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dcterms:isReferencedBy "http://resolve.library.ubc.ca/cgi-bin/catsearch?bid=3980032"@en ;
dcterms:isPartOf "Wallace B. Chung and Madeline H. Chung Collection"@en ;
dcterms:creator "Morris, Keith"@en ;
dcterms:issued "2015-09"@en, "1920"@en ;
edm:aggregatedCHO "https://open.library.ubc.ca/collections/chungpub/items/1.0056059/source.json"@en ;
dcterms:extent "128 pages : illustrations ; 18 cm"@en ;
dc:format "application/pdf"@en ;
skos:note """ zjnes AA. AA. _^^_>_^^%^^_>^___^_y^_^ THE STORY OF THE
CANADIAN PACIFIC RAILWAY
BY
KEITH MORRIS
Author of
'Canada for British Gold and British Enterprise/
'The Anglo-Canadian Year Book," "Louis Botha/
etc.
(ILLUSTRATED)
LONDON
WILLIAM STEVENS LIMITED, Henrietta Streei
Co vent Garden, W.C
1916 CONTENTS
I.—Pathfinders
pages
1-41
II.—Pathmakers
42-61
III.—Craigellachie ...
62-73
IV.—The Saving of British Columbia ... 74-86
V.—The Highway to Asia
87-92
VI.—Superstructure
93-108
VII.—The Making of a Nation
... 109-128
APPENDIX
Canadian Pacific Finance: A Story
in Figures 129-154 f ILLUSTRATIONS
Lord Shaughnessy, Chairman and President,
Canadian Pacific Railway... Frontispiece
facing
page
A Mountain Trail
Statue of Lord Mount Stephen, First
President of Canadian Pacific Railway,
in Windsor Street Station, Montreal
Construction in the Mountains
After Working Hours in a Construction
Camp
Canadian Pacific Trans-Continental
Express at Glacier, British Columbia
Sir William Van Horne
Vancouver Harbour
Canadian Pacific Liner : " Empress of
Russia"
Canadian Pacific Liner : " Metagama "
On the Verandah, C.P.R. Banff Springs
Hotel
Mountaineering in the Rockies
Settlers Arriving at Strathmore, Alberta
Canada at Play
The Land of Promise
Windsor Street Station, Montreal : Headquarters of Canadian Pacific Railway
13
22
42
46
62
72
79
87
99
101
103
116
124
127
144 PATHFINDERS.
FROM a deep canyon in the heart of a range
of Canadian mountains there emerged on a
September day a group of unkempt and
weather-scarred men. They continued their stumbling
march over a ground covered by masses of rock,
fallen trees, long rank ferns, and poisonous devil's club.
At mid-day they halted, wearied and hungry, and
each man ate his perilously meagre rations. Then
one of the party, a tall, bearded man with a
commanding presence and distinguished appearance,
despite the raggedness of his attire, turned to a
younger man beside him and gave him a few words
of instructions. The younger man fired two rifle
shots in rapid succession. All the men then listened
intently. The report of a gun shot was heard in
reply. The rifle emitted another three shots—and
again a gun shot was heard—once—twice—three
times. " Thank God! we have established our connections ! " the tall, bearded man, evidently the leader,
exclaimed. The longed for supplies were there as
arranged. All anxiety for the future was over.
The party hurried forward, eagerly and excitedly
overcoming the obstacles underfoot. After a little
time they halted to rest, and the young man again 2 PATHFINDERS
pulled the trigger of his loaded rifle. Two shots,
more distinct from their closer proximity, were heard.
The men again advanced, elation marked on every
countenance. Going straight in the direction of the
sound, they strove to follow it. Soon they were out
of the green woods and before them lay the waters of
the Columbia. On the opposite shore, about a mile
distant, they observed the smoke of a camp. A series
of hurrahs broke from the men—their friends from
Kamloops were there at the appointed meeting-place.
From the opposite bank two canoes shot out. As
the men in the canoes came into sight, a look of
amazement and bitter disappointment sprang into
the tense faces of the watchers. The canoes contained Indians—only. The two parties met at the
water's edge. The Indians could not speak English,
but with the help of a little " Chinook " the travellers
learned that no one had arrived from Kamloops. It
was the Indians who had replied to the shots.
'We were in the heart of the desert and asked
for bread. We did not even get a stone, but met
hungry Indians ready to devour the little store we
had brought with us.'
The tall, bearded man was Sandford Fleming,
Chancellor of Queen's University and world-famed
engineer. The younger man who fired the rifle shots
was his son; the other two men were Dr. Grant,
Principal of Queen's University, and Albert Rogers.
Five packers completed the party which had
emerged from the canyon. Sandford Fleming was PATHFINDERS
making his memorable journey over the proposed
route of the Canadian Pacific Railway through the
mountains to the Pacific.
Sandford Fleming's diary of his journey is a vivid
exemplification, not only of the hardships endured
and perils encountered by him and his companions,
but by the men who were the first pathfinders for
the railway which was to stretch in an unbroken
line from the Atlantic to the Pacific. The tales of
heroism, of deeds of daring and self-sacrifice performed
in the endeavour to wrest from the mountains their
jealously-guarded secrets, constitute a record as
thrilling in its nature as the stories woven by a
wizard of romance.
Fleming's journey is especially historic in that it
was the first human connection made between the
three mountain passes discovered by Dr. Hector,
Walter Moberly and Major Rogers respectively and
the first over the entire route of that portion of the
great transcontinental highway between Lake Superior
and the Pacific Ocean. His narrative constitutes a
permanent tribute to great explorers and brave men.
S Our journey this day was over exceedingly rough
ground,' reads a passage in his diary. * We have to
cross gorges so narrow that a biscuit might be thrown
from the last horse descending, to the bell-horse six
hundred feet ahead, ascending the opposite side.
The fires have been running through the woods and 4 PATHFINDERS
are still burning; many of the half-burnt trees have
been blown down, probably by the gale of last night,
obstructing the trail and making advance extremely
difficult/
Nor did the road improve as they advanced ; many
miles of burnt woods still lay before them. The air
was still and quiet, otherwise they would have had
the additional risk of blackened tntnks falling upon
them, with disastrous consequences. On they went,
down and up gorges hundreds of feet deep, among
rocky masses, where the horses had to clamber up
as best they could amid sharp points and deep crevices.
' The trail now takes another character. A series
of precipices run sheer up from the boiling current
to form a contracted canyon. A path has, therefore,
been traced along the hillside, ascending to the
elevation of some seven or eight hundred feet. For a
long distance not a vestige of vegetation is to be seen.
On the steep acclivity our line of advance is narrow,
so narrow that there is scarcely a foothold; nevertheless we have to follow for some six miles this thread
of trail, which seemed to us by no means in excess
of the requirements of the chamois and the mountain
goat.
\\We cross clay, rock, and gravel slides at a giddy
height. To look down gives one an uncontrollable
dizziness, to make the head swim and the -view
unsteady, even with men of tried nerve.
11 do not think I can ever forget that terrible
walk; it was the greatest trial I ever experienced, PATHFINDERS 5
We are from five to eight hundred feet high on a path
of from ten to fifteen inches wide and at some points
almost obliterated, with slopes above and below us
so steep that a stone would roll into the torrent in
the abyss below. There are no trees or branches or
twigs which we can grip to aid us in our advance
on the narrow, precarious footing. We become more
sensible to the difficulties we encounter each step
as we go forward. The sun came out with unusual
power; our day's effort has caused no little of a
strain, and the perspiration is running from us like
water. I, myself felt as if I had been dragged
through a brook, for I was without a dry shred on
me.'
The travellers arrived at Major Rogers' camp
weary and footsore after their terrible march of many
miles over rough ground high up on the mountain
side, over a path every step of which was a renewed
difficulty, a path crossed only because of the very
desperation of their circumstances. Having entered
on the journey they would not turn back, and they
had to face the difficulties in their front cost what
it would.
Before them lay a seemingly impenetrable barrier—
the Selkirk Mountains, through which the railway was
to battle its way westwards. Major Rogers had
discovered a pass two years before, and Sandford
Fleming determined to traverse the newly-found cleft
in the mountains. Rogers offered to accompany them
part of the route, and to send his nephew, Albert, 6 PATHFINDERS
who had accompanied him in his exploratory expedi
tion, the entire distance. A horse trail had been
opened to the summit of the Selkirk Range, and a
short way down the Illecillewaet.
Beyond that point lay the wilderness in all its native
ruggedness, without a path for the human foot, with
the river and mountain gorges only as landmarks and
guides.
Early the next morning the travellers were in a
canoe floating down the Columbia River. Looking
back they saw the rocky range which they had crossed
at such peril. The terrace on which they stood at
sunset lay along the foot of the hills, and a second
terrace was seen to follow the Kicking Horse River,
some twelve hundred feet high. The ground from
the canyon of the Kicking Horse River ascended to
this terrace, and it was along the face of this upper
shelving acclivity that the narrow ledge of pathway
was traced, which Fleming had followed for miles.
' I never wish to take another such walk. I dared
not look down. It seemed as if a false step would
have hurled us to the base, to certain death/
At noon the party left the canoe, having overtaken
the packers and the horses, and proceeded on foot
until they reached a rugged mountain defile, leading
up to the summit, which they were to cross. The
mountain peaks rose high above them, and, although
it was far advanced in the forenoon, the sun had
not yet ascended to the lofty horizon.
They crossed many old avalanche slides. On the PATHFINDERS
southern side of the mountains, as they wound their
way, great scaurs, banked with snow, were seen two
or three hundred feet above the bottom of the narrow
valley through which a creek flowed. To the north
lay a glacier some fifty yards thick at its overhanging
termination. Five miles from their previous night's
camp they left the creek and followed a small stream
to the south.
Half a mile further they reached the summit of the
pass, the discovery of which had solved one of the
mightiest and heart wearying problems which confronted the pathfinders for the Canadian Pacific
highway.
It was an occasion for celebration. ' I recollected
that I had a package of cigars, a gift from a genial
Ottawa friend. They had crossed and re-crossed the
Atlantic with me during the present summer, and it
was little thought that when they came into my
possession that their aroma would mingle with the
atmosphere of a summit in the Selkirk Range. They
are produced. We have no wine, so we can only
congratulate Major Rogers over the cigars on the
discovery of a pass so far practicable and on certain
conditions appearing to furnish a solution of crossing
over the Selkirk Range/
I As we quietly rested, enjoying our cigars in the
midst of the remarkable scenery which surrounded
us on every side, Major Rogers described to us various
details connected with the discovery of the pass. . .
With his nephew he had climbed a mountain on its PATHFINDERS
northern bank, and from the summit he looked down
on the meadow on which we were then resting.
Major Rogers, pointing to the height directly in front
of us said :—" There Al. and I stood; we could
trace through the mountains a valley, and the conclusion was established in my mind that it led to
the unexplored branch of the Illecillewaet. We also
traced a depression to the east, which we considered
might lead to the upper waters of the Columbia.
And so it proved."
The travellers were in high spirits. Feeling that
some memorial should be preserved of their visit
there, they organised a Canadian Alpine Club.
Sandford Fleming, " as a grandfather/ was appointed
interim President, Dr. Grant, Secretary, and Sandford
Hall Fleming, Treasurer. A meeting was held and
they turned to one of the springs rippling down the
Illecillewaet and drank success to the new organisation. Unanimously they carried resolutions of acknowledgment to Major Rogers, the discoverer of the
pass, and to his nephew for assisting him.
' The air is bracing, the day is fine. We have
regained our freshness and elasticity, and to show
^hat we still are young and unaffected by our journey
we deem it proper to go through a game of leap-frog,
about the only amusement at our command, an act
of Olympic worship to the deities in the heart of the
Selkirks! Our packers looked upon our performance
gravely, without a smile/ PATHFINDERS 9
Thus and then was played the first recorded game
of leap-frog in the Selkirk Mountains.
The hour arrived to leave the pleasant meadow
in Rogers Pass and pursue their journey. A trail
had already been cut as far as it was made passable.
Beyond that point the Fleming expedition would be
the first to cross the Selkirk Range from its eastern
base on the Upper Columbia.
The descent was comparatively rapid. Soon the
travellers came in sight of a conical peak which stood
out majestically among its fellows. There, they
thought, was a fit spot for the virgin attempt of the
Canadian Alpine Club, They named it Syndicate
Peak; Major Rogers declared that it would be the
summit of his ambition to plant on its highest point
the Union Jack on the day that the first transcontinental train passed through the gorge in which they
stood.
They continued along the valley walled in by
mountains thousands of feet in height. Trudging
slowly over the newly cut trail high up among the
rocks, they descended again to the flat with all its
horrors of devil's club until, at last, they reached
a surveyor's camp, twenty-four miles from the summit
of the pass. The horses had now to leave them,
it being impossible for them to proceed further. The
trail had reached its end, and the men had now to
carry on their shoulders what they required, through
an untrodden forest without path or trail of any kind.
They said good-bye to Major Rogers and to the 10 PATHFINDERS
surveyors, f In saying good-bye to them we were
bidding farewell to all civilization which had forced
itself into the mountains. . . . We were now turning
our back on civilized life and its auxiliaries, again
to meet them, we trusted, at Kamloops. Our world
was for a time in our little band. We knew nothing
of the country before us and we had no assistance
to look for from the world behind us. We were
following a tributary of the Columbia to the waters
of that river, and this was the one guide for our
direction. One by one we march off in Indian file
to the forest/
The story of the journey through a wilderness
unknown, as recorded by the diarist, is a story of
hardships and suffering. Over and under fallen
trees of immense size they crawled and crept, and the
men soon showed that they felt the weight of their,
burdens. Their halts were frequent. The dripping
rain from the bush and branches saturated them from
above. Tall ferns, reaching to the shoulder, and
devil's club through which they had to crush their
way made them feel as if dragged through a horse-
pond, and the perspiration rolled from them in
streams. They met with obstacles of every description. The Panax horridus were numbered by millions
and they were perpetually wounding the men with
their spikes as they struck against these. (' Devil's
club!' a later traveller bewailed. ■ What an experience
is devil's club! Imagine a bare stick an inch thick PATHFINDERS II
and five to eight feet high with a spread of tropical-
looking palmated leaves on the top, set off by a bunch
of bright red berries. The entire surface of the stick
is covered by sharp, fine spines and the canes grow
so close together that sometimes it is impossible to
force a way through them without using an axe.
The points of the spines break off in the flesh, causing
it to fester and become very painful/) The advance
was varied by ascending rocky slopes and slippery
masses, and again descending to a lower level. They
waded through alder swamps and trod down skunk
cabbage and the terrible prickly aralia. Their daily
march averaged about three miles, and at the end
of each all were utterly exhausted ; their first business
at the frequent halting places was to extract the
poison laden prickles from their hands and legs.
'Last night we discussed the suggestion of constructing a raft, and with the current float down to
the Columbia. As we look upon the water foaming
past us and the numerous rocks and obstacles in the
stream, we are satisfied that no raft could live long
in such a torrent. The valley is narrow and is
skirted by lofty mountains, wooded up their sides
and of considerable elevation; but owing to the
height of the trees we cannot see their summit.
Occasionally during the day we have beheld snow
peaks peering above the lower levels. In some parts
of the valley a stray sunbeam never penetrated the
lower ground.
p Darkness at an early hour enshrouds the base of 12 PATHFINDERS
the peaks, so the cook has to bake to-morrow's bread
by the light of the fire. Suddenly thunder is heard
and the red glare of lightning iUuminates all around
us. For some time we are threatened with rain and
at length it falls in torrents. The thunder and
lightning are now seen and heard through the valley,
and our one danger is that a heavy wind may spring
up, and, as often happens, root up many of the forest
trees around us; but our trust is in Providence as
we wrap ourselves in our blankets to sleep.
' By the morning the thunder had ceased and the
thick tall trees around us stood erect; the air is
thick with mist .... We mount our packs, for we
all carry something, and start onwards for another
hard day's march.
'The scene of our midday meal of cold pork and
bread was the junction of two clear streams
from the mountains, the more bright and crystal-like
from contrast with the chocolate-looking water of
the Illecillewaet. We resolve to encamp somewhat
earlier, so that the men may dry their clothes by
day-light. It was fair weather when we halted by a
picturesque brook, tired and weary enough. The
spot we selected was a turn at the Illecillewaet where
the boiling, roaring torrent sweeps past with formidable fury On the river there is a forest
scene of dark cedars, while here and there lie
immense prostrate trunks, some of them eight or
ten feet in diameter, covered with moss. Beyond the A Mountain Trail. 1
PATHFINDERS 13
river the mountains frown down upon us as defiantly
as ever
' It is Sunday, so we venture to sleep a few five
minutes longer, and as we hear the roar of the rapids
which seem to shake the very ground, we wonder
how we could have slept through it. It rained all
night; none of the men had tents and they nestled
by the trees and obtained what protection they
could. Our waterproofs were divided among them
as far as they would go, and such as did not possess
them were more or less drenched.
' Looking skywards through the openings in the
thick overhanging branches there seems a prospect
of the clouds rising. Sunday though it be, with our
supplies limited, we are like a ship in mid-ocean :
we must continue our journey without taking the
usual weekly rest, which would have been welcomed
by us all. Dr. Grant called us together, and after
the simple form of worship which the Church of
Scotland enjoins under such circumstances, we start
onwards.
'The walking is wretchedly bad. We make little
headway, and every tree, every leaf, is wet and casts
off the rain. In a short time we are as drenched as
the foliage. We have many fallen trees to climb
over, and it is no slight matter to struggle over trees
ten feet and upwards in diameter. We have rocks
to ascend and descend; we have a marsh to cross
in which we sink often to the middle. For half a
mile we have waded, I will not say picked, our way 14 PATHFINDERS
to the opposite side, through a channel filled with
stagnant water, having an odour long to be
remembered. Skunk cabbage is here indigenous and
is found in acres of stinking perfection. We clamber
to the higher ground, hoping to find an easier advance,
and we come upon the trail of a cariboo, but it leads
to the mountains. We try another course, only to
become entangled in a windfall of prostrate trees.
' The rain continues falling incessantly : the men,
with heavy loads on their heads, made heavier by the
water which has soaked into them, become completely
disheartened, and at half-past two o'clock we decide
to camp. Our travelling to-day extended only over
three hours; we have not advanced above a mile
and a half of actual distance and we all suffer greatly
from fatigue. I question if our three days' march
has carried us further than ten miles/
The strain of the terrible travelling began to tell
upon the party, and an attempt to systematize the
marching was made. ' Hitherto our rests had been
irregular. Our halts were long and we were drenched
with perspiration; we got chilled, so we laid down
the rule to walk for twenty minutes and rest for five.
Dr. Grant is appointed the quarter-master general
for the occasion, with absolute authority to time our
halts and our marches by the sound of a whistle,
and when he sees fit to call special halts after extraordinary efforts.
' Our period of progress for twenty minutes often
seems very long, and we wearily struggle through PATHFINDERS 15
the broken ground and clamber over obstacles, eagerly
listening for the joyful sound to halt proclaimed by
the whistle/
Thus the explorers struggled forward. In the lower
canyon of the Illecillewaet they climbed from rock
to rock, grasping roots and branches, scrambling up
almost perpendicular ascents, ' swinging ourselves
occasionally like experienced acrobats and feeling
like the clown in the pantomime as he tells the children
" here I am again." * At some places the loads had
to be unpacked and the men had to draw each other
up, by clinched hands, from one ledge to another.
They had another chapter of the Kicking-Horse
Valley experience; passing cautiously along a steep
slope where a false step was certain disaster ; creeping
under a cascade, over a point of precipitous rock and
surmounting obstacles, which, unless they had to go
forward or die from starvation, would have been held
to be insurmountable.
Was ever such a journey made by human beings
before ? The very deities of the mountains, one might
fancy, heralded them as heroes. 'As we were
preparing to rest for the night a bright glare of
lightning and a sharp peal of thunder warn us to
protect our clothes as best we can against rain. We
saw but one flash and heard its accompanying loud
crash to remind us that each night of our descent by
the Illecillewaet we have been saluted after dark by
heaven's artillery/
When they emerged from the lower canyon of the i6
PATHFINDERS
Illecillewaet their terrible struggles against nature
in her fiercest mood were forgotten in the anticipation
of the longed-for succour. ' We expect the party
from Kamloops with supplies to meet us there. It
is the eleventh of the month. I had named the eighth
of September as the date at the latest when we should
reach the place appointed/
But alas for their hopes! The provisions from
Kamloops were not there—as already narrated. It
was the bitterest trial of all.
Sandford Fleming and his companions decided to
cross the Columbia in the Indian's canoes and to send
back the packers to McMillan, the surveyor, as they
had promised him. ' We divided our little store of
provisions with the fine fellows who had carried
ouv impedimenta down the Illecillewaet so that they
would have enough to take them back to McMillan's
camp. I added a letter of approval to their chief.
No men ever more deserved thanks than they did.
They were all made of the truest and best of stuff
and let me here make my acknowledgments to them
for their admirable conduct. . . . These men had been
put to the test, and showed of what material their
manhood was made/
Arrived at the western bank of the Columbia, the
little group of travellers made a fire on the beach and
sat down to eat their scanty dinner, after which they
seriously considered their situation. They were
fatigued beyond measure, and every joint ached. PATHFINDERS 17
The skin of all of them was lacerated, in places, and
their hands were festering from the pricks of the
devil's club. And they had not yet come to the end
of their work. They were well aware that there were
tremendous difficulties yet to be met in reaching
Kamloops. Their supply of food was nearly exhausted,
and what they had left they had to carry themselves.
They felt grievously disappointed that the men from
Kamloops were not there as arranged, and their
absence had a terribly depressing effect on the spirits
of the party.
' Our decision as to the course we are to take cannot
be long delayed, as our slender stock of provisions
will last but a few days. In this painful embarrassment, and it was painful, we asked ourselves the
question : Would it be prudent to go risking the
chance of meeting the party from Kamloops, or do
the circumstances compel us to give up the idea of
crossing the Gold Range and force us to enlist the
services of the Indians to take us down the Columbia,
some two hundred miles to their own village, from
which point we can find our way to Portland in
Oregon in twelve days, and then by Puget's Sound
reach our destination in British Columbia ? This
mode of procedure was most repugnant to us; but,
however desirous we were to cross the Gold range
of mountains, we had seriously to consider the situation. I may seem to exaggerate the doubt and misgiving which had thus crossed my mind. But the
facts of the case must be borne in mind that our
I iS PATHFINDERS
dependence rested entirely upon receiving the supplies
from Kamloops; this source failing, none was open
to us. Had our stock of provisions been exhausted
and no Indians been present on the Columbia, I do
not see that our fate would have been different to that
of many an explorer: starvation. There was only
one deduction to be drawn from the absence of the
Kamloops party : that there had been misapprehension or misfortune, and that we could not look for
assistance where we stood!'
The party were in a grave dilemma. It was
evident, under the circumstances, that they had to
act independently of others, and, in view of the state
of their provisions, they had to determine at once
on the course to be taken. Their united feeling was
strong that they should not abandon the Eagle Pass.
