diff options
| author | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-14 19:57:34 -0700 |
|---|---|---|
| committer | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-14 19:57:34 -0700 |
| commit | 731ffdf99ea3a40d11888deec112bda6d562dd31 (patch) | |
| tree | 1f76e56db40af2f14cdbd0804a7c488c4d342a88 | |
| -rw-r--r-- | .gitattributes | 3 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 32409-8.txt | 8383 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 32409-8.zip | bin | 0 -> 182144 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 32409-h.zip | bin | 0 -> 185711 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 32409-h/32409-h.htm | 11045 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 32409.txt | 8383 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 32409.zip | bin | 0 -> 182077 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | LICENSE.txt | 11 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | README.md | 2 |
9 files changed, 27827 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/32409-8.txt b/32409-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..711323a --- /dev/null +++ b/32409-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8383 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Seeds of Pine, by Janey Canuck + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Seeds of Pine + +Author: Janey Canuck + +Release Date: May 18, 2010 [EBook #32409] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SEEDS OF PINE *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + + + + + +SEEDS OF PINE + + +_By_ + +JANEY CANUCK + + +Author of + +"Open Trails", etc. + + + + "_A handful of pine-seeds will cover mountains + with the green majesty of the forest, and I, too, + will set my face to the wind and throw my + handful of seed on high._" + --_Fiona Macleod_ + + + + +TORONTO + +THE MUSSON BOOK COMPANY LIMITED + + + + +Copyright, Canada, 1922 + +THE MUSSON BOOK COMPANY, LTD. + +PUBLISHERS + +TORONTO + + + + + _Affectionately dedicated to + my four brothers;_ + + _Thomas R. Ferguson, K.C. + Gowan Ferguson, M.D. + Harcourt Ferguson, K.C. + Honourable Mr. Justice W. N. Ferguson_ + + + + +CONTENTS + + +Chapter + + I WESTWARD WITH THE GRAND TRUNK PACIFIC + II A FRONTIER POST + III TO THE BUILDERS + IV BEHIND THE HILLS + V THE END OF STEEL + VI BITTER WATERS + VII MOTORING TO ATHABASCA LANDING + VIII COUNTRY DELIGHTS + IX AT THE LANDING + X ON THE ATHABASCA RIVER + XI SOME NORTHERN PIONEERS + XII AT THE PARTING OF THE RIVERS + XIII ON THE PORTAGE + XIV ON THE LESSER SLAVE RIVER + XV THE BISHOP OF THE ARCTIC + XVI NORTHERN VISTAS + XVII A COUNTRY WOMAN AT THE CITY RACES + XVIII IN NORTHERN GARDENS + XIX COMMUNING WITH THE RUTHENIANS + XX THE SHADOW OF THE SCAFFOLD + XXI THE BABOUSHKA + XXII THE HERO PRIESTS OF THE NORTH + XXIII COAL-MINING IN ALBERTA + XXIV THE PLAYGROUNDS OF THE WEST + XXV THE OVERLAND TRAIL OF '98 + XXVI A SONG OF THIS LAND + + + + +SEEDS OF PINE + + +CHAPTER I + +WESTWARD WITH THE GRAND TRUNK PACIFIC + +"'What went ye out into the wilderness to see?' They answered thus, +'So that we might not see the city.'"--SIR WILLIAM BUTLER. + + +The new steel trail the railway men are laying from Edmonton leads away +and away, I cannot say whither. For these many days I have had an +anxious desire to follow it and the glories thereof. I am tired of +this town and of the electrical devices that appear and re-appear in +the darkness like eyes that open and shut--wicked eyes that burn their +commercial message into my very soul. I am sick of these saucy, +swaggering streets and of sundry of the townspeople. Come you with me +and let us travel down the ways through the heart of the summer! We +shall have breeze and sun in our eyes, and breeze and sun in our +hearts. If you like not the prospect, pray, come no further, for we be +contrary the one to the other and no way-fellows. + +As we climb on the train this morning, it seems as though our quest for +quiet is to be cheated by the wallowing wave of humanity that threatens +to submerge us. Who are these close-nudged folk and whither away? + +She who runs may read them for hard-headed, white-handed men in search +of "prospects"; brown-throated homesteaders; real-estate agents out for +talking points and for snap fortunes; mining engineers with dunnage +bags--young fellows all in the full force of life--these, and "the +gang," who are ill-looking men and rather dirty. The gang fare forth +to work on the railway grades. They are always ganging--that is +going--for the words are strictly synonymous. The gang going to the +city meet the gang coming out. And so in everything they are +retroactive, and fight much, and swear, to give weight to their +differences of opinion. In one thing only is the gang agreed, no navvy +has yet been found who disputed the axiom that the Boss is a yellow +canine. + +There is a sprinkling of women, too, and we talk to each other in the +friendly manner of the country. A couple of them are half-breed girls, +with drooping feathers and skirts that have a hiss. Surely their men +are industrious Indians. Both are cinched into their clothes like a +cayuse into its pack-saddle. Both have skin the colour of brown coffee +into which milk has been poured, and always they are fussing with their +pinned-on curls. "The judicious Hooker" once watched some women doing +this, and he said they were "a-dilling and burling their hair." No one +may ever hope to strike out a more apt expression. The younger of the +girls has an indiscreet mouth and desirous eyes. I should not be +surprised, if one of these times our little brown woman found these to +be a mortgage on her soul somewhat difficult of discharge. And the +usury, little woman, it troubles me, the usury! + +The farmer's wife who shares my seat came to this province ten years +ago from the United States. Her husband made entry for a homestead and +she built the house, outbuildings, and fences on it, and bought the +implements with money she had saved from school-teaching. The first +year, their crop was frozen; the second, it was hailed out; and the +third, a spark from the threshing-machine burned their wheat stacks. +Their horses died and they had to incur debt for others. All this +time, the woman supported the household with the returns from her +poultry yard and dairy. These last years have been fat ones, thus +enabling them to save sufficient money to send two of their sons to the +business college in Town. The eldest girl is walking with the young +man on the adjoining farm and a wedding is brewing. + +To my thinking, this homely, ill-accoutred woman is something like a +heroine, and it is a pity the end of her troubles is not yet. Her +husband, who appears to be a flabby-spirited fellow, has always wanted +to, and has finally decided that he will sell the farm and go to the +town to keep a boarding-house. She is opposed to the move and has been +in the town endeavouring to protect her interests in the property, but +finds she is unable so to do. Because of this she has decided to buy +the farm from him and has the agreement ready for his signature. I am +astounded by her hardihood. She has the soul of a warrior. If the +recalcitrant spouse refuses to sell--no, I won't tell what she intends +doing, for I am willing to wager you, even to the half of my kingdom, +that he sells. + +The woman is proud, I can see, and accordingly careful to enlarge on +her man's good qualities, but it takes no acuteness to read through her +assurances that he is a pessimist and one who always draws tails in the +toss of life. + +The readers who have come with me thus far may here swing off key, but, +People Dear, you would be wrong; she is not chastising him; she is +mothering him. It is a remarkable trait in the make-up of a good woman +that she can, in critical junctures, not only be her own mother but may +also act in this capacity to the husband of her children. It is this +same office the Holy Ghost performs in the Trinity. + +The newsy is giving the last call to breakfast. He is a full-lifed +young man, with a cock-o'-my-walk air. I would not be surprised if he +were hatched out of the egg of a pouter-pigeon. He serves meals as far +as Edson, from whence we will be transferred to a construction train +and trust to manna being rained down from heaven. His tables are +crowded with guests, and we sit close like kernels on an ear of corn. +For breakfast, there is tea; there is coffee; there are pork chops, and +other fat foods which are made palatable by the sprightly addition of +sour pickles. Indeed, you may credit me, this breakfast is not one to +be sniffed at. I drink pannikins of tea that is very strong and green, +and fearlessly ask for more. If there is a happier woman in the North +than myself, I have never heard of her. I quite agree with you; our +pouter-pigeon serves the public far more effectually than do the +cabineteers, or even the bishops. + +We are yet in the wheat belt and the wheat is at flood-tide. When I +see a large stand of grain that is breast-high I say, "Well done, Good +Fellows!" and "Haste to the in-gathering!" The field hears my +salutation to the sowers and bows a million heads to me. And it says, +_shibboleth! shibboleth!_ (If you would pick up the talk of the fields +you must be still and listen.) + +The Hebrews, with ears a-tilt, caught this whisper, and so their word +for an ear of wheat was "shibboleth." It was this word the Ephraimites +lisped and so betrayed themselves to Jephthah. The difference was only +one of an aspirate. What they said was sibboleth. + +Now, while one can tell the sound of ripe wheat, no word is exactly +descriptive of the odour thereof. When I am not tired my pen almost +catches it. The odour is an intangible something between dryness and +colour, and the sign that expresses it can only be revealed. + +It is the mental habit of people to think of wheat as only so many +bushels of inert matter that is bought and sold on margins by half-mad +men, whereas, in all the world, wheat is the thing most richly alive. +It won't die, not for thousands of years. We would put jars of wheat +in the corner-stones of our state buildings, even as the Egyptians +buried it in tombs of rock. It is the only food we could pass down the +centuries to posterity, and apart from its scientific value, there is +little doubt posterity would appreciate the gift infinitely more than +those stupid name-lists of still stupider people. The grain should be +of the highest grade, with the name of the grower and the exact +location of his farm added thereto. + +Yes! let us tuck away these northern wheat grains till England becomes +a republic; the United States a kingdom; and until the yellow peril has +turned white. Let us lay them safely aside for that day when labour +and capital have become one, or till a still later epoch when instead +of sex in soul, there shall be soul in sex. Then take them out, +Posterity, and crush them into a sacramental wafer that all the world +may eat of it as a loving pledge from the twentieth century. + +If you think this too long to wait, perhaps you will recall that while +the seven sleepers slept, Cæsar was superseded by Christ. Now, the +time they slept was for the lives of three men. + +In handling wheat, you have doubtless noticed that it is not only alive +but possesses a markedly developed will-power. It is ever resisting +conquest. They tell me that in the part of the exchange called the +pit, you cannot beat back wheat. Some men have succeeded for a while, +but always it has rolled in and smothered its erstwhile victors. Try +to hold a handful and the task is well-nigh impossible. It slides +through your fingers and causes your palm to open involuntarily. It +wearies a man to hold wheat tightly for long. Oats may be held and +other cereals, but not wheat. Its tendency is to fall to the ground +and reproduce. Thus, it is age-old but still eternally young. It is +the true Isis and no one has lifted its veil. I tell you men, there is +something uncanny and almost wicked about a thing that refuses to die, +and it so small as a grain of wheat. + +As a whole, this country is not beautiful, but now and then, there come +striking pictures. Here are pleasing lakelets a-flush with ducks; tall +cotton-woods which I name the maidens because of their fluffy +hair--these, and lush meadows, over which range regiments of asters, +sunflowers, and yarrow. It is a magic lantern fantasia with an +occasional muskeg to represent the waits between views. On the muskegs +the trees are so thin and straight they fairly scratch your eyes. + +Oh! but it is hot this day, and every leaf seems a green tongue thrust +out with thirst. The sun is making amends for his insulting reticence +of last winter. The Indians call him Great Grandfather Sun, but why, I +do not know. + +The houses of the homesteaders are built of poplar lumber, +weather-stained and ugly. Others are of logs chinsed with mud and +moss. All are small and favourable neither for hospitality nor +reproduction. Some day, when a large acreage is under crop, pretty +bungalows with brave red paint, will edit the scene as in the older and +more settled districts of the north. + +At every station, land seekers get out and disappear into the trees as +if the country ate them up, and, indeed, I am not so sure but it does. + +A baby gets off too--a new baby that has come from the city hospital is +being brought home. You would fancy a baby was a miracle the way the +men look at it and ask questions. Her name is Annette. She was born +on duck-day. Her father works in a saw-mill. We crowd to the window +to watch him meet Annette, for we would see the gladness on his face. +He is an admirably strong man, with the hard sinews of a wolf. He has +surely gone through the mill to some effect. I think he likes Annette, +but he looks most at the small mother and he has the mate tone in his +voice. + +The women ask me concerning my husband, and I say, "Oh yes! I have a +husband up here, somewhere--a big, fair man--I wonder if you have seen +him." + +They are discreetly silent, but I can see they are hoping I'll catch +him. This is not a case of duplicity on my part but rather of +kindness. It is one's stoutest duty to convey colour and snippets of +gossip of women, who, for the long winter months to come, are to remain +in these wilds. You must understand that gossip is not wicked up +North. Besides, this word actually means a sponsor at baptism--an +office recognized by all the world as one of unimpeachable +respectability. + +At Wabamun there is a great sweep of forest, but, a year ago, a great +fire raged here and large patches of burnt trees assault the eyes. +Hitherto, the homesteaders have had a two-handed harvest, one from +their lovely lake and the other from the land, but, nowadays, their +richest harvest comes from the summer tourists, who are building up a +popular resort at this point. Summer girls are trespassing on the +berry-patches, once the sole preserve of Indian maidens, and Ole +Larsen's fishing grounds are full open to sailing yachts and electric +launches. Such fish as Ole could catch, and such fish as his Frau +could cook! Always, I bowed my head over my plate and said the Indian +grace, "Spirit, partake." Ole can tell where the fish are to be found +in certain seasons by the movements of the birds. The fish feed on +flies and rise to the surface for them, whereupon a t gull or duck will +fall with plummet-like pounce. White-fish bite in the autumn. +"Yumping yiminy, dey yust do." + +The remains of the railway construction camps have almost disappeared, +and only the bleached bones of horses mark out the long trail of the +grading gangs. + +Here are the grades I descended a couple of years ago while prospecting +over this ground. What slopes these are to put a horse down. They are +like those described at St. Helena, upon which you might break your +heart going up or your neck coming down, with the additional risk of +being arrested as a trespasser. On this place where we once ranged for +coal-rights, the real-estate agents have sub-divided the surface into +desirable building lots, that sell from three to five hundred dollars +the lot. + +One day, this lake shore will be a hive of industry, for deep in her +loins Mother Earth had hutched her riches of coal and fire-clay, and, +mayhap, more minerals that are precious. Once, in drilling here, our +men came upon black sand with a showing of gold, but it petered out, +after a couple of inches. It was with great difficulty they were +persuaded to go on with the drilling instead of going to town to file +on claims. + +Already there are several towns along this lakefront--that is to say, +towns consisting of three or four tents or houses. In the earlier days +of the North each settlement was commenced with a fort, now it is begun +with a railway station. The next building to be erected is the station +agent's house, which is quickly followed by a restaurant, and a general +store with a post-office. This is the axis from which the homesteaders +radiate into the surrounding country, and, presto! before you know it, +there is a bank, an implement shop, a church, a hotel, and the other +conveniences of modern civilization including mortgages. + +Already you may see trails like long black welts across the +land--trails that appear to fare forth without any preconceived plan +and to hold a lure in their far reaches for happy-go-idlers like you +and me. There is no telling what we might find on them a goodish way +off. The only straight trails made in this North land are made by the +engineers, and as you look down the lines you may readily see that they +lead into the sky. I like greatly the unthanked, unknown engineers who +beat out these paths for the people who are to come after. No trumpets +herald their coming, or announce the leagues they have herded behind, +but I tell you these fellows are a commonwealth of kings, and we may as +well stop here for a moment and stand at salute. + +And after the engineers came the builders with their sinews of steel to +bind the trail. It is this steel strength that makes the land to bud +and blossom. It is creative. Well and truly has a builder said that +the land without population is a wilderness, and the population without +land is a mob. Yes! it is a steel idol we worship in this country and +not one of gold, and we do refuse to grind it to powder and drink +thereof, no matter what any Moses or Aaron may say. + +This last hour I have been in mind-to-mind talk with a young Englishman +who does not think much of Canada. He speaks of our dismal +respectability, our tombstone virtues, and our provincial +small-mindedness. We call our gardens yards, and have no manners to +speak of. Indeed, nothing but a major operation could remedy our +boorishness. + +Now, all he says is quite true _but I don't believe it_; besides, his +English-sure way of summing us up is irritating to my sense of +patriotism. + +In some places up here he has had to sleep in puppy's parlours, which +means with his clothes on. This must have been uncomfortable in that +he still wears leather puttees which are the true hall-mark of men from +the British Isles. He talked about our cold winters and how unbearable +they were, just as if the cold were not the sepia the North shoots +forth to protect herself from joyous loafers. I did not say this, for +one cannot be polite and patriotic at the same time, and it is well to +be polite ... only I remarked that one of these cold days we will shut +off the Gulf Stream instead of sending it out to heat up England. + +I have no doubt he has private means, for he has travelled widely and +is a well-educated man. He came here to have a go at homesteading. +"Have you succeeded?" I ask. He does not reply except to ejaculate, +"Farming--my hat!" whereupon we both laugh, he at the Canadians and I +at the English. + +The average youth from England finds it trying to be stripped of +precedent, and there is nothing approximating Canadian homestead life +in London. We too often forget this and so fail to make allowances for +his prejudices and lack of adaptability. Our government mounts him and +puts his foot in the saddle, but he must set the pace himself. One can +hardly expect the government to do more, but yet, it seems a pity so +much excellent material is annually lost to the Dominion because we +have not the time or means to work it up. It will take some years to +manipulate the crude European immigrants into the mental and physical +trim of this Britisher and to inculcate them with equally high +political standards. We do not recognize this, or maintain an easy +passivity to it, until at some election crises our hearts fail us for +fear because of the preponderance of the foreign vote in educational +and moral matters. + +And the Englishman and I speak of subjects of grave import, and of how +it is not seemly that we trade too freely with foreign peoples +(especially with the States of the American Union), neither is it loyal +to our most Christian King, George V. "Wealth at the expense of +loyalty is not a thing to be desired," says the Englishman, "and +Colonials do well to preserve the integrity of the Empire," to which +dictum I make no reply, not being able to gainsay him. I could wish +though that he tell me how we are to avoid so doing. + +This dear lad would go into literary work if we read anything in Canada +besides statistics, sporting news, and crop forecasts. In the +contemplation of our sordid practicability, he is lost in astonishment. +"No, madam, I shall not do it, and I shall tell you my reason," says +he. "If you write with a sense of life or colour along will come some +weighty, grim fellows whose business it is to write stock +quotations--leaden creatures, believe me--and they will distinctly +sniff and sneeze out the word 'impressionistic,' by which they mean +fanciful. Sons of bats! If once they tried to frame an impression in +black and white they might have some proper comprehension of the word. +Any uncouth man can state facts, but it is the telling what the facts +stand for that hurts. A coarse man cannot take impressions except from +a closed fist, which impression he would probably describe as a 'dint +in the pro-file.' Such an one hears no farther than his ears, +although, in not a few cases, this might be no inconsiderable distance." + +"No, I will not become the local _littérateur_," continues the lad, "to +be received by the community with a mingling of pride and sarcasm. I +tell you what I will do: it is better to be a real-estate broker, in +that all conditions tend to what you Colonials call 'a dead sure +thing.' It is the only business in which a man reaps where he does not +sow. I will surely be a real-estate man. This I will be." + +We are come to Edson now--the terminus of the passenger route--but I am +going to describe it in another chapter, for it would be ungrateful to +bulk it with other events because of the sense of adventure I enjoyed +from my visit thereto. + + + + +CHAPTER II + +A FRONTIER POST. + +The new world which is the old.--TENNYSON. + + +Have I told you about Edson and its prospects? No! ah, well, never +mind, I shall do so by and by, when I have talked to the citizens. + +While biding my time for a seat at the lunch-counter, I will walk up +and down the station platform. Every minute men are arriving to await +the out-going train to the city. They come and come, apparently from +nowhere, till there are quite a hundred of them. Of course, they +really come from up the street (I should have said from the streets, +for there are two, or, perhaps, three streets), having recently arrived +from the grading camps somewhere up in the mountains. We are going +there to-morrow, or maybe the next day, and then we shall see the +habitat of these battling, brown-throated fellows who nose the stream +of flesh-pots and feed on hunks of brawn. + +The men philander about, or sit on the platform planks, and loll lazily +against the sun-warmed wall. They count their money, smoke, and talk, +but on the whole they are quiet. Also they stare at me like they were +gargoyles and whisper the one to the other. This is not because of +rudeness--not at all! Even the white armoured Sir Galahad would find +it difficult to be knightly in the circumstances. For months they have +done naught save stake out and measure up, shovel gravel, dig ditches, +set transits, sweat and swear, for a railway, you may have heard, is +built with heavier implements than batons, pens, or golfsticks. No +woman has come near them except certain will-o'-the wisps whom the +Mounted Police did straightway turn back to town. Their lives have +been filled full of contest, hardship, and loneliness, so that every +mother's son desires, above all else, that some woman (she may be +either saint or sinner) put her hands upon him and tell him he is a +truly fine fellow and worthy to be greatly loved. This is why they +will give her all their money and not because they are of the earth +very earthy. + +Do you waggle your head at me! Do you? Then I care not a straw. It +only means you do not comprehend the ways of men at our frontier posts. + +Some men are here preparing to take the wagon trail to Grand Prairie in +the Peace River District. This trail, they tell me, is one hundred and +fifty miles long, and may be traversed in six days, a journey which +from other points formerly took as many weeks. Hitherto, it has seemed +the faraway edge of the world, a place for none save the adventurous +blooded and sturdy, but in this day it seems to lie at our very door, +for, in the North, one hundred and fifty miles is merely a stone's +cast. In the spring, fifteen thousand homesteads will be thrown open +for entry, so that presently it will seem that all creation is trekking +this way. + +And why not? It requires no fore-vision to know that the land has a +future above anxiety. Up this trail there is a new world to be +possessed, an unequalled empire, in which men may go hither and yon as +they please. It gives my feet a staccato movement to think of it. +Some city folk there are who might fear the trail, but this were +foolish. It is good to ride on a long trail and laugh out loud for +sheer joy. On the trail, the ear of Society is closed and there are +smoked goggles on her eyes. + +I have been talking to a stripling from Nova Scotia, who has been here +these four months. When first he came, there were but three girls in +the village; now, there are eighteen. As a result of this increased +immigration, the weekly dance is better attended and is more amicable. + +Besides his outfit, this Nova Scotian is taking in a year's provision +to his homestead, and so has been working to secure a sufficiency of +money. He hopes to get a steading that will one day become a town +site. This is the dream of every northern farmer: it is the gold at +the foot of the rainbow. Perhaps, my Boy o' Dreams may find it. Who +can say? Providence keeps a closer eye on farmers than we imagine. As +yet, the boy has not persuaded any girl to accompany him to Grand +Prairie. I would go myself only (I had the reason a minute ago but it +has escaped me); what was it? Oh yes! I remember now, I am already +married. The Land of Cockaigne could not have been situate in the +North, for in that most blessed land every Jack has his Jill and found +no difficulty in keeping her. No! it was never in this latitude. + +I went to two hotels before I could find a room. I should have +registered at once instead of loitering at the station. In the first +hotel they could eat me, but to sleep me was out of the question. In +the second, a stout well-looking German--or, as I prefer to call him, a +coming Canadian--took possession of me, remarking in one breath, but +with an air of great punctilio, "You would in my house put up? Der +conductor-man he so told me you to me might come. This my wife is. +You should become to each other known. She a bed for you will +get--water!