does not transform him into at least a temporary resident. The aristocratic residential district has entrancing views of the sea, islands, bays, and mountains, and more than three miles of coast line. The beauty of the architectural effects, the equable climate, the delightful drives afforded by the wide asphalt-paved boulevards, and the variety of amusements and entertainments—yachting, golf, fishing, country clubs with all manner of sports and games, together with its good schools, numerous churches, and library, attract a population of refinement and of a notable order of intellectuality.
To arrive at Seattle in the early dawn is to arrive at the psychological moment.
"If them would'st view fair Melrose aright
Go visit it by pale moonlight,"
counsels Sir Walter; and to view Seattle at her most typical and representative moment one should see her first in the golden glow of a morning, that illuminates all her crescent harbour and reveals her streets alive in the new energy of the day. Seattle is known as "the Seaport of Success." She takes the opposite pole from the motto Dante saw over the red city of Dis. Far from any abandonment of hope by "those who enter here," the very spectacle of her eager, intense life reinvigorates the newcomer. Has he not entered the Seaport of Success? "If you want success—Succeed!" counsels Emerson. Of course one will succeed in Seattle. That is what he is there for. He is "born for the job." Seattle is the marvel of the day. One quite sympathises with the citizen who met a press correspondent from New York on a train and begged him to include Seattle in his glowing interpretations. "But I was in Seattle last week," rejoined the writer. "Oh, but you should see Seattle now!" replied the up-to-date resident.
Seattle has a population of nearly three hundred and fifty thousand; she has four transcontinental railways; and fifty-seven steamship lines. Lake Washington, lying just outside the city, a sheet of water twenty-five miles in length and averaging three miles in width, offers one of the most ideal and poetic regions for suburban homes, and one whose privileges are apparently appreciated. The beautiful residences that adorn its shores render it a locality well worth seeing. The lake extends to the foothills of the Cascade range, whose peaks, perpetually covered with ice and snow, are from five thousand to more than fourteen thousand feet in height. With this majestic mountain range on one hand, and Puget Sound on the other, Seattle has an environment that rivals, in natural beauty, any other city of the world. The boulevards of Seattle are famous, and of these ex-President Taft declared that they formed one of the most magnificent combinations of modern city and mediæval forest. From these boulevards of thirty miles in extent, connecting a chain of thirty-eight parks, there are continual vistas of lake, and sea, and snow-capped mountains, and the drive is often among arbours and flowers and shrubs revealing rare skill and taste in gardening.
The State of Washington has wisely inaugurated a system of splendid roadways, whose skilful engineering has rendered the broad boulevards, the country highways, a veritable paradise of comfort to motorists. More than fifty thousand miles of such road thoroughfares stretch in all directions from Seattle. Four of these great highways, those of the Pacific, Sunset, Olympic, and National Parks, were built and are maintained at the expense of the state. One important feature of these is the Pacific Highway, a thoroughfare of 2000 miles in length, connecting British Columbia with the southern limit of California. It is the longest drive of the world and has a picturesque beauty unsurpassed by that of any known region.
Nor are the ardent residents of Seattle in any way inclined to reticence regarding her allurements. To one voyager on board, who was a native of the States, but who had been so spellbound by her first wonderful trip through Canada that she longed to "assume a virtue, though she had it not" and pass herself off as a native of the Dominion—to this tourist a Seattle lady rather importunately insisted that she ought to remain at least a week in the "Seaport of Success" and revel in its amazements. "You would see parks of hundreds of acres," exclaimed the loyal resident of the capital city of the State of Washington, among other enumerations of the glories to be revealed. "Oh, is that all?" unkindly responded the voyager. "Why, in Canada we are accustomed to parks of over four thousand square miles." The devotee of Canadian landscapes endeavoured to say this with the air of one born and bred in the Dominion, and she was quite charmed with her evident success when the Seattle lady replied, "Oh, you are a Canadian? I thought you were one of our own people." "Did you, indeed?" returned the masquerading Canadian, non-committantly, with the most innocent and unconscious air that it was possible to assume.