They recognised that after a night's rest immediate
action was imperative, that they ought in no way
to delay, but to proceed onward, leaving behind them
tent, blankets, baggage, and everything not absolutely
required, carrying only the remnant of food they still
had, with a small frying pan, and so work their way
westward as best they could.
Evening came on. All that was to be heard was the
peculiar sound of the rapidly flowing stream and the
distant roar of the Falls of the Illecillewaet,
Gloom gave way to hope when five men, of whom
four were Indians, appeared next morning on the
flats of the Columbia, a short distance from Fleming's
camp. The anxious travellers rushed to meet them ; I
fcATHFINDEftS t§
their deliverers had arrived. The leader, McLean,
gave Fleming letters from the Hudson's Bay Company's
agent. Among them was a sheet of foolscap setting forth
a list of the provisions sent. But where was the food ?
The sheet of paper alone represented the provisions,
for it was all that the Company's party had brought
with them. The stores entrusted to them to bring
to the Columbia had been cached at a point five days
distant, and they had brought with them barely
enough food to supply their own wants. Consternation again made its unwelcome presence felt in the
minds of the travellers from the east.
McLean explained. The terribly rough nature of
the ground through the Eagle Pass had caused
unforeseen delay. Many parts of the valley were
blocked by fallen trees of gigantic size; and the
obstructions, owing to masses of rock,. the lakes,
swamps, and a general ruggedness, had proved to
be formidable. No attempt had been made to bring
on any of the provisions beyond the point which the
horses could not pass. At that spot the whole was
cached, and one of the Indians had been detailed to
remain behind in charge of the animals.
There was not a moment to be lost in making a
start. It was discovered that the Indian hunters who
were camped near by were well acquainted with the
country for some distance back of the Columbia;
it had been their hunting ground. One of these was
engaged as a guide to take the party on their way 20 PATHFINDERS
by the least difficult route, to the extent of his
knowledge of the country.
' We imagined that we were making the best of
starts. We all started forward in Indian file with
that springy gait which marks men having confidence
in themselves. The guide, however, led us to his own
camp. He did so without explanation or remark.
He entered his wigwam and we remained outside.
The proceeding was inexplicable, until we learned that
he had to repair his moccasins before he could start.
We halted three quarters of an hour, while the squaw
deliberately plied her awl and leather thong, the
Indian in the meanwhile sitting motionless, smoking
his pipe and looking into the embers of the fire. We
could only imitate his patience and await the result.
At length, in the same silent way he re-appeared
and started without comment on the trail. We submissively followed. The thought crossed my mind
that in this case knowledge was power/
After travelling seven miles the party reached the
summit of Eagle Pass. As night came on they set
fire to a hollow cedar tree. It flamed -rapidly and
illuminated the scene around for the whole evening.
The moon shone in the heavens, but the dense forest
intervened and the camp remained in shadow.
They had entered the third range of mountains
and after crossing the summit had passed beyond the
waters flowing into the Columbia. They had reached
the waters of the Eagle River, which found their
way through valley and gorge to the turbulent Eraser. 1
PATHFINDERS 21
On the third day from their entrance into Eagle
Pass they arrived at the cache. Never was the sight
of food more welcomed by wayfarers in the wilderness.
McLean and the four Shuswap Indians, dispatched
from Kamloops with supplies for the travellers, had
helped to finish the meagre remnant of stores which
Sandford Fleming and his companions had carried
across three mountain summits from the Bow River,
and the party arrived at the cache without even a
crumb of bread in their possession.
All was now well with the travellers, and they
proceeded on their journey with fighter hearts than
they had known for many a day.
'At Savona's Ferry I received messages by telegraph,
and I was reminded of being once more within the
circle of artificial wants and requirements. For the
last thirty days we have been out of the world, knowing
nothing beyond the experiences of our daily fife.
Our leading thoughts were of the difficulties which
lay in our path and of the labour necessary to overcome them. There was nothing vicarious in our
position ; there was no transfer of care or labour to
others. Each one had to accept what lay before
him, and our world for the time was in our little
circle. Now we are reminded that we are again in
another condition of being/
There is a note of kindly lament in the closing
portion of Sandford Fleming's diary of the journey,
of a nature which showed the bigness of the man
and leader. 'At Victoria I am to part with Dave 2_. PATHFINDERS
Leigh, the last of the men who had been with us in
the mountains. He joined us at Bow River, and had
determined to see us to the end of our journey.
From the day when we commenced with pack-horses
to cross the range of mountains, Dave has stood by
us and has gallantly helped in many a difficulty.
He is a powerful Cheshire man, such as one would
fancy a northern Englishman to be: honest, self
reliant, plain-spoken and staunch, with a peculiar
habit of calling a spade a spade. He has cooked for
us in all circumstances, there is no other word for it,
heroically. He did his share of the packing, and if
there was a load a shade heavier it was caught up
by Dave with some saying of his own, and off he
trudged as if it were a plaything. He had done
everything for us that a man could do with unfailing
cheerfulness, and has followed our fortunes for many
a mile. He has driven pack horses, paddled canoes,
rowed boats, built rafts, stretched our tent, driven
handcars, cooked our food and indulged in many a
hearty objurgation at skunk cabbage and devil's club.
He crosses the Straits of Georgia, and then at Victoria
we have to say good-bye/
The search for a path for the Canadian Pacific
Railway is an epic in adventure.
It began as far back as 1857, In that year an
Imperial Commission was established by the British
Government ' to inquire into the suitability of the Statue of Lord Mount Stephen, First President of Canadian
Pacific Railway, in Windsor Street Station, Montreal. PATHFINDERS 23
Colony of Canada for settlement and the advisability
of constructing a trans-continental line of railway
through British territory from the Atlantic to the
Pacific Ocean, and thus to connect and at the same
time to provide a safer and more direct means of
communicating with the British possessions in the
Orient/ in the official phraseology.
To Captain Palliser, an officer of the Waterford
Artillery Militia, was given the task of exploration.
Assisting him were Lieutenant Blackiston, of the
Royal Artillery, and John Sullivan as geographers,
Dr. (afterwards Sir James) Hector and M. Bourgeau,
as botanist.
For four years the British party worked in the
wilderness—a wilderness extending from the British
boundary line to the height of land in the far north,
and from the western shores of Lake Superior to the
waters of the Pacific. Over the plains and through
mountain passes they carried on the work of
investigation.
The Palliser expedition is memorable in the history
of the Canadian Pacific in that one of the great passes
through which the railway now follows—the Kicking
Horse—was discovered by Dr. Hector, an event
commemorated in the granite shaft which was later
erected in his honour near the " Great Divide."
Dr. Hector and his party suffered intensely from the
pangs of hunger, caused by the unanticipated scarcity
of game. Near the confluence of two rivers, the leader
received a severe and painful kick from one of the 24 PATHFINDERS
pack horses, an episode which gave the name Kicking
Horse to the river and to the pass. But the relentless
necessities of hunger compelled the explorer, disabled
and wracked by pain, to proceed without delay, and
at the utmost speed possible in the circumstances.
Success crowned his efforts. ' In that pass/ said
Captain Palliser, referring to the discovery, ' Dr.
Hector has observed a peculiarity which distinguished
it from others we have examined, viz: the absence
of any abrupt step at the commencement of the
descent to the west. This led him to report very
favourably upon the faculties offered by this pass for
the construction of a wagon road, and even the project
of a railway by this route across the Rocky Mountains
might be reasonably entertained/
But Captain Palliser's report to the Imperial Commission shattered the hopes of the British Government. It was an unqualified disapproval.
'I cannot recommend the Imperial Government
to countenance or lend support to any scheme for
constructing, or it may be said, forcing a thoroughfare
by this line of route, either by land or water, as there
would be no immediate advantage commensurate
■with the required sacrifice of capital; nor can I
advise such heavy expenditure as would necessarily^
attend the construction of an exclusively British line
of road between Canada and the Red River Settlement. .... The knowledge of the country as a whole
would never lead me to advocate a line of communis
cation from Canada across the continent to the PATHFINDERS 25
Pacific, exclusively through British territory. The
time has now for ever gone by for effecting such an
object, and the unfortunate choice of an astronomic*
boundary fine has completely isolated the Central
American possessions of Great Britain from Canada
in the east, and almost debarred them from any
eligible access from the Pacific Coast on the west/
Before Captain Palliser returned to England to
present his report, he met at Victoria a man who
was afterwards to play a prominent part in the
pathfinding for an overland railway to the Pacific—
Walter Moberly. To Moberly Palliser said that all
hopes of obtaining a feasible line by which to construct
a railway through British Columbia would have to
be abandoned, as the Gold range of mountains,
immediately to the west of the Columbia river presented
an unbroken and impassable barrier.
Walter Moberly had his own opinion on the subject.
Five years later, having been appointed assistant to
the Surveyor General for British Columbia, he organized
a fight party to explore the Gold, Selkirk, and Rocky
Mountains. He soon reached the Great Shuswap Lake
and made a forced march to its south arm, where
he observed a valley running easterly, apparently
through the Gold Range, and in the very direction
in which the explorer wished to find a pass.
' I arrived at the Eagle River and on the top of a
tree near its mouth I saw a nest full of eaglets, and 26
PATHFINDERS
the two old birds on a limb of the same tree. I had
nothing but a small revolver in the shape of firearms ;
this I discharged eight or ten times at the nest, but
could not knock it down. The two birds, after
circling round the nest, flew up the valley of the river;
it struck me then, if I followed them, I might find
the much wished for pass.*
Circumstances prevented the explorer from following
the river through the valley for more than a short
distance. He returned to the head of Shuswap Lake
and conducted his party over the watershed to the
Columbia River. He then dispatched his Indians
for more supplies, and, accompanied by Perry, ' the
mountaineer/ and an Indian boy in a canoe they had
made from a tree, started down the Columbia to
connect with a branch party at the head of Upper
Arrow Lake.
' We swept along at a grand rate and, at last, found
the river getting narrow, with high rocky banks and
overhanging cliffs. I was in the middle of the canoe
taking bearings, estimating distances, etc., the Indian
boy in the bow and Perry steering. The boy suddenly
exclaimed :—" Wake closhe chuck—konaway name-
luce " : "Bad water—all will be killed" ; he put
in his paddle and lay down in the bottom of thcr
canoe. I crawled over him, and, getting hold of his
paddle, Perry and I managed to keep the canoe out
of the whirls that threatened to suck us down. At
one moment we were on the edge of one of these
dangerous places, and the next swept a hundred PATHFINDERS 27
yards away by a tremendous " boil." Sometimes
one end of the canoe became the bow, and at other
times the opposite end; but at length we reached
a little sandy cove and landed in still water. We
had run the " Little Dalles " without knowing it.'
Moberly, like Sandford Fleming on another occasion,
met with disappointment through the non-arrival of
the connecting party at the appointed meeting-place.
He returned up the river, in which they had recently
come face to face with Death, the poling against the
terrific current demanding herculean efforts. At a
landing-place he came across a link with the past
in the shape of a very old blaze on a fir tree. On
this blaze were inscribed the latitude and longitude,
signed by David Thompson, astronomer and explorer
for the Hudson's Bay Company, with the date A.D.
1828. Moberly's latitude agreed with that of the
Englishman, their longitudes differing slightly. ' It
was valuable information for me,' Moberly generously
acknowledged.
The intrepid traveller now ascended the mountains
on the west side of the Columbia River, for the purpose
of reaching the ridge range and following it to the
boundary line, if need be, in his search for a pass.
From the summit of a high peak he saw a valley
extending to the far off Shuswap Lake, and a continuation of it running westerly to the Columbia
River, and also a valley extending far to the
southward.
' Was this the anxiously wished for pass ? How 28
PATHFINDERS
much depended upon it? How would it affect the
future prospects of British Columbia? These and
many other questions passed through my thoughts
during that almost sleepless night. Before daylight,
leaving my companions, who could not understand
my hurry, to follow after me, I was off to the bottom
of the valley and, on reaching the stream, found the
water flowing westward and a low valley to the
eastward. I blazed a cedar tree and wrote upon it:—
" This is the pass for the Overland Railway." '
Walter Moberly had discovered the path in which,
twenty years later, the rails from the east met those
from the west and the last spike was driven. With
the incident of the eagles in his mind he named it
Eagle Pass.
The explorer's self-designed task was not yet
completed. Grim work lay ahead of him. Entering
the Selkirks by the deep gorge-like valley of a river
which joined the Columbia from the east immediately
opposite the mouth of Eagle Pass—the valley from
which Sandford Fleming and his companions emerged
eighteen years later, weary, worn and hungry, looking
for food which was not there—he forced his way
through dense underbrush, incessant cold rain, over
jagged rocks and fallen trees to the forks where it~
divided into two streams of nearly equal size. The
general bearing of one valley above the forks was
north-east; that of the other nearly east. The
latter valley was evidently one that, judging from
its general bearing, would be most likely to afford a PATHFINDERS
29
pass in the desired direction, and Moberly decided
to follow it.
But the Indians had not the dauntless spirit of their
leader. The explorer tried to induce them, by every
possible persuasion, to accompany him all the way
across the Selkirk Range. All his efforts were unavailing. Winter had set in, they said, and the party
would be caught in the snow and never get out of the
mountains. Death lay ahead.
Moberly, to his chagrin, had to abandon his
exploration of the valley. He reported to the British
Columbian Government that it was his belief that the
only feasible pass through the Selkirk Range would
probably be found in that region, and urged that
future explorations should be made in the direction
of the south-easterly branch of the river, which he
had named the Illecillewaet, in the nomenclature of
the Indians who were with him, meaning ' a very
rapid stream/ Sixteen years afterwards, acting on
this suggestion, Major Rogers traversed the valley
and discovered the pass through which the railway
was destined to cross the Selkirks.
The entrance of British Columbia into the Confederation of Canada, in 1871, was an epoch making
event in the history of the Canadian Pacific. In the
terms of union the Canadian Government undertook
to secure the commencement, within two years, of
a railway from the Pacific Ocean towards the Rocky 3<>
PATHFINDERS
Mountains, and from a point east of the Rocky
Mountains towards the Pacific, having in view a
through line of railway to connect the sea-board of
British Columbia with the Atlantic, and to complete
the transcontinental system within ten years from
the date of the union.
The work of exploration and surveying was entrusted
to Sandford Fleming as engineer-in-chief. It was a
stupendous undertaking. Through the forests of
Ontario, along the rugged shores of Lake Superior—
a vast inland sea—across the buffalo-tracked prairies
of the North-West Territory, and over five hundred
miles of towering mountains beyond, a route had to
be discovered and surveyed. Attached to the army
of surveyors were specialists, whose duty it was to
study and report on the botanical, geological, clima-
tological, and topographical features of the country,
both along the proposed fine of the railway and in
the tributary territory. The location of a telegraph
was also undertaken ; the great railway engineer had
his dream of a Canadian Pacific oceanic cable, connecting the Dominion with China, Japan, India, and
Australasia, a dream the subsequent realisation of
which was an outstanding achievement in a noble
career.
From Ottawa to Red River the surveying parties
had to overcome physical obstacles of the most trying
nature. The country was practically unknown. The
few fur traders who penetrated the region followed
the canoe routes of lakes and rivers, and the region PATHFINDERS
31
in the interior had never been trodden by civilized
man. Dense forest with heavy undergrowth barred
the way of the pathfinders, who had to literally hew
their way westward.
The work on the prairies was less ardous, although
it had its own peculiar difficulties. In the mountains
the obstacles were on a gigantic scale. Rocks, forests
of fallen trees, rushing torrents of glacial origin—all
had to be traversed. ' Deeds as worthy of record as
any ever done in battle/ says Begg, ' were of almost
daily occurrence on the C.P.R. surveys, and, although
they have not yet formed the subject of romance or
poem, the heroes of them can look with pride to the
result of their pluck and endurance : the Canadian
Pacific Railway—a lasting monument to Canadian
enterprise and patriotism/
The Canadian Pacific surveyors had their own
anthem, written by one of themselves. In every camp,
from Lake Superior to the heart of the Rockies, they
sang their song of cheer, forgetting the toils and
vicissitudes of the day in the merry glow of the camp
fire, their voices awaking echoes which had never
before responded to human notes. ' The C.P.S.,' sung
to the air of Les Deux Gendarmes, has earned the
right to a place among the folk songs of Canada:
Far away from those we love dearest,
Who long and wish for home,
The thought of whom each lone heart cheereth,
As 'mid these North-West wilds we roam. 32 PATHFINDERS
Yet still each one performs his duty
and gaily sings:
Tra, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la,
Hurrah! the jolly C.P.S.!
They're at home upon Superior's shore,
Hurrah! we'll drink to them success,
And a safe return once more.
From all parts of our new Dominion
As strangers each the other met,
We'll strive for each one's good opinion,
And part with nothing but regret.
And as we trudge along the line, boys,
We'll gaily sing:
Tra la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la,
Hurrah! the jolly C.P.S.!
In the woods or prairies, wild and free,
Hurrah! we'll drink to them success,
Wherever they may be.
When home in spring we are returning,
A tired and weather-beaten band,
We'll find the lamp of love still burning
For us, by some fair, constant hand.
For wives and sweethearts—cheer them hearty,
And gaily sing :—
Tra la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la,
Hurrah! the jolly C.P.S.!
Hurrah! for those at home we love so dear,
May Heaven each loved one there bless,
For sweet home we'll raise a cheer. PATHFINDERS 33
It is an anthem hallowed by memories of the
wilderness.
For ten years Sandford Fleming and his assistants
laboured at their task. In initiating the work the
chief drew up a general plan of action. He urged
that every effort should be directed to the discovery
of the shortest and best route through the forest
region, from Ottawa to the Red River, which would
touch or connect with Lake Superior; that the line
over the prairie should traverse the best area for
future settlement, and that the greatest possible
energy should be brought to bear on the work of
exploration in the Rocky Mountains zone in order to
discover a practicable line which would best subserve
the interests of the country, and lead to the most
eligible harbour on the Pacific coast.
The problem of the mountains was the greatest
problem of all. The difficulties met with in the
mountain region was so great that the engineers were
almost baffled. At the end of 1875 thirteen separate
lines had been run through the valleys of British
Columbia, eleven of which converged from their coast
termini to the Yellow Head Pass, and the end was
not in sight. Year after year the work was carried
on, fine after line was located and abandoned, till
in the autumn of 1879, an Order-in-Council was
passed, adopting the route through the Yellow Head
Pass to Burrard Inlet, on the Pacific Ocean.
The importance of the mass of information gathered 34
£ATHFlftDEl-§
by the Canadian Pacific surveyors is inestimable. For
the first time Canadians learned the true value of the
' Great Lone Land/ The wilderness of the West was
transformed into a Land of Possibilities.
From the inception of the explorations and surveys,
in 1871, until the year 1880, the enterprise was in the
hands of the Dominion Government. In that year
the great undertaking was transferred by the Government to a corporation which was destined to become
a household name throughout the world—the Canadian
Pacific Railway Company.
Events now moved rapidly. The Company decided
to change the route selected by the Government to
a more southerly direction. Attention was turned
to the Bow River and Kicking Horse passes, and the
valley of the Columbia. Major Rogers, who had been
appointed engineer in charge of the mountain division,
discovered the gateway of the Selkirks. Moberly had
sixteen years before discovered the path through the
Gold Range on the same course, and the new fine was
tentatively adopted.
Verily, the mists were clearing.
The story of Major Rogers' discovery of the pass
which bears his name has been written by his nephew,
Albert Rogers, who accompanied his uncle on his
expedition up the Illecillewaet valley. It is a thrilling
record of intrepid fearlessness and adventurous energy.
The spirit of the man—an American—was PATHFINDE&S
35
exemplified in the boldness of his plans. His purpose
was to make his way from the Pacific coast across
an unknown mountain region and meet his assistants,
whom he had despatched by a well travelled route
to Bow River Gap, on the east side of the Rockies,
at the end of two months* time. By his indomitable
push he accomplished his object, fifteen days later
than the time set, having covered all but about one
hundred miles of the mountain portion of route as
finally adopted, and having made a long detour into
the United States for supplies.
Twenty-two days were consumed in travelling from
St. Paul to Kamloops, where the outfit was secured
for the journey through the wilderness. Eight days
more were absorbed in estimating distances: trying
to find out how far an Indian could travel between
suns with-one hundred pounds on his back and no
trail, how little food he would require to do it—the
exigencies of exploration prohibit superfluous burdens
—and what kind of food was best under such conditions ; what protection from the weather would be
required and the possibilities of supplementing the
larder by killing game. After much trouble, which
resulted in subsidising the Indian Chief, Louie, and
with the assistance of the priest in charge of the
Mission, ten strapping Indians were enlisted under a
contract which Albert Rogers admits was of rather
an ironclad nature : their services would be given
without grumbling until discharged, and if any went
back without a letter of good report, his wages would wr
36 PATHFINDERS
go to the church, and the chief would lay one hundred
lashes on the bare back of the offender!
These essential prehminaries arranged, Major Rogers
chartered a small steamer to take the party to
mouth of Eagle River on Shuswap Lake. Landing at
the mouth of the Eagle, the two explorers bade farewell
to the last sign of civilization.
An old canoe was found at the mouth of the river
and this was utilised in transporting the outfit as far
as possible. After caching the canoe and taking their
packs on their backs, they discovered that, meagre
as the commissary seemed, it was not possible to carry
it along in its entirety. The necessary cachings and
returns made the journey across the Gold Range to
the Columbia one of fourteen days of hard travel.
On reaching the Columbia, they built a raft of cedar
logs large enough to carry the supplies and the
explorers, the Indians svdrnming, with one hand
pushing the raft to make the crossing, and landed a
mile above the mouth of the Illecillewaet.
From now they pushed forward, making twenty-
minute runs, with five minute rests, picking their way
over mudfalls, scaling perpendicular rock-points,
wading through beaver swamps dense with underbrush
and the fiendish devil's clubs, the Indians balancing
all the time one hundred pounds on the back of the
neck. ' I am convinced,' says Albert Rogers, ' but
for the fear of the penalty of returning without their
letters of good report, our Indians would have deserted
us.' PATHFINDERS
37
Although at this season the days were very long and
the party travelled from early till late, they were
five days making sixteen miles. Reaching the forks
of the Illecillewaet, they followed the valley which
Moberly had described in his report as the direction
most likely to lead to a pass through the Selkirks—
the direction he would have taken had not his Indians
refused to accompany him. A mile and a half from the
mouth of the east fork they came to a wonderful
canyon, where the river, far below, was compressed
into a narrow, roaring, boiling torrent. This gorge >
was later named Albert Canyon by Dr. Grant during/
his journey with Sandford Fleming, in honour of
Major Rogers* nephew.
For five days their course was across snow avalanches
some of which had started from the very peaks and
had left a clean path behind them, crushing huge
trees into matchwood. On and on they struggled
until they reached a point where the stream seemed to
fork, and in front of Major Rogers there appeared the
main range of the Selkirks. The whole success of his
journey and the possibilities of getting a direct route
for the great national thoroughfare depended upon
the gateways that might be at the head of either
of these streams.