--towels!--whatsoever Madam she may desire." + +"Urbanity" is the one word that fits the German, my host. His Frau, +who is of the pure Teutonic type, has a heart of great goodness, with +emotions that lie close under the exterior. + +All might have been well with me at this hotel, but, unfortunately, in +descending the closed-in stairway, I stepped on a sleeping cat and +plunged headforemost to the bottom.... "Der drouble mit you," says my +host, "a crick in der back is." The cat's "drouble" seems to be +paralysis. + +Some one has said that reserve is a sign of great things behind. Sweet +Christians! this is entirely true; I realized it to the full while +holding back the tears and assuring the assembled household I was not +even jarred. I am proud of the way I behaved, and sorry my own folk +were not there to see. Now, they will never believe it. + +One of the maids brought me brandy which I did not drink, but after +awhile, my hostess fed it to me in what she called canards. You dip a +lump of sugar into the cognac and transfer the lump to your mouth--that +is all. You could never believe how nice they taste, or how curative +they are for "crick" in the back. + +Before long I am able to limp down the street and call on the doctor. +I used to know him in days when we both lived farther south. But any +way, a previous acquaintanceship would have made no difference. We do +not need introductions at a frontier post like this, for there is an +undercurrent of good fellowship which understands that the stranger who +talks to you is not necessarily a scalawag, with subtle designs on your +purse or your person. Any one who fails to grasp this plainly obvious +fact is either a newcomer or a solemn humbug. + +This doctor has charge of the hospital car that lies in the station +yard, and most of his time is spent travelling from camp to camp down +the line of construction. I saw the car to-day, or rather I nosed it, +for the smell of iodoform came siftingly through like dry cold. It is +owned and operated by the railway company for the benefit of their +employees. At certain stations along the line, the company have placed +cottage hospitals where emergency cases are treated. Those who have +fevers or require major operations, are usually taken to the city. + +Long ago, when the earlier railroads were being constructed it was not +possible to supply such life-saving appurtenances, so that nothing +remained for the wretched fellows but to drag themselves away and die +like hurt dogs. There is a current aberration that the golden age was +"once upon a time," but, in my opinion, it is here and now, or at least +it will be when every municipality has instituted classes to teach +policemen the difference between drunkenness and a fit. I will say a +prayer about this some of these days. One must be business-like. + +As he builds up and smokes a cigarette, the doctor tells me that the +navvies and teamsters have a singularly critical taste in the matter of +medicine. They do not like tablets or medicine with an innocent +flavour. Unless it be distinctly pungent, they feel cheated. + +"Do you accede to their demand?" ask I. + +"I do, Good Lady," says he. "It is modesty that prevents my describing +to you the excellency of my flavours" (and here he assumed a truly +sagacious air): "my medicines have 'nip' to them and a body that is +really desirable. They are indescribable, but most they approach the +little girl's definition of salt--'that which makes potatoes taste bad +when you do not eat it with.' + +"I see, Dear Lady, you are still of inquisitive mind," says this Man of +Medicine. "Yes! I can see that and I dare say you will put me in a +book, so I shall not rise to your questions--not I! Let us prefer to +talk of how we shall invest our money when we sell our lots, and things +like that." + +"Real-estate is a valuable asset in this place," continues he, "if you +buy it 'near in' on the original town site, but three miles out of the +subdivisions, it is equal in value to a pop-corn prize. And yet who +can say? Who knows? In these new places, the bread we cast on the +sub-divisions has a way of returning to us in meat and pie and cake. +It is often the height of wisdom to be foolish. That singularly +unattractive person on the doorstep across the way--the shrunken, +hollow-stomached one--has made much money in buying and selling." + +"Do you believe me?" he asks with some trace of heat; "then pray heaven +speak!" For I have fallen into silence. But I will not speak--not one +word--but only smile in an enigmatical way, for the stop I am pulling +out is one of intended indifference. It is about the navvies and +teamsters I would talk and not of hollow-stomached men who gather much +money. + +The doctor rolls up two cigarettes and offers me one. + +"You will smoke?" asks he. + +"No!" says I, "not till I am sixty." + +"Let me see your palm and your nails. Humph! Lady, you had better +start now as a mere matter of expediency. Why not try this one? +Where's the use of a mouth and an index finger if you do not smoke?" + +Now, I cannot say why I do not smoke, except that there are so many +reasons why I should, and so I return to our first topic and ask, "Does +your medicine make the men well again?" + +"No, no, decidedly no!" he replies--"they allow me to hold no such +illusion. The talismans they carry, work the cure--a bear's tooth, a +lucky penny, or the image of a calendar saint. A snake's rattle is a +panacea for anything but a broken heart. Time was when men only choked +on grape seeds as did the old poet chap, Anacreon, but in these days, +the navvies get appendicitis from them. It would be offensive to +suggest other causes, in spite of the fact that most of them never +taste grapes. No! it would not be right for me to put my patients in +the wrong and shockingly poor policy." + +"Have you much trouble with drunkenness?" I query. + +"Not a great deal!" he makes answer, "for the Mounted Police have a +disconcerting habit of probing into bales of hay and of finding false +floors in wagons. They have fifty-fox power, these police fellows, +although I have heard tell that a gallon or more of whisky has been +within roping distance of them and escaped. A bottle that gets by them +is worth ten dollars, but the navvies declare whatever it costs it is +worth it. But, dear me, there are other liquids for inordinate and +uncritical thirsts, such as----" + +"Your medicine?" I suggest, whereupon our conversation abruptly ends, +for he will be no longer beset by me; and he will not give me a bottle +of liniment for "crick" in the back; no, not if I die in Edson, without +even a graveyard started wherein to bury me. He supposes Providence +knows his business, but how ever woman came to be made is a mystery far +beyond his wit's end. + +Huh! Huh! I am tingling to scratch this man's eyes out, but I only +call him a brown pirate. + +Do you think I care so much as a snap of the fingers for the medicine +of this spiteful doctor of the countryside? Not a bit of it! One of +the navvies will give me a talisman if I cannot find the cordial tree +for which I search. It grows in the North, and the fruit gives life to +strong people and faintness to the weak. It was Théophile Tremblay who +told me about it. He lives always in the woods. Once, he found the +tree but he was afraid to eat of it, for how could he know whether he +was strong or weak? He has heard tell that, in the tree, there is a +wood's-woman and that sometimes she laughs aloud, but he thinks it may +be a soul or something like that. + + * * * * * + +The only drawback to happiness is the peculiar impermanence of its +character. Happiness is a large, comely person, but, withal, as +elusive as the smallest sprite. Such hours of pain as I spent last +night on this wretched sagging bed--I who was so happy only +yesterday--with nothing to look at save a little lamp with a flame like +a bleary red eye. Truth to tell, it was the eye that looked at me. It +stared till I became hypnotized, when by the blessing of God, I fell +asleep. + +This morning, I am consumed between a desire to get up and one to lie +still. In all such crises of the will, it is better to follow the line +of least resistance, and so I lie in bed. My hostess brings me an +amazingly pungent liniment which she calls "Herr the Doctor's +medisome." It came last night, but Daisy, who is a waitress, neglected +to deliver it. Perhaps the sarcastic advice which the doctor set down +for me under the word "Poison," may have frightened Daisy. + +"She a lump is, that Daisy!" says the Frau. "Believe me, Madam, for I +know. I tell her a thing to do and she doing it keeps on, till I to +stop tell her. Then I to her explain that she is not for ever to stop, +nor for ever on to go, and all the time, about everything, I have her +so to tell." + +The Frau pours on the liniment with generous measure and rubs me till I +prickle with it, and feel for all the world like a wet newspaper caught +in a wire fence. She rubs me with a used-to-things way until I beg her +to desist. I should not be surprised if Herr the Doctor took this +means of venting his spitefulness on me. + +The Frau tells me she had a vision once. I wish to experience a +vision, or a miracle, but nothing comes to me save presentments which +have their terrible plain origin on the basis of cause and effect. Her +vision was about heaven. She saw heaven quite distinctly and the +streets were really made of gold. There were no children there, but +only men and women, so that there must be a special Paradise for boys +and girls. The Frau believes heaven will be a failure because there is +no division of the sexes provided for. How, she would like to know, +could a woman enjoy heaven with men there all the time looking at +everything she does. It would be an impossible situation. + +After awhile, Daisy brings me a meal. There is a tremendous finality +about the way she sets down a tray. Daisy, in spite of her name, is +not so much a housemaid as what they used to call a stout serving +wench. She is courtly neither in figure nor manners. Her hair is +puffed out over her ears and drawn down low, till her head looks like +the husk of a hazel nut. But what odds? Daisy is splendidly plebeian +and really of more value to the community than a writing person who +falls downstairs. She cannot see for the life of her how I happened to +come out here, and so I am apologetic and find it necessary to explain. +She asks permission to try on my hat and tells me she has ordered a new +one from Edmonton. It is to have three "ostridge" feathers. + +To assure me that the cat I stepped upon is not dead, she descends to +the kitchen and returns with it. The cat seems all right except that +it sags in the middle, but Daisy says this is because it has just been +fed. I am glad I did not kill it, in that I always associate a cat +with Diana Bubastis, the Egyptian goddess who presided over childbirth, +and who was represented with a feline head. Indeed, Bubastis is said +to have transformed herself into a cat when the gods fled from Egypt--a +play of gods and women and cats that has continued even to this very +day. + +After dinner, I am able to go down to the sidewalk where I fribble away +the hours agreeably enough. It is a sun-shot afternoon, but the air is +cool to one's skin, and grateful after the scorching heat of yesterday. + +Some civil engineers who came in on the train with me are playing +baseball on the road. These are no æsthetic feeblings, these merry +gentlemen, but a sturdy breed, upstanding and handsome, with skin like +the colour of well-seasoned saddles and a smell of burnt poplar in +their hair. I think the rough clothes they wear throw their good looks +into relief. Or it may be that the people _are_ better looking in the +North and have better physiques. It must be so, for the South has in +all ages drawn upon the northern blood for rejuvenation just as, in +these days, they need hard wheat to tone up their softer varieties. + +I write of them as merry gentlemen because this fornight agone I had +been watching them make ducks and drakes of their savings. When they +come to Town, which they do once or twice a year, they cannot be +accused of nearness. Each mother's son holds to the amended maxim of +this country, "Hard come, easy go." "Jack ashore," I called one the +other day. "Possibly so! Possibly," answered the delicious boy, "but +I prefer to think of myself as March--in like a lion and out like a +lamb." + +The whole Town is a foraging pasture for the engineers on vacation. +They buy everything they do not need, from gramaphone records and +swearing parrots to Gibbon's _Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire_. +They yell into the telephones as if it were a lung tester, and it makes +their hearts dance like daffodils to hire taxicabs for the day, boxes +at the theatre, and to give suppers and dances to all and sundry of +their acquaintances. Neither are they laggards in love. They are +vastly appreciative of the girls, and I am told go sweethearting with a +directness there is no possibility of misunderstanding. It is well the +girls do not take them too seriously, for they are roving bachelors +all, and would seem to be as faithful as the poet who vows his love for +Kate, and Margaret and Betty and Sweet Marie. + +Yet, once in a blue moon, an engineer and a girl make decision "to be +man and wife together," and to live in a shack on the Residency, much +to the annoyance of the townsmen, who dislike the engineers, being +inordinately jealous of them. + +The game of baseball which the engineers carry forward on the highway +is strenuous rather than scientific. Things that are considered +important in the league matches have no significance here. As I watch +the pitch and toss of the ball, it occurs to me that this game has +filtered down the ages from the primeval woods where orang-outangs +threw nuts from tree to tree. They pitch them that the young lady +'rangs might admire their cleverness and good form. You may credit me +this was the way of it. + +A Chinaman and some Indians are also watching the game. The Indians +think it fine fun, and fetch and carry the lost balls like spaniels +retrieving sticks. I like the Indian men for several reasons, but +chiefly because they are shrewd riders; have a sovereign indifference +to appearance, and never quarrel over theology. + +The game of ball was not completed, the interest of the players being +diverted by a blindly vindictive fight between a staghound and a +bulldog. I did not see the conclusion of the fight, but the honours +lay with the bulldog. "For you must know, Dear Lady," explains one of +the engineers, "that all things considered, the grip on the throat is +an eminently practical one." + + + + +CHAPTER III + +TO THE BUILDERS + + To the builders of the highway, that skirt the canyon's brink, + To the men that bind the roadbed fast, + To the high, the low, the first and last, + I raise my glass and drink!--EVELYN GUNNE. + + +As yet, there is no passenger service from Edson to the End of Steel. +Several day coaches are run, but they are chiefly for the use of the +engineers and workmen. This is how I happen to be the only woman +aboard pulling out for the mountains across this newly-made trail. + +Do not misunderstand me; it is the railroad that is new. The trail +that runs by its side was an old one when Columbus discovered America, +and beaten deep with feet, and also it is a long trail, for it leads +through to the Pacific Ocean. For centuries, it was the only mark of +human interference in this waste that is world-old. It is a trail of +lean hunger and bleeding feet, one that has ever been prodigal of +promise, but wary of accomplishment. Surely this is so, for once over +it stumbled and swore those half-mad men known as the Caribou +Stampeders--these, and other unwept, unhonoured fellows who fared into +the wilderness for what reasons even the wise Lord knoweth not. If the +bones of the red and white folk who have travelled this long, long +street were stood upright, I doubt not they would make a fence of +pickets for us all the way. + +I have no sooner thought this thing than it happens there is a dry +stirring and, in an eye-wink of time, the dead men have taken on flesh +and colour. They must have been keenly near. Grim, plainish fellows +are they, not unlike the gang around me, but rougher-clad and more +hairy. They are powerful and full-lifed men, I can see that, and the +rough-necked one with the trail stride and mop of curly hair is +Alexander MacKenzie, a Scotchman from Inverness, but late of Messrs. +Gregory & Co.'s counting-house. He is "down North" endeavouring to +open out a trade with the Indians, obtaining a foothold they doubtless +call it; his masters, the Nor'-West Fur Company--for monopolists are +always sensitive to terms. His is a continental errand (mark this +well), for he is the first white man to cross the Rockies, and to tell +us what lies over and beyond the hills where the sun goes down. Honour +to Alexander MacKenzie, Esq., of Inverness, say I! Some day, when +Messrs. the Publishers give me fuller royalties, I shall surely build a +cairn to him on the height of land e'er it falls away to the Western +Sea. + +This man lived more than a century ago, and yet, as his figure fades +back into nothingness, we see this other figure close by. It is David +Thompson, the Welshman, who has recently discovered a river, and has +called it by his own name. Also, he has captured the Astoria +fur-trade, and has established a trading post, which future generations +will know as Kamloops. + +And here is Sir George Simpson, Resident Governor of the Hudson's Bay +Company. He likes to travel with pipers who go before him, piping as +he enters a fort in order that Lo, the Red Man, may be properly +impressed. + +The ugly person with the harshly aggressive features is Sir James +Douglas. He looks as fully open to convincement as a stone pavement. +This spalpeen near by is none other than young Lieutenant Butler of +Ireland. He is gathering material for a volume he proposes to call +_The Great Lone Land_. I like the way he carries his head. Who runs +may read him for a fighter with a fighter's build. + +But on they go, and on, this long procession of pioneers, till we can +only call out their names as they file by--Dr. Hector, Daniel Harmon, +Viscount Milton, Alexander Henry, Dr. Cheadle, and other lean, +laborious fellows, long since passed into the shadows. Dead men do +tell tales. You may hear if you care to listen. + +And what a strange thing has come to pass in these latter months! The +tenuous, twisting trail--that very old trail--has been superseded by a +clean white road that is like to a long bowstring. Its impotent, +creeping life has given way before the gallant onslaught of pick and +spade, chain and transit, and before monstrous lifting machines which +have other names, but which are really leviathans. + +Hitherto, it may be said of this land what was once said of Rome, that +the memory sees more than the eye. This is no longer true. Before we +realize it, Baedeker will be setting down a star opposite the name of a +fashionable hotel in the Athabaska Valley, and the whole of this +morning world, from end to end, will be spotted with a black canker of +towns. Right glad am I to go through it this day with a construction +party, and for my own satisfaction to mentally tie together the threads +of the Past and Present. And who knows but in a century from now some +curious boy in one of these towns may find this record in an attic +rubbish-heap, and may rejoice with me over the knotted threads. (I +love you, boy! you must know this.) + +My fellows of the Way, who are young engineers, tell me the peculiarity +of each cut and grade and the difficulties they encountered. They do +not speak of stations but of "Mile 48" or "Mile 60," by which they mean +48 miles from Wolf Creek. The railway, when completed, will measure +3,556 miles. They talked of other matters mathematical, much to my +bewilderment, but from which I, for myself, ultimately deducted that +while the genie who built Aladdin's palace in a night was the champion +contractor of fairy-tale countries, he is not to be mentioned in the +same breath as these master-men who blaze out this metal highway +towards the sea. + +Each engineer lives on a residency which is twelve miles long, and it +is his duty to supervise the work of grading in his division. This +duty occupies about eighteen months, when he is moved on to another +residency. + +The men placed in a residency camp are an engineer, an instrument man, +a rod man, two chain men and a cook. Over these camps, there are +placed the chief engineer at Winnipeg; the divisional engineer at the +End of Steel; and assistant divisional engineers, who may locate at +different points from fifty or sixty miles apart. + +The grading itself is built by contractors, and sub-contractors, down +to station men, who with the aid of spades, picks and wheelbarrows, +built a hundred feet. All these are paid by the yard and according to +the nature of the soil or rock. The station men work from five in the +morning until nine or ten at night, and make from five to ten dollars a +day each. The blasters are known by the uneuphemistic title of +"rock-hogs." + +The first engineers who scouted had a hard time in their unsplendid +isolation, but now that the rails are catching up, life on the +residencies is more pleasant than one might imagine. The shack is +fairly warm and comfortable and the Powers that Be supply to the men an +abundance of the best food procurable, with a reasonable portion of +dainties. The Powers doubtless recognize the distant advisability of +keeping the engineers and their assistants in health and temper, for +after all, nothing is so expensive as sickness. Still, the men are by +no means petted. It is true that one engineer has a pair of sheets, +but these are the talk, and possibly the envy, of all the residence's +on the line. When visitors come to his residency they sleep between +the sheets, while their chivalric host betakes himself to the long desk +that is built for map work. + +Each residency has a gramophone, and some of them have small +menageries, including pet bears. In the summer, after hours, the men +have outdoor games such as baseball and tennis. They have been able on +several occasions to secure a sufficiently large attendance of women to +have a dance. It may happen that the engineer is married and that his +wife has girl-visitors, which party may be augmented by a visiting +contingency from the residency twelve miles further down the grade, or +some such fortunate happening as this. It is a heyday, I can tell you, +when this happens. + +They do not quarrel in the residencies as missionaries do at their +posts, although a man sometimes gets moody. All through the winter +they talk over everything they did when last in town, and what every +one else did. Between times, they can watch the married engineers and +declare how much better the bachelors are situated. Purple grapes were +ever sour. They told me about other things, but I forget them; +besides, they are secrets. + +One of the engineers gathers me some flowers at a wayside station, +concerning which the others, with full-throated laughter, propounded +riddles. + +"When did he ast-er?" "How much did the rose raise?" "Who gave Susan +her black eye?" These, and other problems of peculiar interest to +young bloods, the solution of which we shall never know till flowers +learn to speak plainer. + +The riddle, "Why does the willow weep?" elicits a discussion on music, +and on the sound of the wind in the pines. One man says he has read +somewhere that violin makers construct their instruments out of the +north sides of trees. He does not know if this be true, but I think it +must be, for the urging of the north wind in the trees and the soft +calling of the violin, are one and the same. They both allure to a +land where no one lives. You must have observed this yourself. + +One rueful rascal with no civic conscience, and an overweening +appreciation of his sex, gives it as his opinion that this is an +ill-reasoned theory. He declares the sound to be a screeching +crescendo that has its origin in an implacable quarrel between the wind +and the pines. The wind is a suffragette, a woman of determined +grievance, who would be better of bit and bridle and possibly of gag. +She makes the pine a butt for her insult and ridicule and a target +against which she lashes the hail and drives her shrewish snow. When +not grappling his throat with her plaguing, pestilent fingers, it is +only because she is recoiling to strike again. She calls this "a spell +o' weather." + +It is a bitter monologue this leather-fleshed, lathy-framed fellow +gives me, and I takes it as a body blow, but I answer not a word, for I +have heard it said, or perhaps I have read it, that the meek will own +the earth; besides--you can try it yourself--nothing so puzzles the +understanding of mortal man as a woman who refuses to go on defence. +Her silence fills him with a gnawing uneasiness similar to that one +feels when he has swallowed a tack. + +And yet I would like to tell him he has overstated his case; to point +out that the trees are cross-grained to the wind; that their green +spectacles prevent their seeing things in proper perspective, and that +they are deep-rooted in obsolete prejudices. Sir Pine cannot escape +being an intractable old person, seeing that woman's suffrage was not +the rule seventy-five years ago, or more, when he was born. Yes! I +should have liked to say this, but it is almost as equal satisfaction +to score a verbal chicane. + +I think, perhaps, the men felt my silence more than I intended, for +they argue the anti-suffragist out of countenance, although I have no +doubt they secretly and sincerely agree with him. To change the +subject, one of them brings me a caged squirrel he is taking to his +residency. Punch is a well-groomed squirrel and has an immoderate +tongue. His owner says that in the mountains these red squirrels +collect and dry mushrooms. They group them on a rock, or fix them in +the forks of young trees, ultimately banking them in hollow logs. He +is trying to tame Punch, but then we have all heard of the American who +tried to tame an oyster. + +Punchinello is as active as pop-corn in a pan. He is a squirrel with a +job, and not nearly so light-minded as he looks. His job is to go +round and round on a wheel but never to make progress, for the wheel is +so swung that it revolves with him. I am appalled by the absolute +inutility of it. What a life! What a life! Wearing out a wheel and +himself at one and the same time. "Let him go when you get to the +woods," say I, "it will be kinder. You have heard of those Eastern +folk, who, when they wish to praise Allah, buy birds and set them free." + +"No! I have not heard," he replies; "tell me about them." + +"There is no more to the story, that is all." + +"But I don't see the application when a fellow does not want to render +praises. I invested part of my savings at the races and the tenor of +my success was markedly uneven. I bought town lots, hoping to sell +before the second payment--'Stung'--Yes! it's as good a word as any. +The father of my best girl has cursed me to the tenth generation." + +"For what?" + +"Oh! for a newspaper item which concerned me. I will allow it would +have been just as well had it not appeared, but there it was! There it +was! No! I cannot see any special reason why I should set the +squirrel free. Besides" (and here he speaks softly and with a kindly +persuasiveness, as if he had butter in his mouth), "this Punchinello is +a sweet-toothed fellow, and the cook will feed him daintily; he has no +store set by for the winter; no drey, no mate; he is not properly +furred for exposure, and he would not know how to protect himself +against the hawks and stoats. Surely, you would not have him go free? +I tell you the thing would be cruelty itself, and I will not do it." + +You see, he does not know this matter is a personal one with me, I mean +the wheel that goes round and never gets anywhere. If he did it would +probably make no difference, for the peculiarity about his arguments +are their sincerity and wisdom. I always did suspect that Providence +was a large serene young man with a strain of steel in him. + +At Bickerdike, all the engineers I knew got out. Some are stationed +here; some await orders, but most of them go down the branch line that +is under construction from this point. Bickerdike is largely a tent +town, although, as yet, it is the metropolis of the Grade. I heard one +man on the train tell another it was "one of these here high-society +places where folks dance on a plank floor and don't call off the +figures." I promise to visit at Bickerdike on my return trip with some +friends I have not seen for years. No matter where you come from, it +would be almost impossible to drop off at any of these little frontier +posts without meeting some one you knew elsewhere, so representative is +the population of this Northern country. + +At each post the same question is asked the newly-arrived passenger. +"Well, what's the news along the road?" To-day the news concerns a +wash-out near the End of Steel, and doubts are expressed as to the +possibility of our getting through. + +At Marlboro, the people are talking of their cement industry, and at +the next station lumber is the topic. They are making the lumber out +of spruce. The small logs have been converted into railway ties. Some +of them are crossed. If ever you have "taken out" ties you know what +this means. As you likely haven't, I'll tell you. The railroad +contractor, when he rejects a tie, crosses the end of it with a blue or +red pencil. Once an acquaintance of mine, by name Jerry Dalton, took +out a cut of ties in the Province of Saskatchewan. One day Jerry--an +accurate man rather than a placid one--was stamping about somewhat more +rampageous than a baited bull. + +"What is the matter now, Man Jerry!" I asked; "you are always having a +big sorrow." + +"Sorrow ith it?" lisped Jerry at the top of his tall voice. "Look at +them d---- ties (begging your pardon, ma'am). Look at them ties! Does +that turkey-faced, muddle-headed idjit of a contractor think I'm +running a Catholic themetery? Crosses ith it? It's crosses he's after +giving Jerry! Troth! an' it's a crown I'll be puttin' on him." ... + +And so as I look at this pile of crossed logs by the wayside, I am +wondering who is the rascal responsible for the Catholic themetery. + +These mills belong to a Northern timber chief whose large holdings have +made them turbulent. They have called him a timber-wolf, and other +names that are smart rather than polite. As a matter of fact, any man +who pays the government dues and converts the trees into lumber for the +use of the settlers, deserves all the emoluments that can possibly +accrue. On account of floods and fires, lumbering is a precarious +industry, and the majority of operators fail thereat or carry a +nerve-grinding overdraft at the bank. + +And did you ever stand on the heights and watch a rising, ripping flood +bear out your booms and incidentally the year's logs? If you have, my +good little man, you'll be sensible to something closely approximating +a tender regard for the timber-wolves. This play of lamb and wolf is +frequently disastrous to the wolf. + +I would like to rest off here to see the whip-saw bite into the logs; +to watch the long white boards as they fall from the carriage, and to +drink in their refreshing odour, for the whole essence of the North is +concentrated in the odour of the spruce. + +Big Eddy takes its name from the whirlpool formed by the confluence of +the McLeod River and the Sun Dance Creek. The creek is an impetuous, +capering stream that leaps to the McLeod as a little laughing girl +would throw herself into the arms of her father. This is the fairest +tarrying place I have seen this way, and fit for a ball-room of the +dryads. Down in the valley beside the great bridge, the divisional +engineer has built him a wide house of logs, with hospitable porches +and chimneys that suggest generous fireplaces. I covet his right, +title and ownership thereto. They say this engineer is seventy-eight +years old, but I don't believe it. + +"Beyond all doubt he is," says one of the train officials; "believe me, +he has eaten up his teeth at the work of building roads, and he has a +heart of great goodness." + +"A strong man, is he?" I ask. + +"Why, I cannot say, only that he sticks to his work and takes the trail +with the best of them. The men say he is 'sun-ripened,' which I am +convinced means something praiseworthy, for every man is his friend." + +The Canadian Northern Railway Company is running a line immediately +parallel to this of the Grand Trunk Pacific, and as I look out of my +window I can see the men at work on the rival road. They are the +primal ploughers of the land, these railway fellows, and can cut a +valley out of a hill, like it were the rip of a brutal blade. To my +thinking, this is an enterprise of high heart and bravery..... And +yet, as I watch them at work, heaping up a grade, they seem small to +me, and paltry, like dirty boys intent on nothing more serious than +mud-pies. In some places, they build through marshy dunes that are +coppery-brown and tawny-red. Walking in these places is like walking +upstairs all the way, or like treading in deep straw, forms of exercise +most certainly concomitant with heart disease and a hackney gait. +Westward they go and Westward, these uncouth moving pictures of the +landscape, that change well-nigh as quick as those on a canvas, but +always it is a picture of a grade, a new cut, a gridiron of ties, and +long, long trails of steel. I tell you, these trails are the +heartstrings of the North. + +But you must not think that the only builders are the men. The horses, +mules and oxen help. Some folk there are who mislike the oxen, but +these are foolishly prejudiced and ill-informed. The ox, it is true, +has a tiresome straddling gait, and his brain is small in comparison +with the bulk of his head, but contrariwise he retains a stolid +reliability that keeps him at his job. Once inspanned, he has no +desire to kick over the traces or to explore foreign parts; he doesn't +bite his trace-mate, or engage in any of those little playful jinks so +strangely peculiar to northern horses and northern men, not he ... the +ox is a good sort, and one who strictly attends to business. He is an +animal that walks in the light. There are northern men who will +doubtless resent these remarks, so I may as well explain that my +comparisons have been prompted by the conduct of "the gang" which +offends my sense of decency. + +The "happy low lie down" all over the car in various stages of +intoxication. How hideous they are with their unshaven faces, open +mouths and yellow teeth! Abroad they are silly; at home they are +heart-scalds. As they sprawl over the floor like huge primeval toads, +I am consumed by a desire to kick them with my boots. Drunkenness is a +disgusting, unfleshed sin. + +And yet, these prostrate fellows are hardly more offensive than those +still able to sit up and debate about nothing. As controversialists +they remind me of the characters in _Alice through the Looking-Glass_, +who want "to deny something and don't know what it is." When any +over-wise babbler feels himself worsted in an argument, he says to his +opponent, "You are a liar." While fairly popular, this argument can +hardly be considered a logical one. It can be claimed, however, to +cover the whole ground, and to be a masterpiece of brevity. + +One fellow, who reeled through the car in a molluscous invertebrate +condition, stopped by my seat to tell me he was my friend for life. He +was old enough to have known better, and I was glad when a glorious, +tall stranger collared the fellow and hurtled him down the aisle like a +hockey-player would hurtle the puck. + +Soon afterwards the train's agent, a civil-spoken young man, came into +the car and took me into his caboose. I knew something fortunate would +happen on this journey.... And to think it came just as my nomad +spirit had failed me, and I was utterly crumpled with weariness and +hunger. + +I would here desire to reiterate my belief that Providence is a large, +serene young man, with a strain of steel in him. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +BEHIND THE HILLS. + + "Behind the hills, that's where the fairies are, + Behind the hills, that's where the sun goes down." + + +I fell asleep in the cupola of the caboose and dreamed that my head was +a rubber band holding too many notes, and that it was going to snap any +second. "Hit's the bloomin' haltitude in your 'ead, Ma'am," explained +a Cockney later, and I expect he was right, for we have made an ascent +of over one thousand feet since leaving Edmonton. + +When I awake the train is standing stock-still. Here is the trouble! +the heavy rains have been playing havoc with the newly-made grades that +have hardly been shaken down to stay, and progress is necessarily slow +till the proper ballast has been laid on. Outside, on the grade, the +fireman is swearing with remarkable precision. His language is not +exactly that described by the Prayer-book as "comfortable words," but +then, a man who fires up with slack coal when the thermometer is +sometimes thirty degrees below zero naturally becomes proficient in the +use of secular expletives. + +I open my window above him and say very distinctly, "Wicked man! swear +not by the Lord Christ." Then I lean back so that he may not see me. +It must have surprised him to hear such a reproof in this no-woman's +land. Out he goes and looks up and around, and up again, but I keep +well hidden. That writer who conceived the horror of _The Wandering +Voice_ was no nid-noddy fellow, I can tell you. + +As I was thinking this very thing, a voice close behind said to me, +"Wicked woman! play not the oracles," and almost I fell out of the +cupola with fright. It was the glorious tall stranger, and he was +laughing mightily. I almost hated him. Indeed, I quite hated till I +saw the joke and laughed too. + +He had been reading in the opposite bunk and, incidentally, watching so +that I might not roll out, for it is a high climb to the cupola bunk, +and there are no sides to it. He says that he is an engineer and that +the boys who left the train at Bickerdike gave him instructions to see +that I got through all right. Did I say mean things awhile ago about +certain northern men? Did I? Well then, I am a spiteful jade and my +tongue should be split. + +He has yellow fruit for me, and cherries, but hands them out carefully, +for the smell of steam from the stove shows that dinner is deliciously +imminent. The cook is turning cakes on a pan with a spat like the +sound of clog-dancers on the stage. He turns them with a grace and +intelligence which I may never hope to equal. I have an idea his elbow +and wrist work on ball-bearings. + +The glorious tall stranger whose name is _not_ Burney (but it will do +as well as any other) tells me he was reared down by the Miramichi +River. He went back East to see his mother last Christmas, but it took +her some days to get used to the grown man who had left home a lad. I +can see this thing in my mind's eye. His mother is very clever and has +a beautiful face. He need not have told me this. It is true of every +man's mother "back home." + +Burney was among the first men who scouted for the railway to the West +and helped run the try-lines. Falling into the pose of the +raconteur--one very natural to the northman--he tells me tragic things, +and some that are both tragic and humorous. + +One of these was about a Mounted Policeman who was sent out from his +post to bring in a murderer. It was terribly cold weather, the mercury +almost falling out of the tube. Now, the wanted murderer is the +wariest game in the world, and to take him in those mountains one needs +boldness and caution in the right proportions--that is to say +ninety-nine per cent. of the former, and one per cent. of the latter. +The policeman who was sent out was only a stripling, but there was no +yellow in him save the streak on his trouser-legs. The round journey +was one hundred and twenty miles, but, alone and unaided, he brought in +his man, not even waiting to sleep. Almost immediately on a fresh +mount, he again started out from the post, but this time to bring in +the corpse. The second hundred and twenty miles were terribly long and +arduous ones, and the cold cut like a blade. By shutting your eyes you +can see and feel this thing: the two frost-covered horses plodding +through the bleak and sterile mountains that are grim as eternity--no +sound save the cry of starveling wolves, or the white whine of the +sleepless wind, these and the sharp-drawn breath of the men. No! we +must be mistaken. Only one man breathes, the other seems strangely +still, and his lips are tight shut. There is something peculiarly +defective in his stony eyes and stony face. If you look closer you can +see he is roped close to the horse, and that he doesn't give to the +lope.... God of men and beasts! that is a dead man that rides through +the snow, and he rides to confront his slayer.... And when the two +reached the police post, the live dare-doing man was found to be +terribly exhausted from hunger, lack of sleep, and the long, long ride, +so that his brittle nerves were like to snap in two. This was how they +came to give him the stimulants which in some way (it is not for a +tattling civilian to say the way) had not entirely worn off when he was +summoned to give evidence at the inquest. + +The auditory consisted of engineers, and chainmen from the residencies +who resented this grim sitting with a murderer, a judge and accuser, +and the white, stark man on the table, whom presently they would put to +bed with a spade. They were sitting austerely upright with grave faces +as became the occasion, when it came upon them suddenly that the police +stripling was intoxicated. It is true he faced the judge with an +uncompromising attitude and stood erect, and "at attention" as if a +perpendicular rod braced his body from his crown to his heels, but when +the judge's glance wandered for the fraction of a moment, the stripling +would wink prodigiously at the engineers, and in an unholy manner that +threw them into suppressed convulsions. The thing was grievously +grotesque. It was as though a stone altar-saint had suddenly awaked +and had put his fingers to his nose in a way that was sinister. Comedy +with her wry face was peeping through a tragic mask. It is a way of +hers. + +It was not until the judge observed the policeman constantly dropping +his papers and picking them up in a stiff unjointed way, that the +reason of the court's commotion became apparent to him. + +"What is the rest of the story?" you ask. I do not know. I am a +reviewer of books and never go so far as the end. + +Sirs and Mesdames, but it is an athletic feat climbing out of the +cupola of a caboose. I stepped on the shoulder of Burney, who is +admirably strong, and then down to a chair. The brakesmen enter the +cupola off the roof and have a way of sliding to the floor backward. +It looks easy, and if I were alone, I would surely try it. + +There were four of us for dinner, and we had pork and beans, beefsteak, +potato-cakes, rolls, peaches and coffee. The butter was tinned, but +withal toothsome, and so was the milk. The butter is shipped here from +Nova Scotia, and is supplied to all the camps on the road. I help the +cook clear away the dishes, but he thinks me rather unhandy, for I +upset both the sugar and salt. He comes from Kilmarnock in Scotland, +and is a nice lad, I can see that. He has a thicket of hair that +stands erect from his head like a growth of young spruce, and he always +looks as if he had just heard some good idea. His latest idea, he +confides, is a job with the purveyors who contract for the supplies for +all the grading camps on the line. + +Hitherto, I have always looked upon a caboose as something commonplace, +but now, I know it may be truly a Castle of Indolence. I have a sweet +tooth for this kind of life, and have no objection to continuing it for +a month. Journalists, and important people with stamped passes, go on +private cars, but the advantage of mediocrity is that you can travel in +a caboose and need not view the scenery as a commercial commodity. +When I can think of what to say, I will write a story called "The +Romance of a Railway Van." Its setting will be in the hills. The +heroine will be a southern girl of probably twenty summers (with a +corresponding number of winters). She shall be no fine die-away lady, +but middling strong and built to go out in all weather. Each move of +the romance will be made by invisible kelpies, ogres and dryads, who +will say "Ha! Ha!" and "Ho! Ho!" and who will clap their hands when +the wicked flourish, or valour wins against the odds. But I never +could think this story out, so I pass it on to you. + +At the McLeod River the grades begin to spy into the mountains. These +mountains have all the bewilderment of an elusive dream, and in the +thin northern air seem nearer than they really are. There is a +come-hither look about them. It is well, at first, to thus see from a +distance, for to stand against a mountain is to lose one's sense of +proportion and symmetry. + +At Prairie Creek the road runs high up on a ridge to the south of the +Athabaska Valley, so that it looks like a ribbon of steel basted on to +the hills. The Athabaska River is wide and swift here, and has what +the Japanese call the language of line. The Cree Indians call it the +_Mistahay Shakow Seepee_, meaning thereby the great river of the woods. +A semi-spectral mist rises off its waters, as if it were an incense to +the mighty spirit, Manitou. + +It would be well if I, one of the first of the tourists who, world +without end, will travel through these hills, could tell how they +impress me, but I am crushed into a wordless incompetency. I cannot +speak the language of this land nor interpret its spirit. These hills +of White Alberta have something to say, but they will not say it. It +must be true what the essayist wrote, that you cannot domesticate +mountains. + +There appears to be no life here, nor any form of sentience, but when +it is dark, the grizzly bear, the lynx, the moose, and other +night-things, will move out for purposes of life or death. + +Alexander Mackenzie, who entered these defiles one hundred and +twenty-five years ago, wrote down that the Atnah Indians believed all +this land was made by a mighty bird whose eyes were fire, the noise of +his wings thunder, and the glances of his eyes lightning. This bird +created all things from the earth except the Chipewyans, who were made +from dogs. Now the Chipewyans and the Atnahs were not on borrowing +terms. + +These were the times when the Indians were as plentiful in the +Athabaska Valley as dandelions in a meadow, and they told this +Mackenzie of Inverness how, in the good old days, their ancestors lived +till their throats were worn out with eating and their feet with +walking. + +The Athabaska Valley is enclosed by a circle of the hills, the two most +prominent of these being Roche Perdrix, or Folding Mountain, and Roche +Miette. The latter peak takes its name from the French word _roche_, +meaning "rock," and _miette_ which is the Cree for sheep, this because +of the mountain-sheep which make it their home. It is 8,000 feet high +(I give you the height because it is not legal to go down the line +without so doing). Somewhere, near here, at Fiddle Creek, at a height +of 1,200 feet above the railway, there are wonderful hot springs +concerning which Burney talks learnedly. I pretend to understand all +about sulphuric anhydride, and carbon dioxide, and 127 degrees +Fahrenheit, but do not really know if there are things which should be +remembered or forgotten. + +Other of the peaks which enclose the Valley are Roche Ronde, Roche +Jacques, Bullrush and Roche Suette. Off to the west, the range of +hills silhouetted against the sky is known as the Fiddle Back Range. +These are crowned with snow, but as the sky changes, take to themselves +its moods--coral-red, opal, stone-blue and a mellow, purple glow, which +blend and shift like the weird fantasy of the auroral lights. + +It is an idea of mine that these hills are the lair of the running +winds which for past eons have swept in bitter streaks across the +prairies, winnowing them like a thresher would winnow grain. +Seven-leagued boots have they and no man has tracked them down. How +could a man when they fling dust in his eyes? They are the bitter +scouts of the North who fight as they go. I have no doubt their home +is hereabout. It might be found if we had time to stay, but this would +take too long, for you must surely understand these winds are +non-resident to a degree that is nothing short of scandalous. + +At this point, we ought in all propriety to talk about Brule Lake, +which is not a lake at all, but an enlargement of the river. We should +nudge each other and remark that this is Jasper Park; that it consists +of 5,450 square miles, and that it is held in perpetuity for the +nation. I should ask, "Why do they call it Jasper Park?" and you, my +fine fellow-farer, should tell me how old Jasper Hawes was one of "the +gentlemen adventurers" of the Hudson's Bay Company, and doubtless a +purposeful man and clever. "But why do they call this defile 'the +Yellow Head Pass?'" I should further query, whereupon you ought to +reply, "I perceive you are an untaught person else you had heard how +this Jasper Hawes had hair the colour of September wheat in the sheaf, +so