At the forks the travellers decided to cache everything that would impede travel, and make a forced
march up the north fork to the summit. Taking all
the Indians with them—they did not dare to leave
the Shuswaps with the supplies, which were getting 38 PATHFINDERS
alarmingly low, and short rations had already begun
to tell on the party by the number of holes they had
taken up in their belts—Major Rogers and his nephew,
with two days* rations, started over the crust of snow,
keeping in the lee of the great mountains which they
had named Syndicate (afterwards changed to Mount
Sir Donald), and in the shadow of which they travelled
until they arrived at a large level opening. This they
crossed and discovered that the water divided there,
running east and west.
From the opening of the summit they had seen a
strip of forest extending about half-way up the mountain between two snow-slides, and decided to make
an ascent at that point. Cutting each a good tough,
dry, fir stick and adjusting their light packs, the party
began to climb. The terrible travelling with heavy loads
through the valley, soaked to the skin by rain and
wet brush, wading in snow and ice-water, and sleeping
in but one-half pair of blankets to each man, had
begun to show on all their faces. Gaunt as greyhounds,
their lungs and muscles were of the best, and they
soon reached the timber line, where the climbing
became very difficult. They crawled along the ledges,
getting a toe-hole here and a finger-hole there, keeping
in the shade as much as possible and kicking toe-holes
in the snow crust. When several hundred feet above
the timber line, the men followed a narrow ledge
around a point that was exposed to the sun. Four
of the Indians in the lead had tied their pack-straps
to each other's belts in order to help over bad places. PATHFINDERS 39
The leader had made several attempts to gain the
ledge above by crawling on the soft snow. Then a
catastrophe happened. By some awkward move the
Indian fell backward with such force as to miss the
ledge upon which the other three stood. Headlong
the four fell, striking upon a very steep incline some
thirty feet below. Down this they rushed, rolling
and tumbling, tangled up in their pack straps, until
they disappeared from view over another ledge.
' Our hearts were in our mouths/ Albert Rogers
narrates, ' fearing the worst might have happened to
them. Dead Indians were easily buried, but men with
broken legs, to be carried out through such a country
and with barely food enough to take us back to the
Columbia River on a forced march, made a problem
which even strong men dreaded to face. Anyone
who has been a mountain climber knows that there
are times when going down is a great deal more
dangerous and difficult than going up. Slowly descending, we had nearly reached the timber line when
one of the Indians, with an exclamation, pointed to
four black specks moving across a snow-slide far below.
Our glasses were quickly turned on them. There they
were, and, to our great relief, all were on their pins
making down the mountain as fast as possible/
The travellers had lost several hours of the best
part of the day for climbing, but they had started
for the top and what Major Rogers purposed that he
performed. The sun had long set in the western
heavens when they reached the summit. 40 PATHFINDERS
The extreme exhaustion of the explorers was
forgotten in the panorama of glory which spread
before them. ' Such a view! Never to be forgotten!
Our eyesight carried from one bold peak to another
for miles in all directions. The wind blew fiercely
across the ridge, and scuddy clouds were whirled in
the eddies behind the great towering peaks of bare
rocks. Eveiything was covered with a shroud of white,
giving the whole landscape the appearance of snow-
clad desolation. Far beneath us was the timber-line,
and in the valleys below the dense timber seemed
but a narrow shadow which marked their course.
We had no wood for fire, no boughs for beds, were
wet with perspiration and eating snow to quench
our thirst; but the grandeur of the view, sublime
beyond conception, crowded out all thoughts of our
discomforts/
' Standing upon a narrow ridge at that great elevation, mid nature crowned by solitude, where a single
false move would land one in the Great Beyond, man
feels his weakness and realizes how small is human
effort when compared with the evidences of nature's
forces/
Crawling along this ridge, the explorers came to a
small ledge protected from the wind by a great perpendicular rock. There they decided to wait until
the crust again formed on the snow and the morning
fight enabled them to travel. At ten o'clock it was
still twilight in the peaks, but the valleys below were
filled with the deepest gloom. The shivering men PATHFINDERS
41
wrapped themselves in their scanty blankets and
nibbled at their dry meat and bannock; stamping
their feet in the snow to keep them from freezing,
and taking turns at whipping each other with their
pack straps to keep up circulation of the blood.
Two years after Major Rogers' discovery of
Rogers Pass, Sandford Fleming made his historic
journey at the request of the Canadian Pacific Railway
Company, and reported favourably on the feasibility
of the proposed route through the mountain passes.
Canada's great highway was found. PATHMAKERS.
After the pathfinders, the pathmakers.
A mighty work was theirs, a work worthy of the
Trojans. For nigh three thousand miles these builders
built, spanning a continent with a line of steel, hacking
and dynamiting their way from ocean to ocean, toiling,
sweating, and cursing, but ever going forward. Through
forests, over swamps and rivers, over prairies, through
rocks and mountains they laid the rails. From all
parts of the world were gathered men for the army—
Anglo-Saxons, Celts, Teutons, Latins, Slavs, Mongolians and Hybrids—a veritable army of construction,
with engineers as officers and William Van Home as
Commander-in-Chief.
Two phases of the great achievement stand out,
pre-eminent,—the construction of the line along the
shore of Lake Superior, and the building through
the mountains west of the prairies.
In his preliminary and personal survey of the
wilderness on the north shore of Lake Superior, Van
Home found what he afterwards described as " two
hundred miles of engineering impossibilities." The
country through which it was necessary to traverse
was a waste of forest, rock and " muskegs," or swamps.
Almost every mile of the road had to be hewn, blasted,
or filled up. Enemies of the railway cried out that
this portion of the line would alone take twenty
years to build—if construction were possible.
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43
It was built in four. But the work was tremendous.
Of the twelve million dollars expended on the construction of this section of two hundred miles, over two
million dollars were literally blown up—in explosives.
Twelve thousand men, two thousand teams of horses,
and twelve steamers for the transport of material and
provisions were employed in the work.
But gigantic as was the task of building the line
along the rock embedded shores of Canada's inland
sea, it sinks into comparative insignificance when
compared with the stupendous exploit of crossing the
mountains. Only the traveller who has journeyed
through this mountain zone, with its cloud-splitting
peaks, wild and gloomy canyons and roaring mountain
torrents can realise—and but vaguely realise—the
nature of this unequalled feat of construction.
Every conceivable engineering problem was
encountered and overcome. ' Every foot of the
mountain division of the road was contested and
probably every mile of tunnel and track was sealed
with the blood of men. The bridging of fathomless
chasms and the piercing of many mountains were
accomplished only after herculean labour. There are
bridges on this mountain division that hang in air—
mere spider webs of iron—three hundred and odd
feet above the river they span. There are places
where masonry is plastered, so to speak, against the
solid rock of mountains. There are ledges midway
between heaven and earth, and elevations where the
whirling trains plunge headlong into clouds and deep.
E 44 PATHMAKERS
cool ravines where the road bed- disputes with the
darkness the realms of mysterious mountain torrents.
There are miles of tunnels and bridges without number/
The mountain portion of The Canadian Pacific
Railway stands for all time as a monument to the
dauntless hearts and daring genius of its engineer-
builders, giants among men.
Among the rank and file of the army of construction
in the mountains was a young man, known by the
nickname of " Texas," an appellation bestowed upon
him by a working companion by reason of the huge
brimmed hat he wore. Obviously a man of education,
the Englishman had become ' Arbiter elegantiarum'
for the particular gang of which he was a member,
and in the evening he and his companions would
gather around the fire, exchanging yarns, singing
songs, and in other ways manifesting their appreciation
of the hours of rest after the hard work of the day.
" Texas" has narrated his experiences in the
Canadian Pacific railroad camps. But his readers
know him by his real name—Morley Roberts.
' We were a strange gathering at night-time/ the
author muses, ' and not without elements of the
picturesque, I fancy, in our strange interior of log-hut
and its confused forms on blocks of wood before
the fire, which burnt brightly and threw a glare on the
darkness through the entrance, that did not boast a
door, but only a rude portiere of sewed sacks. We PATHMAKERS 45
sang at times strange melancholy unknown ditties of
love in the forests, songs of Michigan or Wisconsin,
redolent of pine odour and sassatras, or German
Liede, for we were more cosmopolitan than a crowd
of EngHshmen would be at home, and did not insist
only on what we could understand. I myself often
sang to them both English and German and Italian
songs, and it seems strange to me now to think that
these forests heard from me the strains of Mozart's
"L'Addio," sung doubtless out of tune, as it was also
out of place, perhaps, and the rigorous tune of "La
donna e mobile." But even songs like these were
appreciated, and often called for, with "Tom Bowling,"
or some other English sea songs. Then we would tell
each other stories or yarns, and I would repeat some
of my travels in Australia for them, or explain how
large London was, or tell those who had never seen
the ocean, stories of my own and my brother's voyages
or those of the great English sea-captains.'
' Such evenings came to be a recognised institution. .
I wrote for them a song which was very much admired
as the culmination of genius. It was a song of the
C.P.R., or Canadian Pacific Railroad, and all I remember is the chorus, which was :
' For some of us are bums, for whom work has no
charms,
And some of us are farmers, a-working for our farms,
But all are jolly fellows, who come from near and far,
To work up in the Rockies on the C.P.R. 46 PATHMAKERS
' From which specimen,' the author is careful to
explain, I the reader will not estimate my poetical
powers so highly as the simple railroad men/
In these musical gatherings the men had the example
of their chief ; for is it not recorded that sometimes
after night-fall the strains of some classic aria would
float out over the wild mountain passes—strains from
a violin played by William Van Home, greatest of
railroad builders?
Song and music awakened the echoes of the mountains
as the shadows of night fell on the railway camps,
but hard and strenuous work was the order of the
day. Morley Roberts depicts this, the all-important
phase of the railroaders' life, as experienced by him.
' In the daytime there was the usual labour, such
as drilling holes in the rock to blast it with powder,
whose explosion sometimes threw the heavy stones
a hundred yards into the torrents of the foaming
river. We would dodge behind trees and get into all
sheltered places till the shot was fired, then come
out again and take away the debris, hammering the
larger blocks to pieces and shovelling up the smaller
into the carts. Then there were slopes to make smooth
and round rocks and stones to be picked up from the
borders of the Kicking Horse, to make a " rip-rap "
or stone wall at the bottom oi the embankment, where
the river would shape it when swollen with melted
snow. It was often laborious and wearisome, and I
never looked at the scenery except, perhaps, when After Working Hours in a Construction Camp PATHMAKERS 47
clouds gathered overhead, and rain-mist crawled along
the ramparts of the hill, filling the valley, until a shower
would come upon us suddenly and as suddenly depart;
for then, when the mountain wind rolled up cloud and
mist, the sun shone bright upon the hills above, dazzling
our eyes with a sheet of new snow that had fallen
on us below as rain.
' Our camp was right on the banks of the river,
which ran in a sharp curve round the base of the hill
through which the tunnel was being cut. The Kicking
Horse was furious as usual there, rushing at the rocks
which impeded its course and breaking about them
in foam, or leaping with a swing and a dive over the
lower and rounded boulders. Beyond it, on the other
bank, was a thick wall of pine and fir, and overhead
the vast slope of mountain. Our side was decorated
with a medley of various-shaped tents, round and
square and oblong, so that it was difficult at night for
a stranger to avoid tripping himself up with the pegs
and ropes, or half strangling himself with the stays
carried from the ridge-poles to the trees growing about
all the encampment. Besides the tents there were
two large log-huts or shanties, built out of half-squared
timbers with the bark only partly removed, and up
a little slope, on the other side of the road which ran
through the camp, stood a little log-house and kitchen
for the accommodation of some of the " bosses " and
the head contractors. Beyond this the hill ran up
gradually into a maze of fallen timber, with one little
melancholy cleared space, where a simple and rude 48
PATHMAKERS
grave held the body of an unknown and friendless
man who had been killed some short time before I
came. And still further on was the summit of the
low hill under which the tunnel was to be, and above
again mountain piled on mountain.
' The work was of a hazardous and dangerous
character. The hill was being attacked on both sides
at once, and at the west end, down stream, the tunnel
was advanced to some distance, but at the east end,
though there, too, the hole had been run into the hill,
the work was to do over again, owing to the tunnel
having " caved " in, in spite of the huge timbers.
' The hill was composed of gravel on the top, then
a thick stratum of extremely tenacious blue clay, and
beneath that a bed of solid concrete which required
blasting. We had to remove the immense mass of
clay and gravel which had come down when the
" cave" had occurred, and to cut back into
the hill some distance until it appeared solid enough
for the new tunnel to be commenced. As the cut in
the hill was now very deep, we worked on three
" benches." . . . The highest gang worked in comparative safety ; the next in some peril, as they had
to look out for the rocks that might fall in their own
bench and for those from the upper bench as well;
but the lowest gang were in danger of their lives all
the time, as from both benches above them came
continually what rocks escaped the vigilance of those
working over their heads.
' I worked here myself, and without any exaggera- PATHMAKERS 49
tion I can say I never felt safe, for every minute or so
would come the cry : " Look out below! " or " Stand
from under!" and a heavy stone or rock would come
thundering down the slope right amongst us.'
' In the gray half-light of the early morning/
narrates another worker in the mountains, ' but little
imagination would have been needed to believe that
the dimly-seen forms which peopled the rocky river
banks were the advance guard of an army making its
laborious way towards some naturally fortified stronghold. So at least it seemed to me as each morning I
pursued my difficult and often dangerous path to the
particular part of the work on which I was engaged.
Here, in the mountains, the right of way followed the
river canyons, sometimes close down to the edge of a
torrent, again pressing high up on the side of some
tremendous valley, every here and there crossing a deep
ravine, mere clefts in the gigantic towering bulk of
rocks, at the bottom of which, perhaps hundreds of
feet below our path, ran turbulent, brawling streams
of wonderfully clear, ice-cold water.
' Looking ahead it would seem as if the grade must
inevitably run straight into some one of the stupendous
mountains which barred its progress, but inevitably
there was some way round. Perhaps the river would
be crossed suddenly, and the road He along the farther
bank, only to re-cross the stream a few hundred yards
farther on, seeming to spring from the last foothold
on the steep slope ending in a sheer precipice, to the
rocky abutment on the farther side which offered a 50
PATHMAKERS
fresh chance of clinging to its weather-beaten crags.
Or, perhaps, a tunnel would have to be cut through
a seemingly impassable spur of rock overhanging the
river bed itself, and again a new valley would open
up for the road to follow.
' The work proceeded in the winter as in the summer,
but with increasing discomfort. Steadily, steadily
every day, the white soft snowflakes fell, so soft, so
wet, and so impalpable that one hardly knew whether
it was snowing or raining except that, as one climbed
wearily over the path back to camp in the dark, an
incautious mis-step proved that the depth was greater
than in the morning.
' Long before daylight the men would start down the
path, each in turn stopping before the door of the
powder house to pick up a keg of powder, or, if he
was unlucky, a box of d*ynamite.
' Then to work, and, perhaps, a wait till it got
fight enough to see to smite the drill fairly on the
head. The darkness cleared away slowly. The
wet flakes, instead of striking invisibly, could now be
distinguished from the air by sight. Next, the timber
at the far side of the river loomed out from the river
mists, and the mists themselves seemed to clear off
and hang like a ceiling across from the trees on one
side to the rough rock on the other.
' Presently the chant arose, and clink! clink! the
hammers went on the drill, stopping every now and
then while the drill-holder scraped out the powdered
rock from the depths of the hole with a long thin rod PATHMAKERS
51
flattened at the end. Perhaps the hole was too deep
for striking, and then a long churn-drill came into use :
left, half-turn, downward drive ; left, turn again, and
so on, boring its way twenty, or even thirty feet into
the solid rock.
' When a row of such holes had been drilled, and the
drilling gang moved on to fresh work, the holes would
be all charged with powder, fuses placed in position,
and the charges tightly " tamped " down with clay.
Then, while the call: "Fire, Fire, F-i-r-e!" warned
all and sundry to get to cover, the fuses were touched
off. A second later the whole face of the rock heaved
outwards to the river, and the valley roared with the
echoes of the terrific explosion. How the echoes rang,
too! First, concussion of the blast and the near-by
echoes of the woods, river, and foggy pall; then
rattle and bang up and down the valley, gradually
dying away to nothing, only to start into renewed
fife as the sound reached some distant, tremendous
precipice, the new crash echoing and re-echoing from
every crag that had been awakened by the first
explosion, till one would swear that the whole valley
was full of big guns, and that an artillery duel was
at its height/
From the Pacific eastwards to Kamloops, a distance
of two hundred and thirteen miles, seven thousand
men, mostly Chinese, were meanwhile vigorously
hewing their way. This part of the railway was constructed by the Dominion Government. The contrac- 52
PATHMAKERS
tors had a formidable task. Between Yale and Lytton
the Fraser River had cut its way through the Cascade
Mountains, plunging in foaming cataracts through
deep lateral gorges, flanked in places by spurs of perpendicular rock, and offering a continuous resistance
to the pathmakers. Along nineteen miles of the
route thirteen tunnels had to be pierced. In many
places the roadway had to be hewn out of the rock.
The work was of a dangerous nature, the men being
often lowered hundreds of feet down almost perpendicular cliff for the purpose of blasting a foothold
on the mountain side.
Supplies had to be sent to the camps on pack animals
over trails ' never before deemed practicable except by
Indians, and by them only with the aid of ladders.*
As the work advanced transportation became even
more difficult, until it was resolved to attempt the
passage of the ferocious Fraser canyon to the navigable
water above, and a steamer was built for the purpose.
But where could be found the daring navigators
who would pilot the vessel through the turbulent and
angry waters of the wildest of all the world's canyons ?
It was a task to strike terror to the heart of the boldest.
' One captain after another, looking at the tiny
craft and at the " Scylla and Charybdis" beyond,
declared the feat impossible,' records Begg. 'At
length two brothers consented to undertake the task.
With a steam winch and capstan, and several large
hawsers, they set forth on their voyage, with a crew
of seventeen men, the steamer being in charge of a PATHMAKERS 53
skilled engineer. The severest struggle was at a point
called China Riffle, where the power of the engines
and steam winch, with fifteen men at the capstan,
and a hundred and fifty Chinamen laying hold of one
of the ropes, barely sufficed to pull the vessel over
the shoals. Overcoming the difficulty and passing
through Hell Gate and Black Canyon, where the
stream runs at some twenty miles an hour, the Skuzzy
was able to convey her first load of freight from
Boston Bar/
Work on the prairies proceeded with a rapidity
unparalleled in the history of railway construction.
In fifteen months' time, notwithstanding a winter's
interruption, over seven hundred miles of track were
laid by the contractors, a feat which roused the
admiration of the vigorous Van Home himself.
The camp of each considerable " outfit" on the
prairies presented an almost military appearance.
One or two large dining-tents, with the cooks' quarters
and the office tent were generally in the centre. All
round stood orderly lines of small two-man tents,
and at one side the big horse tents and the rows of
wagons. ' Early dawn brought the cry of " Roll out,
teamsters," from the " corrall boss," and by the
time the men had shaken themselves out of their
blankets the horses—herded during the night by
" horse wranglers "—had been driven in ready to be
caught and fed. Then breakfast, followed by the cry
of " Hook up" from the foremen, and the whole 54
PATHMAKERS
force would commence its first five-hour stretch of
work. " Unhook " at noon, and dinner; another five
hours' work before supper; and then—the blankets,
till the morning of a new day/
Thus progressed the mighty work of conquering
a wilderness.
While the army of railway builders were fighting
their way victoriously through mountains and forests,
over plains and rivers and swamps, the organizers of
the Company were fighting their own grim battles
in the realms of finance—fighting for the money
which was to supply the sinews of war.
The story of their struggles and ultimate victory
is as thrilling as the story of construction. Ere
victory was secured George Stephen, and his cousin,
Donald Smith had mortgaged their very homes,
but through all vicissitudes the flag was held high.
In the terms of the contract—the most eventful
contract ever entered into between a Government
and a commercial corporation—the Dominion Government agreed ' to complete and hand over to the
Canadian Pacific Railway Company the line between
Port Arthur and Winnipeg and the line from Savona's
Ferry to Port Moody, and a branch already complete
from Emerson to Winnipeg ; also to grant the Company
a cash bonus of twenty-five million dollars and twenty-
five million acres of land.' The Company on their
part pledged themselves to build the intervening PATHMAKERS 55
portions—comprising over three-fourths of the transcontinental main fine—within a period of ten years.
The history of the agreement is told by Sir Charles
Tupper in his " Recollections of Sixty Years," written
two years before the aged statesman's death in England,
in 1915. Sir Charles Tupper, who became Premier
of Canada, was Minister of Railways during the early
stages of the building of the railway.
' Sir John A. Macdonald, in forming his Cabinet, in
1878, tendered me the portfolio of Railways and Canals,
and assigned to me the chief task of inaugurating a
vigorous policy in regard to the building of the line
from the head of the Great Lakes to the Pacific
Coast/
The 'vigorous policy' soon bore good fruit. When
Macdonald was returned to power a portion only of
the line between Port Arthur and Winnipeg had been
placed under contract, it being the policy of his
predecessor, Mackenzie, to place steamboats on the
intermediate water-stretches through the Lake of the
Woods, leaving a gap in the railway of over two hundred
miles. The new Government at once decided to link
up this gap and immediately placed the contracts
for the additional construction, thus providing an
all-rail route from Port Arthur to the Red River.
Two years later the Minister of Railways awarded
the contracts for building the line from Yale to Savona,
near Kamloops, and later for the work from Yale to
Port Moody, the Pacific terminus.
Afterwards the Company, ' of their own volition 56 PATHMAKERS
and at their own expense,' extended the fine farther
westward along Burrard Inlet, thereby laying the
foundations of the city of Vancouver.
The Government had strong opposition to overcome
in the maintenance of their railway policy, but they
kept to their chosen path. Sir Charles Tupper was
an especially valiant and strenuous champion of the
great enterprise.
' Sir John A. Macdonald, who was also Minister of
the Interior, observed in Council that he had made
up his mind that a system of local railways was needed
in the North-West in order to attract immigration.
He spoke of his intention of going to England that
summer for the purpose of enlisting capital in the
project. " I want you all to meet me here this day
week with any suggestions or advice you can offer,"
was his injunction to his colleagues.
1 " Sir John," I replied, " I think the time has
come when we must take the advance step. I want to
submit a proposition for building a through line from
Nipissing in Ontario to the Pacific Coast."
' " I'm afraid, Tupper, that's a rather large order.
However, I shall be pleased to consider anything you
have to submit," was his genial comment.'
On the appointed day Sir Charles Tupper presented
his report to Council. He recommended, in brief,
that the contract be entered into with a responsible
company for the completion of a transcontinental
railway on the terms already recorded. ' I gave reasons
for my belief that the undertaking could be carried PATHMAKERS 57
to a successful conclusion, and that strong men could
be induced to take hold of the enterprise. " I heartily
agree with you," declared Sir John in the whole-
souled, generous spirit that always characterised him
after I had concluded my remarks in favour of a
through line, to be built, owned, and operated by a
chartered company. Our colleagues concurred, and
the report was unanimously adopted.'
The ' strong men ' were found. ' We entered into
an agreement with a number of capitalists, who later
became known as the " Canadian Pacific Railway
Syndicate," to build the transcontinental railway on
the precise basis of my report and recommendation
to the Government.'