that the Indians called him 'Tete Jaune' or 'Yellow Head,' much +after our mischievous manner of turning about on the street to look +after a lady who is flaxen." + +Yes! we should say all this, and more, but it might sound like the +private car "write-up," so we had better not. Besides, our engine has +come to a sit-still and will not go a step farther. The gossip we +heard at Bickerdike about the wash-out has been verified. The +officials in the private car are in no very graceful temper over this +landslide, and some of the men on the firing-line who dug and blasted +and built the grade, are going to have their hearts cut out because of +it. + +The trouble is that these vastly particular officials conceive of the +mountain into whose body they have slashed as a dead thing--dead as +pickled pork--whereas it is splendidly alive. Because of the malapert +efforts of the builders, the mountain has shaken its monstrous sides +with laughter till the tears ran adown its face and washed out their +puny sticks and stones. One might hint this to the officials, but one +is scared to. They belong to the unamiable sex and are showing an +anger highly disproportioned to the cause. Indeed, I saw a very +special official put the hot end of his cigar in his mouth. Sometime +to-night, a few flat cars will come from the End of Steel to convey the +gang thither. The gang will climb up one side of the wash-out and down +the other, and I will too, if the train's agent will let me, but from +his hard-baked, non-committal manner, I glean he is predetermined to +take me back to Edson in the caboose. + +The men have lighted a fire in the hills, and this fire seems to be the +kernel of the land. Strange elemental figures appear and disappear in +the darkness as though they were performing unnamed, unholy rites. +They seem human but, perhaps, they are spirits, for I have some +splendid clues that these mountains are the haunted house of the world. + +Here, there are eyes that watch you all the time, but they are hidden; +and if you have a listening ear you may hear voices that call. The +gods come close in the hills. They go whispering about in the night +and calling your name. + +Foolish folk there are who say that the world is old, and that all its +songs are sung. There is a new song that can never be told, else I +would tell it to you. Only it may be heard. + + * * * * * + +A man whose face is covered by the dark is spinning a yarn about an +engineer lad on this grade who truly loved an Indian girl. This is +what he says-- + +"She died a week ago, and the lad was with her. It is a beautiful +story, but I know another like hers. It is about a butterfly that had +specks of gold on its wings." + +I did not see the gang climb down the crevasse and up the other side, +but I heard the low lorn echo from the train roll up along the crags +and die away in the snows. The train's agent said I could go to the +End of Steel if I insisted, but I was not to insist. This is why I am +travelling back to Edson. Only I am disappointed much, but he says I +may come again soon, when no one shall disallow me. It would have been +all right for me to go with the gang, and I could have taken care of +myself: any woman could who has been years and years "in society." + +The agent and the Scotch boy have made a bed for me on a wide bench +with my blankets and cushions. If little private, the bed looks wholly +comfortable. + +"You'll be after loosenin' your collar," says the young person from +Kilmarnock as he fluffs up another cushion, "an' ye 'ull be takin' off +baith your shoes an' your stockin's. I'll be keepin' the daftie loons +out o' the car till ye get a bit o' sleep." + +For the benefit of the nervous readers I may add he does not say, +"ye'll be layin' off your bloose," but these are such nice lads I could +do so with absolute propriety. + +And they turn the lamp low and shade it with paper while I am asking my +prayer. And I pray, "Spirits of the Mountains and Rivers, be not angry +with me for talking in the hills. Gods of the North, strong Gods who +watch over little children and us older ones, let me sleep in quietness +this night, and at last bring me home in safety where all the lights be +white ones." + +And I press my lips to the palm of my heart-hand to say "Amen," and to +let the gods know I love them. To let them know I love them! + + + + +CHAPTER V + +THE END OF STEEL. + + I love the hills and the hills love me + As mates love one another.--MACCATHMHAOIL. + + +It is over a year since, in the last chapter, I was turned back from +the End of Steel because of a wash-out on construction, and now I am +come back, but this time, through the kindness of the Grand Trunk +Pacific Railway, on a through service, electric-lighted, +fast-scheduled, no-fare excursion. And on this occasion, I am not the +only woman on the train but merely one among a hundred, for this, you +must know, is the triennial excursion of the women journalists and +authors of Canada. The men present may be counted on one hand. The +engineers who travelled with me last time have gone on further to new +outposts. + +"What are they doing?" you ask. I'll tell you. + + "They are busy building railways on + The map's deserted spot, + Or staking out an empire in + The land that God forgot." + + +Doers of deeds are these men and the world has salted them with curious +and stern experiences. To my way of thinking, Dinny Hogan, boss +contractor, with his blue eyes that are the blue of steel, is a bigger +man than the First Lord of the Admiralty and his work is of more +permanent value to the Empire. It was only the other day that Dinny +made an arch of "coyotes"--that is to say, of round holes--in one of +the mountains, and into them he packed fifty carloads of gunpowder. +The reader may find it difficult to follow this idea, but no doubt he +could if he saw where Dinny removed the mountain in one shot. This +would seem to be a kind of big game shooting which has all others +vanquished into nothingness. This is a wonderful trail through the +mountains--the pass called the Yellowhead--a level ribbon of land along +which the steels are laid for most of the way. But in some places, a +road has been blasted out just to show how the mountains can be beaten. +These lords of earth and sky, when called upon, must bow their +unwilling necks to the yoke of steel. And no proper-spirited person +can stand in this pass without feeling the challenge of the hills and +without an immutable desire to conquer them. This I take it is the +spirit of the buccaneer. + +The highest mountain in these Rockies is Robson, called +_Yu-hai-has-kun_ by the Indians, meaning thereby a high, winding road. +The Alpine Club of Canada intend, one of these times, to erect a châlet +at Mount Robson so that they may attempt to scale it often. Three men +succeeded in making the ascent this very summer. They were roped +together for thirty hours, and when they had come down again, their +faces were seen to be cut and greatly marred. These men spoke fine and +glorious things concerning the hilltop, and of how they looked down +upon five hundred other peaks, but, in strait and narrow minds like +ours, these climbs may be accounted only as strange follies. I have +talked to Clausen Otto about these things, for he has been a guide +hereabout these ten years or more, and is a notable man of affairs. He +said I was only a terribly lame dog in front of a terribly high stile, +and then, fearing that his comment was truthful rather than polite, +Otto proceeded to salve my feelings by explaining how the desire to +climb glaciers was an ill-regulated one, and that what the Bible said +about sucking honey out of a rock was "plumb foolishness." + +Once, he was climbing with a hunter of goats when a bear came swiftly +over the glacier-clad peak of the mountain. They were greatly puzzled +to know why the bear had climbed so high, and why it dashed across the +summit. Surely there was something remarkable on the other side of the +peak. After climbing several hours they made the ascent and looked +over. "What do you think we saw?" asked Otto. + +"Give it up," said I. + +"I wish we had too," said Otto; "there was nothing on the far side but +another glacier." + +Perhaps, the literary critics will help me decide if Otto meant this +for the parable of the climber or whether he was only singularly adept +in the art of suggestion. + +You do not see Mount Robson till you have passed by. Our train stops +to let us look aright, but cloud curtains obscure the turrets of this +great temple of stone. Like a sorrowful Caryatid it stands erect under +the burden of the sky. But, after awhile, the veil is rent asunder and +a tingling flood of light spills itself on the snow in blurs of garnet +and blue and gold which scintillate and blend like the colours of a +shell: Of a surety, the North has the alchemy that transmutes base +metals into gold. + +What else may one see at Robson in this dream of summer Canada? Come +near till I whisper! You may see white horses--and roan--and chariots +of fire, but not every one can. This is one of the mountain's secrets. + +And if you listen you may hear what the hills talk about, but you must +listen. One mountain who is not so solemn as you might imagine wishes +to deny that he is of the earth, earthy. + +"Bosh!" he said, and "Stuff! Any one who hasn't moss on his eyes can +see I am of the rocks, rocky!" + +"Mark me and be astonished!" boasts a stupendous fellow near by whose +face is furrowed by snow-slides. "I am a western mountain. Beat me if +you can!" + +"I used to be a fish plantation," remarks a chalky-looking individual. +"It was in the cretaceous period and I lay underneath the sea." + +"Lobster plantation?" queries the western one. + +"No, you froward ignoramus," replies the fossiliferous fellow, "I +consist of Inoceramus problematicus, Faseiolaria buccinoides, and other +aristocratic mollusks of the which you have never even heard." + +... Overhead, an aweless eagle, rising wing above wing says to his +sweetheart, "It is my opinion God made these mountains for no other +reason than that you and I might build our nest in them....." + +There is, in this region, a body of water called Maligne Lake, and +Jules DuBois, a trapper, whose son is married to 'Toinette, the niece +of the second cousin of Pierre, whose mother-in-law was the third wife +of Black Moccasin, the chieftain, once told me that this lake is +dreaded by the Indians because there are no fish in it. This is why it +is called "maligne." It frets Jules at the heart to go near it, for he +has heard how the fish have been frightened away by a dead man who +lives there. This man can see without eyes and his face is like a +fungus with white teeth. When he laughs there is a noise in his throat +like the crackle of tamarack twigs, freshly lighted. + +Because of the glaciers on these hills and the warmth of the summer in +the valleys, this atmosphere seems like that of an eternal spring. +Just to breathe it is a delight. Here the air strokes you into +quietness till you forget the tearing hurry of life; the fretting +uneasiness that rasps, and the hurt that comes of the fight. This is a +sating of one's desire for the spiritual. And should you wish for a +token you may stay awhile and drink of the water that cascades over the +rocks. This is living water. This is the good wine of the hills. You +may drink it in remembrance. + +I am very sorry I must die some day and miss these wilding joys and the +odour of the trees and flowers, but it is my comfortable hope that when +I return to Claeg, the Round One, who is called the earth, I shall be +evolved into a pine-tree and grow happily in this mountain pass. Then +will other people come to, even as I come to these trees, and say, +"Good morning, my friend! I have been lonely for you." + +The pines are our fellow-creatures and more closely related to us than +anything that has roots in the earth. They speak to our inmost being. +A group of pines will restore sanity to the disdistracted and sorrowful +mind, for they are cordial trees, and in quietness and confidence is +their strength. The pines are never tremulous or trivial, neither do +they fade or die. Other trees are green for awhile, but these all the +while. + +... Pippa, the little maid who sang for the world's hurt, came out of +the woods, as likewise the Nazarene who died for it. + +Upland growths are the pines as befitteth the gods of the arboreal +world. They are northern trees, "the chief things of the ancient +mountains, the precious things of the lasting hills." Their history is +writ far back in the black strata of the carboniferous age, and that +they will be the last trees to disappear off the earth, who can +gainsay? As for me I shall not be persuaded otherwise though a man +rise from the dead to tell me. + +And now we have come to Jasper, where we have two hours to rest off and +talk to the men of a construction camp who have struck work for the day +in order to see the train come in. Of course, it does not take all +their day for this, but there were the preliminary toilet preparations +to make and the walk in and out. Such newly shaven chins; such freshly +brushed clothes; such irreproachable boots! Who could have expected it! + +Like the ascetics who of old-time went into the wilderness and found +themselves dreaming of scarlet lips and white arms, so these fine +fellows are ever fancying a comely woman gliding across their trail; a +distressed damsel who needs to be fed and carried for long, long +distances and sheltered in a low-built house of logs that is +well-warmed and well-provisioned, with no other bachelor nearer than a +hundred miles. + +The bachelors will doubtless deny this sweet dalliance with a vehement +fervour, but it has the matter of fact virtue of being true, and is no +whimsey of mine. A year ago it was, in a prize competition, I was +called upon to read over a hundred short stories, or more properly +speaking, human nature studies. An amazingly large proportion of these +came from northern camps, and in nearly every case the afore-mentioned +situation was the theme. The variation from this concerned a young +Englishman of education who is notified that he has inherited wealth at +home but prefers to stay with his woodland wife--a beautiful Indian +girl--rather than return to the granitic conventions of the old world, +and to the busy idleness that goes by the name of society. + +And why deny that their hearts are a-brim with dreams, for these are +beautiful reveries and worthy the most chivalrous of knights. Since it +was given me to look into the recesses of their minds I have liked them +better than ever and am many times heartily glad. Any woman who is a +gentleman would. + +And here Opportunity has spilled a whole trainload of women before +them--old and young, wise and otherwise. It would be tempting the +patience of Providence if they didn't meet the train, these bachelors +who would gladly lose a rib. + +"Such a waste of excellent material," says a poetess who looks over the +bachelors with an appraising eye. "How big they are! Someway or +other, they make me think of steel girders." + +"Ragingly handsome, I call them," says a petite miss who edits a page +on a big eastern daily. "Do you think it possible, Lady Jane, that +they--could--have--holes--in--their--socks?" + +"Not only possible, My Dear, but highly probable," I reply. + +"What odds?" asks Cy Warman, the poet. "It is recorded that President +Taft was noticed to have a hole in his sock when he took off his boots +in a Tokyo tea-room." + +"I am persuaded," remarks an historian who has been listening, "that it +is the duty of the Prime Minister of Canada to import wives for the +bachelors who live on the frontiers. He has most excellent precedent +in the case of Talon, the Intendant, who in 1670, because of the +disparity of the sexes in this country, imported one hundred and +sixty-five young women. Moreover, Talon specified that in sending out +these girls from France, the King should see that they had good looks +and were strong and healthy." + +"My fellow-women!" interrupts a society reporter, who is an incarnation +of frankness, "lend me your ears; I won't need your money. I intend +coming here to live. No longer will I remain a martyr to good form. I +am weary to death of musicales and other entertainments of an +objectionable character. I intend to quit the 'best circles,' the +'local coteries,' and the '_haut noblesse_ in favour of a man with a +bungalow at Jasper, and for these delectable mountains with the glories +thereof. Now, what do you say to that?" + +"Taken," replies a distinctly masculine voice in the rear--a voice that +might come from a steel girder--whereupon the rest of us discreetly +retire to allow for the arrangement of preliminaries. Love is born +through effrontery more often than we think. + +When we have achieved the sights of Jasper we entrain for Tete Jaune +Cache, a beautiful moping place on the Fraser River. All the way along +we pass through the fastnesses of the hills, places of glamour and +mystery, and perhaps of fear. Here our eyes are pleasured with an +illusive perspective or an uncertain silhouette; a fantastic rock-form +cut out by the cruel chisels of the ice; a precipitous gorge up which +the adventurous trees have stormed in darkened files; a welt of green +where the moss has healed the hurt of the avalanche; a snow-born river +with its white-toothed angry waters, a splash of ice called a +glacier--a steady, long-living splash obedient only to the sun. + +The artists with us talk of values, vistas, truth of space, +chiaroscuro, mellowness of effect, and transparence of air. Perhaps +they are right, but it seems to me that when Nature stretched her stone +canvas in the Rockies she did not trouble with the trivialities of +pleasing prettiness or technical nicety. She brushed in her colours +with a boldness of mass and outline, with an energy and expression that +stagger. There is no ambiguity about them. She used primary colours +and never hesitated. Royal purple, the orange light of fire, and the +sickening red in which Tintoretto has painted the wounds of his +martyrs, she here emphasized by the "cold virgin snow" on the peaks. + +For uncounted centuries, silence has brooded over the beauty of these +imperturbable hills and over their unpathed, desolate places which only +the eyes of the gods have seen. It is well with me this day that I +journey through them, for here, as in Eden, the terrestrial and +celestial may be one. It is well, too, that in passing I may shut my +eyes and mentally sing the song of the land as it came hot from the +heart of a poet in his home at the foot of these hills-- + + "Oh, could ye see, and could ye see + The great gold skies so clear, + The rivers that race the pine shade dark, + The mountainous snows that take no mark, + Sunlit and high on the Rockies stark + So far they seem as near. + + But could ye know, and forever know + The word of the young Northwest; + A word she breathes to the true and bold, + A word misknown to the false and cold, + A word that never was broken or sold, + But the one who knows is best." + + +At Tete Jaune Cache, they are preparing to "strike camp" and move on to +Mile 149. This has been the supply station for all the outposts, which +means more than you may think, for the Railway Company furnishes an +amazingly generous and varied bill-of-fare to its employees. + +Don't ask me what you can get here, for I won't tell lest the urban +epicures whose jaded palates need tickling should start out in a body +for this lodge at Tete Jaune. + +And the leading man in the kitchen has the most substantial merit and +can roast a sirloin of beef or bake a cake of prodigious bigness for +the men's supper just as he can cunningly and designedly contrive a +pimento bisque, an omelette espanol, or shrimps à la créole for the +boss and his company. I'll not tell another word about the fare, but, +believe me it is "with such cookery a monkey might eat his own father." + +Te' Jaune, as it is familiarly called in the North, is situated on the +Fraser River. Because of the snow melting on the mountains, the Fraser +is swollen as if the waters surged from underneath. While we wait, +swart, husky-looking men are putting off to Fort George in primitive +craft built of squared logs. These boats are called scows. They are +carried along by the current which is from six to eight miles an hour, +and are guided by means of a paddle with a vast yellow blade. + +As the men pass on and wave their hands to us, a fret falls on me to go +with them along this river-road to its very end, and if you are of my +kin you would want it too. We would live sturdily; we would be sopped +in sunshine, and God would give us joy. + +At Te' Jaune there are many tongues spoken, for the workmen hail from +all over the universe. Of late, we have heard much about these +foreigners and of "those nations which we, so full-mouthed, call +barbarous." Certain Canadians are enwrathed and utterly discomfited +because of them. It is their desire to tidy up the country by sending +the "alien offscourings" to where they belong. They tell us that our +manners will become corrupted and our institutions imperilled by them. + +This fear of strangers is not peculiar to our country and age. +Strangers have, in all lands, been looked upon as enemies to the +commonwealth, and consequently to be avoided or extinguished. +According to Flavius Josephus, when Moses came to die he said, "Oh you +Israelites and fellow-soldiers.... I would advise you to preserve +these laws to leave none of your enemies alive when you have conquered +them, but to look upon it as for your advantage to destroy them all, +lest if you permit them to live, you taste of their manners and thereby +corrupt your own proper institutions. I do farther exhort you to +overthrow their altars and their groves and whatsoever temples they +have among them, and burn all such, their nation and their very memory +with fire; for by this means alone the safety of your own happy +constitution can be secured to you." + +The Jewish constitution was not worth the price asked; neither is ours. +This should be far from the spirit of Canada--"the manless land that is +crying out for the landless man." Canada is the child of the nations +and our husky provinces have need of these husky peoples. Not only +must we open wide our doors and bid them a good welcome, but having +entered, it must be our endeavour to weld them into a seemly and +coherent whole. + +This is a task which is half accomplished e'er it is begun, for the +Russian, the Italian, the Scandinavian and all our immigrants are eager +to be like the Canadians, to speak our language, to wear our clothes, +and to think, talk and walk like us. Their differentiation is a burden +to them and they desire to drop it as quickly as possible. + +These Coming Canadians from Europe are of a fine advantage to this +country where thousands of miles of roads and railways are to be built, +in that they perform the more onerous tasks of digging and drainage +which the Canadian, British, and American turns from as menial and +unworthy. It would be a wide mistake for us to turn back from our +sea-ports these unlearned and common peoples who seek entrance--as +foolish as the farmer who would fear a large yield of wheat lest he +could not thresh it, or a banker who dreaded an inrush of gold lest he +could not count it. + +It was Michael Gowda, a Ruthenian living at Edmonton, who expressed for +his people their feelings of loyalty towards the land of their adoption +in a poem entitled "O Free and Fresh-home Canada"-- + + "And are you not, O Canada, our own? + Nay, we are still but holders of thy soil,-- + We have not earned by sacrifice and groan + The right to boast the country where we toil. + + But, Canada, our hearts are thine till death, + Our children shall be free to call thee theirs, + Their own dear land where, gladly drawing breath, + Their parents found safe homes, and left strong heirs. + + Of homes, and native freedom, and the heart + To live and strive and die, if need be, + In standing manfully by honour's part + To guard the country that has made us free." + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +BITTER WATERS + +I + +They could not drink of the waters of Marah, for they were +bitter.--_The Pentateuch_. + + +"Tweet, my little plover! Thy lips are like unto the bleeding +strawberry." + +Wasi, the father, smiled indulgently on this child-play, cooing +chatter, and sweet-flavoured words of his girl-wife as she fondled +their wonder-eyed baby. + +And in truth, it was a round dimpled baby--a cunning, cuddling papoose +that looked for all the world like a live bronze. Wasi did well to +smile. + +The older Braves had sneered at Wasi, "the Yellow Pine," for had he +not, they asked, breathed the breath of his squaw till his heart was +even as faint and soft as a squaw's heart. But Wasi of the swart face +heeded not their gibes for he loved Ermi with the flaming love known +only to men of hot heart and greedy senses. + +"Lazy one, to sleep till sun is high," merrily chided Ermi. "Little +Ninon has been awake since the dawn raised the meadow-larks." + +Wasi rose hastily, for he would take the trail early to the sun-dance, +and it was four suns' journey to the North. + +Once, Ermi had gone when she was ten spring-tides old, but the +cruelties of the scene with its shrill jubilations, had bitten +themselves into her memory. Her brother had been one of the candidates +for the coveted title of "Brave," and she had seen the wooden skewers +thrust through the muscles of his chest by which he was suspended to a +tree and from which he only freed himself by tearing away the flesh. +Since then, she had been to the mission school at St. Albert, and the +nuns had taught her that the body was holy, "a temple," they called it, +and that the sun-dance was sinful exceedingly. + +Father Lament at the cathedral had christened her Agatha, for she had +come to them in February on the day of the virgin-martyr of Sicily. +But Wasi was a Pagan, and called her Ermi. + +Ermi busied herself laying out Wasi's beaded moccasins, his bow of +cherry-wood with its leathern thong, and his arrows of Albertan +willows, that were winged with eagle feathers and tipped with iron. + +All the while she sang a quaint song about love. + +"Why singest thou thus!" asked Wasi. "'Tis the foolish song of the +hunters from the south-land." + +But Ermi laughed as she sang-- + + "'Twas odour fled + As soon as shed, + 'Twas morning's winged dream; + 'Twas a light that ne'er can shine again + On life's dull stream." + + +Then, as Wasi held his pony, Ermi kissed her brave and rested her +slight little body against him with love speaking in every line of its +limp abandon. + + +II + +Outside, the smouldering sun sank earthward in a drapery of blood-red. +In the tepee, the fierce dryness of the hot winds breathed on the baby +that lay dying by the open door. + +The Indian women feared the measles more than any other plague, and so +Ermi had been alone all the days, save only for the medicine-man who +had come to her thrice. He would drive out the evil spirits who had +caused the sickness, but Ermi only shook her head and held little Ninon +the closer. Once, she had seen him sear the flesh of Cheneka with a +burning piece of touchwood, and he had sucked the blood from the breast +of Kon. Besides, Ermi was a Christian and worshipped always at the +shrine of the great white virgin. + +The hours passed, horrible hours, and still in her loneliness and +parching anxiety she cried for the life of her baby, cried the prayers +of impotence to omnipotence. Already the baby-face was old and tired, +but the mother crooned and rocked her all through the night till, at +dawn, the wearied eyelids drooped over the darkened eyes for the last +time. The dove had found no rest for the sole of her foot. + +Ermi knew where there lay a great stone in the coulee off by the river +bank. She would carry her baby thence and bury it under the stone, +safe from the grovelling of wolves. + +Then she washed the tiny form and combed the tangles from the soft +hair, looping it back from the face with a band of scarlet. "After +all," she mused, "life has no beauty so wonderful as death." + +And because it was the tribal belief that if a corpse were carried +through a door, the next person following would shortly die, Ermi put +Ninon through the window, for Wasi would come home soon and the dread +fate might fall on him. + +Gathering the little clod of flesh in her arms and pressing it closely, +the dry-eyed mother set out on her journey across the wide-lying +plains. On and on she walked, trudge, trudge, trudge, under a brazen +sky that looked down pitiless and tearless. + +"Oh! If Wasi were here," she thought. "He would carry the spade and I +would hold little Ninon only. If Wasi were here!" + +The ground reflected heat to her weary soul and body, and the weight of +the world seemed to crush her frail being. + +"Oh, Mother of God! Sweet Mother of God!" she moaned. "How the sun +burns, and I am very tired." + +But the women of the Braves are in pain and weariness often, so Ermi +staggered on till she reached the coulee, with its boulder that had +been carried hither by the river when it overflowed its banks at the +last springtide. + +Laying her burden in the shadow of the rock, Ermi hollowed out an +earthen cradle for the baby. She lined it with green, too, just as +they had done at school when any one died, and then passionately +kissing Ninon, she wrapped a bit of blanket about her, for the living +would have the dead sleep soft and warm. + +Ermi tried to think a prayer, but she had forgotten them all since the +nights when Ninon was sick. She could not think of even one. She only +noticed that the white butterflies swam lazily to and fro like floating +blossoms, and that the sunflowers were wondrously beautiful as they +punctuated the rank, shaggy grass with gold. Lissome lilies swayed +gently in the hot breeze and made blotches on the earth like spilled +wine. + +At midday, the lilt of a lark stabbed the air, and the sound roused +Ermi, for she rose sharply to her feet and sang with hoarse voice and +stiff lips-- + + "'Twas odour fled + As soon as shed; + 'Twas morning's winged dream; + 'Twas a light that ne'er can shine again + On life's dull stream." + +The startled gophers darted into their cover and waited. When they +looked again, the mother had packed the little form in clay, had rolled +to the stone and lay face down wards on the earth. It was early dawn +when she rose from her vigil. + + +III + +As Ermi neared the house, she saw that Wasi had returned, and with +bursting heart she ran to tell him of their sorrow. His face grew sad +and stern as he listened, but again, it lit up as he took her by the +hand and led her to see Asa, the woman he had brought as a wife to his +hut. Asa, who would be to her as a sister, one whom she would love in +the place of Ninon, the child. + +There are half-hours that dilate to years, and Ermi seemed to have +suddenly grown cold. It was as though the vampire vixen who haunts the +muskeg swamp had suddenly sapped her youth. Ermi spoke nought, only +she laughed like Kayosk, the sea-gull, as he flies across Lac Wabamun, +a loud laugh and bitter, like the taste of sleugh salt in summer. + +She knew the unwritten laws of their tribe permitted polygamy, but she +knew not that, even in his best love, a man's heart is never entirely +absorbed, that no Wasi ever belongs wholly to any Ermi, knew not that +this is the tree of woman's crucifixion. + +And Wasi endeavoured to comfort her, but she was only silent and +motionless. He told her of the great sun-dance, and of the feastings, +and of how the sisters of the youths had cut little pieces of flesh +from them, but the youths cried not, for they were no weak women. + +Then Ermi moved around gently and prepared food for Asa, who wore a +wreath of yellow blossoms wherewith Wasi had crowned her. + +Sometimes, as she moved to and fro, she stopped as in a dream to look +at the glowing and beautiful body of her rival. The woman was lithe as +a sapling, her cheeks were like wild red roses, and her mouth was like +to a bow and arrow when it is set. Asa's hair was blue-black, but her +skin was almost white, for her father had been a pale face, one of the +Company's men at Fort Edmonton. + +But Ermi neither spoke nor complained, even when she read in Wasi's +eyes strange depths of passion as he looked on the lovely stranger. A +few days agone, she would have torn this woman to pieces, but there was +no rage in her heart now. The world had hardened around her, and she +could not cut through. + +And so four moons filled and waned, and darkness and sun passed +unheeded to the stricken Ermi, for the light had gone out of her life, +and from the heavens too. + +The women who loved her, and even Asa, tried to break her apathy, but +guessed not that her wound was past all surgery--that her life was a +bitter marah into which no tree of healing could fall. + +Some said the sun had kissed her when she carried little Ninon to the +coulee, and others said it was the touch of God, for the world has +always a name for a broken heart. + +Once the wife of Tusda told her that Ninon was better off and not +needing her in the least, but this only made Ermi's heart the more dull +and leaden. Wazakoo thought that Ninon might have grown into such a +wicked woman as the bold Asa, but the words were an insult to the +innocent eyes, the little unsullied feet, the lips pure as thought of +God, which the mother's eyes called up. + +"Very soon, you will go also," added Taopi, but it bewildered Ermi the +more to know that the little piece of ground on which she stood was +crumbling too. + +Another moon waned and yet she served the household. In her brain the +fire still burned on. Without, on the plains, the wind made a black +discord like the sobbing cry of a starved wolf, and, sometimes, it was +most like the whine of a whip-thong. Manitou walked about the earth +and the leaves faded and fell from the trees. Manitou blew with his +breath, and the river became like flint. At the wave of his arms the +animals hid away in the ground and the birds forsook their nests in the +wild rice and flew far off to the south-land. + +But all the days the baby called to Ermi, and often it wailed. One day +the voice wooed her unto the snow, out into the sheeted storm that +turned the air into a white darkness. Streaks of bitter wind screamed +across the prairie. The snow cut her face with stinging lash and the +cowering cold cut into her very bones. But still, without ceasing, the +baby called to her. Now and then, she almost clasped it, and her soul +swooned, but something intangible, impalpable ever waved her back. + +And then Ermi understood that the night was closing in and that she had +come a long, long way. She would go back to Wasi, for she had +forgotten about the other woman. The fire would be low, he would need +her and she must find him, however weary the trail. + +But even as she resolved, the woman sank limply to where one finds +dreams and soft reveries and where church bells toll the vesper hour. +Her hands clasped her rosary, but she did not pray. She only maundered +softly the foolish song of the hunters from the southland-- + + "'Twas odour fled + As soon as shed; + 'Twas morning's winged dream; + 'Twas a light----" + + +Once at school, she could not solve a problem and so she broke the +slate. She remembered it quite well; it was a question in the rule of +three. "How foolish!" she mused, and Ermi smiled as she remembered. + + * * * * * + +The morning dawned brightly in the coulee where a stone covered a +little grave. There was nothing to be seen, nor anything to suggest +that it was here Ermi had lain down to dreams. The snow had hidden her +well in its white bosom, but somewhere, somehow, Ermi, the Indian +woman, was working out the pitiful problem of life on another slate. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +MOTORING TO ATHABASCA LANDING + + "I'll tell the tale of a northern trail, + And so help me God, it's true." + + +I dreamed three times that I was taking this trip, and here it has come +to pass. + +Our party consists of an editor from Vancouver; an editor from +Edmonton; a Member of Parliament, a chauffeur, and myself. I feel +guiltily feminine. + +The road is one hundred miles long and connects Edmonton with the +North. Over it are hauled all the supplies for the settlements and +trading posts clear down to the Arctic. Once arrived at Athabasca +Landing, the supplies are loaded on to scows or, in the winter, to +sleighs, and from thence carried to their destination. I secretly call +this the Trail of Sighs, for to the freighter it is a long and weary +way, especially in these later days when editors, M.P.'s and graceless +witty bodies whirl past him at forty miles the hour in motors that are +quite mad. Some day a teamster will kill a chauffeur for sheer spite. +Even now the fuse is fizzing round the magazine, or whatever you call +the gasoline receptacle under the seat. + +It would be hard to declare how long this trail has been used, but I +would say for a century at least. From Edmonton for a few miles out, +it is called the Fort Trail because--allowing for a slight +divergence--it goes to Fort Saskatchewan, the head-quarters of the +Mounted Police in this district. From thence, it is called the Landing +Trail. + +But soon this whole country will be shod with steel, for, even now, you +may see navvies building grades as you pass along the trail, and next +week the first railway to the Landing will be opened for traffic. I +tell you, these railways are creating a new heavens and a new earth +however much the freighters may object. It is true, the trail will +lose in interest once the lumbering stage coaches and heavily laden +"tote" wagons have disappeared. When there are no long whips that +crack like pistol shots; no night encampments around blazing fires, and +no browsing cattle with tinkling bells, much of its picturesqueness +will have been surrendered to the implacable cause of civilization. + +From this time forth, the men who travel the trail will work for a +wage. They will forget the feel of frozen bread in the teeth; the hard +earth underneath them and the rough blanket against their chins. Yes! +and they will also forget the fine elemental thrill that comes from +hitting a running moose at long range, or a slithering wolf that lurks +privily in a covert of kinikinnic. The pity of it! + +No longer will our trail know the tired huskies, and still more tired +runners, who each year, come February, make this homestretch to the old +fur-market. The enormous bundles of fur that each spring sell for a +million dollars to the bidders from Vienna, St. Petersburg, London and +Chicago, will, for the future, figure as only so many untanned hides, +as per bill of lading, instead of precious peltry or--supposing you to +have sight and insight--"the lives o' men." + +Our first stopping place is Battenberg, by the Sturgeon River. The +place is not named for the lace as you might conjecture, but in honour +of the son-in-law of her late Majesty, Queen Victoria. It is here the +rural telephone wire comes to an end but if you are inclined to be +finicky, it is not well to telephone. I tried it and had a +conversation with Central in the which she expressed her opinion of me. +I cannot complain that it was not informing. + +The motor in which we travel has a record, not for speed, but as having +made the farthest north trip on its own power. Last winter, Jack Kydd, +our chauffeur, took it down the Athabasca River, on the ice, as far as +the Pelican Rapids--that is to say, 225 miles north of Edmonton. "The +make of the car?" you ask. I would tell you straight off and, later +on, would endeavour to collect a bonus from the manufacturers were it +not for the uncompromising prejudice of the publishers and their +editors. Men are like that. + +But I was telling you about Jack Kydd! His talent as a chauffeur is +one that trails no feathers and he is a fine, likely looking lad. This +day, I saw him pull the remains of a stump out of the road without +breaking the axle. Such a performance should be rated as a religious +act like the planting of the pipal tree in India. + +All the way along, our road is contested by farmers' dogs who surge out +from the shacks in a vain endeavour to regulate our speed. The dog is +an incurable motophobe who says everything profane about motors that +can be said. + +Here is a morose young bull contesting the high way with us, refusing +to budge an inch, and facing the motor with a menace. He is a +grim-visaged brute and built for battle like an ironclad. His +challenge to combat is a very dagger stroke of sound. Although the +M.P. wagers fifty dollars on the motor, we do not try conclusions, but +discreetly take to the side of the road at an angle that is truly +appalling. + +Even the calves are not afraid of the car and make their perilous bed +in the middle of the road, thus causing us to reduce our pace to a +legal one. Indeed, the only animals frightened of it are the horses. +Its huge black snout and great goggle-eyes must make it seem to them +like some monstrous, unthinkable brute. And, all considered, the +horses are the wisest of the animals---wiser even than men--for the +yellow peril--is as nothing to the black one. + +Still, we are having a mighty good time. When the road is clear, the +car spreads her wings and flies. Her gentle pliancy seems incompatible +with her hurtling force. Each moment, she accumulates momentum so that +we feel a sensation of tremendous power without pity. For the nonce, +we are potential murderers and pigmy men had better have a care how +they lounge across our paths. This mad car doesn't know a hill when +she comes to it and even sings a long-metre song on the ascent. She +might fairly be considered to have conquered gravitation. On! On! +with bird-like swoop she goes, fairly skimming the ground and taking +the corners just as if she knew what was there. + +You can never believe how stretched out the world is till you motor +this way north and see the long ribbons of road that unfold at every +turn, the silver illimitable distances that suggest both a mystery and +an invitation. I love these open trails, and to be of the earth earthy +is not so wicked after all. + +Gur--r--r--umph! Our 50 H.P. had dwindled to less than one-pony power +and we haven't a leg to stand on. I will never say we burst a tyre: we +cast a shoe. + +"It is neither, Madam," said the Vancouver editor who was helping to +prise up the wheel. "It is a valvular disease. Our viary accident is +the result of a vicious valve that, of its own volition, has put a veto +on our volacious voyage." + +"Avant!" retorts the editor from Edmonton. "I will vouch that the +accident to the vitals of our vehicle was a voidable one and arose from +violent vibrations and vulgar velocity." + +"Your verbose verdicts will never make the vamp or fill the vacuum," +says the more practical M.P. "Bring me the vade-mecum this instant, +you vacillating vagabonds." + +I cannot think of any assonant words so I am content with fining each +man a "V" or "vifty" days. I told you I was guiltily feminine. + +Sitting at the side of a road, waiting for a plaster to dry on a valve, +is about as exciting an occupation as knitting. Men should see to it +that women learn to smoke if only that the women may take breakdowns +more placidly. I can understand smoking becoming a means of grace. +Besides, the sun is very hot this day and burns my face and neck to a +vivid scarlet. Each man in the party produces a talcum tin for my +alleviation. "Sunny _Alberta_!" snorts the British Columbian, "_Sunny_ +Alberta! a place of sun, believe me, for people who would prefer shade." + +This newly acquired habit of the modern man in carrying a talcum tin is +one that, hitherto, has escaped print. I here set it down for your +consideration. + +While we are at work, three handsome boys drive up and stop to talk +with us. I take their photograph while they pose for me on a stump. +They are real-estate fans, so that their heads are full of +"propositions," their pockets full of maps. They have imagination, +unflagging industry, facility of expression, and love of +country--qualities which are sure to bring them to the front in their +gainful pursuit. + +The illustrious financiers who come yearly to this province to deliver +much kind advice and sage instruction, warn us to beware of these boys +whom they are pleased to call "wildcatters," just as if we were the +first to spend our money on the evidence of things hoped for, the +substance of things not seen. The trouble which follows from +over-investment in real-estate futures is attributable, not so much to +the wildcatters, as to the unknown author of the multiplication table. +Multiplying is our favourite occupation in Alberta even as it is in +some other provinces I know of. Up here, every one who has a tongue +talks about his "turn-over"; his "c'mission"; his "stake." Those who +haven't tongues are the listeners. And it is a good thing to have a +stake in this North-West Canada--very good. I have never yet met a +person who regretted having one, but there are many regret they have +not. I could tell you more about the real-estate situation only Jane +Austen says if a woman knows anything she should strive superlatively +to conceal it. + +Fifty miles from Edmonton, we cross the Arctic watershed, so that from +this point it is strictly proper to say down North, although the fall +is only two feet to the mile. It is at this height of land that we +look around and mentally spy out the country. We talk about the +incomparable wheat fields of Grande Prairie; the water-powers of the +Peace River; the oil-fields at Fort McMurray; the natural gas at +Pelican Rapids; the timber berths and asphaltum of the Athabasca; of +the coal, salt, fisheries, furs, and minerals spread all over and under +this new and unrivalled Northland. And all this riches lies at our +very feet--_ours for the taking_. "Hungry and I feed them," says the +North. "Naked and I clothe them; thirsty and I give them----" + +"No, it doesn't," says our chauffeur. "You can't get anything to drink +beyond the Landing. The North is strictly a prohibition country." + +"Dear me!" whines a person in the back seat, "and we are dreadfully out +of tea." + +At five o'clock, we stop at Eggie's for supper. Eggie broke land here +fourteen years ago, and ever since has kept a stopping place for +travellers. There is no need of his transporting eggs, butter, meat, +grain, and vegetables to market, for the market comes to him. He makes +hay when the sun shines, and also in the dark. As a result, he has +accumulated sixty thousand dollars in money and gear. So far as I +know, there is no eating-house with a record in any way comparable. + +Eggie Jr. is a telegraph operator. His instrument is back of the cook +stove over against a window. When he is away from home his young +sister works the code. She picked it up while tending the stove. You +can never tell what is up the sleeve of these pioneering women. I told +her she was the sixth wise virgin. "The other five?" she queried with +a glint of laughter in her eyes. There are other folk having supper at +Eggie's. The man with the long slouchy stride is a land surveyor. +They grow on every bush here. + +That crisp-mannered youth with the honey-coloured hair is going down +north to cap a gas well. In what better task can a youth engage than +to conserve power, heat, and light for humanity? Dear young man! + +Their driver quotes Cicero, and swears in Cree. He is a living example +of what whisky can do for a Bachelor of Arts who entirely devotes +himself to it. + +By six o'clock we are again on the road, and passing through a rolling +park-like country dotted with clumps of cottonwood, birch, poplar, and +spruce. Sometimes, we pass lush meadow upon which graze full-fleshed +cattle and comfortably rotund sheep. On one farm, a man is burning +dead brushwood. There is no keener pleasure than, here and there, to +thrust a core of fire into long grass or brushwood, and to watch the +red tongues of flame as they greedily lap it up. As yet, no farmer has +written about it, but this is only because farmers are afraid of +literary critics. It is a pity the workers are so frequently +inarticulate, thus leaving their joys and sorrows to be imperfectly +sensed by onlookers. But, Hear, Oh Men! and rejoice with me for at +this game I am not a mere onlooker, having once burnt over twenty-eight +acres. In making these fires, there is a kind of madness that takes +possession of you so that you pay no heed to the shrivelling of your +shoes; to the scalding cinders on your hands; or the inky blackness of +your face and clothes. Indeed, it would not be surprising to +ultimately learn that the direful task assigned to Lucifer is not +wholly without its compensations. + +At long intervals, we pass fat little shacks that spread over the land +instead of stretching up. At one of these, we stop to get cold water +in the engine. + +"Any news moving?" asks the bachelor who is overlord to the shack. + +He does not wait for an answer, but proceeds to inform us that the +prime knowledge a man needs for homesteading is the art of cooking in a +frying pan. + +His homestead is a ranch; not a rawnch. The difference, he explains, +is that the former pays sometimes; the latter never. + +He very kindly invites me to see his swineyard, the special pride of +which is a heavy thoroughbred called "Artful Belle" ... O la! la! la! + +As he upholsters his pipe with a stuffing of cut-plug, her master would +have me observe that Belle's face is "dished" and that her eyes are +free from wrinkles of surrounding fat. Indeed Belle is no waddling, +commonplace sow; no mere animated lard keg, for she has been bred to +the purple with great care. + +"A bacon hog?" I ask. + +"Yes, madam," he replies, "but in order that her bacon may be of the +desired streakiness I feed and starve her alternately." + +It makes a vast difference to a sow whether her ears stand up or lie +down. Belle's ears are 'pliable' and 'silky.' Her hair doesn't comb +straight either, but tends to swirls and cowlicks which are +proof-positive of her blue blood in the same way that a cold nose is in +a woman. + +I made a grave error, too, in speaking of Belle as red. Every swine +husbandman knows the technical word for her particular colour is +"mahogany." She has already farrowed two litters of six, the members +of which inherit their mother's fatal beauty. He tells me other things +but I forget them, except that pigs can see the wind, and that they are +older than history. + +We take a photograph of this bachelor homesteader and promise to print +it in a city paper under the caption, 'Wife Wanted.' In the North, we +call a bachelor, 'an anxious one.' + +The last miles of our journey are heavy going because of the hills and +stones, and our motor makes a lugubrious noise internally that is +wholly at variance with her velvet wheels, well lubricated machinery, +and the comfortable roundness of the corner seats, as if a plump and +smiling matron had suddenly started to swear. + +We reach Athabasca Landing at half-past ten while daylight still +lingers. Our complexions are somewhat impaired, but the man who +settles the bill for the steaks and coffee says there is nothing wrong +with our appetites. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +COUNTRY DELIGHTS + +Sometimes, I go a-fishing and shooting, and even then I carry a +note-book, that if I lose game, I may at least bring home my pleasant +thoughts!