And fortunate it was for Canada that the syndicate
included such men as George Stephen and Donald
Smith, for the test was great, and the efforts required
to achieve success almost superhuman. The Dominion
was not known to the world as it is to-day, and the
population of the country was but four million people,
with little, if any, superfluous capital at their disposal.
When the United States, with a population of forty
millions, linked Omaha with the Pacific coast, it was
heralded as a stupendous achievement. How much
more stupendous was this achievement of the
organizers of the Canadian Pacific!
The year 1884 was a critical one in the history of
the Company. The enormous expenditure involved
in the building of the railway during the preceding
three years resulting from the magnitude of the work 58
PATHMAKERS
had emptied the coffers. They endeavoured strenuously
to secure more money in London, but their efforts came
to naught. In New York they met with a similar fate.
' I had gone to Birmingham,' narrates Tupper, ' to
propose a vote of thanks for an address on Canada
to be delivered by the Marquis of Lome, a former
Governor-General. Lord Norton, the Under-Secretary
of State for the Colonies when Federation was carried,
presided, and it had been arranged that I was to spend
a holiday with him at his country seat at Hams.
During the course of the lecture I received a cable
from Mr. Pope, acting Minister of Railways, informing
me that the Canadian Pacific Railway was in financial
difficulties, and urging me to return home at once.
At that time I was acting High Commissioner, but
still held the portfolio of Railways and Canals/
Sir Charles Tupper crossed the Atlantic by the first
steamer available. On reaching Ottawa he sent for
an expert accountant in the Government service, and
the Government Chief Engineer, and instructed them
to proceed to Montreal to examine the books of the
Company. ' As soon as they had reported I recommended that Parliament be asked to authorise the
Government to advance the Canadian Pacific Railway
thirty million dollars for four years at four per cent.
per annum on the condition that the Company agreed
to finish the road five years sooner than the contract
called for—namely, by 1886, instead of 1891. In
Parliament I advocated the granting of the loan on
that ground/ PATHMAKERS 59
The loan was granted and for a time all went well.
But not for long. The railway absorbed money as a
sponge absorbs water, and ere a year had passed the
coffers were again empty. The outlook was black
indeed, for the Premier refused to sanction another
Government loan to the Company. At this juncture
the President of the Company and his associate,
Donald Smith, flung their entire fortunes into the
undertaking, determined as ever to maintain the work
of construction. But again the coffers were emptied.
The situation had now become desperate. Ruin
stared the two cousins in the face, but they fought on
and the flag still flew. The President went frequently
to Ottawa for the purpose of inducing the Premier
to render the assistance which had become vitally
essential to victory, but Macdonald, to whom credit
is due for his powerful co-operation in the earlier
stages of the Company's history, was seemingly
relentless. Senator Smith, a member of the Cabinet,
and a man of much political and personal influence,
joined forces with Stephen and pleaded strenuously
with the Premier on behalf of the afflicted railway.
William Van Home joined also in the financial fray.
' The Company were within a day of the due date of
a large amount of liabilities/ a writer, who
was acquainted with much of the inner history of the
Canadian Pacific in its earlier years, states. When
Van Home was advised of the situation he rushed to
Ottawa by a special train that made a record trip
and put the circumstances squarely before the then 6o
PATHMAKERS
Minister of Railways and Canals, the Hon. J. H. Pope,
who was so impressed by the vigorous presentation
of the facts, and of what a continued refusal would
result in, that he at once sought Sir John Macdonald,
and, aided by Sir Frank Smith, secured the Premier's
acceptance of the Company's proposals and a guarantee
to the Company's bankers, which enabled them to
tide over the financial difficulties/
Van Home afterwards described the scene to his
friends. In a room next to that in which the
discussion—a discussion momentous in its consequences to the Company and to Canada—took
place, he sat with several of the others vitally
concerned, awaiting the Government's decision.
' I guessed that sound would come best to me if
I stood in the room opposite the glass door which
would help to act as a resonator. But though I could
hear each voice as it spoke, I was unable to make
out clearly what anyone said. It was an awful time.
Each one of us felt as if the railway was our own
child and we were prepared to make any sacrifice
for it, but things were at a dead-lock and it seemed
impossible to raise any more money. We men ourselves
had given up twenty per cent, of our salaries and had
willingly worked, not overtime but double-time, and
as we waited in that room, we thought about these
things and wondered whether all our toil was going
to be wasted or not, and what would happen if Canada
were ruined. . , .
'At last Joe Pope came in with a yellow paper in PATHMAKERS 61
his hand. He said that the Government were prepared
to back the Bank of Montreal to the extent then
required.
' I think we waited till he left the room,' Van Home
said, ' I believe we had that much sanity left us!
And then we began. We tossed up chairs to the ceiling ;
we trampled on desks ; I believe we danced on tables.
I do not fancy any of us knows now what occurred,
and no one who was there can ever remember anything
except loud yells of joy and the sound of things
breaking!'
Victory was now assured. All obstacles had been
overcome and construction work on the great transcontinental railway proceeded with the utmost vigour.
The day of triumph loomed close. ■p—
CRAIGELLACHIE.
In the story of nations there are episodes which
shine, resplendent, pre-eminent, as planets in the
starry heavens. Of such is the ceremony of the
driving of the last spike in the Canadian Pacific
Railway. By that simple yet momentous act the
confederation of the Dominion of Canada became a
living reality. A new world's highway had been
opened, and the dream of statesmen and pathfinders
had become a concrete fact.
The setting was worthy of the drama. Craigellachie,
where the rails from the Atlantic first met those from
the Pacific, lies in the Eagle Pass, over which towers
in majesty the snow-crowned crags of the Gold Range.
The Pass itself is but a narrow gorge, in which the
Spirit of the Mountains holds undisputed sway.
On the seventh day of November, in the year 1885,
the shrill whistle of a locomotive reverberated through
the stillness of the ages. It was the heralding of a
new era in the life of a nation. From a private
passenger car," Saskatchewan," there stepped, among
others, three men, representatives of the human force
and power that had made the completion of a mighty
undertaking possible. They were Donald Alexander
Smith, William Van Horne, and Sandford Fleming.
To Donald Smith was given the task of honour.
And right well did the future Lord Strathcona and
Mount Royal wield the hammer which drove the
spike into position.
62 (4
O
5
o
o
t
6 CRAIGELLACH1E 63
Sandford Fleming describes the historic scene.
\\ The work was carried on in silence. Nothing was
heard but the reverberations of the blows struck by
him. It was no ordinary occasion ; the scene was
in every respect noteworthy, from the groups which
composed it, and the circumstances which had brought
together so many human beings in this spot in the heart
of the mountains, until recently an untracked solitude.
Most of the engineers, with hundreds of workmen of
all nationalities who had been engaged in the mountains
were present.
' Everyone appeared to be deeply impressed by what
was taking place. The central figure in the group was
something more than the representative of the Railway
Company which had achieved the triumph he was
consummating. His presence recalled memories of the
Mackenzies and McTavishes, the Stuarts and
McGillivrays, the Frasers, Finlaysons, McLeods and
McLaughlins, and their contemporaries, who first
penetrated the surrounding territory. From his youth
he had been connected with the Company (Hudson's
Bay Company), which had for so long carried on their
operations successfully from Labrador to the Pacific,
and California to Alaska, To-day he was the chief
representative of that vast organization which before
the close of the last century had sent out pioneers
to map out and occupy the unknown wilderness, and
which as a trading association is in the third century
of its existence.
'All present were more or less affected by a formality If
64
CRAIGELLACHIE
which was the crowning effort of years of labour,
intermingled with doubts and fears, and of *oft-renewed
energy to overcome what at times appeared unsur-
mountable obstacles. Moreover, was it not the
triumphal termination of numberless failures—the
successful solution of the frequently repeated attempts
of the British people, ever since America has been
discovered, to find a new route to Asia ?
' To what extent the thoughts of those present
were turned to the past must, with that undemonstrative group, remain a secret with each individual
person. This much may be said : to all, the scene
was deeply impressive, and especially to the many
hundreds of workmen, who, from an early hour up
to the last moment, had struggled to do their part,
and who were now mute lookers-on at the single individual actively engaged—at one who in. his own
person united the past with the present, the most
prominent member of the ancient company of
"Adventurers of England," as he was the representative
of the great Canadian Pacific Railway Company.
' The blows on the spike were repeated until it was
driven home. The silence, however, continued
unbroken, and it must be said that a more solemn
ceremony has been witnessed with less solemnity.
It seemed as if the act now performed had worked
a spell on all present. Each one appeared absorbed
in his own reflections. The abstraction of mind, or
silent emotion, or whatever it might be, was, however,
of short duration. Suddenly a cheer spontaneously CRAIGELLACHIE 65
burst forth, and it was no ordinary cheer. The subdued
enthusiasm, the pent-up feelings of men familiar with
hard work, now found vent. Cheer after cheer followed,
as if it was difficult to satisfy the spirit which had
been aroused. Such a scene is conceivable on the
field of hard-fought battle at the moment when victory
is assured/
Several hours later a message was flashed across the
Atlantic. It was from Queen Victoria, and conveyed
the royal congratulations to the people of Canada on
the completion of the Canadian Pacific Railway, a
work which Her Majesty regarded as c* of great importance to the whole British Empire."
It was more. It was a work pregnant with results
of importance to a whole world.
Fleming does not record his own thoughts on this
memorable occasion. But in his retrospective reflections it may be that an address he gave to an Ontario
audience nigh thirty years before recurred to his mind.
In an address delivered in Toronto, in 1904, he took
his hearers back in fancy to this earlier lecture, and
pictured the country lying west of Lake Superior
—the Great Lone Land—as it was before the advent
of the life-spreading steel, and the dreams and
aspirations which even then were cherished by a few
far-seeing visionaries of Empire. He recalled that
in 1858 there was not throughout the whole extent
of North or South America a single transcontinental «F*-
66 CRAlGELLACHtE
railway; that there was scarcely a mile of railway
in the United States west of the Mississippi, and a very
small mileage west of Chicago; that the greater and
by far the most valuable portion of what is now
known as the Dominion of Canada was held as a
vast hunting-ground by the Hudson's Bay Company,
' and it was indeed fortunate that it was so held,
as the present and future generations of Canadians
will testify/ At that date the provinces and
territories west of the longitude of Lake Superior
were not thought of. British Columbia itself was not
even a Crown Colony. The city of Ottawa as the
capital of the Dominion was unknown. Winnipeg did
not then exist. Ten years later, there were only a
few people around Fort Garry and along the banks
of the river, known as the Red River settlers.
Exclusive of pure Indians there were probably not
more than eight thousand people in the whole North-
West. The settlers were shut off from the outer world,
except by such means of communication as that
furnished by dog-trains in winter and canoes in
summer, together with Red River carts.
But even at that period of Canada's history there
were a few public-spirited, sanguine men who had
the hardihood to peer through the pine forests and
the wooded wilderness of a thousand miles to Canada's
richest heritage, the prairie region. Their mental
vision carried them across the rolling prairies another
thousand miles to gaze on the mountains with the
setting sun and the ocean beyond them. These daring, C_UlGELLACHl_- 67
yea, visionary spirits did not think Canada was
destined to stop short at the Georgian Bay and the
tier of counties lying eastward of Lake Simcoe.x There
were dense forests to subdue. The Ottonabee, the
Trent, the Ottawa, and other rivers had abundance
of water power to prepare for exportation the timber
then growing in the tributary forests. It required
no seer to see that these forests would become
exhausted, and that new fields and other sources of
industry would have to be sought out. Precisely as
there are to-day, there were men then who inscribed
on their banner, the words, " Build up Canada," and
visionary and impracticable as it seemed to many,
they formed the resolution to carry their standard
across the home of the buffalo and the distant Rocky
Mountains.
This was the inception of the Canadian Pacific
Railway. By a large number of people it was
regarded as an idle fancy, the dream of chimerical
men, never to be realized. The enormously large
works involved were not common at that stage in
the history of engineering undertakings. The proposal
to build a railway through uninhabited British North
America, over one of the great mountain ranges of
the globe, across a roadless continent, respecting much
of which nothing was known, when looked at soberly
by the practical man presented to him a project which
passed at a single leap from the plane of ordinary
undertakings to the lofty sphere of enterprises of the
grandest description. It surpassed in every element 68 CRAIGELLACHIE
of magnitude and cost, and probably also in physical
difficulties, any work ever previously undertaken
by man.
' But what were the purposes to be achieved ?
Were they not inestimably important ? Wonderful
commercial results could be counted on, and it was
felt that the national, the imperial, advantages and
possibilities were far beyond the conception of the
most sanguine of far-seeing men. The undertaking
would have an immediate effect in expanding Canada,
then limited to two provinces in the valley of the
St. Lawrence; it would be of the greatest advantage
to the Mother Country in opening up new channels
for the enterprise of British merchants. The railway
from the Atlantic to the Pacific when completed
would bring nearer to England her Eastern Empire ;
it would unite with a new bond the interests and
affections of Britons in Europe, Asia, Australasia,
and America ; it would secure in perpetuity British
dominion upon the continent of America ; it would
promote the occupation and civilization of half a
continent, and go a long way to lay the foundation
of what might be regarded as a Canadian Empire.'
In his biography of Sandford Fleming, Lawrence
Burpee records that during the engineer's visit to
London, in 1876, he called at 24, Cheyne Row, with a
letter of introduction to Thomas Carlyle. ' It had
long been his desire to meet face to face the great
prophet of the nineteenth century/ says Burpee. CRAIGELLACHIE 69
' The conversation drifted to Canada, with many
shrewd questions and comments as to the conditions
of life in the new land. The recent death there of
Carlyle's brother Alexander, lent a personal note to
the subject. The vast possibilities and human
significance of the Canadian Pacific Railway appealed
to him, and the political and social experiments that
were being worked out in this younger Britain beyond
the seas. An aftermath of the interview is found
in the " Descriptive Catalogue of the Carlyle's House
Memorial Trust." Among the books listed in the
Back Dining Room is : " Fleming, S., Report on the
Canadian Pacific Railway, 1877. Presentation copy." '
The history of the creation of the Canadian Pacific
Railway is the history of a small band of men. Political,
financial, and physical obstacles had to be fought and
overcome in a manner which called forth efforts, as
has been narrated, almost superhuman in their
intensity. But these men continued in their chosen
way. The path was steep, and at times they stumbled
over the jagged rocks which lay as barriers in the
course, but their indomitable spirit remained unbroken
and they reached the summit of their aspirations on
that eventful November day.
It is a story of Romance in Action.
The greatest achievement in the career of Lord
Mount Stephen is his part in the building of Canada's
first transcontinental highway. It was he who 70 CRAlGELLACHtE
carried the biggest burden. As first President of the
Canadian Pacific Railway Company, and the official
head of the syndicate to which the Dominion Government transferred the Great National Enterprise in the
stormy days of 1880, he took the leading part in the
negotiations with the Government and with British
capitalists, and his executive force, restless energy,
and conquering perseverance, constituted him the
dominating factor in the affairs of the Company.
Despite the great strain resulting from his occupancy
of the Presidency during the Company's early financial
struggles, he maintained his active association with
the Canadian Pacific for nigh three years after the
completion of the line, and did not leave " the bridge "
until the corporation had reached the smooth waters
of prosperity. ' From the time I became a party to
the contract with the Dominion Government for the
construction of the Canadian Pacific Railway, and
consented to accept the position of President of the
Company,* he said in his farewell letter, dated 7th
August, 1888, to the Shareholders, ' it has always been
my intention to relinquish the active chief control of
the affairs of the Company as soon as the task which
I then undertook should be completed. This task was
partially finished when the line was open for traffic
through to the Pacific Ocean, over two years ago;
but at that time so much remained to be done towards
the firm establishment of the enterprise, and its
future development and success, that in deference to
the wishes of my colleagues, I consented to continue CRAIGELLACHIE 71
for a time in office. Warned now by the state of my
health, finding that the severe and constant strain
which I have had to bear for the past eight years has
unfitted me for the continuous and arduous duties
of an office in which vigour and activity are essential;
feeling the increasing necessity for practical railway
experience; and believing that the present satisfactory and assured position of the Company offers a
favourable opportunity for taking the step I have had
so long in contemplation, I have this day resigned
the Presidency of the Company which I have had the
honour to hold since its organization.
' In taking this step, it may not be out of place to
say that my pecuniary interest in the enterprise remains
undiminished, and that the welfare of the Company is,
and always must be to me, a matter of the deepest
possible interest; and that as a member of the Board
of Directors, I will always be ready to aid and
co-operate with my colleagues in everything calculated
to protect and promote the interests of the shareholders. In resigning the position of the President of
the Company, it is to me a matter of the greatest
possible satisfaction to be able to say that in my
successor, Mr. Van Home, the Company has a man
of proved fitness for the office, in the prime of life,
possessed of great energy and rare ability, having a
long and thoroughly practical railway experience,
and, above all, an entire devotion to the interests of
the Company/
In the Canadian Pacific Railway station at Montreal 72 CRAIGELLACHIE
there stands a statue of Lord Mount Stephen. It is
the Company's tribute to one of their greatest men.
All honour, too, to Donald Smith, who loyally
supported George Stephen in the days of struggle.
He took the same risks as his cousin took, and with
him fought and overcame the obstacles in the path
which led to Craigellachie.
In the history of Lord Strathcona—the big Scotsman with the massive head and keen grey-blue eyes
under the shaggy eyebrows, ' that somehow suggested
snow-laden eaves,' who drove the last spike in Eagle
Pass, and who lived to become one of the most honoured
sons of Canada and of the British Empire, ending his
activities in a blaze of glory, and leaving behind him
a name which has been indelibly written in the Book
of Immortality—his association with the Canadian
Pacific Railway Company is a prominent phase, of
which he was ever and rightly proud.
Conceived in the dreams of statesmen, formed in
the realms of finance, the travail of the birth of the
Canadian Pacific Railway as a concrete reality was
endured by William Van Home.
His was the constructive genius the fruits of which
was the spanning of a continent by lines of steel at
a rate of speed never previously attempted anywhere
and never surpassed since. ' No problem that ever
arose—even that of conquering the Rockies and
Selkirks—had any terrors for him.' Sir William Van Horne. CRAIGELLACHIE 73
He was a human dynamo. From him there radiated
currents of activity, the galvanic effects of which were
felt along the route from end to end. His capacity
for work was prodigious. " Sleep," he said, " is just
a habit; a habit to be indulged in only when absolutely imperative." 'He thought nothing of staying up
all night, and making up the deficiency by snatching
a few winks here and there during the day. He had
the knack of commanding sleep whenever and wherever
he willed it. He could doze off whenever he liked for
five minutes, and wake up at the end of that time
thoroughly refreshed. He had such an intense interest
in fife that he felt he could not afford to sleep, except
by way of indulging in brief intermezzos.'
A story is still related in Canada that a stalwart
Western miner, hearing the many tales of Van Home's
almost superhuman habitual labours, undertook to do
in one day and hour by hour exactly what the famous
"railway man" was doing. At the end of the day the
miner was carried to his bed, where he remained for
several weeks afterwards in a state of collapse.
William Van Home was in truth the Master Builder.
An American of Dutch blood, he possessed the qualities
peculiar to his race in a supreme degree. There
was that in the old Dutch stock of the Van Homes,
it has been said, which caused him to hammer away
at the problem until he finally succeeded. His
hammering was as rapid as it was forceful, and the
result was an achievement unparalleled in the history
of railways. THE SAVING OF BRITISH COLUMBIA.
The Canadian Pacific Railway Company saved
British Columbia for the British Empire. The driving
of the last spike at Craigellachie automatically drove
the last nail into the coffin of Separation, a policy
which threatened the disruption of Confederation.
How serious that danger had become and how it
was averted only by the finking by rail of the Dominion
from East to West is recorded by Sir Charles Tupper
in his memoirs. It is a record fraught with interest.
' The motives that impelled Sir John A. Macdonald
and his colleagues at Ottawa to " round off' " Confederation by adding the Province of British Columbia
to the Union after the North West Territories had been
acquired from the Hudson's Bay Company were based
on national as well as Imperial considerations,' he says.
' What would have been the fate of British Columbia
if it had remained isolated from Eastern Canada by
an unexplored " sea of mountains " and vast, uninhabited prairies?
' There is no question that it would have inevitably
resulted in the absorption of the Crown Colony on the
Pacific Coast by the United States. Social and economic
forces were working in that direction from the date
of the discovery of gold in 1856. Thousands of
adventurous American citizens flocked to British
Columbia, and between the two countries there was
a good deal of inter-communication by land and sea,
74 THE SAVING OF BRITISH COLUMBIA
70
Sir James Douglas, an ex-Governor, a prominent figure
in the early days of the colony, was opposed to
Confederation.
' Until his eleventh-hour conversion, ex-Governor
Seymour entertained similar views. The appointment
of Anthony Musgrave, a pro-Union man, in 1869,
came at a psychological moment when the Imperial
authorities in London were giving their ardent support
to the cause dearest to the hearts of Canadian
statesmen.
' The offer of the Dominion Government to build a
railway from the head of the Great Lakes to the
Pacific coast was the chief inducement that settled
the political destiny of British Columbia. The story
of the great difficulties encountered and the obstacles
overcome in carrying out that gigantic and epoch-
making project, forms an interesting chapter in
Canadian history. As Minister of Railways at the
time, I had something to do with the preliminary
negotiations and the carrying out of the work.
* The Government of Canada, having been successful
in acquiring the North-West Territory, felt that the
completion of Federation, both for national and
Imperial consideration, involved the addition of
British Columbia. Sir John A. Macdonald's views
in regard to the wisdom of this step were shared
just as strongly by every one of his colleagues. They
realised that a federation, to be effective for a young
nation, must represent a union extending from sea
to sea
G 76 THE SAVING OF BRITISH COLUMBIA
' It would have been impossible to retain British
Columbia as a Crown Colony if overtures in favour
of the Union had not been made by the Dominion.
How could it have been expected to remain British
when it had no community of interest with the rest
of Canada from which its people were separated by
two ranges of mountains and the vast prairie ? Under
the existing circumstances it had no means of advancement except by throwing in its lot with the great
nation to the south, with which it had constant
communication both by land and sea.
' We all felt that we were bound to make the hazard
of incurring the large outlay for a transcontinental
railway if Confederation from coast to coast was to
be made a reality, and if the sovereignty of Britain
was to be retained
' The most potent of all the arguments for Union
was the promise it held of promoting overland communication with Eastern Canada.'
In 1871 British Columbia entered Confederation.
' The main provisions upon which the Pacific coast
province entered the Union ensured, in the first place,
that the Dominion should assume all debts and
liabilities of the colony, as well as undertake to build
a railway from the head of the Great Lakes to the
Pacific coast within ten years, and to commence actual
railway construction within two years after the date
of the Union. The idea of an all-rail route to Eastern
Canada from British Columbia did not take shape
until about 1880, as it was thought that the needs of THE SAVING OF BRITISH COLUMBIA 77
the situation could be met by providing steamboat
communication between the head of the Great Lakes
and the settled portions of Ontario/
'At that time there did not exist any road worthy
of the name of highway across Southern British
Columbia to the vast and lonely prairies. It is true
that the Hudson Bay Company had its own trails
through the northern and central sections of the
province, but only for the purpose of packing in
supplies or shipping of the fur catch. Of commerce in
the ordinary sense there was none. Ordinary communication between British Columbia and Eastern
Canada in those days had to be conducted via San
Francisco or the Isthmus of Panama.'
Thus, in the words of one of the "Fathers of
Confederation " himself, is shown the dominating part
of the proposed railway to the Pacific in the negotiations for the entrance of British Columbia into the
Dominion of Canada.
The Canadian Government undertook to build the
line, but a political upheaval and other causes prevented the fulfilment of the compact. In 1878, seven
years after the agreement had been made, not one
yard of railway had been built in British Columbia.
Feeling in the Pacific province became bitter in
the extreme and threats of secession were openly made.
The Attorney General was instructed, in 1874, to
proceed to England to present a petition from the
Executive Council of British Columbia to the Imperial
Government complaining of the breach by the THE SAVING OF BRITISH COLUMBIA
Dominion Government. He interviewed Lord Carnarvon, Secretary of State for the Colonies, who
ultimately forwarded a despatch to the Governor
General, Lord Dufferin, containing his recommendations, which became known as the " Carvarvon
Terms."
The embittered state of public opinion in British
Columbia was exemplified during the visit of Lord
Dufferin to Victoria, in 1876. On one of the arches
erected on the Governor General's line of route the
words : " Carnarvon Terms or Separation " had been
inscribed. Lord Dufferin declined to pass under this
arch -unless the letter ' S ' in the last word was altered
to ' R '—a witty and diplomatic suggestion which was
not adopted.
Six days later a deputation waited on the Governor
General, with an address, in which reference was made
to the unsatisfactory relations which existed between
British Columbia and the Dominion, owing to the
non-fulfilment of the terms of union, and stating that
it was the opinion of a large number of the people
of the Province that separation from the Dominion
would be the inevitable result. Lord Dufferin, who was
placed in a delicate position, declined to receive the
address and suggested that it should be presented by
memorial or petition to the Crown in the usual manner.
The return of Macdonald to power and the appointment of Sir Charles Tupper, who was known to be a
strenuous advocate of the building of a railway to the
Pacific, to the position of Minister of Railways, MP
Vancouver Harbour. THE SAVING OF BRITISH COLUMBIA 79
resulted in a lull in the storm. But difficulties continued
to arrive, and the conviction was forced upon the
Dominion Government that the construction of the
highway would have to be transferred to a private
corporation.
The wisdom of this decision has been amply demonstrated in this narrative. The Canadian Pacific Railway
Company succeeded where Governments had failed.
Five years after they undertook the great task,
British Columbia was bound by a bond of steel to the
Dominion of Canada and to the British Empire.
Sir Charles Tupper's contention that without a
railway connection with Eastern Canada British
Columbia, by the compelling force of circumstances,
would inevitably have been drawn into the United
States as a component part of that nation, has a solid
basis. The Americans themselves contemplated such
a union : to them it was to be " annexation " ; and
annexation, not only of British Columbia, but of the
whole of Western Canada.
Their aspirations and anticipations were openly and
officially expressed. In the year 1869 the United
States Senate Committee on Pacific Railroads issued
a report of a nature as highly interesting to the people
of the Dominion of Canada and of the British Empire
as it was to those of their own country. ' The line of
the North Pacific road runs for 1,500 miles near the 8o
THE SAVING OF BRITISH COLUMBIA
British possessions/ this historic document read, 'and
when built, will drain the agricultural products of the
rich Saskatchewan and Red River districts east of the
mountains, and the gold country on the Fraser, Thompson, and Kootenay rivers west of the mountains.
From China (Canton) to Liverpool, it is 1,500 miles
nearer by the 49th parallel of latitude, than by the
way of San Francisco and New York. This advantage
in securing the overland trade from Asia will not be
thrown away by the English, unless it is taken away
by our first building the North Pacific road, establishing
mercantile agencies at Puget Sound, fixing mercantile
capital there, and getting possession on land, and on
the ocean, of all machinery of the new commerce
between Asia and Europe. The opening by us first of
a North Pacific Railroad seals the destiny of the
British possessions west of the 91st meridian. They
will become so Americanized in interests and feelings
that they will be in effect severed from the New
Dominion and the question of their annexation will
be but a question of time.'
Six years before the publication of the United
States Government Report, the small pioneer settlement in the Red River Valley had pointed out this
danger to Imperial interests in a memorial presented
to the British Government, praying for the establishment of a highway between the eastern provinces
and British Columbia, by way of Lake Superior to
the Red River and the Saskatchewan River. Their
plea was then unavailing, but, in the light of the THE SAVING OF BRITISH COLUMBIA 81
United States document, their memorial is of
permanent interest.
' The people of Red River have long earnestly
desired to see the Lake Superior route opened up
for commerce and emigration, and they rejoice to hear
of the proposal to open up a road and establish a fine
of telegraphic communication through the interior
to British Columbia, entirely within British territory,
believing that such works would greatly benefit this
country, while subserving at the same time both
Canadian and Imperial interests,' said the petitioners.
' The whole country through which the proposed road
would run, almost from Lake Superior to the Rocky
Mountains, is remarkably level. The surface of this
vast region is, generally speaking, like the ocean
surface in a calm, and besides being so remarkably
level, it is, for the most part, free from the heavy
forests which, in Canada, and elsewhere, cause such
delay and expense in road-making.
' Having thus cursorily alluded to the practicability
of the road, on which point our local knowledge and
experience ought to give our views some weight, and
while admitting the intense interest and satisfaction
with which we view the prospect, of a work fraught
with so much good to us politically, socially, and commercially, we might be allowed to point out very
briefly the views we entertain regarding its importance
to England and Canada alike.
' Canada would derive great benefit from the Overland carrying trade, which would spring up immediately _T"
82
THE SAVING OF BRITISH COLUMBIA
on the estabhshment of this route, and the constantly
growing traffic of this district and British Columbia
would thereafter be an ever increasing source of
profit.
' Besides this, it may reasonably be presumed that
the people of Central British America, present and
prospective, would prove permanent and liberal
customers in the markets of England and Canada.
Be it remembered, moreover, that a vast fur business
is carried on in this country, and that, towards the
Rocky Mountains, gold has been discovered in many
quarters. Besides gold there are iron, lead, coal,
petroleum, and other minerals which, together with
the rich fur trade, would prove a source of great wealth,
not only to this country but to Canada ; and although
the colonization and settlement of the vast area of
cultivatable land would somewhat curtail the territorial
limits of the fur business, still, the millions of acres
north of the fertile tract will, in all probability, remain
a rich fur country for centuries to come.
' This is the most natural highway by which commerce and general business with the East could be
carried on. It would be also the most expeditious.
And as a result of such commerce and traffic along
this route, Central British America would rapidly fill
up with an industrious loyal people; and thus, from
Vancouver's Island to Nova Scotia, Great Britain
would have an unbroken series of colonies, a grand
confederation of loyal and flourishing provinces,
skirting the whole United States frontier, and com- THE SAVING OF BRITISH COLUMBIA 83
manding at once the Atlantic and the Pacific. In
this connection we feel bound to observe that American
influence is rapidly gaining ground here; and, if
action is long delayed, very unpleasant complications
may arise. Thus both politically and commercially
the opening up of this country, and the making through
it of a national highway, would immensely subserve
Imperial interests, and contribute to the stability and
glorious prestige of the British Empire.'
The road from Lake Superior to Red River
was wanted as part of a bigger project—a road from
Lake Superior to British Columbia. And even this
was to be but a preliminary undertaking to the
establishment of a railway, or a combined rail and
water route, that would ultimately traverse British
North America from ocean to ocean.
They were men of vision, these Scotch pioneers of
the Red River country.
" The British possessions west of the 91st meridian,"
remained true to British allegiance, and to-day the
only " annexation" desired by Americans is the
annexation of the friendship and good will of Canada.
What was the price—the price of Empire ?
' To learn the price Canada was ready to pay for
Confederation and for a pathway from ocean to
ocean,' a historian of the period writes, ' the traveller
must climb by rail from the prairies at Calgary through
the gorges of the Rocky Mountains to the summit of .r—
84 THE SAVING OF BRITISH COLUMBIA
the Kicking Horse Pass, and then sweep down through
the defiles and valleys of the opposite slope, across
the Selkirk and Gold ranges, and past the canyons of
the Fraser and Thompson rivers, till he has reached
the Pacific. He must study the line of railway in
winter, when, as he looks up, at a hundred points,
avalanches of snow are seen ready to descend upon
it from lofty peaks ; he must visit it in spring, when,
looking down, he sees the tremendous torrents that
roar beneath, swollen from the melting snows; he must
observe with what elaborate care these dangers have
been successfully overcome ; he must feel the sensation
of gliding by day and night over bridges which stretch
like immense slender spiders far over the top of lofty
pines; he must look down almost from the carriage
windows into the depths of the Albert canyon ; he
must be whirled, ascending and descending, around
the curves of the Great Loop ; he must look out for
two days continuously on the marvellous succession
of mountain peaks and range and gorge and embattled
cliff guarding the long narrow valleys, all of which
go to make up the impressive and magnificent scenery
of the greater part of British Columbia. When he has
wondered at the courage of the engineers who faced
such a task of railway construction, and the energy
of the contractors who transported the material and
fed the armies of labourers by whom the work was
done, he has yet even more striking conditions
connected with its construction to consider.
! Ontario, the base from which the task was THE SAVING OF BRITISH COLUMBIA 85
approached on the side of Eastern Canada, is sixteen
hundred miles away. The first four hundred miles of
road round the north side of Lake Superior had to be
cut through a wilderness of rough granite country,
uninhabited, and well nigh uninhabitable. Then
followed twelve hundred miles of prairie, all of which
was also uninhabited, or very thinly inhabited, until
the railway opened the way for settlers. All this had
to be traversed before the foot of the mountains was
reached, where the really serious work began.
'And for what purpose was this mighty barrier of
the Rockies and Selkirks, six hundred miles wide, to
be crossed ?
' Not to unite two great communities, as was the
case when the forty million people of the Eastern and
Western States, already advanced far beyond the
Mississippi, made the first American line across a
narrower range of mountains to get in touch with
San Francisco and the large population of the Pacific
States, which was also pressing up to the base of the
Rockies. In Eastern Canada there were only four
million people ; in British Columbia there were less
than fifty thousand white people—the population of
a small English manufacturing town—and few of these
on the mainland, when the railroad was undertaken*
' It was to complete and round off a national conception ; to prepare the way for commercial and political
advantages as yet far remote, and by many deemed
imaginary, that the work was faced. British Columbia,
insignificant in population, was significant enough in 86
THE SAVING OF BRITISH COLUMBIA
position and in its resources. It fronted on the Pacific ;
it had splendid harbours and abundant coal; it
suggested a new and short pathway to the Orient and
Australasia. The statesmen in Ottawa who, in 1867,
began to look over the Rockies to continents beyond
the Pacific were not wanting in imagination ; many
claimed that their imagination outran their reason;
but in the rapid course of events their dreams have
already been more than justified/
The cost of saving British Columbia for Canada and
the British Empire was heavy, but the results were
magnificently worthy of the price. A Governor
General of the Dominion, the Marquess of Dufferin,
regarded the association of the province with the
Dominion as the crowning triumph of Federation.
It is a country rich with promise. ' British Columbia
is on the threshold of a destiny unparalleled in its
magnificence,' a great statesman has said. ' With its
salubrious climate, and enormous resources, embracing
soil, minerals, coal, water-powers, fisheries, and forest
wealth, no limit can be set to its possibilities/
Greatest of all in its value as a national and Empire
factor is its position as a Gateway to the Pacific, a
Gateway without which the Imperial pathway to Asia
would have remained an unrealisable dream. pS
_ THE HIGHWAY TO ASIA.
The establishment of a transcontinental railway,
supplemented by a telegraph line over the whole
route and a steamship service on the Great Lakes,
resulted in the linking up of Canada from ocean to
ocean and in the binding of the far-spread communities
of the Dominion into one indissoluble national family.
But they were Empire Builders in the biggest sense
of the term, these men of the Canadian Pacific Railway.
They had made a pathway across a continent. They
now planned to bridge the oceans.
True to their traditions, they carried their plans
into effect. Two years after the completion of the
railway the mighty Pacific was spanned. A steamship
service was inaugurated between Vancouver and Japan,
China, and Hong-Kong, and the new world Dominion
was linked with the ancient and mystic Orient, with
its teeming millions of human beings.
Sixteen years later the Company acquired the Elder
Dempster (Beaver) Line and the Atlantic was spanned.
The Canadian Pacific Railway then came into existence
as a bridge connecting Europe with Asia, and the
greatest of all Highways of Empire.
Forty years before the Canadian Pacific was finally
established as the long-dreamed of bridge between
87 88 THE HIGHWAY TO ASIA
Great Britain and Asia—a bridge spanning the Atlantic
Ocean, the continent of North America, and the Pacific
Ocean and under British control—an eminent English
publicist, Sir Edward Watkin, made an eloquent plea
for 'A British Railway from the Atlantic to the Pacific'
in words which, in the light of later events, were of a
nature prophetic.
He commenced his plea by quoting from the Queen's
speech to Parliament, in 1858 : " I hope that the new
Colony on the Pacific (British Columbia) may be but
one step in the career of steady progress, by which my
dominions in North America may be ultimately peopled
in an unbroken chain, from the Atlantic to the Pacific,
by a loyal and industrious population."
' This aspiration, so strikingly expressed,' Watkin
said, ' found a fervent echo in the national heart, and
it continues to engage the earnest attention of England,
for it speaks of a great outspread of solid prosperity
and rational liberty, of the diffusion of our civilization,
and of the extension of our moral empire. Since the
Royal Speech, Governments have done something and
events have done more to ripen public opinion into
action, The Government at home and in Canada
have organised and explored. The more perfect
discoveries of our new gold fields on the Pacific, the
Indian Mutiny, the completion of great works in
Canada, the treaties with Japan and with China, the
visit of the Prince of Wales to the American continent,
and, at the moment, the sad dissensions in the United
States, combine to interest us in the question, and to "I
THE HIGHWAY TO ASIA 89
make us ask, " How is this hope to be realized; not
a century hence, but in our time ? **
' Our augmenting interests in the East demand for
reasons both of Empire and of trade, access to Asia
less dangerous than by Cape Horn, less circuitous
even than by Panama, less dependent than by Suez
and the Red Sea. Our emigration, imperilled by the
dissensions in the United States, must fall back upon
colonization. And, commercially, the countries of the
East must supply the raw materials and provide the
markets which probable contests between the free
man and the slave may diminish, or may close, elsewhere. Again, a great nation like ours cannot stand
still. It must either march on triumphantly in the
van, or fall hopelessly in the rear. The measure of its
accomplishment must, century by century, rise higher
and higher in the competition of nations. Its great
works in this generation can alone perpetuate its
greatness in the next.
' Let us look at the map! There we see, coloured
as British America, a tract washed by the great Atlantic
on the east, and by the Pacific Ocean on the west, and
containing four million square miles, or one-ninth of
the whole terrestrial surface of the globe. Part of this
vast domain, upon the east, is Upper and Lower
Canada; part, upon the west, is the new colony of
British Columbia, with Vancouver's Island (the
Madeira of the Pacific) ; while the largest portion is
held, as one great preserve, by the fur-trading Hudson's
Bay Company, which, in right of a charter given by
■0 90 THE HIGHWAY TO ASIA
Charles II. in 1670, kills vermin for skins, and monopolises the trade with the native Indians over a surface
many times as big again as Great Britain and Ireland.
Still, all this land is ours, for it owes allegiance to the
sceptre of Victoria.
' Between the magnificent harbour of Halifax on
the Atlantic, open throughout the year for ships of
the largest class, to the Straits of Fuca, opposite
Vancouver's Island, with its noble Esquimault inlet,
intervene some 3,200 miles of road line. For fourteen
hundred or fifteen hundred miles of this distance the
Nova Scotian, the Habitant and the Upper Canadian
have spread, more or less in fines and patches over
the ground, until the population of 60,000 in 1759
amounts to 2,500,000 in 1860. The remainder is peopled
only by the Indian and the hunter, save that at the
southern end of Lake Winnipeg there still exists the
hardy and struggling Red River Settlement, now
called Fort Garry ; and dotted all over the continent,
as lights of progress, are trading posts of the Hudson's
Bay Company.
' The combination of recent discoveries places it
at least beyond all doubt that the best, though perhaps
not the only, thoroughly efficient route for a great
highway for peoples and for commerce, between the
Atlantic and the Pacific, is to be found through this
British territory. Beyond that, it is alleged that
while few, if any, practicable passages for a wagon
road, still less for a railway, can be found through
the Rocky Mountains across the United States terri- THE HIGHWAY TO ASIA 91
tory (north-west of the Missouri), there have been
discovered already no less than three eligible openings
in the British ranges of these mountains, once considered as inaccessible to man. While Captain Palliser
prefers the " Kananaskakis," Captain Blackiston and
Governor Douglas the " Kootanie," and Dr. Hector
the " Vermilion *' Pass, all agree that each is perfectly
practicable, if not easy, and that even better openings
may probably yet be found as exploration progresses...
'Although the lakes and the St. Lawrence give an
unbroken navigation of two thousand miles, right to
the sea, for ships of three hundred tons burden, yet
if there is to be a continuous line, along which, and
all the year round, the travel and traffic of the western
and eastern worlds can pass without interruption,
railway communication with Halifax must be perfected,
and a new line of iron road, passing through Ottawa,
the Red River Settlement, and this continuous belt,
must be constructed. This new line is a work of above
2,300 miles, and would cost probably £20,000,000,
if not £25,000,000 sterling. The sum, though so large,
is still little more than we voluntarily paid to extinguish slavery in our West Indian dominions ; it does
not much exceed the amount which a Royal Commission, some little time ago, proposed to expend in
erecting fortifications and sea-works to defend our
shores. It is but six per cent, of the amount we have
laid out in completing our own railway system in this
little country at home. It is equal to but two and a
half per cent, of our National Debt, and the annual
H 92 THE HIGHWAY TO ASIA
interest upon it is much less than the British Pension
List.
' We say, then, " Establish an unbroken line of road
and railway from the Atlantic to the Pacific."
' Such a great highway would give shorter distances
by both sea and land, with an immense saving of time.
As regards the great bugbear of the general traveller—
sea distance, it would (to and from Liverpool), save,
as compared with the Panama route, a tossing,
wearying navigation of six thousand miles to Japan,
of five thousand miles to Canton, and of three thousand
miles to Sydney. For Japan, for China, for the whole
Asiatic Archipelago, and for Australia, such a route
must become the great highway to and from Europe ;
and whatever nation possesses that highway must
wield of necessity the commercial sceptre of the world.'
The Canadian Pacific Railway Company made what
was a vision to Sir Edward Watkins a reality to the
Mother of Nations. And the reality was greater than
the vision. From the western shore of Britain to the
eastern shore of Asia, by way of Canada, the Imperial
route of Empire is traversed by the ships and trains,
not of several separate corporations, but of one individual corporation.
In that lies the Canadian Pacific Company's greatest
strength. SUPERSTRUCTURE.
The economic history of Canada since 1885 is
fundamentally the history of'the Canadian Pacific.
As the railway and its many auxiliaries develop so
developes the Dominion.
The record of growth is unsurpassed in the annals
of industrial enterprise. The railway mileage controlled by the Company has expanded to over eighteen
thousand miles. The single track of early years is
rapidly being converted into a double track from ocean
to ocean ; branch lines and connections have been
extended north, south, east and west, spreading
settlement and civilization with the rails; mountain
grades have been halved; long lines of snowsheds
have been supplanted by tunnels which pierce the
giant buttresses of the Selkirks; trestle bridges have
given way to steel; " ocean " liners have been placed
on the Great Lakes; gigantic additions have been
made to the storage capacity of the grain elevators;
a hundred thousand miles of telegraph lines are now
in operation ; palatial new hotels have been erected
and additions and improvements made to the older;
new railway stations have been built in the big centres
of population which, along with the Company's
hotels, are among the leading architectural features of
the cities and a source of pride to the citizens;
93 94
SUPERSTRUCTU RE
immense railway workshops have been developed—
the Angus workshops in Montreal, employing six
thousand men, rank first in magnitude on the American
continent; a million and a half acres of arid land in
Southern Alberta have been irrigated and made
suitable for intensive farming; and huge modern
liners have been added to the Atlantic and Pacific
fleets, constituting these the pre-eminent factors in
the Canadian-Atlantic and Canadian-Pacific maritime
traffic.
One hundred and twenty thousand men are to-day
on the pay roll of the Canadian Pacific. ' It might
be said that over five hundred thousand persons are
directly interested in, and look forward to, the monthly
pay day, while, if we consider the allied interests,
the indirect relations sustained one way or another,
the commercial and industrial affiliations of the
Company outside the regular list of employees, we
get over one million people more or less directly
concerned, in the issuance, once a month of those
seemingly innumerable bits of paper which are so
eagerly transmuted into bread and butter. If,
however, we get beyond all those who are more or
less directly interested in the Company, and reach
out to the various activities which depend on the
Company—each industrial organism with its own
army of employees; if we consider every allied or
affected interest, we find that the entire population
of Canada are affected in their lives and outlook by
the operations of the C.P.R/ SUPERSTRUCTURE 95
In this work of expansion—a work which has resulted
in the creation of a superstructure of world-wide fame
and significance—the same indomitable energy has
been shown as in the building of the line. In the
closing sentences of Lord Mount Stephen's farewell
letter, written, readers will remember, scarcely three
years after the completion of the transcontinental line,
the retiring President said:—' I cannot refrain from
congratulating the Shareholders upon the arrangements recently completed by Sir Donald A. Smith and
myself which will have the effect of securing to the
Canadian Pacific Railway the permanent friendship
of the new and important American lines, extending
from Sault Ste. Marie to Minneapolis and St. Paul
on the one hand, and to Duluth on the other, and
reaching a traffic the importance of which would be
difficult to over-estimate. It is also a matter for
congratulation that arrangements have been practically settled with the Wabash Railway for the permanent connection between the Detroit River and
Chicago and the South-West; and, further, that the
long pending negotiations with the Imperial Government for the establishment of a first-class steamship
line between Vancouver and Japan and China have
at last been concluded.'
The establishment of ' the first-class steamship line
between Vancouver and Japan and China,' fore- 96 SUPERSTRUCTURE ;
shadowed in Lord Mount Stephen's letter, marked a
new era in development. As early as 1887, the
Company had inaugurated a trans-Pacific service, with
three chartered vessels; four years afterwards they
joined the ranks of ocean steamship owners, possessors
of the three finest and fastest liners on the Pacific—
the " Empress of India," the " Empress of Japan,"
and the " Empress of China."