--PLINY. + + +I am fishing for graylings, but so far have caught none, my case being +similar to that of one Chang Chi-Ho, who in the eighth century, "spent +his time angling but used no bait, his object not being to catch fish." + +And truth to tell, I have not even the grace of an object, unless it be +to talk to the men folk who are lading the big flat scows called +"Sturgeon-Heads," for the trip down the river. + +By these right pleasant waters of the Athabasca, you are no longer +guided by duty but throw a rein on the senses. You do things because +you want to do them, and not because you ought to. This is owing to +the fact that the time-table loses its thrall north of 55°. I intend +stopping here a long while. + +It is a sun-steeped day, and the river looks like a bed of sequins. +The sun, although it is strong in Alberta, doesn't seem to ripen people +like it does farther south. I can see this from the way people give me +greeting and from how they tell me all that is in their hearts. + +Antoine hears that far off in that place called Montreal they dig worms +out of the clay for bait, and that these worms have neither shells nor +fur. This must be "wan beeg lie," for how could the worms keep from +freezing? It is not according to reason. These white men with trails +in the middle of their hair say these things so that the Crees, who are +very shrewd rivermen, will go to live in Montreal. + +I heartily concur with Antoine. I have been to Montreal myself and +have never seen so much as the sign of an earth-worm. They tell queer +yarns, those Eastern fellows who come from down North to write books +and buy land, but Antoine and I won't be fooled by them. Indeed, we +won't. + +Antoine caught a pike the other day without a line, but he lost it +again. It was the biggest fish he ever caught, but this is only +natural, and is no new thing, for ever since the first slippery fish +slithered through the hands of primeval man, it has always been the +biggest one that got away. Where these biggest fish foregather +ultimately has always been a mystery to me. Some day, we shall +discover a piscatorial paradise with millions of them in it. + +Antoine presents me to Captain Shot, an Indian who has been on this +river for forty-eight years. The Captain is seventy-three, and his +name is really Fausennent. He is called "Shot" because he was the +first man to shoot the rapids of the Athabasca. I say that Antoine +"presents me" but I say it advisedly, for the North levels people, by +which is meant the primitive north where they live with nature. In +this environment, the man who builds boats and supplies food or fuel, +is the superior of the man or woman who writes, or pronounces theories. +I may be able to hoodwink the people up south as to my importance in +our community, but it is different here. And this is as it should be. + +Captain Shot is engaged in building a boat for the Honourable the +Hudson's Bay Company, and there is even a smoking-room in it. But, +Blessed Mother! it is no trouble to build a boat now--none at all, for +presently the railway will be completed and the boilers and metal +fixings will come in over it, but in the old days--that is to say up +till now--it was different. When the Northern Navigation Co. brought +in the boilers for their boats, they hauled them a hundred miles over +the trail from Edmonton, and it took seventy-two horses on each boiler. + +"Didn't the government help any?" I ask. + +Oh yes! the late government at Ottawa tried to help transportation by +sending in fifty reindeer; but the Captain has heard tell that some men +swore terrible oaths at the government, and set their dogs about eating +up the deer, for these men hold a kind of an idea it is railways the +country hereabouts needs, but he is not quite sure as to the rights of +the story. + +There are four hundred men employed here at the Landing in building +scows and transhipping. Only a few of the scows are brought back, for +they have to be tracked up by power of man. For this reason, a new +flotilla is built each year. + +Captain Shot has many estimable sons, all of whom are rivermen and +shipbuilders. They could hardly be expected to disgrace their name by +becoming mere farmers or teamsters after the unwisdom of the white +man's way. Ho! Ho! the idea of any one wishing to become a farmer. + +But I was telling you about the scows. Unless you sat here catching +fish, you could never believe how much stuff can be packed into a scow. +As I watch the men at work, I think of Mark Twain's ambitious blue-jay +who tried to fill a house with acorns. Still the men do not seem +lacking in confidence, and keep wading backward and forward through the +water with sacks of flour, slabs of bacon, chests of tea, crates of +hardware, tins of stuff, and treasures in boxes that can only be +guessed at. I am hoping the biggest box contains dolls, ribbons, +work-bags, picture books, peppermint bull's eyes, and things like that, +for a mission school Christmas-tree somewhere down near the Arctic. I +am almost praying that it does. + +The smaller boxes are called permits, and each contain six bottles of +whisky. These are for the pioneering gentlemen at the different posts +who are delicate, and who honestly desire to get strong. + +Each permit is signed by a doctor so that the liquor must be considered +strictly as medicine. Irritating people who fail to understand that +there are only two licensed hotels between Edmonton and the North Pole, +sneer about there being a thousand delicate men on the rivers; but, for +my part, I am inclined to stand by the doctors, although I have always +held the clinical thermometer to be the only thing about the medical +profession with an integrity beyond question. + +If any one should glean from reading these lines that all there is to +loading a scow is to load it, he or she is a much misled person. The +last bale is hardly stowed away till two of the men have disappeared. +No one saw them go, least of all the Boss, but any one can see they are +not here now. The Boss is a creature of steel who seems to forget +there is much to be done in the last hour or two before a boatman +leaves the Landing for the stretched out journey beyond. Various +purchases are to be made; people are to be seen; drinks are to be had +against a long, long thirst, to mention nothing of new vows to Marie, +Babette, and Josephine. + +After awhile, the voyageurs are all rounded up with the exception of +Luke. The best the Boss can say for Luke is that he has been given a +Christian name. Jake is sent to fetch him. Luke turns up, but Scotty +must find Jake. Luke isn't drunk either--not he. It's the scow that's +drunk. Who said Luke was "fuller'n a goat," I'd like to know. +Ultimately, the Boss starts off to get Scotty and Jake. He gets them, +and he sits them down in a highly decisive manner, only to find that +Bill, and Jean Baptiste, and One-eyed Pete have gone up town for a +dunnage bag they left at the Grand Union Hotel.... The Boss looks +eight feet tall when he is angry, but, otherwise, to the unseeing eye, +he is only a young factor, or maybe an independent trader, intent on +his work like scores of other ordinary, unaccounted workmen. +Contrawise, the eye of imagination may see in him an adventuring +gentleman launching a craft that is to traverse for hundreds of miles +through many and diverse waterways, carrying with it a veritable cargo +of blessings to the far and lonely outposts of the North which, as yet, +are little else than names. + +The rivermen push off from shore with their oars till, in the centre of +the stream, the current catches them and carries them along. This is +their only method of locomotion, to float and float with the stream. +They have a steering-pole in the scow similar to that which may be seen +in pictures of old Roman galleys, and when, because of darkness, the +voyageurs wish to stay their course, they make to shore by its aid, +even as the Romans did more than two thousand years ago. To make the +simile complete, I stand on the bank and repeat the invocation of the +Roman poet: "Oh ship that conveyest Virgil to Greece, duly deliver up +the precious life entrusted to thy care."... + +If I hadn't jerked the crown of an old hat out of the river under the +impression that it was a fish, Justine would not have laughed out loud +and I would not have had an excuse to get acquainted with her. She has +been sitting nearby this half-hour. Her name isn't really Justine and +I forget what it is. She is the prettiest breed-girl in the country +and, by the same token, the frailest. "Believe me, Madam," explained +an old officer of the Mounted Police, the other day, "those eyes were +never given her for the good of her soul. She is a little +worth-nothing person like all the other breed-girls." + +This man despises breed-women and he has made a sufficiently intimate +study of them to form an opinion. He wishes they were all dead. "For +an absolute truth, Madam, listen to me. For years, these women have +paddled their canoes up this river with kegs of contraband liquor +a-swing from ropes beneath and none of the force ever suspected. They +were so monstrously civil, they would even give us 'a lift' if we +desired it. I was highly surprised when we found them out, and so +disgusted with myself that, for a time, I thought of becoming a +type-setter. By Jove! you know; a fellow doesn't expect to find a keg +outside a canoe. Now does he?" + +But I am not one of those who believe there are good women and bad +women. Some are elemental and others are not; that is the only +difference. I will maintain this to the very day my tongue wears out. + +Justine's white father must have had a head and shoulders of the most +perfect classical type. As she sits on the beach with a light shawl +drawn down over her head, this girl resembles greatly the Madonna of +Bouguereau. I tell her this, and we talk for a long while. She thinks +my suggestion that she marry a riverman, or a trapper, and have quite a +large family, a wholly foolish suggestion. It causes her to think +little of both my discernment and my knowledge of men. Rivermen, she +would have me understand, hardly ever come home, and when they do, only +to get drunk and beat their wives. A white man won't marry a breed +girl, nowadays, and if he should give her his heart, he expects it to +be returned sometime. Still, Justine considers his transient +affections to be preferable to those of the breed's, in that a white +man seldom strikes his girl. Justine gives me a short lesson in Cree, +and, among other words, I learn that _saky hagen_ is the equivalent of +"one I love," and that _nichimoos_ means "sweetheart." The former is +usually applied to a child, the latter to an adult. + +When I ask Justine to tell me a story about the North, she complies +because she has been educated in a mission school and speaks English +well. And then she is not in the least afraid of me since I showed so +lamentable a lack of insight about marriage. Now listen to the story. + +Once a mallard who was sick of love asked a blackbird to marry him. +"Marry me," he said, "and I will give you fish to eat and wild rice. +And when the sun is hot, I will hide you in the rushes and keep you +under my wings." + +And so they lived together as man and wife and the blackbird bore her +husband three sons, but soon he tired of her and made believe he was +dead so that she went away and left him in peace. + +And then the mallard went in search of another wife.... It was a story +I craved of Justine, and lo! she has told me a parable. + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +AT THE LANDING. + + A city founded is no city built + Till faith becomes prolific by the fathering tale + Of good report and all-availing effort.--J. M. HARPER. + + The sweet of life is something small, + A resting by a wayside wall + With God's good sunshine over all.--R. W. GILBERT. + + +This is the rainy season at Athabasca Landing, so that the streets are +very muddy. Long ago, it was like this in Edmonton, my continuing +city, but when we were come to a very considerable puddle our escorts +carried us. This is why big, fine-looking men were in high demand. + +But, this day, by some strange providence, the glut of rain has abated +and the clemency of the sky fills me with an importunate inclination to +gad about and use my eyes. There are no moments to be lost, to-morrow +it is sure to be raining again. Never was land more golden; never one +more grey. + +Here at the Landing, it makes no difference where one goes in search of +diversion, for it is to be found in all directions and every foot of +the way. This morning I preferably take to the hill back of the town, +for the water has drained off it to the river and the footing is good. + +The hill is held by the Honourable the Hudson's Bay Company, who have +owned it time out of mind. It hurts the Company to sell land, for they +are the true lineal descendants of that classical tree which groaned +with torture when a limb was dissevered from its trunk. This being the +case, they may be expected to hold the hill until the municipality +taxes it away from them. + +Ignorant people like the wheat-sellers of Winnipeg, speak of this +settlement as a new place, a mushroomic upstart of yesterday, whereas +it was an old post before Winnipeg was thought of. North of the +Landing, there are thirty thousand people who depend on the local +rivermen to bring down their year's supplies, so that this is a place +of no small concernment and it has seven streets, you might say. As +yet, its houses and public buildings do not run to paint or useless +ornamentations, and there is a stolid practicability about its front +doors. + +But about the hill: Terry, who is in "the Mounted," tells me it is a +walk of three cigarettes to the top of it, but two if you step lively. +This Terry has a bold and busy fancy, and if he cared to write, he +would, like Xenophon, be "an author of wonderful consequence." Once, +he tried to set down a story, but it was like trying to make a fire +with a wet match. + +Aha! Terry, Aha! you have said it exactly--defined it to a +hair's-breadth--the plight of the authors who would rise up on wings as +eagles but only they faint and are weary. A wet match! What greater +or more invincible deterrent could exist to the kindling of a fire? If +Terry's manners were less adroit and his hair less curly, I could +almost love him. I am half-purposed to anyway. + +And now that we are on matters literary I wish to announce that some +day, when my thoughts have come to issue, I intend writing an article +on the evil taste of pen-handles. There are several million dollars in +store for the man who will manufacture handles that are toothsome--say +of licorice, cinnamon, or sassafras wood, or of some composition +agreeable to the palate. The connection between the tongue and the pen +is a much closer one than generally recognized. + +We might even have pleasantly medicated pen-handles guaranteed to +stimulate our addled heads, or--Heigh, my hearts of the fourth +estate!--to fill us with an irresistible desire to work when there is +music and laughter downstairs, or a horse and sunshine out of doors. +The invention of such a pen could not fail to be imparted as +righteousness.... The roses are in full blast, and all the way along I +walk the earth in a fine rapture. On the hill-top, there is a spread +of blue hyacinths like a torn veil that has been thrown to the earth. +Here, in bewildering array, grow wild parsnips, feverfew, painter's +brush, mint-flowers, and lilies that flame riotously across the sheens +and greens of the open ways. I love the crimson glories of these +lilies; they seem to bring grist to life. Indeed, there is no question +but they do. + +The poplars and cottonwoods are hanging out long tassels of woolly +silver. It is a pity these do not pledge fruit like the tassels of the +Indian corn. Mayhap, some day, a scientist will cause the black poplar +to produce something for the sustenance of the North. Even the honey +which the bees store in its cavities becomes bitter and acrid to the +taste. Or it may happen we shall discover a cordial substance which +will transmute the tassels of the poplar into something else--say into +mulberries. Long ago, the English orchardists believed such things to +be possible, for, in the fourteenth century, one wrote down that "a +peach-tree shall bring forth pomegranates if it be sprinkled with +goat's milk three days when it beginneth to flower." + +It is good to be here this day enjoying the pleasant amity of the earth +and sky. One may draw physical and spiritual renovation from both. It +is very good to feel on one's face the soft-handed wind that is seldom +still. This is the kindly unrestricted breeze which brings gifts to +the North and West. It blesses the grain by swaying it to and fro, for +the word "bless" means literally to fructify. On some such day as this +I will come back here from the dead. + +On this hill, the Hudson's Bay Company, the world's oldest trust, have +erected their storehouse and factor's residence. These are log +buildings, austerely square and ugly in the extreme. In the factor's +garden is an old sundial which adds the needed touch of romance to the +place; also, it connotes a fine leisureliness. + +The erstwhile typical régime of a Hudson's Bay fort is a phase of +existence which shortly will be sponged off human memory. It has never +been as fully explained to me as I could desire, but as nearly as I can +make out, the staff of a well-manned post consisted of the factor and +chief factor, the trader and chief trader, an accountant, a postmaster, +two or more clerks, a cooper, a carpenter, a blacksmith, and labourers, +the work of the last mentioned being to haul water, cut wood, and +secure meat. There were also as many cooks as required. Food was +sometimes scarce, so that the men were required to lick their platters +clean. Contrariwise, they drank not a little of heady beverages which +they are said to have "carried well." + +The Indian's idea of a house is a different one to the trader's. It is +not a place to be lived in, but exists merely as a shield from the +weather. Accompanied by Goodfellow, a frowsy, stump-tailed dog from +the hotel, I visited the Indian houses hereabout. Goodfellow came with +me, not as a protector, but because he wouldn't be driven back. He is +a reprobate cur, forever spoiling for a fight; a natural born feudist +who lives in a state of violent excitement. Terry says he is "no +bloomin' lap-dog," but a four-legged incarnation of the devil himself. +Sometime soon, this dog's day will be over, for he is surely going to +die of lead poisoning. + +All the way to the Indians, with a stupid malignity, and in defiance of +the plainest laws of fence, Goodfellow gave chase to every cat and +rabbit and bit every cow. It is not open for me to say what I thought +of him, except that his conduct was solidly wrong. It was, +accordingly, of high gratification to the rancour I hid in my heart +when the Indians' huskies made short shrift of him. Like Humpty +Dumpty, it will be hard to put him together again. They are no dealers +in sophistries, these wide-mouthed wolf-dogs, with their wicked teeth, +and would fight against the stars in their courses. + +When the women have beaten them off and learn I am not offended +concerning Goodfellow's drubbing, they are pleasant to me. A thin, +pock-marked squaw invites me into a shack or, more properly speaking, +into a baby-warren which fairly bristles with a flock of semi-wild +children, for, as yet, the squaws have not deliberately ceased from +having children. + +What I said awhile ago about the Indian's house applies equally to his +children's wearing apparel. It shelters rather than ornaments. Their +clothes seem to have no visible supports, but are held to their small +fat bodies by some inexplicable attraction. One may see the same +phenomenon on the apostolic figures on stained glass windows. + +A chocolate-coloured baby with blackberry eyes is propped against the +wall in a moss bag, and looks for all the world like a cocoon that +might any moment push off its sheath and take to wings. + +An unsavoury mess of entrails is stewing in a black pot and filling the +house with an unpleasant odour. I try not to show my repugnance lest +my hostesses consider the white woman to be proud-stomached with no +proper appetite for lowly faring. I tell them as I take down the +blanket from the door--not untruthfully you understand, but as a small +matter of immediate expediency--how it is light one desires rather than +fresh air, and that it is hard to see aright when one has been walking +in the sunlight. + +This Hudson's Bay blanket is, next to _uskik_, the kettle, the one +indispensable thing in an Indian household. It serves as a door, a +coat, a carpet, a bed, and for other things which it boots not to +mention. It is, therefore, well to be explanatory when one removes it +from its place, just as it is wise to apologize when one pokes an +Englishman's fire of coals. + +Mrs. Lo tells me the old woman who is making moccasins is _Naka_, which +word, she explains for my better understanding, is the Cree for "My +Mother." Naka is a very old woman and "can no English say." Neither +can she be considered as typical of Whistler's mother. + +There are amusing things to be done in this shack. For instance, you +may by signs and smiles make Naka, my mother, to understand how you +greatly desire to sew upon the moccasins she holds, and Naka may, in +the amiability of her disposition, accede to your importunity. + +As thread, deer sinew is not so easily manipulated as you might +imagine; indeed, I should say it is distinctly uncontrollable. The +audience, in spite of its manifest efforts at politeness, is +nevertheless widely diverted. Who would have thought a white woman +could be so droll in the woods, and so very stupid? + +Huh! Huh! she may be so stupid that even old Naka, who is a proper +woman with her needle, has to scrub the air with her arms and show her +yellow gums in laughter. + +Their always wakeful curiosity leads the maidens to enquire as to what +might be inside a white woman's hand-bag, and that they may +sufficiently know about this matter, the white woman empties it upon +her knees. Immediately, the articles are passed around for appraisal +and approval. Bank cheques! ... _Oui_! _Oui_! The men who work on +the boats get these. The girls know how it is talking [Transcriber's +note: taking?] paper to get money. + +My penknife, pencil, note-book, purse, and handkerchief are duly +examined and quietly commented upon, but a package of tablets packed in +a silver paper, and small tube of cold cream, cause no small flutter in +our circle. When I am through demonstrating their use, every one's +breath is laden with the odour of mint, and their hands with that of +roses. Um--m--m--mh! + +The women feel my arms, try on my bracelet and rings, and ask me to +take off my hat that they may see my hair, which, alas! is devoid of +all waywardness and coquetry. I can see they are disappointed in this +and think me what Artemus Ward calls "a he-looking female." + +In one shack to which the girls accompany me, an emaciated, coughing +boy is bed-ridden and near to death. Lili Abi has him in her arms, and +he may not go free. + +Who this Lili Abi, or Lilith, is does not certainly appear, but, +according to the Rabbis who wrote of old time, she is the first wife of +Adam and queen of the succubi. Some there are who declare this to be +an ill-framed story, and a conceit of the fancy, but others hold it as +a creed that she lives by sucking the blood of children till they fade +away and die. It is from Lili Abi that we get our word lullaby. The +malific lullaby she sings has come nigh to breaking the heart of +humanity, but, one day, it shall happen that a sure and strong-handed +scientist will get a strangle hold on Lili Abi and pierce her to death +with his slender but omnipotent needle. + +Amil, who is the lad's father, says, "I am mooch scare' 'bout leetle +boy, for sure. I ees pray all tam to de holy mother. Mabbe he ees get +well... la bonne chance ... mabbe non! Leetle boy sing all de tam when +he ees well." + +Amil has never been to the south, or over the mountains, but he has +heard much about these countries. He has been told how, in the United +States, they do not believe in the pope and get married many times. He +has also heard that the Yankees mean to conquer Canada and pull down +the tricolor. + +Michele Daubeny, who once went across the mountains to where the +fish-eaters are, told him that the ocean never freezes. But this +Michele has a tongue which is not straight, also he has been known to +steal fur out of the traps, so that Amil does not know what to believe. + +"I have mak rip'ly," says Amil, "dat mabbe by'me by, I ees tak de trail +dem queeck an' see _kickekume_, de great sea water, to myse'f." + +And when I leave the shacks and go back towards the village, I fall in +with some swart broodlings, who are shooting with arrows. At first, +they will have none of me until I make the mortifying confession and +concession that I cannot shoot and desire greatly to be taught. After +this, nothing could exceed their pedagogic enthusiasm. Apollo, prince +of archers, could do no better. + +In the pale face, the hunting instinct, while never entirely lost, is +still greatly modified. In the red man it is a passion. Watch this +little lean-bellied Indian as he stalks his game. The bird rises and +settles again a few yards away. The boy trails it up closer and closer +with a feline softness of tread, a queer slurring movement that belongs +only to animals of prey, and then, standing taut and tense as a +finely-bred setter making game, he concentrates the whole energy of his +body on one piercing point and sends his arrow home. + +The bow-and-arrow stage through which these Indian lads are passing +corresponds in the white boy to that inevitable condition of +development known as gun fever. In our city, at a