The fame of these vessels, which at that time set a
new standard of efficiency unsurpassed in the annals
of ocean travel, spread far, and the North Pacific
route assumed at one bound a position of great
Imperial value. And the Company gained added
prestige. ' The Canadian Pacific Railway Company,'
chronicles a historian of the period, ' when taken in
connection with the various branches and extensions
of the railway and Lake Superior navigation, together
with the Pacific " Empresses," may be classed as one
of the greatest, if not the greatest commercial company
in the world/
Had this chronicler lived to see the " Empress of
Russia " and " Empress of Asia," which were placed
on the Pacific service in 1914, his approbation would
have been even more enthusiastic. These truly magnificent vessels, which may well be described as " the
Swallows of the Pacific," represent the highest skill
of Scottish shipbuilders—and that means the highest
skill procurable. In speed and luxurious accommodation they have set a new standard in Pacific Ocean
travel, as their predecessors did on inauguration. SUPERSTRUCTURE
97
Five years after the establishment of the
" Empresses " on the Pacific ocean, by which a fast
mail route from Great Britain to the East was secured,
and a new link in the chain of Empire was forged,
the Company augmented their steamship interests by
the acquisition of an existing fleet of steamers on the
Columbia Lake arid River and Kootenay Lake. The
Crow's Nest branch of the line was then approaching
completion and this, with the steamship service, added
the important mining districts of Southern British
Columbia to the Company's sphere, with beneficial
results to the Canadian Pacific and British Columbia
alike. New steamers were also placed on the Arrow,
Slocan and Okanagan Lakes, and the life-giving
touch of the Canadian Pacific Railway was soon
manifested in the stimulation of the industrial and
social life of the territory involved in the Company's
operations.
The following year, 1897, is famed in the history of
the American continent as the year of the Klondyke
rush. The lure of gold was on man—a lure stronger
even than love. The fame of the new El Dorado
acted as an irresistible magnet to prospectors and
adventurers the world o'er. ' How many of those
early pioneers fell by the way; how many perished
by flood, by cold and exposure on that lonely and
dangerous trail, will never be known ; for to the call
of gold there came a world-wide response; and many 98 SLTPEftSTRUCTUi.__
whom the summons attracted were ill-fitted to stand
the hardships of getting there.'
More fortunate were those who came under the
benign sway of the Canadian Pacific Railway. To
them the terrors and horrors of the overland trail with
Death in hideous garb ever stalking at their heels,
were comparatively unknown. The attitude of the
Company was as humane as it was business-like. They
had brought the men to the shores of the Pacific. To
carry them to their destination as far as practicable
was accepted as a duty. They could not transport the
men to the golden Mecca itself, but they would take
them to far-off Skagway. A coastal service from
Vancouver and Victoria was organised, the inauguration of which not only relieved the congestion at the
Pacific Coast ports but it prevented the stranded
prospectors from wasting their time and substance in
tedious and demoralising waiting for transportation.
■ Thousands who flocked Dawson City-wards bear
witness to the great and Imperial part played by the
Canadian Pacific Railway in meeting the emergency
created by the gold discoveries in the Yukon Valley/
' The Imperial part'; it is an oft recurring phrase
in a story of the Company's work.
Four years after the inauguration of the Klondyke
service the Company purchased the Canadian Pacific
Navigation Company's fleet, thus laying the foundation of the British Columbia Coast Service, the fast
vessels of which accomplish a triangular journey unique
in coastal navigation. Between Vancouver and SUPERSTRUCTURfe 99
Victoria, in British Columbia, and Seattle, in the
American state of Washington, they steam a distance
of three hundred and thirty nine miles, making three
stops.of approximately two hours each ; at each stop
passengers are landed and embarked, the ship is
cleaned, coaled, watered and provisioned—and all this
is done during twenty-four hours of time.
The appearance of the Canadian Pacific Railway flag
on the Atlantic Ocean in 1903 marked a new era in
the history of the Canadian Pacific. The Company
had acted quickly after deciding to enter the Atlantic
trade. They did not wait for a fleet to be built.
They bought' a fleet in being,' and the Elder Dempster
Beaver Line, comprising fifteen vessels, by a few
strokes of the pen became the property of the Canadian
Pacific Railway Company. It was an episode as
dramatic as it was far-reaching in effect.
Developments proceeded apace. The service from
Liverpool, Bristol (Avonmouth), and London was
extended the following year to Antwerp. Three
years afterwards the " Empress of Ireland " and the
" Empress of Britain " were added to the Canadian-
Atlantic service between Liverpool and Quebec, and
a big spurt was given to the popularity of the St.
Lawrence route among maritime travellers. Subsequently, the | Metagama " and the " Missanabie "
were placed in commission, and the " Melita " and
the "Minnedosa," of a similar type, will assist materially
in coping with the ever-growing Trans-Atlantic traffic. 100 SUPERSTRUCTURE
In January, 1916, the Canadian Pacific Ocean
Services, Limited, were appointed the Managers and
Agents of the Canadian Pacific fleets on the Atlantic
and Pacific oceans, and the old-established Allan Line.
The Allan Line possesses a number of fine vessels,
including such well-known steamers as the "Alsatian,"
" Calgarian," " Scandinavian," " Corsican," " Victorian," and " Virginian," also an ocean navigation
history going back to the year 1822, when Captain
Alexander Allan sailed from Greenock to Quebec in
the little brig "Jean," in search of cargo for his vessel.
How well the intrepid Scottish sailor succeeded in his
mission is exemplified in the Allan Line of to-day.
In the close connection early established between
the Canadian Pacific and the Canadian-Australasian
Line, the Company created an additional factor in
their trans-Pacific ramifications, a factor which assists
materially in the closer linking up, not only of the
Mother of Nations with her Over-seas Dominions, but
of the Dominions themselves. Under the arrangement
the Canadian Pacific Railway connects at Vancouver
with this branch of the Union Steamship Company of
New Zealand, which, starting forty years ago with
three small coasting vessels, now own a fleet embracing
in its operations traffic with Australasia, the Islands
of the Southern Seas, India and Canada. Canadian-
Australasian steamers leave Vancouver at regular B!U_k 1
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intervals for New Zealand and Australia, calling
en route at Honolulu and Suva, Fiji Islands. From
Sydney there are services to Manila and Hong Kong,
where connection is made with the Canadian Pacific
" Empresses."
The establishment of a chain of hotels across Canada
is not the least important of the Company's developments. From the Atlantic to the Pacific these
hostelries are of much utility to travellers, who otherwise would frequently have to endure the discomforts
of the " second-rate " and often unwholesome accommodation which only is available in communities still
in the early process of evolution.
The Chateau Frontenac, in Quebec, the dominating
architectural feature of Canada's most historic city,
and the Hotel Vancouver—" The World's Half-Way
House "—in Vancouver are meeting-places of wayfarers from all corners of the earth. The Place Viger,
in Montreal, the Royal Alexandra, in Winnipeg, the
Hotel Palliser, in Calgary, the Banff Springs Hotel, in
the heart of the Rocky Mountains, and the Empress
Hotel, in Victoria—" that little bit of England on the
Pacific "—are establishments of the highest national
and continental repute, and in many other centres
of Canadian travel the Canadian Pacific Railway hotel
is a radiator of social activities, or a haven of rest
according to the tastes and desires of the visitors. 102 SUPERSTRUCTURE
A story—a true story—is told of an American
woman who, after gazing at one of the world's wonders,
the great Illecillewaet Glacier, a mighty mass of
crystal ice towering thousands of feet from the level
of the Canadian Pacific railway tiack, asked in all
earnestness : " Is it a real glacier, or only one that
the Company have put there for an advertisement ? "
That was a task beyond the powers of even the
men of the C.P.R. But to them belongs the credit
of opening to the nations of the earth the portals of
a mountain region which, for immensity and scenic
grandeur, is unparalleled elsewhere in the world.
" Sixty Switzerlands rolled into one," is Edward
Whymper, the conqueror of the Matterhorn's description of this land of peaks and eternal snow. " It
is a glut of glory," said another traveller, wearily,
her mind overwhelmed by the sheer riot of
splendour.
The Canadian Government quickly realised the
priceless treasure which the railway had brought to
the nation. An Act was passed, ' after a memorable
debate in the Dominion House of Commons,' setting
apart for the use and enjoyment of the people a
national park, to be named the Rocky Mountains Park,
with the C.P.R. station of Banff as the radial centre.
Subsequently this park was extended to embrace an
enormous area, and Yoho Park and Glacier Park
were also added later to the national reservation—a Mountaineering in The Rockies. SUPERSTRUCTURE 103
reservation comprising a territory nearly six thousand
square miles in extent.
' Let us think of the future,' Lord Bryce has said.
' We are the trustees of the future. We are not here
for ourselves alone. All these gifts were not given
to us to be used by one generation or with the thought
of one generation only before our minds. We are the
heirs of those who have gone before, and charged
with the duty of what we owe to those who come after,
and there is no duty which seems to be higher than
that of handing on to them undiminished facilities
for the enjoyment of some of the best gifts the Creator
has seen fit to bestow upon His people/ The Dominion
Government, to their honour, have given practical
effect to Lord Bryce's dictum and their national park
policy rests on a broad and generous basis.
To preserve intact for the benefit not only of
Canadians but for visitors from all parts of the globe
the resplendent and majestic beauties of the mountain
zone of Alberta and British Columbia is a work worthy
of the Government of a great Dominion. And in
that work the Canadian Pacific Railway Company
are helping nobly. ' It is the people's right to have
primitive access to the remote places of safest retreat
from the fever and the fret of the market place and the
beaten tracts of life. We are devoutly grateful, as
we ought to be, that the Canadian Pacific Railway
Company have shown themselves wise in a national
sense, by refusing to follow in the wake of the cog- 104 SUPERSTRUCTURE
railways of the Rigi and Pike's Peak ': it is a Canadian
mountaineer's tribute.
While assisting in the work of conservation, the
Company are active in the work of development on
aesthetic lines. At the great scenic centres, Banff,
Lake Louise, Field, Emerald Lake, and Glacier—
"they established mountain hotels and these have
become the headquarters of mountaineers. They
instituted a service of Swiss guides, and the model
Swiss village of " Edelweiss " for the homes of these
sturdy sons of the mountains. They built a number
of specially equipped observation cars for travellers
whose only opportunities for seeing the region in all
its native glory are from the railway train. They
employed world-famed mountaineers to explore and
map the country ; they cut mountain trails ; and, in
general, have encouraged and assisted every scheme
for the creation and improvement of facilities for a
full appreciation of this dazzling Land of Enchantment.
In the big work of building a motor road through
the mountains from Calgary to Vancouver they are
associated with the Dominion Government and the
Provincial Governments of Alberta and British
Columbia. The route of this road which, when
completed, will be the most beautiful and alluring of
all the pathways of Canada, follows the old coach road
from Calgary to Banff and on to Lake Louise as far as
Castle Mountain, turns thence to Vermilion Pass, the
boundary of Rocky Mountains Park on this side.
From Vermilion Pass the road crosses the Briscoe SUPERSTRUCTURE
105
Range by Sinclair Pass, and ascends the valley of the
Columbia to Windermere Lake and the source of the
Columbia. Crossing the spit of land that separates
the Columbia from its mighty tributary to Kootenay,
the mountain highway follows the latter stream to
Wardner, then verges west to Kootenay Lake and
Nelson, crosses the Columbia again after its huge bend
to the north, and swings down to the international
boundary at Grand Forks. From there the road
follows a general westerly direction, crossing Okanagan
River, ascending the Similkameen, traversing the Hope
Range and coming down the Coquihalla to Hope on the
Fraser River, and descending the Fraser to Vancouver.
An alternative route runs west from Windermere,
over the Wells Pass, crosses the Lardo country to the
head of Lower Arrow Lake, thence up Fire Valley to
the old wagon road to Vernon and Grand Prairie,
thence by way of Douglas Lake to Merritt and a
junction with the main route. The main road from
Calgary to Vancouver will have a total length of
about six hundred miles, constituting a panorama of
scenic glory.
Another alternative route swings east from Wardner
and traverses the Crow's Nest Pass to the Alberta
side of the Rockies, then follows the foothills to
Calgary. Yet another branch of the main highway
runs from Castle Mountain through Rocky Mountains
Parks to Field and Golden. The route of this branch
and that portion of the main road from Castle Mountain to the Columbia Valley traverses several wildly io6
SUPERSTRUCTURE
beautiful valleys and mountain passes, encircling a
region of heaven-towering peaks, snowfields, glaciers,
ice-cascades, lakes and waterfalls—a peerless region
which rouses nature lovers to the highest heights
of ecstasy.
The nomenclature of the Rocky Mountains and
Selkirk Mountains exemplifies and commemorates the
stupendous achievement of the explorers and builders
of the Canadian Pacific Railway of making a great
national heritage available to the people.
Mount Stephen, a giant among the giants of the
Rockies, is named after the first President of the
Company, who later took bis title as a British peer
of the realm—Lord Mount Stephen—from this cloud-
splitting crag. Van Home range in the Rockies and
Van Home Glacier in the Selkirks commemorate the
Master Builder. Mount Hector is named after the
adventurous discoverer of the Kicking Horse Pass—a
pass so named from an incident in the explorer's
travels. In the Selkirks, the majestic Mount Sir
Donald and Sir Donald Glacier are everlasting tributes
to the driver of the last spike at Craigellachie, and
Mount Shaughnessy stands as a stately statue to Lord
Shaughnessy. Rogers Pass, Rogers Peak, and Rogers
Glacier honour the intrepid pathfinder, and Albert
Canyon and Albert Peaks, his nephew who accompanied
him in his exploratory expeditions; Moberly Peal-
towers in testimony to the work of the dauntless
discoverer of Eagle Pass, Mount Sir Sandford, king of SUPERSTRUCTURE I07
the Selkirks, and Fleming Peak are named after the
great engineer, and Grant Peak commemorates his
friend, Dr. Grant, who shared the hardships of his
travels in the mountains.
It is a galaxy of noble names.
When Sir William Van Home retired from the
Presidency in 1898—he succeeded Lord Mount Stephen
in that position—his mantle of office was placed on
the shoulders of a man who was well able to bear it,
and who had been his most brilliant lieutenant:
Thomas Shaughnessy.
To the far-seeing and courageous vision, organising
genius, administrative and executive ability, and
forceful personality of Lord Shaughnessy (as he afterwards became) is mainly due the great modem
developments which have made the Canadian Pacific
Railway famed throughout the world, and have
earned for him the appellation: " King of Railway
Presidents."
' Under the present regime a colonial railway
company has grown into a tremendous world-circling
web of commerce of Imperial significance, with
radiations in every quarter of the globe. Such developments do not take place by themselves ; they require
imagination, foresight, and a broad, open outlook,
which together spell genius. These qualities Thomas
Shaughnessy has brought to his fife work—these,
and an untiring energy and a knowledge of his business I08 SUPERSTRUCTURE
that can only be won by those who have climbed
upward through every grade.' The words are those
of a Canadian writer.
' A strong, clear thinking man, wise in counsel,
with good purpose, his advice and guidance are
valued in connection with every kind of business and
public activity. He has done great things on sure
and safe lines to promote the development of Canada,
has been earnest and active when the country needed
the services of its most capable and public spirited
men, and has seen with the larger vision where the
true interests of the Dominion and of the Empire lay/ THE MAKING OF A NATION.
An American senator, in a moment of irritable
admiration, described the Canadian Pacific Railway as
" The Dominion of Canada On Wheels *'—a definition
which, although of an exaggerated nature, suggests
the dominating position which the " C.P.R." has
acquired in the affairs of a nation.
From the beginning of their existence the Canadian
Pacific Railway Company have been the leading
factors in the national development of the Dominion.
' Never were the fortunes of a great country and a
great commercial corporation so closely intertwined as
in the case of the Canadian Dominion and the Canadian
Pacific Railway Company/ Dr. Parkin wrote only
nine years after the historic happening at Craigellachie.
' From Halifax to Vancouver the " C.P.R.," as it
is familiarly called, is a factor, and often a large
factor, in the affairs alike of the country village and
of the great city—in the politics of the municipality,
the province, and the Dominion.'
Since those days of which Parkin writes, the
Canadian Pacific have gone far, very far, and have
become an even more dominating factor in the
economic and social fife of the Dominion. And the
position they have acquired is the natural sequence
of their activities, for the Company are doing much
of the work which in other countries is done by the
109 110 THE MAKING OF A NATION
Government. The Dominion and Provincial Governments of Canada are accomplishing their splendid
part in the task of securing settlers from the British
Isles, the United States of America, and other parts
of the world, and assisting them to become worthy
citizens of the Dominion, but the settlement of the
great agricultural plains of the West, which has
brought Britain's great over-sea Dominion before the
eyes of the world, is primarily the result of the building,
development, and operation of the transcontinental
line through a region which before the advent of the
iron horse of civilization was the domain of savages
and buffaloes.
The railway galvanised a sleeping country into
activity. The West was awakened by the touch of
steel. !#!#■
The Goddess of Agriculture had in her goodness
endowed the land with the power to produce grain in
abundance. But she needed the aid of man in making
the land exercise its wonderful power and assume its
heritage as the Granary of an Empire.
The Canadian Pacific, it might be fancied, made
a compact with Ceres. " Do your part in the giving
of crops," they said, " and we will do ours. We will
bring the men, from all the ends of the earth, if need
be, to plough and cultivate the land into productivity."
Ceres replied : " I agree.'*
The Canadian Pacific Railway Company are carrying
out their part of the "compact with Ceres" vigorously. THE MAKING OF A NATION
They have become the biggest homemakers in
Canada. By the establishment of C.P.R. " colonies,"
where the interests and happiness of the settlers
are promoted and jealously guarded by the
Company; by their activities in Great Britain,
Northern Europe and the United States in securing
settlers, not only for their own lands, but for the
Dominion as a whole; and by their co-operation with
the Dominion and Provincial Governments and civic
municipalities in every scheme which has for its object
the progress of Canada and Canadians, they are
worthily fulfilling their pledge.
Lord Shaughnessy has outlined the nature of the
Company's work on behalf of Western Canada and
the settlers therein. ' The ultimate source of wealth/
he said, 'is the employment of human activity upon
natural resources, such as tilling the soil, clearing the
forest, developing the mine. The Canadian Pacific
have, therefore, devoted much of their energy to
facilitating the access of the worker to the raw material
from which he can produce wealth.
' In our modern state of civilization the city,
town, or village is just as necessary to the land as
the land is to the community as a whole. The problem
is to keep the growth of these to their due proportion.
The abnormal growth of city life is a social disease,
which can be cured, but, better still, prevented.
Every state from the dawn of history has grappled
with the problem—Rome, England, France, have
passed and re-passed laws innumerable—in the 112
THE MAKING OF A NATION
endeavour to cure the disease of cities. What the
Canadian Pacific Railway Company are endeavouring
to do in Canada is to prevent the evil, so far as possible,
by providing conditions of settlement which shall
induce the settler to stay upon the land instead of
drifting into the town or city. There are cases where
they have prevailed on the town dweller to go back
to the land, but human nature is such that these cases
are comparatively rare. Pronounced success, however,
has followed the policy of settling practical farmers
from Great Britain, Europe, and the United States
under favourable conditions on Canadian land. In
each of these cases there must have been some feeling
of dissatisfaction with his lot, which resulted in the
emigration from the old home to the new home in
Canada. That dissatisfaction might easily have ended
into emigration from the land to the city. The history
of every civilised nation is full of such cases. The
saving of the farmer for the land, whatever that land
may be, is a service to the human race for which too
little credit has been given to colonizing railways,
such as that which I have the honour to direct.
c It is the Company's belief that the successful and
permanent settlement of western Canada land depends
on the adoption of mixed farming by the settler on
the prairie, and with the object of encouraging mixed
farming the Canadian Pacific have not only carried
on an active educational propaganda, but have established a loan farm policy, under which stock to the
value of $1,000 is loaded on easy terms to settlers THE MAKING OF A NATION
113
experienced in handling stock. In this respect the
Canadian Pacific is ahead of any railway in history ;
indeed, it may be questioned whether any government
has done so much for its agricultural population.
'It is thirty years since the Canadian West was
opened up to settlement by railway construction, and
since then an ever increasing stream of population
has poured in, from eastern Canada, from Europe, and
particularly of recent years, from the United States.
The proximity of the more developed states south
of the line has had considerable effect on the standard
of civilization, and the youngest western Canadian
municipality considers itself behind the times if its
streets are not paved and lighted with cluster lamps.
Banks, schools, churches, and moving picture theatres
are strongly in evidence, and the automobile garage
is as busy as the livery stable. The transcontinental
train service makes rapid connection with the larger
cities, and the settler of to-day on the Canadian prairie
is within almost too easy reach of the allurements
of city life. Indeed, it is the opinion of the competent
judges that the urban growth in western Canada has
been too fast in comparison with the actual settlement,
and that there are more small towns and cities than
the extent of the present agricultural population
justifies. At the same time, it is erroneous to consider
that the desire for a high standard of living and the
high cost of living in the cities is altogether bad for
the farmer. The high standard of living in Montreal,
Winnipeg, and Calgary, for instance, may not interest mtmml
114 THE MAKING OF A NATION
the Canadian wheat farmer, but it has meant substantial profits for the Canadian intensive farmer.
'Paris, in France, is the most notable instance of
the value of a rich, luxurious city to the surrounding
agricultural community, and in the same way the
demands of London for the product of the hotbed has
revivified many a deserted English acre. But the
small town in the Canadian west consists, for the most
part, of middlemen, as the country is as yet too young
and undeveloped to support any industries. These
middlemen depend for their existence principally on
the intensity of agricultural settlement in the neighbourhood, as the farmers are their chief customers
for the goods which they sell. If that neighbouring
agricultural land is but sparsely populated, the cluster
lamps will but light up the deserted store and the
departure ot the bankrupt.
' In order to secure closer settlement on the Canadian
prairies the Canadian Pacific Railway Company,
who are the largest land owners in that region,
have recently made notable conditions attaching to
the sale of their land. In the first place they have
entirely eliminated the speculative holder of land, and
absolutely decline to sell their agricultural lands except
to genuine settlers.
' On the other hand, in the case of genuine settlers
they offer substantial inducements. Land may be
purchased on the instalment system spread over
twenty years. Then there is a loan farm policy,
under which buildings and farm improvements to the THE MAKING OF A NATION 115
value of $2,000 are advanced to the settler, also
repayable over twenty years. In order to encourage
mixed farming live stock to the value of $1,000 is
supplied to those experienced in the handling of live
stock, payment for which is also arranged on easy
terms.
' This policy may seem startling at first sight, but
its benefit to the farming population is obvious. No
longer is it possible for a real estate speculator to
hold up large areas, growing rich on the unearned
increment which accrues to the value of his lands
through the enterprise of genuine settlers alongside.
The settlement now is a close settlement of actual
farmers. Schools are more accessible, churches are
frequented, neighbours are closer. In a word, the
settler on the prairie is no longer subject to isolation,
and the capital which enables him to develop his
farm is supplied to him on easy terms by the Company.
I In addition to the assistance given to new settlers,
the Company, in special cases, each of which is carefully investigated by a committee of railway officials,
help old settlers on the Company's land who have the
elements of ultimate success but have met with temporary misfortune. Thus the Company have on their
books a number of notes and chattel mortgages taken
over from banks and implement-makers, which would
otherwise have foreclosed on the settler owing to delay
in payments.
' " Better Farming " special trains, with competent
lecturers, are run by the Canadian Pacific Railway -____*_
Il6 THE MAKING OF A NATION
in co-operation with the Provincial Governments, and
a model farm at Strathmore, Alberta, serves as a
demonstration farm at which the principles of good
farming on irrigated land are taught to settlers on the
large irrigation block east of Calgary. During the
year 1913 eleven additional demonstration farms were
established in the three prairie provinces, duly
equipped with buildings, and under the care of
experienced farmers.
' When we consider that these operations are spread
over three provinces and are scattered over an area,
roughly, seven hundred miles wide by two hundred
miles deep, the magnitude of the work can, perhaps,
be realized.'
In this work of nation-building the conversion of an
area of three million acres of ranching land into a crop-
yielding territory, supporting a prosperous community,
is a noteworthy achievement.
Southern Alberta has veritably been irrigated into
prosperity. Before the wizard wand of the C.P.R.
was waved over the land the rancher and his cattle
reigned supreme. Now the iarmer is king, paying
homage only to the Company who supply him with
the water of agricultural life—the homage, not of
subjection, but of gratitude.
The work has not yet reached its finality. But that
already accomplished constitutes the system the
largest of its kind on the American continent and
second in the world, From the great Bassano Dam, -I THE MAKING OF A NATION 117
connecting with the Bow River, there radiates a network of canals and ditches, which are as the arteries
of the body corporate, and through which flows the
life-giving fluid from the mountains beyond. In the
establishment of " Ready Made Farms " in Western
Canada for British settlers the Company have laid
the foundations of what will ultimately develope into
an immense colonization project. Indeed, as a
prominent economist has said, the far-seeing statesmanship of the Canadian Pacific is nowhere more
clearly exemplified than in their efforts to stimulate
immigration. ' The direct aim of the Company in
prosecuting this work is to benefit their stockholders.
But in looking after the interests of their proprietors
they are promoting the welfare of the Dominion and
of the British Empire. They are assisting to provide
Canada with what she stands most in need of—
population. They have irrigated a desert into land
that is bearing the richest crops. They are ministering
to the Dominion's political stability through helping to
maintain an equilibrium between the races, and the
constant manifestation of the railway's executive of
a public spirit has done much to earn for the Company
the good will of the people.'
In war, as in peace, the Canadian Pacific Company
have helped valiantly in the cause of Empire. Even
before the railway was completed the Company were
i*nvQ_vecl hi matters military, an4 the story of their Il8 THE MAKING OF A NATION
achievement during the Riel Rebellion, when the
Indian and half-breed population of the Western
plains were in arms against the Dominion Government,
and the scattered white settlements were in dire peril,
is memorable in Canadian history.
The new railway had one hundred and thirty miles
to be completed. William Van Home, recognising
that if the rebellion was to be crushed without disastrous consequences to Canada the soldiers would have
to be conveyed to the scene of insurrection without
delay, offered to the Premier, Sir John A. MacDonald,
to undertake the task of transporting the troops.
" How can you carry men without a railway ? It
is impossible,** answered the Premier.
" Raise the men, and give me a week's notice of
their arrival, and I pledge myself to do it."
" What do you pledge ? " asked Sir John.
" I pledge my word, and, if necessary, my life,"
was the answer.
" Can you do it in a month's time ? " was the next
question.
" I will do it in- eleven days to Fort Qu'Appelle,"
said Van Home. " Send up the men and I only make
one stipulation : I shall carry them up in my own
way, and they are under my direction for transport
and supplies." (" I was not going to have Quartermasters and such-like fussy folks bothering about red
tape and supplies," said Van Home, in describing the
episode.)
' The railway was being built in sections and there THE MAKING OF A NATION 119
were many gaps in it. But the sleds which had
brought four thousand men up to work on the railway
fine were available. Into these Van Home packed
the soldiers like sardines in a barrel. He directed his
own transport, and he took them across the snow
whenever there was a gap in the railway line, and he
reached Qu*Appelle in six days, thus leaving five days
to spare over and above the contract which he had
made,' And the rebellion was crushed.
In the greatest of world wars the Canadian Pacific
Railway Company have proved of immense service
to Canada and to the Mother Land. ' Imperial
in character, international in influence, transcontinental in size, the Canadian Pacific Railway
occupies a premier position in the activities
of this growing country. Therefore, in the
first business of Canada, the successful prosecution
of the war, it is not surprising that the Canadian
Pacific Railway is taking a prominent part. Canadian
Pacific ships are transporting men, munitions, and food
supplies across the Atlantic. In their primary business
of railroading the Company have handled with despatch
their share of the record crop of wheat and grain
from the western prairies, much of which is being sent
to the Allies in Europe. The executive officials and
employees are lending their assistance to the Empire
and to Canada, both on active service and in the
acquisition, manufacture, or transportation of the
various " bullets " that are so necessary to bring to r^~
120 THE MAKING OF A NATION
a successful issue the operations carried on by British
forces/
On the declaration of hostilities, Lord Shaughnessy
was able to offer for the service of the Government
perhaps the most perfect organization of its kind in the
world, an organization controlling fast ships capable of
being converted into armed cruisers and transport on
the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, nineteen thousand miles
of railway track for the transportation of men and
supplies across and from Canada, and a telegraph
system of over one hundred thousand miles of wires.
Three of the Pacific " Empresses " were made into
armed cruisers, and did good work in helping to round
up the elusive German " Emden." Before being
released by the British Admiralty the " Empress of
Russia" steamed eighty thousand miles in seven
months over the Pacific and Indian Oceans and several
of the Company's Atlantic vessels formed part of the
great modern Armadas which brought the Canadian
Expeditionary Forces to England under the watchful
care of the all-powerful British navy.
At the request of the Canadian Government the
Canadian Pacific formed a Railway Construction Corps
for service in Flanders; this corps was described by
the King as one of the finest bodies of men he had
ever seen, and their work at the front has exemplified
their capacity as experts. For the securing of general
war supplies in the Dominion, the Imperial Munitions
Board commissioned the Purchasing Department of
the Company to act on their behalf. THE MAKING OF A NATION 121
In these and other ways the Canadian Pacific have
worked, and worked strenuously, in the service of the
British Empire. In the annals of the Company, the
record of their work during Armageddon will stand
high in a record of great national and Imperial
achievements.
In that mightiest of all the world's structures, the
British Empire, Canada occupies an imposing position,
and the progress of the Dominion automatically adds
to the progress of the Empire. As a leading factor
in the development of British North America, the
Canadian Pacific Railway Company are taking an
important part in the development of the Imperial
fabric.
They are primarily a commercial corporation, with
profit-yielding transportation by land and sea as their
chief function. But in the very nature of their work
they are Empire builders. From the moment of the
driving of the last spike in the transcontinental railway
the Canadian Pacific assumed a status of Imperial
significance. The saving of British Columbia, the
opening of the vast agricultural plains of Western
Canada to settlement, the linking of Canada and
Canada's people from ocean to ocean, the establishment of an all-British highway from Great Britain
to Asia and Australasia, the stimulus to the industrial
activities of Eastern Canada, the widening of the 122 THE MAKING OF A NATION
national horizon—these were the immediate results
of the Company's work.
The development of trade between Canada and the
Mother Country and between the Dominion and her
sister Dominions, the peopling of the prairies with
British citizens, the establishment of the wheat zone—
Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta—as the Granary
of Empire, the securing of a higher place for Canada
among the nations of the world, and the strengthening
of the Imperial family ties—these are among the later
fruits of the Company's activities.
In truth, the history of the Canadian Pacific is a
history of work from which have sprung results of
far-reaching value to Canada and to the Empire of
which it is a part.
The Canadian Pacific Railway, like a rolling snowball,
gathers size with impetus. As the Dominion expands
the Canadian Pacific as an integral and vitally essential
part must grow with it, just as Canada will grow with
the Canadian Pacific ; the country and the corporation
are interdependent.
To that growth no man or woman can state a limit.
The enormous and incalculably rich natural resources
of Canada, only a meagre portion of which has yet
been tapped ; the immensity of her national territory,
comprising in area nearly four million square miles—j
forty per cent, of the area of the British Empire;
her brain, body, and character-buuding climate; her THE MAKING OF A NATION 123
geographical position, midway between Europe and
Asia, and contiguous to the United States of America,
with the Atlantic fronting her shores on the east and
the Pacific on the west; the virility and enterprise of
her people, now numbering only eight million, in a
country with room and scope for two hundred million,
all assure the Dominion in the future a proud position
among the great nations of the world.
In the fulfiling of Canada's national destiny, the
Canadian Pacific will continue, as in the past, to take
a strenuous part. Already the Company are preparing
to render titanic assistance in the solution of the
problems which will come to all nations after the
cessation of strife and a war-scarred world lays down
its death-dealing arms, and the accomplishment of
tasks made bigger by strife.
Canada's share in the work of re-organization and
rejuvenation will be big and the country is fortunate
in possessing a constructive statesman of the calibre
of Lord Shaughnessy, who, in a message which echoed
through the Empire, indicated his recognition ot the
supreme importance of anchoring settlers to the land
—the basis of Canada's prosperity and greatness.
' The future of Canada,' he said, ' depends largely
on the ability with which we handle the incoming
population, the preparedness we make for absorbing
the heterogeneous elements whom we may be called
upon to assimilate after this terrible racial eruption in
Europe. We should be busy now thinking out and
formulating an organization which should place upon 124 THE MAKING OF A NATION
the land, or in the industries for which they are fitted,
with the least possible friction or loss of time, those
individuals or families which come to make a new home
in Canada. In the past we have been too apt to let the
immigrant shift for himself and find his place by
himself. As a result, many a good farm labourer has
been lost to the land, and has helped, in times of
economic stress, to overcrowd our cities. We have said
to the mechanic : " Take the first job that is offered to
you," instead of having a carefully organized labour
bureau which would tell him of the place where his skill
was needed. This war has accelerated many manufacturing activities in Canada, and there is possibility of
a greater demand for highly skilled labour than was
the case when Canada depended more completely on
her agriculture. Even in the case of the immigrant
farmer from Europe, we have not always been ready
with the expert advice which would enable him to
adapt himself without loss of time to his new conditions.
We have let men with invaluable knowledge of intensive
farming go to waste on homesteads remote from
the markets and have not sufficiently posted our
settlers on climatic and soil conditions, the knowledge
of which is essential to their success as Canadian
farmers. We have, as it were, brought seeds and
bulbs and plants from Europe by the ton, and planted
them indiscriminately in a garden which had not been
prepared for them—a method of culture which could
only result in a heavy percentage of waste. There
is so much to be done to develop this Canada of ours, Canada at Play. THE MAKING OF A NATION 125
that any waste of energy should be avoided. We
must conserve that energy just as much as we must
conserve our credit, if our future is to be as great
as all true Canadians hope to see/
' These views,' said a distinguished Canadian publicist, in comment, ' expressed by one so well situated
as he is to put them into practice, are of the highest
importance. They indicate that the President of the
Canadian Pacific is prepared to sweep out of the
path of settlers—especially of those of the West—all
obstacles, political or economic, that stand in the
way of rapid settlement. Lord Shaughnessy, as head
of the Canadian Pacific Railway, can do more even
than the Parliament of Canada to make the settler
happy and prosperous and to insure the growth of
Canada after the war/
With characteristic thoroughness Lord Shaughnessy
has already set to work in solving one of the great
after-war problems—that of the ex-soldier. The
scheme he has formulated in connection therewith is
worthy of the man and worthy of the great corporation over which he presides. ' We have been giving
this question the most careful consideration and have
decided on a comprehensive plan of colonization
which will be the largest of its kind in the history of
the Canadian Pacific Railway/ said Lord Shaughnessy,
in making the official announcement. ' The details
of the colonization plan are being worked out now,
and when I say that it involves the preparation of
perhaps as many as a thousand farms in Western 126 THE MAKING OF A NATION
Canada for occupation in the spring of 1917 alone
the size of our undertaking may be realized.
' Our duty, however, demands that this great
problem be met with the energy that it deserves.
One of the most serious problems facing Canada
to-day is the matter of handling the hundreds of
thousands of returned soldiers after the close of the
war. Their military service will have unsettled and
unfitted many of them for a return to ordinary clerical
and sedentary life and something will have to be done
to enable them to obtain.outside employment. The
problem is further complicated by the fact that
without doubt a very large number of men who will
be mustered out from the British army will want to
emigrate to overseas dominions, and provision must
be made to properly take care of them and colonize
them in suitable employment.
' The problem is one of such magnitude that it must
be faced and solved by the British Government, but
the Provincial Governments and the large Canadian
corporations must also do their part. Realizing that
the crisis must be met and desiring to take their share
of the burden of trying to solve this problem and
assist the men who have fought the battles of the
Empire, the Canadian Pacific Railway Company have
decided to establish in Western Canada colonies which,
for the moment, we are calling Returned Veterans
Colonies, where men who wish to go in for farming
can obtain improved farms on terms which will in
time enable them to become land owners and create The Land of Promise. THE MAKING OF A NATION 127
homes for themselves and families. These colonies
will be given distinctive names, probably with military
associations, and will contain a sufficient number of
families in each to insure social, school, and church
facilities and in each case will include a central instructive farm under a competent agriculturist so that
advice and instruction may be available for the
colonists.
' Our experience in connection with the ready-made
farms has been invaluable and will enable us to avoid
mistakes which are inevitable to new undertakings.
The burden which we propose to carry will be no
light one, as human nature is such that there are
always fault-finders—always square pegs which will
not fit into round holes. We have had such cases
in connection with our ready-made farms, but on the
whole the colonies established under the ready-made
farm scheme have been highly successful; for instance,
Sedgewick, which has a group of settlers of which
Western Canada may well be proud. But we are
prepared to face all the trouble, all the petty annoyances which may occur in connection with this still
greater scheme, realizing that it is our duty towards
the Empire to which we are proud to belong.'
Aided by the European organization of the Company,
which is under the management of Mr. George McLaren
Brown, an ardent Imperialist and enthusiastic advocate and supporter of all causes which have for their
object the binding of the United Kingdom and the
over-seas Dominions in closer relationship, the
wm -—I
128
THE MAKING OF A NATION
Canadian Pacific will thus be a leading factor in the
movement to Canada and settlement therein of
British men, women, and children, when the nations
of the world are again living in harmony.
It is a noble work that lies ahead of the Canadian
Pacific Company—a work fraught with significance
to Canada and to the British Empire. APPENDIX APPENDIX.
CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE.
A STORY IN FIGURES.
The Canadian Pacific Railway is an international
barometer. By the prosperity of the Company is
judged the prosperity of the Dominion. On the
stock exchanges of Europe and America every passing
or permanent phase of Canadian economics and world
politics is depicted in " the latest price of Can. Pacs.,"
in the nomenclature of the market.
The growth of Canada is represented in the growth
of the C.P.R. ' Our railways are prosperous only
when the people at large are prosperous. The
prosperity must begin with the people, and the share
of the railways is a toll upon popular profits. This
toll is earned, because the prosperity of the people
is made possible only by the service of the railways.'
To say that the prosperity of the Canadian people
has been made possible by the Canadian Pacific—
' the chief artery of trade, of commerce and of civilization throughout the Dominion'—is merely to state
an axiom.
130 CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE I3I
In reviewing the financial development of the
Canadian Pacific Railway since its inception, in a
speech made in Montreal at the close of the year
1912, Lord Shaughnessy (then Sir Thomas Shaughnessy) said :—' My mind goes back to the early days
of the Company thirty years ago, when the men who
constituted what was known as " the Syndicate"
undertook to finish what the Government had commenced, that is, the construction of a line across the
continent in Canada. When I first joined the
Company I became general purchasing agent and
afterwards assistant to the general manager and had,
consequently, a somewhat intimate knowledge of the
affairs of the Company, not only the general works
of the Company, but the finances as well, and no one
remembers better than I do the enormous risks which
the Syndicate took in the construction of the transcontinental line. Mr. George Stephen and his
associates staked their entire personal fortunes. At
that time it looked as if their personal fortunes did
not have much chance, and the enterprise had the
appearance that it might not succeed. When the
successful time came there were those who spoke of
the Government subsidies in a not very enthusiastic
manner, and pronounced them unduly liberal, but in
1881 to 1885 the investing world did not view them
in the same light. In those early days it was almost
impossible to secure money for the prosecution of the
work. It was only through the indomitable will and
devotion of the General Manager and Vice-President —«_-_!
132 CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE
of that day, Mr. Van Home, that the work was carried
forward to completion. There were times when they
did not know just where the money was to come from
to carry on the work, but it was the practice of Mr.
Van Home, as he was then, to order five thousand
more men to be sent West and to trust to Providence
to find means of paying the wages.
'In the year 1885, the Canadian Pacific Railway
made a mark in the progress of the Company. Early
that year the line was sufficiently advanced north of
Lake Superior to prove of great assistance in suppressing the Indian Rebellion. When the war broke out
the Canadian Pacific were able to move troops from
the East to the West on Canadian soil, thus saving
what would otherwise have been a long drawn-out,
troublesome, and expensive warfare. That circumstance impressed the people of Great Britain with the
importance of the route, and the attention of the entire
financial world was called to the great possibilities
of the railway which up to that time had not appealed
to their investing instincts.
' For several years the Company had a struggle
in the North-West owing to dissatisfaction, resulting
from what was known as the " monopoly clause " of
the contract, which provided that for a period of
twenty years no other railway could be built between
the Canadian Pacific Railway and the United States
boundary. After much discussion and a good deal of
friction, this monopoly clause was finally cancelled by
the Dominion Parliament, the Government giving as CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE 133
a consideration for it a guarantee of 3J per cent, on
the land grant bonds of the Company to the extent
of $15,000,000, secured by their entire land grant,
and that land grant that is to-day quoted as such a
rich asset was not then considered worth $ 15,000,000,
because the bonds, even with the Government
guarantee, only yielded the Company about ninety
cents on the dollar.
'After the completion of the railway some progress
was made year after year until the serious business
and industrial difficulties of the American continent
in 1893 and 1894 commenced, when a large number
of the most important railways in the United States were
compelled to default on their securities and went into
the hands of the receivers. The Canadian Pacific
Railway did not default, but as a precaution, and with
a view to mamtaining a reasonable reserve, the
dividends were passed for one or two half-years, and
after that, things commenced to look up again.
I It was not until 1902 that the Company began to
receive any important return for the stupendous
efforts and enormous outlay of money made by the
Canadian Government and the Canadian Pacific
Railway Company to attract the attention of the
world to Canada's advantages and to encourage
settlers to come to the Dominion to cultivate the
unoccupied lands. It was in the year 1902 that the
Company started the great forward movement which
has been in continuance ever since/
In reviewing, the progress made during the decade, 134 CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE
the President said that in 1902 the Company had no
Atlantic steamships, but since then they had not only
secured a steamship line on the Atlantic, but had
supplemented the line previously inaugurated on the
Pacific. ' To-day the Company may be considered
as a pre-eminent factor in the North Atlantic Ocean
trade. Our Pacific Coast line is also becoming a very
important feature of the Company's affairs. I
recollect the time when the Company decided upon a
service between Vancouver and Victoria in lieu of the
service provided by what was then known as the
Canadian Pacific Navigation Company. The steamship "Prince Rupert" was built, but the merchants of
Victoria raised such trouble that the Company
abandoned the project. Later the Canadian Pacific
Navigation Company were acquired and rehabilitated,
and every year since the Company have spent more
money in providing new ships than the entire amount
paid for the original fleet.
' With regard to the increased business of the
Company during the past ten years, I have had some
statements prepared that give interesting figures.
During the last year over ten million meals have been
served on the ocean, lake and river steamers, the
dining cars, and in the hotels operated by the Canadian
Pacific Railway, representing an average of about
thirty thousand meals per day, with an annual expenditure of upwards of four million dollars for provisions
and supplies. The orders placed through the purchasing department in 1912, for equipment and CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE 135
supplies required in connection with the business of
the Company will approximate about eighty-five
million dollars, and the pay rolls during the past year
have averaged five million dollars per month.
' Now these figures may be spoken of very glibly.
Indeed, few people who have not got to deal with
them from day to day realize what they mean. To
spend eighty-five million dollars on equipment and
supplies in one year is a big undertaking, and when
you have to hand your paymaster five million dollars
every month to pay your employees you have got
to be pretty prosperous, or you will occasionally be
short of funds. The Canadian Pacific have a great
many men to pay, ninety thousand of them, regularly,
and at times quite twenty thousand more. To pay
ninety thousand men every month naturally requires
a very large sum of money, but fortunately, the
revenue of the Canadian Pacific Railway is such as to
warrant it, and, in addition, to give the Company's
credit such a position in the financial markets of the
world that the vast sums required for capital expenditures are secured with a comparative degree of ease.
* While on the subject of the Company's finances
I should like to say, and truthfully say, that, notwithstanding the vast risk that was taken by the
men who built the Canadian Pacific Railway, and who
were responsible for its construction, not one large
fortune was made out of the affairs of the Company.
Lord Mount Stephen, who, of course, was in the front
rank, was the man of resourcefulness, who was willing 136
CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE
to risk everything; yet his connection with the
Company was a source of distinct financial loss.
Lord Strathcona kept five thousand shares of his stock,
and, of course, he is participating in the advantages
resulting from new issues from time to time. With
that exception, not one single man connected with
the Canadian Pacific Railway Company has made
what might be considered even a reasonable amount of
money from his financial connection with the Company.
It has been an understood thing from the beginning
that no director should either speculate in stock or
should take advantage of any information secured
by reason of his membership on the Board, and in all
my experience there has never been an occasion to
find fault with any member of the Board of Directors
for either speculating in stock or for utilising to his
own advantage inside information that he possessed.
'While I am exceedingly proud, naturally, as we
all are, of the progress the Canadian Pacific Railway has
made as a great transportation company, as a great
developer of territory, and as a great factor of assistance to the Canadian Government in bringing Canada
to the present important position it occupies in the
world, I am still more proud of being able to say that
there has been no taint of graft of any nature or
description. Further, I may say that I have never
found it necessary to ask an officer of the Company
to tender his resignation because he was engaged in
affairs that were not consistent with his duty to the
Company.' CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE
137
In the official financial statement issued by the
Canadian Pacific Railway Company, on June 30th,
1915, the Company's Total Assets were valued at
$931,853,369. Of these the Assets in Property
Investment were valued at $527,793,320, composed
as follows :—
Railway: $349,989,662; Rolling Stock Equipment : $153,595,063; Ocean, Lake and River
Steamers : $24,208,595 ; Total Property Investment: $527,793,320.
The Assets in Acquired Securities, under Schedule
"A," valued at cost, amounted to $111,652,627. Of
this sum all but $7,265,625 represented securities of
leased and controlled fines.