highly immoral +price, we dress up in khaki the boys of the lower classes, give them +guns, and call them scouts. I like the Indian way better. Of course, +there is this to be said for our method, that it instils a martial +spirit into the youngsters so that when they are grown larger we shall +have no lack of soldiers. This is a statement so obvious and axiomatic +that it hardly needs writing down. + +Well, so be it! How else are our bonds to be protected? And may not +the lower classes be relied upon to constantly produce batches of boys +to step into the ranks? Yes! I believe in Boys' Brigades and in war. +I have some bonds myself. + +In the village, several homesteaders who are trending northward to the +Peace River country, have drawn up to the hotel. Their wagons are +piled high with farm implements and household stuff which they +purchased at Edmonton. + +All of these people are topful of enthusiasm, being of wise and gallant +mind. Indeed, the whole country seems surcharged with it and even the +poplars clap their hands. The settlers will tell you the only knocker +here is Opportunity. There is always a mirage in the pioneer's sky +which, God be praised, he manages to haul down bit by bit and pin to +the solid earth. "The pins!" you ask. Ah yes! I may as well tell +you; they are surveyors' stakes and tamarack fence-poles. + +I have some little talk with a woman who is resting on the balcony +while her horses are being fed. She comes from the United States and, +until her marriage three months ago, practised her profession as a +trained nurse. Her husband is going to make entry for a homestead, and +when, in three years, he has "proven up," they will open a store in one +of the villages. By that time, the railway will have reached their +district. Here is a woman of varied interests and many pursuits; one +with more than an arm up her sleeve. I am doubly sure of her +practicability now that she has told me of the stuff she has packed in +the corners of the wagon, and in the narrow spaces between the +household utensils. She has seeds for her kitchen garden, also sweet +peas, mignonette, sunflowers, hollyhocks, and pansies. The firebox of +her stove contains a hand sewing-machine, while the oven is the +receptacle for a guitar, some music a surgical case, a box of +medicines, a small looking-glass, two metal candlesticks, a roll of +coloured pictures for her walls, a few thin paper classics, stationery, +fishing-tackle, and a well-stored work-bag. The matches she carries in +a case with a close top, while the groceries are packed in tin bread +boxes which will serve the same end in her new home. Besides their +cooking utensils, toilet articles, clothing, blankets, and tent, this +couple carry a rifle, a shot-gun, ammunition, and other small but +useful things like a map, a compass, and an almanac. The wagon has a +canvas top. + +One man who is also heading for the far north tells me he has sold +everything from painkiller to mining stock. Of late, he has been +selling real-estate, but the bottom has dropped out of this business. +For the future, he intends raising potatoes on the land instead of +prices. He has "cleaned up" eight thousand dollars in real-estate, but +he wishes me to understand he made this honestly by taking options on +property and selling before the options came due. + +With remarkable precision of language, he explains how the slump in +real-estate is chiefly due to those large, didactic gentlemen of slow +conscience and insulting superior manner who come here by the trainload +and tell the North she is still a flapper, and that it is unbecoming of +her to do up her hair and lengthen her skirts, after which cheap and +unsolicited advice, they take themselves and their pestiferous money +homewards. + +Their opinions are quoted from the Atlantic to the Pacific, which I +must know takes in Spruceville, till the bankers are seized with the +complaint known as cold feet--pest take them!--and "get orders from +headquarters" to close up all outstanding accounts. These banker +fellows, my informant says, lose their beauty sleep, but as far as he +can see, lose nothing else. A business man may be potentially rich and +yet be put into bankruptcy by a corporation, the spoils going to the +corporation, or its manager. There should be a law against elderly +wide-jawed financiers who prophesy hard times because, with them, the +wish is father to the thought. There is nothing in all the world they +desire so much in order that they may, by their phenomenal rates of +interest, pillage the country to their heart's satisfaction. So +gainful is their pursuit, my friend will not be at all surprised if, at +the last day, it is found that these tongue-lolling financiers have a +lien on heaven; indeed, he believes this to be inevitable. Owing to +the fact that we are unaccustomed to it, the process of thinking is a +somewhat painful one to us of Alberta, but it is wonderful what flashes +of illumination come to us sometimes. + +To-day, the first train of cars has entered this place. It belongs to +the Canadian Northern Railway Company. For many years Edmonton was +known as the last house in the world. This, of course, was not +literally true, and it would be hard to state where or which is the +ultimate hearth-stone in this very good land of Canada, but assuredly +Edmonton was the last post-office and, until this year, the End of +Steel. To-day, this road is born. When will it die? We fall into a +way of thinking it is here for eternity, but railways vanish like +everything else. Even the great Appian Way, which lasted for over two +thousand years, has, in these last centuries, become little more than a +name. + +To build even one of our railways, a hundred forests are sacrificed, +and, in the uncanny gloom of the dead country which lies in the heart +of the earth, thousands of bowed, grim workers toil, Vulcan-like, for +the iron to make its spikes and nails. + +The railroad seems like a huge centipede with rails for the body, ties +for the limbs and smoke for the breath. The men who stand by her side +are the waiters who feed her with coal and slake her thirst with water. +Sometimes, when she is weary of the freightage these men lay upon her, +she rises and crushes it to atoms. Men call this happening "a broken +rail" or "an open switch," but we know better. + +Or we may think of the railroad as a streak of light through desolate +places telling the pioneer to be strong and of good courage with the +hope of better days. + +Or, again, it is a belt which binds the lustrous provinces of the East +and West into the eager land of Canada. What odds that the belt, +partaking of its environment, is rocky here or sandy there, so long as +it be really a belt? + +No one can truly say when this road will die. It may be--if one may +hazard so saucy a suggestion--that the airships will kill her by taking +her traffic in men and merchandise. And maybe the great-grandchildren +of the "Coming Canadians" who arrived this year from Scandinavia or +Austria, will plough long furrows on her right-of-way and haul off her +bridge timbers for firewood. Guesswork all! + +I might have gone on musing about this railway until now, and computing +what its advent means to the North, the country which has hitherto been +the land of the dog and the canoe, had not a commanding voice bade me +come and "drape" myself with the crowd beside the first train in order +to have my picture taken. + +"I won't go! not a toe," said I, but I went, for no woman who is even +fairly normal can successfully resist having her photograph taken. She +always hopes it will turn out better than the last one, and I hoped so +too. + + + + +CHAPTER X + +ON THE ATHABASCA RIVER + +I am but mad north-northwest: when the wind is southerly, I know a hawk +from a handsaw.--_Hamlet_. + + +All the world is a deluge of rain when we leave Athabasca Landing, and +we wait at the hotel till the last minute, hoping the storm may abate +in order that we may reach our steamer without losing too much starch. +But the horn is making the asthmatic lamentations, meaning thereby that +everybody should be aboard, so we say good-bye to all at the hotel; +promise to be good; to take care of ourselves; and to come back soon. +I say "we" because it is journalistic etiquette to be impersonal, but +actually there is only myself, the other passengers having gone down to +the river over an hour ago. + +It is a troublous jaunt which I make, for a streak of wind turns my +umbrella into a cornucopia; the fat drops of rain splash into my eyes; +I take the wrong turn, get mired and lose my rubber shoes. When the +river is reached, I find the descent to the steamer is buttered with +mud and so steep that sliding is the only method of locomotion possible. + +A vastly tall man stands on the gangway at the foot of the hill; holds +out a pair of arms that must measure ten feet from tip to tip and says, +"Come on, lady." The lady comes, but with such impact that we nearly +go through to the opposite side of the steamer. Our final resting +place is on a banana crate, which, in all conscience, is yielding +enough, the fruit proving to be over-ripe. The passengers are +distinctly amused, but the freight master is in no gallant temper over +it and disapproves of the whole affair. I could tell you what he said +to the vastly tall man, but you would have to come very close to hear +me. + +After supper, which consists of beef with stuffing, macaroni with +cheese, pork with beans, white fish, stewed tomatoes, escalloped corn, +boiled potatoes, walnut pickles, catsup, soda biscuits, pumpkin-pie, +apple-pie, currant buns, cocoanut cake, cheese, coffee, stewed figs, +tooth-picks and other things which I cannot remember, I crawl to the +deck to find out where Grouard is, and how we are to get there. + +Although thither bound, my knowledge of its location is shamefully +vague. Here is what I learn. We sail north and west on the Athabasca +River till we come to Mirror Landing, at the confluence of the +Athabasca and Lesser Slave River, at which point we leave the steamer +and make a portage of fourteen miles to Soto Landing. This portage is +to avoid the government dams which have been built to make the Lesser +Slave River navigable. At Soto Landing we embark on the _Midnight +Sun_, another steamer of the Northern Navigation Company, and travel on +till we enter Lesser Slave Lake, down which we journey to its extreme +western end, where Grouard sits on a hill overlooking a bit of the lake +called Buffalo Bay. Without mishaps, we ought to reach Grouard in four +or five days, but no one will cut off our heads if we loiter a bit on +the way. + +There are about thirty male passengers on board and seven women. This +half-hour I have been talking to a plausible prolix villain whom it +would be easy to like greatly. He is going to make three million +dollars from his oil-wells on the Mackenzie River. He says so himself. +He has been down north for several years and walks like one who has +been used to the spring of a snowshoe beneath his foot. His clothes +have the odour of the forest--that is to say of leaf mould, poplar +smoke and spruce resin. He went to England two years ago to persuade +Grandfather Bull to invest in oil and asphaltum, but was not as +successful as he could desire. "I figure," he says, "it will take +another century to convince Grandfather, and by that time the fourth +generation of America 'Coal-oil Johnnies' will have squandered the +dividends on actresses and aeroplanes. Pouf! these Americans have no +idea the world belongs to the Lord." + +It was well I agreed with him so civilly, for he said, "If you wish to +invest in some oil-stocks, Madam--and no doubt you will after what I +have told you--I will see to it that you get in on the ground-floor and +no questions asked." + +Now I did not like to inquire of him what is meant by the ground-floor, +lest he should think me the veriest ignoramus, but I am persuaded it +means something most excellent, for I have frequently heard promoters +mention it to people like me, who have not much money to buy with. + +This man originally hailed from New Zealand, but he tells me that +country is no good; it is too far from Fort McMurray. At Fort McMurray +life is one round of pleasurable anticipation and all the day seems +morning. Who can tell at what moment a gusher may shoot into the +clouds and blot out the sun itself? Then it's gorged with gold we +should all be--those of us on the ground-floor--and are millionaires, +with hundreds of universities and public libraries to give away. What +would be the use of having oil and hiding it under bushels of rocks, +we'd like to know. + +At this point the purser explains that the steep ascent to our right is +called Bald Hill. It can be seen from a long distance, and is one of +the features of the landscape from which, in the winter, the freighters +measure distances--a kind of millarium or central milestone. Surely +this is a country of vast horizons, both mentally and visually. + +About every twelve miles we pass a stopping place where the winter +freighters and their teams are fed. These houses and stables are built +of logs and are sheltered by the forest. I prefer to say they have a +roof-tree, the words seeming to suggest a good deal more. In spite of +their splendid isolation, these stopping places do an excellent +business and, while warm and well-provisioned, are still somewhat in +the rough. The purser says this roughness is not worth regarding, for +while here is the country a fellow roughs it, in the city he "gets it +rough." + +"And that reminds me, ladies, of my errand to you," he continues; "you +are probably aware there are only sixteen bunks on this boat and eight +mattresses. You, of course, will use your own blankets and pillows, +but I perceive you have not secured mattresses. It would be +wonderfully easy if you were to carry off one, or even two, from the +priests' state-rooms, for at this very minute the priests say prayers +on the lower deck." + +"And believe me," he concludes in a highly chivalrous manner, "you two +ladies have an unquestionable right to the mattresses, so that I shall +consider your act to be one of perfect propriety." + +Thus encouraged by the pursuer I proceeded with my room-mate to seize +our "unquestionable rights," but, approaching the priests' door, my +heart failed me, and our undertaking seemed a plain and undeniable +demonstration of wickedness like the robbing of a child's bank. They +are such quiet, well-deserving men, these eight black-smocked Brothers +who are going North to the jubilee of the great Bishop Grouard, the +like of whom there never was. Also, they are very polite, and the one +who is an astronomer and comes from Italy, picked out the tenderest cut +of beef for me at supper. + +"Pray don't be silly," snorted my room-mate, "the rules of their Order +say distinctly they shall deny themselves and not sleep softly. +Besides, when men take terrible vows that they will never get married, +it is a woman's stoutest duty to steal their mattress whenever the +opportunity serves." + +She also told me with rapid brevity some names which Clement of +Alexandria, a Father of the Church, applied to women in the early days +of the Christian era. She had read about them in a history...... + +In the falling of the night, at the mauve hour, our ship having been +made fast, we go ashore and talk with the Indians who are camped here +in a wigwam. One of the passengers, who has lived among the Crees for +many years, tells me I express myself with redundancy in that the +literal meaning of wigwam is camping-ground. She says the Indians have +many grotesque folk tales, which are told by the men. Each story has a +moral which they desire their wives to consider from an educative +standpoint. Once there was a man whose _utim_ (that is to say his dog) +used to turn into an _iskwao_, or woman, when it became dark. She had +yellow hair and her arms were white and soft like the breast feathers +of a young bird. This happened long ago, before the Indians were +baptized and when people were not so pious as they are now. Any man +can do the same thing to this day if he happens to know the magic +formula. + +There is also a tale about a woman of the woods whom we, in our +scientific conceit, call the echo. Once when her man was away for many +moons on the great _sepe_, or river, the woman took another husband, so +that when her man came back she flouted him and slapped his face. That +night the moon changed her into a voice, and now she calls for her +husband to come and love her, but he only mocks at her. + +This habit of the husbands in telling tales with palpable deductions +attached would seem to be common to other races than the Indians, for +the Romans, likewise, had a story about the echo. It appears that +Jupiter confided to Madam Echo the history of his amours, and when she +told his secrets among her friends she was deprived of speech and could +only repeat the questions which were asked of her. The Cree story is +the better one. It has a fine human motive which the other lacks, and +also it drops, a much-needed tribute on the worn altar of domesticity. + +When a fire is lighted with birch bark and tamarack knots, we sit +beside it and are more merry than you could believe. + +The sweetheart of Jacques dances for us to the well-cadenced rhythm of +a Tea Song. I cannot spell her Indian name, but it means "Fat of the +Flowers," by which term they express our word "nectar." The cree is a +droll language. + + "Ha! He! ne matatow, + Ha! He! ne saghehow." + +she chants and rechants as the fitful flames make sharp high-lights on +her dark skin, causing her to appear as the flying figure of a bronze +Daphne, and, in truth, the boughs of the trees lend likeness to my +fancy, for as she dances into them, they seem to absorb her, even as +the laurel absorbed the Grecian nymph of old time. + +Translated literally, the words of the Tea Song read thus-- + + "Ha! He! I love him, + Ha! He! I miss him." + + +This is a supremely cunning song, in that it utters in six words (if we +exclude the interjections) the summary of all the love songs which have +ever been written--"I love him: I miss him." I am glad it was framed +in the unsophisticated North. + +And Fat of the Flowers sings another song which is addressed to her +lover. She is lonely for him, our interpreter explains, but drinks her +tears in silence. Sometimes his presence comes to her in the hour of +twilight, and she kneels to it as the poplar kneels to the wind. When +he returns to the camp fire she will give to him a blanket made out of +the claw skins of the lynx, and a white and scarlet belt from the young +quills of the porcupine. + +I can see that her honeyed words are agreeable to Jacques and give him +fullness of pleasure, for there is a tell-tale joy in his face that +refuses to be hid. + +Jacques, who is a riverman, was educated at a mission school on the +Mackenzie, and he tells me that Fat of the Flowers is nearly as +"magneloquent" and clever as a man. He is almost sure there is a +little white bird that sings in her heart. + +After a time, our dusky friends steal away one by one to their rest, or +two by two. The ship lolls lazily on the bank and there is no sound +save the whimper of the fire and the deep breathing of some over-tired +sleeper, but once a sleeper laughed aloud. + +I step carefully between the recumbent forms on the deck lest I hurt +them or disturb their quietude. I am sorry now that I stole the +mattresses. Surely I am a bitter sinner and unlovely of heart. + +In the morning, when I told the Brothers how I had privily taken the +mattresses because I disapproved of their vows concerning marriage, and +because of the unseemly remarks Clement of Alexandria had applied to +women in the early days of the Christian era, they laughed again and +again with much hilarity. Indeed, one of the Brothers said he +applauded my moderation and marvelled that I was good enough to leave +their blankets and pillows. Another gave it as his opinion that +Clement's pleasantry was a shabby-minded one and needlessly sarcastic, +the result of an ill-governed disposition. But this Brother, like the +others, took full care to evade the question I had raised as to +celibacy.... + +What Clement of Alexandria said was that women, like Egyptian temples, +were beautiful without, but when you entered and withdrew the veil, +there was nothing behind it but a cat or a crocodile. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + +SOME NORTHERN PIONEERS + + Through these shores amid the shadows, with the apparitions pressing, + Pioneers! O Pioneers!--WHITMAN. + + +In the morning, soon after sunup, we continue our joyous journey on the +Athabasca, but the birds are out and about before us. An occasional +duck rises off the water sharply with a whir of wet wings, but +generally they are self-complacent and play at last across the road +with the ship, just as if they sought trouble and despised it. The +young ducklings, who have only taken to water these few days agone, +form themselves into tiny rafts and one might almost expect to see a +fairy step aboard them. The fish jump out of the water, praying to be +caught. They look like strips of silver ribbon. Mr. Patrick O'Kelly, +who is also watching their come and go, declares this to be a sign of +rain. "When birds fly low, lady, and when fish swim near the surface, +it is well to bring in the clothes off the line." He also says that +the plover's cry indicates rain, even as does its name--the _pluvoir_, +or rain-bird. + +There are few birds to be seen, except an occasional hawk, who seems to +have no other object than to curvet about and display his clipper-built +wings for our admiration. Sometimes he soars into the skies in order +to exercise a keen vision that covers half the province, or, again, he +appears to hang in the air with an invisible string, so perfect is his +poise. It is foolish to call hawks ravening birds and to impute evil +motives to them. We only do this because they like chickens and other +gallinaceous fowl whose end we should prefer to be pot-pie. This is +not a reprobate taste on the hawk's part, for, of course, he has never +read the game-laws, nor the Book of Leviticus, and cannot be expected +to know that certain flesh, in certain localities, in certain seasons, +is the particular appurtenance of the _genus homo_. In truth, we are +so uninstructed in these laws ourselves that the government must, +perforce, keep game-wardens and the churches must keep preachers to +educate us more fully. + +The Athabasca River, Mr. O'Kelly calculates, is about eight hundred +feet wide and about twelve feet deep. Its current is about five or six +miles an hour. The less said about its colour the better. At +Athabasca Landing they use the water as a top-dressing for the land. + +I get on well with Mr. O'Kelly because he does not mind answering +questions, and I am rather stupid and do not understand irony, a fact +now published for the first time. + +Mr. Patrick O'Kelly started on "his own" thirty years ago in Manitoba. +His name isn't really O'Kelly, but in this country a name is neither +here nor there. He homesteaded one hundred and sixty statute acres, +but to be a farmer one had to possess a capacity for waiting and he +didn't possess it. After this, he became a prospector. Now, in +prospecting, a man does not have to wait: his money is always +discernible to the eye of faith. Mr. O'Kelly still holds his on this +unnegotiable, spiritualistic plane. In the meanwhile he is boss of a +big lumber camp over Prince Albert way. He used to be a captain on +this river, but he doesn't captain any more. Some of these days he +intends to take a wander back home. He hears that northern folk are +foreigners in the South. This last remark is made with a rising +inflection as if an answer were expected. + +Who would have thought such a pathetic fear to be lurking under so +confident and so square-shouldered an exterior? I can see now why Mr. +O'Kelly finds it hard to get away. Without letting him know that his +secret is suspected, I try to explain how it is the northerners who +have changed. We pioneers talk of going home but we really never go +back--that is the person who went away. This may be equally true of +all migrants who go into a far country, whether it be Abraham who went +into Ur of Chaldea, or Reginald of Oxford who goes into Saskatchewan. + +There are several scribes on board, and one of them, "a editor in human +form," gives us greeting and joins our company. He is a thin, straight +young fellow with a likeable face, but his hair is shockingly awry. + +"So you are an editor," says Mr. O'Kelly. "Your unpeaceable tribe has +committed much damage in this country." + +"What do you mean by calling us a tribe? I conceive that you are an +old fool and perhaps a liberal in politics. Although I am an editor, +and by no means proud, I consider myself to be much better than you." + +"Young person! you mean you are no worse," answers Mr. O'Kelly, "but, +in faith, I meant no offence and I am not a liberal." + +Being thus reassured, the editor proceeds to discuss his difficulties +with us. He has been treated with great unfairness in one of the +northern towns. They gave him a fine mouthful of promises when he went +there, but they gave him nothing else. They failed to pay their +subscriptions and their advertisements, so that he had to leave the +place naked and ashamed. Some day, he is going to write a story in an +American magazine and describe this town as a real-estate office in a +muskeg. It will be marrow to his bones, and he will let the magazine +have the story for nothing. + +Or, worse still, he will tell the truth about all the leading citizens; +he will set it down without equivocation or shadow of turning. + +"But you wouldn't do this latter," I argue; "only a man with ink for +blood could do so terrible a thing." + +"On the