The Assets in Securities of Electric Power and
Light Companies, Collieries, Mining and Smelting
Companies, etc., (" Active "), and in unsold Agricultural Lands, Timber Lands, Coal-rights, Town sites,
Town plots, etc., (" Inactive "), under Schedule " B,"
amounted in value to $131,241,869. These assets,
which exemplify the Canadian Pacific Railway Company's extensive ramifications, as apart from transportation, were composed as follows :—
Active Assets : 26,190 shares Consolidated Mining
and Smelting Company Stock, cost, $712,273;
11,000 shares West Kootenay Power and Light
Company* Common Stock, and 550 shares West
Kootenay Power and Light Company, Preferred 138
CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE
Stock, cost, $517,493; Hull Electric Railway
Company, cost to date of statement, $1,067,602;
Company's Collieries in Alberta and British Columbia
and Company's interest in other producing Coal
Mines, $2,500,000. Total value of Active Assets,
$4,797,368.
Inactive Assets, consisting of Unsold Lands and
Other Properties: Surplus Lands and Bufidings,
available for sale in the Provinces of New Brunswick,
Quebec, Ontario, Manitoba, and British Columbia,
" representing mainly those purchased in excess
of the requirements when securing right of way,
station grounds and shop sites, as being more
economical than a resort to condemnation proceedings," $2,390,360; Agricultural Lands in
Manitoba : 214,339 acres at $10 per acre, $2,143,390.
Agricultural Lands in Saskatchewan: 2,122,131
acres, at $13 per acre, $27,587,703; Agricultural
Lands in Alberta : 3,326,358 acres at $13 per acre,
$43,242,654, also Alberta Railway and Irrigation
Lands (500,000 acres tract, under agreement with
Government), 49,421 acres at $5 per acre, $247,105;
Irrigated Lands in Alberta: Western Section,
43,399 acres at $25 per acre, $1,084,975, Eastern
Section, 419,159 acres at $40 per acre, $16,766,360,
A.R. & I. Section, 31,902 acres at $40 per acre,
$1,276,080, and Land Reserved in Irrigation Blocks
for right of way and operating purposes, 57,357
acres at $13 per acre, $745,641 ; Demonstration
Farms, sixteen, $218,000 ; Timber Lands and Mills ; CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE
J39
Timber and Tie Reserve in British Columbia,
552,360 acres at $4 per acre, $2,209,440 ; A.R. & I.
Timber Limit in Alberta, 45,000 acres at $1.50 per
acre, $67,500; Bull River Mill and improvements,
$100,000; British Columbia: Columbia and
Kootenay Lands, 21,412 acres at $2 per acre,
$42,824 ; Unsold portions of Esquimalt and Nanaimo
Land Grant, 1,097,480 acres, $5,000,000; Unsold
Lands in Townsites : Subdivided Sites in Manitoba.
Saskatchewan, and Alberta, $7,500,000; Unsub-
divided Land adjoining Town Plots in Manitoba,
Saskatchewan, and Alberta, 137,868 acres,
$5,000,000; Unsold Plots in British Columbia,
including Vancouver, $4,500,000; Unsubdivided
Land adjoining Townsites in British Columbia,
including Vancouver, $5,000,000 ; Northern Colonization Railway Land Grant in Quebec, 96,000 acres,
$96,000 ; Coal Lands : 3,000,000 acres of coal-rights,
reserved under land sold and unsold in Alberta, to
be developed on a royalty basis, nominal, $1 ;
46,933 acres of Coal Land in British Columbia, at
$10 per acre, $469,330; Iron Property in British
Columbia, $25,000 ; Natural Gas : Rights Reserved
in 100,000 acres of Land sold and unsold in Alberta
(Revenue from area under lease to June 30, 1915,
$46,002), nominal, $1 ; Petroleum Rights : Rights
Reserved in 50,000 acres of Land sold and unsold
in Alberta, to be developed on a royalty basis,
nominal, $ 1 ; Improved Farms: Buildings and
improvements on Improved (Ready Made) Farms I40 CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE
in Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia.
investment being repaid with land instalments with
interest at 6 per cent., $551,109; Live Stock,
advanced to farmers having land contracts
with Company, on security lien notes, $181,027.
Total value of Inactive Assets: $131,241,869.
The statement of Assets in the Company's balance
sheet, June 30, 1915, also includes, in addition, the
following:—
Advances to Lines and Steamships under Construction : $42,472,295; Advances and Investments,
$10,457,985; Deferred Payments on Lands and
Townsites Sales, $7,431,543; Special Investment
Fund, being security for issue of Note Certificates,
$52,000,000,—$55,870,069, made up thus : Deferred
Payments on Lands and Townsites, $41,328,917,
Government Securities, $10,088,735, Deposited with
Trustees, $4,452,417 ; Working Assets, $44,933,661,
made up thus : Material and Supplies on Hand,
$15,729,605, Cash in Hand, $17,055,270, other
working assets as specified, $12,148,786.
The Total of all Assets, as already stated, amounted
to $931,853,369.
The statement of Liabilities at June 30, 1915, was
as follows:—
Capital Stock: $340,681,921, made up thus,
Ordinary Stock, $260,000,000, and four Per Cent.
Preference Stock, $80,681,921; Four Per Cent. Consoli- CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE 141
dated Debenture Stock, $176,284,882; Mortgage
Bonds, $6,399,180, as follows: Canadian Pacific
Railway First Mortgage 5 percent., $2,749,180, and
Algoma Branch First Mortgage 5 per cent.,
$3,650,000; Note Certificates 6 per cent.,
$52,000,000; Premium on Ordinary Capital Stock
Sold, $45,000,000 ; Current Liabilities, as specified,
$12,552,310; Accrued Liabilities, as specified,
$830,614; Equipment Obligations, $12,780,000;
Reserves and Appropriations, $10,852,465; Net
Proceeds Lands and Townsites, $65,979,356.
Surplus Revenue from Operation, $83,019,483;
Surplus in Other Assets, $125,473,158.
The railway mileage owned, leased, and controlled
by the Canadian Pacific Railway Company at the end
of the fiscal year 1886, amounted to 4,651 miles;
in 1896, 7,251 miles; in 1906, 12,884 miles; in 1915,
18,090 miles.
The railway equipment owned by the Company at
the end of each of the fiscal years, 1886, 1896, 1906,
and 1915 respectively, was:—Locomotives : 372 ; 584
1,109; 2,255. Passenger Cars: 378; 709; 1,207
2,781. Freight and Cattle Cars: 8,253; 15,162
34,152; 87,504. Conductors'Vans: 178; 297; 658
1,424. Boarding, Tool, and Auxiliary Cars and Steam-
Shovels : 71; 554; 1,745; 6,467.
The total amount of freight (including live stock),
carried during each of the fiscal years, 1886, 1896, 142 CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE
1906, and 1915, respectively, was, in tonnage:—
2,046,195; 4,442,055; 13,933,798; 21,490,596.
The number of passengers carried during each of
the fiscal years, 1886, 1896, 1906, and 1915, respectively
was:—1,899,319; 3,029,887; 7,753,323; 13,202,603.
For the fiscal and calendar year, 1886, the gross
receipts amounted in value to $10,081,803 ; the working expenses amounted to $6,378,317 ; the net earnings
amounted to $3,703,486, and the surplus for the
year, after deducting working expenses and fixed
charges, totalled $635,445. The ratio of working
expenses, compared with gross earnings, was 63.26
per cent., and the ratio of net earnings was 36.74
per cent.
For the fiscal and calendar year 1896, the gross
receipts amounted in value to $20,681,597, the working
expenses amounted to $12,574,016 ; the net earnings
amounted to $8,107,581, and the surplus for the year,
after deducting working expenses and fixed charges,
totalled $1,706,773. The ratio of working expenses,
compared with gross earnings, was 60.80 per cent.,
and the ratio of net earnings was 39.20 per cent.
For the fiscal year, 1906 (ending June 30), the gross
receipts amounted in value to $61,669,758; the
working expenses amounted to $38,696,446; the net
earnings amounted to $22,973,312, and the surplus for
the year, after deducting working expenses and fixed
charges, totalled $16,012,215. The ratio of working
expenses compared with gross earnings was 62.75 per CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE 143
cent., and the ratio of net earnings was 37.25 per cent-
For the fiscal year 1914 (ending June 30), the gross
receipts amounted in value to $129,814,823; the
working expenses amounted to $87,388,896; the net
earnings amounted to $42,425,927, and the surplus for
the year, after deducting working expenses and fixed
charges, totalled $29,957,774. The ratio of working
expenses, compared with gross earnings, was 67.32
per cent., and the ratio of net earnings was 32.68
per cent.
For the fiscal year 1915 (ending June 30), during
which Canada, as a Dominion in the British Empire,
was involved in the war, the gross receipts amounted
in value to $98,865,209; the working expenses
amounted to $65,290,582 ; the net earnings amounted
to $33,574,627, and the surplus for the year, after
deducting working expenses and fixed charges, totalled
$21,508,965. The ratio of working expenses, compared
with gross earnings, was 66.04 per cent., and the ratio
of net earnings was 33.96 per cent.
For the fiscal half-year 1916 (July 1st to December
31st, 1915), the gross receipts amounted to $66,470,000,
an increase over those of the fiscal half-year, 1915,
of $10,532,000. The net earnings for the fiscal half
year, 1916, amounted to $29,623,000, an increase of
$9,949,000 over those of the corresponding period of
the preceding fiscal year. The percentage of working
expenses was 55.43, which is 9.40 per cent, below
that of the corresponding period of the preceding
fiscal year. 144 CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE
The following resume of the Company's physical
and financial development is extracted, by courtesy
of Sir Thomas Skinner, Bart., from " The Stock
. Exchange Year Book, 1916." :—
The Canadian Pacific Railway Company incorporated in February, 1881, for the purpose of
constructing a line of railway to connect the seaboard
of British Columbia on the Pacific Ocean with the
railway system of Canada, and of operating the same
for ever. The Dominion Government gave a subsidy
of $25,000,000 in cash, 25,000,000 acres of land, and
sections of railways, some built and others to be
built, to the extent of 713 miles. To compensate the
Company for the extra expense incurred in anticipating
by as much as five years the contract time for the
completion of the road, further assistance was subsequently given by the Government, the most important
being the purchase back, in 1886, of 4,528,676 acres
of the land grant at $1.50 per acre. The Company
now own and lease 13,361 miles and control in all
18,090 miles.
The Company's accounts are made up annually to
June 30th and submitted in Montreal the first Wednesday in October. For 1900-1 and 1901-2 the dividend
was 5% each year ; for 1902-3, 5J% ; for each of the
six years to 1908-9, 6%; and for 1909-10, 6£%;
while additional distributions of 1 % per annum were
made in 1907, 1908, 1909, and 1910, out of the proceeds < CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE 145
of land sales. For 1910-11 the total dividends paid
to the shareholders aggregated 9|% (7% from railway
and steamship earnings, and 2J% from interest on
land sales and from other extraneous assets), and, as
foreshadowed at the Annual Meeting in 1910, and
promulgated in a circular issued to the shareholders
in March, 1911, a plan was formulated by which the
shareholders might in future receive greater advantage
from the extraneous assets of the Company than they
had in the past. The plan involved the separation in
the accounts of the income from the extraneous assets
(consisting of interest on investments, dividends,
rentals and like income) from that from the railway
and steamship fines, the former income being placed
with the interest on the proceeds of land sales, already
kept separate, and together forming a special income
account. For 1911-12, 1912-13, 1913-14 and 1914-15,
the total dividends paid each year were 10%, 7%
being, as regards the first two periods, from railway
and steamship earnings, and, as regards the last two,
from the earnings of the railway alone, and 3% from
such special income (the 10% dividend being paid in
equal instalments about the end of March, June,
September and December). For the year 1914-15
there was a surplus of $89,914 on the earnings of the
railway, and $3,169,332 on special income account,
the total accumulated surplus on both accounts (after
deducting the balance dividends for 1914-15, paid in
October, 1915) being $74,905,845, besides which there
was at June 30, 1915, a " surplus in other assets of 146
CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE
$ 125,473,157," and at the same date there were reserves
for steamship and equipment replacement and for
contingencies aggregating $10,852,465.
In 1902, 1904, 1906, 1908, 1909, 1912 and 1913,
the shareholders had allotted to them at par, as
regards the first four issues, 125% for the 1909 issue,
150% for the 1912 issue and 175% for the 1913 issue,
new shares to the amount respectively, of 3 shares,
2 shares, 2 shares, 2 shares, 2 shares, 1 share and
3 shares, to each 10 old shares held at the time of
issue; the market values of these rights were
equivalent respectively to 3f, 5}, 12, 9, 9J, 8 and 19
per cent, on the holdings in respect of which the rights
were allotted, and the rights of subscription to the
special investment fund note certificates were valued
at $4-5/16 per cent, thereon.
At the Annual Meeting, October, 1913, the President
indicated that the Directors had had under consideration the desirability of conveying the Company's land,
town sites and other interests to a Company in exchange
for all its capital stock to be held in the Company's
treasury and taken into the Balance Sheet with the
other assets, but that there were disadvantages attaching to a conveyance of that description, particularly
with reference to land, and that probably the same
end might be accomplished by the creation of an
Investment Fund to be administered by trustees, and
he stated that in any event the Directors would
endeavour before the publication of the next annual
report to devise some plan for re-constructing the CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE I47
Special Income account, and showing the extraneous
assets in more definite and tangible form. In
redemption of that promise the earnings from ocean
steamships now appear in the Annual Report in
Special Income account, as also do the proceeds from
town-site sales and the net earnings of Pacific Coast
steamships, the commercial telegraph, the news
department and the hotels; and the extraneous
assets, consisting of collieries, shares in mining,
smelting, light and power companies, unsold agricultural,
irrigated timber and town site lands, coal, natural
gas and petroleum rights, and demonstration and
improved farms, etc., appear in the Balance Sheet
under the head " Other Assets : Schedule B." (at
June 30th, 1915, $131,241,869). The report for
1913-14 stated, with regard to the issue of Special
Investment Note Certificates, that $35,571,960 had
been advanced from current funds to meet the cost
of additional mileage and ocean steamers, against
which no securities had been issued or sold; that,
in the ordinary course, 4% debenture stock would
have been issued to meet the expenditure, but that,
market conditions having been unfavourable for
selling that security in large amounts, the Directors
decided to create a Special Investment Fund composed
of the deferred payments on land already sold, and
securities in which land funds had been invested
aggregating $55,000,000, and to issue against that
fund and the Company's credit, ten-year Note
Certificates to the amount of $52,000,000, carrying *+m+\\
148
CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE
interest at 6 per cent, per annum, to be offered to the
shareholders at 80%. In December, 1913, a circular
was issued to shareholders of record on December 23,
containing the terms of the issue (see below), accompanied by subscription warrant entitling them to
subscribe for $100 Note Certificates in respect of each
five shares held. The Note Certificates with interest,
are to be paid off in instalments without any encroachment on the revenue from traffic, and the 4% Consolidated Debenture Stock can be marketed when most
advantageous.
All the outstanding 5 per cent. First Mortgage Bonds
were retired in 1915, and the capital is as under, all
the issues, except the Special Investment Fund Note
Certificates and the equipment obligations being quoted
in the official list:—
$260,000,000 Shares of $100 in certificates of various
amounts. Included in this total are the
above-mentioned allotments, offered for
subscription at par for the issues of
1902-8 inclusive, at 125 per cent, for the
1909 issue, 150 per cent, for the 1912
issue, and 175 per cent, for the 1913 issue,
and all were made payable in five equal
instalments, the amounts of the issues
being as follows : $19,500,000 in 1902 ;
$16,900,000 in 1904; $20,280,000 in
1906; $24,336,000 in 1908; $30,000,000
in 1909; $18,000,000 in 1912, and
$60,000,000 in 1913. The authorised CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE 149
share capital is $335,000,000, the amount
having been increased in October, 1914,
from $260,000,000; no portion of the
additional capital is to be issued until
after the sanction of the shareholders has
been obtained at a special meeting called
for the purpose. The dividend dates are
January 1, April 1, July 1, and October 1.
Share Registers are kept in London, New
York and Montreal, that in New York
being in charge of the branch there of
the Bank of Montreal. Shares on any one
register may be transferred to any other
register. For obtaining New York or
Montreal certificates in exchange for
discharge warrants the London office
charges 2d. a share; and for effecting
transfers on the New York or Montreal
register and obtaining new certificates
the charge is 2d a share, with the addition,
in the case of the New York register, of
ld. a share, New York State transfer
tax, and ld. a share Federal transfer
tax; and in the case of the Montreal
register ld. a share Province of Quebec
Transfer tax. Shares on the London
register are transferable on common
forms, which require the J per cent,
stamp on the consideration paid; fee
2s. 6d. per deed, Holders of shares on i5o
CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE
the London register receive cheques on
London for dividends at the rate of
4s. ljd. per dollar. Voting power, one
vote for every share.
£16,578,477 Preference Stock 4 per cent. Non-cumulative. The dividend is payable April 1
and October 1 in respect of the periods
to December 31 and June 30, by warrant
from the Company's London office,
where stock is transferable in multiples
of £1 ; transfer form, common, fee
2s. 6d. per deed ; separate deed required
for each class of security. Voting power,
one vote for every £20. The amount of
this stock may not exceed one-half the
ordinary stock outstanding.
£750,000 Algoma Branch 5 per cent. First Mortgage
Bonds of £1,000, £500 and £100 each,
issued by Messrs. Baring Brothers & Co.
(now Baring Brothers & Co., Limited),
8, Bishopsgate, E.C, in January, 1888,
at 98J per cent. Coupons are payable
January 1 and July 1, and the bonds
mature July 1, 1937, all payments being
made by Baring Bros. & Co., Ltd., at
the above address. The bonds may be
deposited with Baring Brothers, who
give a receipt therefor and remit the
half-yearly interest by cheque, a charge CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE 151
of J per cent, being made on depositing
the bonds. Such deposited bonds are
given up on the surrender of the receipt
properly discharged.
£36,222,921 Perpetual 4 per cent. Consolidated Debenture Stock. Interest is payable January
1 and July 1 by warrant from the
Company's London office, where stock
is transferable in multiples of £1 ; transfer
form, common; fee 2s. 6d. per deed;
separate deed required for each class of
security.
$52,000,000 Special Investment Fund Note Certificates
of $20, $100, $500 and $1,000 each,
issued in February, 1914, to the shareholders in the proportion of $100 of
certificates for each $500 of share capital.
These notes carry interest at 6 per cent,
and are specially secured on the
" Canadian Pacific Railway Company's
Special Investment Fund" which at
June 30, 1915, amounted to $55,870,068.
The certificates are guaranteed both as
to principal and interest by the Canadian
Pacific Railway Company. Interest is
payable March 2 and September 2 by
warrants sent to the registered owners
and the certificates are to be redeemed at
their face value not later than March 2,
1924, but the Trustee (The Royal Trust 152 CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE
Company, Montreal), and the Company
may at their discretion from time to
time redeem by drawings whenever there
is sufficient money in hand for the
purpose. Notice of the Note-Certificates
drawn will be given by advertisement in
London, Montreal and New York twice ,
a week for four weeks and they will be
paid with interest accrued thereon on
presentation at the Company's bankers
at these places within sixty days of the
first publication of the notice. The whole
of the issue was in the first instance
placed on the New York register, but
purchasers were given the option of
having their allotments registered in
Montreal or London. The New York and
Montreal register certificates have a
transfer and power of attorney endorsement which when signed in blank by the
registered proprietor renders them transferable by delivery. The London
register certificates are transferable by
deed only, stamped with duty at
the rate of 10s. per cent. Transfer
form, common; fee 2s. 6d. per deed.
The charge made by the London office,
for transmitting Note-Certificates to New
York or Montreal for transfer is 2d. per
100 dollars or fraction thereof, and a CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE 153
further payment of ls. New York
Power of Attorney tax has to be paid in
respect of each transfer endorsement,
dated between December 1, 1914, and
December 31, 1915, inclusive. Interest
warrants are mailed from New York to
holders on the London register in time
to reach them on or about the due dates ;
and to those in Europe registered on the
New York and Montreal registers about
the same dates. European holders can
negotiate their warrants at the Bank of
Montreal, 47, Threadneedle Street,
London, E.C.
; 12,780,000 Equipment Obligations.
The Land Grant—In addition to the original grant of
25,000,000 acres, the Company have received
through their branch and subsidiary lines grants
to the amount of 9,816,202 acres: in January,
1911, 102,174 acres in the irrigation belt were
acquired from the Hudson's Bay Company at
$13J per acre; and in 1912, 209,559 acres were
acquired from the Alberta Railway and Irrigation
Company.
In the accounts for the year 1913-14 the land
accounts appear in new form, the unsold lands now
valued, as stated above, being included in the Balance
Sheet among " other assets '* schedule B, together
amounting at June 30, 1915, to $131,241,869 and in
the Balance Sheet under the heading " Special In- 154 CANADIAN PACIFIC FINANCE
vestment Fund/' appear as assets the deferred payments on land and town sites, Government securities,
etc., which have been set apart to meet the interest on
the Special Investment Fund Note-Certificates and
the principal of the issue at maturity. The deferred
payments on land and town sites not so hypothecated
are shown separately. The unsold acreage, amounting
at June 30,1915, to 8,214,186 acres, is valued at prices
ranging from $40 to $1 per acre ; the directors and
the officers of the land department are satisfied that
these lands will eventually command much higher
prices on the average than those given.
The sales of agricultural land in the year to June
30, 1915, were 231,297 acres for $3,742,115, being an
average of $ 16.17 per acre. Included in this area were
6,550 acres of irrigated land, which fetched $55.22
per acre, so that the average price of the balance was
$15.04 per acre. (In 1886, the average price paid to
the Company for purchased land was $3.28 per acre ;
in 1896, $3.51 per acre ; in 1906, $5.84).
Companies forming part of the Canadian Pacific
System, but retaining their original titles in the
London Stock Exchange:—Alberta Railway and
Irrigation, Atlantic and North West, Calgary and
Edmonton, Dominion Atlantic, Manitoba Southwestern, Nakusp and Slocan, New Brunswick, Ontario
and Quebec, Quebec Central, St. Lawrence and Ottawa,
and Toronto, Grey and Bruce.
Other Companies controlled but not leased:—
Duluth, South Shore and Atlantic, and Minneapolis,
St. Paul and Sault Ste. Marie. Ill
rfr?£$/C>
c I """@en, "Illustrated\"
Originally published: 1916"@en ;
edm:hasType "Books"@en ;
dcterms:identifier "HE2810_C2_M6_1920"@en ;
edm:isShownAt "10.14288/1.0056059"@en ;
dcterms:language "English"@en ;
edm:provider "Vancouver : University of British Columbia Library"@en ;
dcterms:publisher "London : W. Stevens"@en ;
edm:currentLocation "Rare Books and Special Collections"@en ;
dcterms:rights "These images are provided for research and reference use only. Written permission to publish, copy or otherwise use these images must be obtained from Rare Books & Special Collections http://www.library.ubc.ca/spcoll/"@en ;
dcterms:source "University of British Columbia. Library. Rare Books and Special Collections. HE2810.C2 M6 1920"@en ;
dcterms:subject "Canadian Pacific Railway Company"@en, "Railroads--Canada--History"@en, "Canada--Description and travel"@en ;
dcterms:title "The story of the Canadian Pacific Railway"@en ;
dcterms:type "Text"@en ;
dcterms:description ""@en .