contrary, lady," snaps he, "I shall take blood for ink, that is +what I will do." + +"But," said I, "you must expect to be beat a few times in your life, +little man, if you live such a life as a man ought to live, let you be +as strong and healthy as you may." This was quite a clever answer, and +I wish Charles Kingsley had not said it first, then it would have been +original with me. + +This young editor talks with so much vigor and so many gesticulations +one might think he was acting a picture for a biograph machine. It is +a pity his political heroes do not avail themselves of his services. +As a fighter, the dear lad would have a fine genius if properly +incited; also, he has a marvellous vocabulary of flaming adjectives. + +There is an Indian woman on the ship who is married to a white man, who +seems most kind to her. The northern woman who interpreted the Toa +Song for me, says this man believes the world well lost for love, his +heart being very full and his head very empty. You will observe that +this northern woman is a philosopher, probably owing to the fact that +she has had little to read and plenty of time to think. She was born +in this country over fifty years ago but was educated in the South. At +the age of sixteen, she married a Factor of the Hudson's Bay Company, +and is now his widow. This year agone she has been in Europe, but has +returned once more to her native North with its hidden wilds and yet +unhappened things. I tell you that some secret presage lies upon this +land, and one who has sensed it must come back again and again to its +intangible allurement. It may be the strong, austere spirit of the +land that holds one; or the vast voids of the sky, with their blue and +gold, and blue and silver. Or it may be that Tornarsuk, the great +devil of the Arctic, who rides on the wind, steals from their breasts +the midget souls of humans so that they belong to him and must follow +whither he wills. It is not for me to know the reason, or to tell it +to you, for I am southron born and cannot construe aright. + +Time was when this woman only tasted flour once a year. It was in New +Year's Day, when her mother baked cakes for the gentlemen who came to +pay their respects to her--the doctor, the missionary, the clerks at +the post, or the visitors from other posts. On the first of these +occasions her mother, with an ill-grounded confidence, passed the plate +of cakes to the earliest visitors so that there were no cakes left for +the callers who came afterwards. + +When flour became more plentiful, it was her mother's custom to have +cakes every Sunday evening. A cake was baked for each member of the +family and one for the plate. No one dreamed of taking the last cake. +It would have been accounted a gross breach of etiquette to have done +so, and one not to be thought of. + +"But what became of it?" I ask; "who ate it ultimately? Surely some +one knew?" + +Apparently no one did, for I am answered by a lift of one shoulder, +suggestive of ignorance and possibly indifference--a little defensive +shrug which precludes further intrusion into the subject. It is unkind +of her to leave me with this worrying problem, for there are fifty-two +cakes a year to be disposed of, and I may never hope to dispose of them +alone. + +The Indian woman who has the white husband gives me bon-bons from a box +she purchased in Edmonton last week. Nothing so makes for confidence +in women as to eat sweets together. Authors write much about breaking +bread and the sacredness of salt, but, in actual life, nothing cements +friendship like chocolate drops. This is why the woman opens her heart +to me and says she desires to write a book--a great book about the +white people of whom she knows many things. I have no doubt she does, +and that if she put down all that is in her heart without one glance at +the gallery and without trimming her language to the rules of syntax, +her book would be the literary sensation of the year. + +She wants to know if ever I wrote a book. Now, once I did, but it was +a simple book, so that wise people did not care so much as one finger's +fillip for it, but, sometime, I am going to put all their counsel +together and compose a really great one. It will not be disjointed, +but will flow along without a break in the smooth, natural way people +talk when they are alone with their families. It shall concern psychic +phenomena, yearnings, root-causes, the untrammelled life, strange +decadencies, and things like that. It shall be paradoxical, +epigrammatic, erudite, even vitriolic. I will pierce the self-conceit +of these Canadians and tell them they have need to mend their manners; +that they are primitive beasts--even _Diprotodons_. + +Now the _Diprotodon_ was a kind of ferocious kangaroo, carnivorous and +predaceous, which lived in the Tertiary Period and had a skull three +feet in length. Those who are not of this species, I shall designate +as fanatics who cling to worn-out shibboleths over which they snarl +like pestilent dogs; or prigs who affect neurotic cults that are +exceedingly false and not native to this country. I will be superior +and insufferably arrogant so that they may be vastly annoyed with me +and rage like the Psalmist's "heathen." I shall not be kindly to any, +nor say them fair words, no matter how much I may desire to, nor how +much it hurts me to tell lies. + +Then will the wise people take their pens in hand to say that "This +writer is possessed of the discriminating sense to an extraordinary +degree. She has vision, luminosity, verve, technique, and artistic +self-restraint--these, and other palpable qualities which bid us hope, +in spite of all which has been said to the contrary, that the time is +not so hopelessly remote when Canada may lay some small claim to having +a literature of her own." + +Oh Me! Oh Me! This is what they will say, and I will laugh in my +throat and in my sleeves. I win not care the point of one pencil what +they say, so long as they refrain from using the adjective breezy. +When a northern woman goes visiting and the wise people wish to be +kind, they all apply this word to her. When the dubious visitor looks +into the dictionary for the exact meaning of breeze, she finds it +stands for either an uproar or a gentle gale. People have been +murdered for less obvious errors, so that all wise people will please +to be forewarned. + +If you were to ask here what the Indian woman wished to write in a book +about the white people, I would not be able to tell you, for, at this +juncture, we all forgot to talk and crowded to the prow of the vessel +to see a moose that swam boldly ahead of us in the river. He kept far +enough away to be out of range, so that no one shot him. I use the +word shot in deference to the untaught urban folk into whose hands this +book may pass. What the men really desired was to "trump" him. + +We did not see him take to the bank, for we took to the bank ourselves +in order to load wood for the engine. He is a worthy gentleman, the +moose, and should be well esteemed. Dropped in a thicket, hunted by +wolves, unprotected save by his sharp hoof, which, however, will rip +anything softer than a steel plate, he ranges the forests till his +antlers are full-branched, and then, at the age of three, without +costing the Province or the Indian a cent, he tips the scales at a +thousand pounds of meat. + +We are invited to the tent of Mrs. Jack Fish, who receives us seated. +This is not owing to any lack of hospitality on her part, but because +she is very old and quite blind. The Oblate Brothers say she is over a +hundred years old, and truly she might pass for the honourable +great-grandmother of all Canada. Her son, with whom she lives, minds a +wood-pile on the Athabasca, but in the winter he has a house of logs at +Tomato Creek to which he retires. All Indians live in tents from +preference, and not from the sordid reason assigned them by the +would-be poet who declares that "Itchie, Mitchie lives in a tent," for +"He can't afford to pay the rent." There are no rented houses in this +country, and no man has ever heard of a landlord. Every person holds +his house, or his several houses, in fee simple. In Great Britain, +these residences would be designated as "shooting boxes." + +Neither would it be a sign of mental superiority on the part of the +traveller to consider Jack Knife's job a menial one. Banking +situations or provincial politics may have an importance in the fence +country, but in boreal regions the prime test of intelligence is a +knowledge of how to handle a boat or an axe. + +Madam, our hostess, informs the Factor's widow that she keeps quite +well except for an evil and tormenting spirit in her chest. She +desires to know who are in our company, and when she learns that the +_Okimow_, or Great Chief of the Peace River Country, is one of us, she +asks for tobacco. Ah! the Chief at Fort Edmonton would be generous to +her, but he is dead now and there is no tobacco to soothe her pain. +When she was young, her people fought with the Blackfeet tribe in the +Bear Hills, and many of the Crees were scalped. She fled through the +forests to Fort Edmonton, carrying her two children on her back, but +there was much rain and almost she was drowned crossing the rivers. +That was many, many nesting-moons ago, and now she is old and her pipe +is empty of tobacco. + +"Is the kind lady going down the river to find a man?" + +No! the kind lady has white hair and her man is dead. + +"May be it is the _Okimow_?" + +No! the _Okimow_ has a wife in the South with brown hair. + +Ah well! Ah well! but it was different when she was young. Then every +woman's skin was full of oil and there were many braves who loved her. + +After she has been led into the open, and has had her picture taken +with us, the great _Okimow_ takes her back to her blankets and fills +her lap with a heap of pungent tobacco. It will be many moons before +our honourable great-grandmother requires a fresh supply. "An old +straggler," that is what I call her, after the beggar-woman who asked +Sir Walter Scott for alms. + +The religion of the gentle Nazarene has cut the fighting sinews of the +Indians. This was why the Christianized Hurons were brushed off the +earth by the tigerish and unapproachable Iroquois. The Hurons became +soft, and being soft, they became a prey. In some inexplicable way, we +Anglo-Saxons have managed to keep our bumps of veneration and +combativeness well partitioned or estranged and so keep mastery of the +changeling tribes who permit them to commingle. This is why the +Indians are a dying race in a new country. This is why our honourable +great-grandmother whimpers for tobacco instead of hurling us over the +bank and throwing her camp-fire on the top of us. I could almost find +it in my heart to wish that she had. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + +AT THE PARTING OF THE RIVERS + + "Think o' the stories round the camp, the yarns along the track + O' Lesser Slave an' Herschel's Isle an' Flynn at Fond du Lac; + Of fur and gun, an' ranch, an' run, an' moose an' caribou, + An' bulldogs eatin' us to death! + Good-bye--Good-luck to you!" + + +Mirror Landing, where we leave the boat to make the portage to Soto +Landing, is on the Lesser Slave River, at its confluence with the +Athabasca. Its name has been well chosen, for the Lesser Slave River +is a clear stream, and shows a kindly portrait to all who look therein. +A telegraph office, an official residence, a stable, and storage sheds +are the only buildings. What is to be done with the portaging party, +whom we have met here and who go back to Athabasca Landing on our boat, +is beyond a mere woman to say. Both parties must spend the night here; +there is only one bunk to every twenty persons, and those who hold +possession utterly refuse to sleep outside with the mosquitoes and +bulldog flies. Once I read a story in the Talmud which I considered +wholly fabulous. It was about a mosquito saving the life of David when +Saul hunted him upon the mountains. I no longer doubt this story, my +incredulity having vanished this day with my courage. A mosquito is +big enough to do anything. + +A member of the Royal North-West Mounted Police, truly a most +formidable appearing man, insisted on searching our luggage for +contraband liquor. I was sorely displeased, and could have dealt him a +clout with all my might, for the froward manner in which he turned out +my things to the public view. He might have known if I carried a +flask, it would be in my coat pocket. His only find was an unbroached +bottle of elderberry wine which a rancher's wife was bringing home for +her dinner-party next Christmas. Be it said to the youth's credit that +upon the circumstances being explained to him he returned the wine to +her. He had no authority for so doing, but assuredly he had the +countenance of a great example Yahveh of the Jews having aforetime +"winked at" certain breaches of the law which He considered to be the +better kept in their non-observance. + +The liquor taken by the police is either given to the hospital at +Grouard or poured on the ground as a libation to Bacchus and his +woodland troup. It is very foolish to ask the officer in command if +his men ever drink themselves, for he will say, "Pooh! Pooh!" and use +other argumentative exclamations that will fright you out of your wits. +You would almost think the subject was loaded, and it takes a soft look +and a wondrously soft answer to turn away his wrath. + +Early in the evening I was invited to browse at the official residence, +and I had a good time; that is to say, I found it distinctly +entertaining. "I would say that you are very welcome," remarked my +hostess as she held out both her hands, "were it not that it seems an +understanding of the fact. I have read your _Sowing Seeds in Danny_, +and feel that I know you extremely well." + +It was fortunate I did not tell her she had confused me with Mrs. +McClung, for she gave me eggs to eat that were most cunningly scrambled +with cheese; also many hot rolls sopped in butter, and yellow honey in +its comb. + +This is a ramblesome bungalow and very comfortable. Musical +instruments, couches, big cushions, book-shelves and pictures take on a +peculiar attractiveness when they are the only ones in a hundred miles +or more. + +After supper we read _Phil-o-rum Juneau_, by William Henry Drummond, +and discussed its relation to the French Canadian legend, _La +Chasse-Gallerie_. Of all our Canadian legends, I like it the best, and +it may happen that you will too. It tells how on each New Year's Night +the spirits of the woodsmen and rivermen are carried in phantom canoes +from these lonely northlands back to the old homesteads in the south, +where, unseen and undisturbed, they mingle with their friends. The +father embraces his children; the lover his maiden, the husband his +wife, and once more the son lays his head on his mother's lap. All of +the voyageurs join the feast, the song, and the dance, so that no man +is lonely in those hours, neither is he weary or sad. It is a better +thing, I make believe, than even the communion of saints. But just +before the dawn comes, the wraith men find themselves back on the +Athabasca, the Mackenzie and the Slave, and no one speaks of where he +has been, or of what he experienced, for all this he must keep hidden +in his heart. + +When, over a century ago, the legend first sprang to life, there were +none save men to travel like this, but now, of times, a woman may +travel too. I know this for a certainty in that each New Year's Night +I go myself. In my dug-out canoe--delved from wishful thoughts and +things like that--I take my hurried way across prodigious seas of ice +where never living foot has fallen; adown ill-noted trails through +silver trees; by hidden caverns that are the lairs of the running +winds; over dark forests of pine and across uncounted leagues of white +prairies which light up the darkness, till I come to the warmer +southland, where youths and maidens make wreaths of greenery, and where +mellow-voiced bells ring out the dying year. + +And when those who are my own people feel their hearts to be of a +sudden rifled of love; that some one has brushed their cheek, or that a +head is resting on their shoulder, then do they know the exile has come +back, for I have told them it will be thus. + +And you, O my readers of the Seven Seas, now that we are friends and +know each other closely, will you of New Year's Night be keenly +watchful too. + +It was here that our conversation wheeled off from the consideration of +this legend to the northern postman. In the final summary he must be +classed among those peerless fellows who, because of their courage and +incredible endurance, have won for Canada this myriad-acred but +hitherto waste heritage. No man here who puts his hand to the mail +bags must ever look back; he must have the quality of keeping on +against the odds. He is the modern young Lord Lochinvar, who stays not +for brake and stops not for stone. Often his route is stretched out to +hundreds of miles, and there is no corner grocery where he may thaw out +his extremities while mumbling driftless things about the weather and +the government. + +Presently the railways will have taken over his perilous profession, +and he will exist only as a memory of pioneer days. For this reason I +took great heed while my host talked concerning him and of the +qualities which go into making a successful postie under the aurora. +He must be agile, light of weight, abstemious, trustworthy, tireless, +thewed and sinewed like a lynx, and, above all, he must have +wire-strung nerves. In a word, his profession requires a strong will +in a sound body. + +"Does it ever happen that the mail is not delivered?" I asked. + +My host hesitated, and made three rings of smoke while he considered +the answer, as though he would be sure-footed as to his facts. + +"Sometimes it is not delivered, Madam," said he; "there may be an +untoward happening, in which event its delivery depends upon the +recovery of the carrier's body." + +When he made another three rings of smoke he proceeded with the story. +"Yes! the mail-carrier in this country is a special person and must not +be judged as general. He deserves a much better reward than he gets. +To my thinking, it is a vast pity poetic justice so frequently fails. +It may be that some day you will write a story about us Northmen, and +if you do, be sure you set down how Destiny so often blue-pencils our +lives in the wrong places. We will read your book down here, all of +us, just to see if you have been true to us instead of laying up for +yourself royalties on earth." + +"And where do you bury a postman who dies with his mail-bags?" I +further pursued. + +"Holy Patriarch!" he ejaculated. "You don't think he is carried back +to Athabasca Landing? His body is cached in a tree and the police are +notified. When they give their permission, and when the ground is +thawed out in the spring, we bury him just where he died. It may, +however, interest you to know that the letters 'O.H.M.S.' are cut on +his tombstone." + +"'O.H.M.S.'" I repeated. "Don't you mean 'I.H.S.,' _Iesous Hominum +Salvator_, the same as we write over our altars and on our baptismal +fonts?" + +"No!" he replied, "I mean 'O.H.M.S.'; the same as they stamp on +government letters which are franked '_On His Majesty's Service_.' You +see the work of delivering the mails down this way, while extremely +arduous, must never for a moment be considered as menial. The carrier +is a servant to none save His Imperial Majesty, George the Fifth, of +England." + +They are all gamblers, these Northmen: they play for love, for money or +for the mere pleasure of the play, and Boys of our Heart, like the +mail-couriers and the striplings of the Mounted Police, gamble with the +elements for life itself. + +"Ah, well!" remarked my host, as he put away his pipe for the night, +"these fellows know the rules and dangers of the game when they 'sit +in,' and while twenty-six of the cards are black, it is just as well to +bear in mind that there are an equal number of reds." + +On my return to the ship at midnight, I found that some one had seized +and was occupying my state-room on the nine-tenths of the law idea. +She seemed to be a woman turbulent in spirit, and, accordingly I left +her in possession: also, I left her door open to the mosquitoes, who +are evil whelps and more tutored in crime than you could believe. + +The purser, a very agreeable and well-behaved man, gave up his office +to me, but I did not rest well, in that a whirligig of jubilant +mosquitoes was occupying it conjunctively. Being full-blooded and +sometimes inclined to be rather mean, I endeavoured to accept this +retributory plague as a chastening which might prove beneficial to both +body and soul. + +In the morning all the reckonings of the trip were settled at a desk +beside my bunk, the men moving around with the prehensile tread of the +villain who goes round a corner in the moving-picture films. I +pretended they had not awakened me, and breathed with much regularity, +but all the while I was stealthily peeping. They would not have +understood if I had made objections to their entering, for here, at the +edge of things, all men are gentlemen, or are supposed to be. +Conventionality would be actual boorishness, and a woman must try and +earn for herself the title of a good scout, it being the highest +encomium the North can pass upon her. + +Before leaving the ship for the portage, we backed into the Athabasca, +and, after travelling two or three miles, unloaded a vast deal of +freight at a little tent town on the bank. Here and there, through +this country, you come upon these white encampments, which mean that +the iron furrows of the railway are steadily pushing the frontier +farther and farther north. This was the first load of freight to be +brought down the Athabasca for the building of the Grand Trunk Pacific +Railway. It was only rough hardware truck, but, withal, amiable to my +eyes, standing, as it did, for the end of a long rubber between fur and +wheat. You would like the looks of the young engineers who took charge +of the stuff. They were no muffish sick-a-bed fellows, but brown with +wind and sun, hardy-moulded and masterful. One of them has written +something about life on the right-of-way, which he intends sending me +to touch up a bit for a paper. It augurs well for a country when its +workers love it and want to write about it. + +And even so, My Canada, should I forget thee, may my pen fingers become +sapless and like to poplar twigs that are blasted by fire. And may it +happen in like manner to any of thy breed who are drawn away from love +of thee. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. + +ON THE PORTAGE + + We sing the open road, good friends, + But here's a health to you.--WILLIAM GRIFFITH. + + +As one watches the efforts of the wagoners to store away the valises +and rolls of blankets without ejecting the passengers, one remembers +that Cæsar's word for baggage was impedimenta. But Prosper, our +wagoner, is the best packer on the trail, also he can sing, "I've got +rings on my fingers." + +"It is strange there are so many dingy half-breeds in the world," says +the person by my side who objects to her blankets being tied on behind. +"To my thinking there is no colour to compare with white. 'Ishmaels,' +I call these breeds." + +Prosper's bearing under her choleric criticism is so superbly apathetic +that I like him swiftly and completely. Any one can see that he is a +man of substantial qualities and not to be excited by fidgety women. + +It is fourteen rough miles from Mirror Landing to Soto Landing, along a +black trail that lifts and dips through the tall ranks of the poplars +and pines. The scenery offers no great varieties except those of light +and shade, vista and perspective. + +Whenever we pass through a thick-knit stand of pines, the people in the +wagons are instinctively reticent and subdued, but, upon emerging into +open space where there are only birches to throw a shimmering wayward +shadow, 'tis observable that every one laughs or sings. It was _La +Marseillaise_ the eight Oblate Brothers sang, and once they broke into +a French ballad the theme of which was-- + + "Mary, I love you, + Will you marry me?" + + +The team on our wagon is a badly mated one. The off beast trots like a +sheep and has a way of hanging her head as if some one had told her a +story too shocking to contemplate: while Lisette, the nigh mare, +although strong as a steel cable, picks objections to every foot of the +way either with a kick or an idiotic sidelong prance. Now and then +Prosper, who knows the whole truth about Lisette, and who looks more +religious than he really is, advises her as to her forbears and +predicts as to her posterity, but, like Job's wild ass, this +whimsical-minded trailer "scorneth the multitude of the city and +regardeth not the crying of the driver." + +"She's a female voter, she is," says an Englishman, who has been back +home on a visit, "and it's a tidy bit of walloping she needs." + +The London suffragettes would have been pleased with our opinion of +their countryman and that we were able to express it in the exact +words. After a full and unreserved apology from the frightened +traveller, we, in turn, retracted the indecorous charge that he was a +ridiculous pinhead, and a man of low understanding, whereupon peace +once more reigned in our wagon. It is astonishing what pernicious +consequences may follow from the kicking of a wayward-minded mare on +the trail. Most of the frontier tragedies are attributable to this +very thing. + +Anderson's stopping-place which we are passing used to be the only +house between Grouard and Athabasca Landing, and accordingly is a +notable landmark. Anderson is still unmarried. It is forced upon the +notice of a traveller in these North-Western Provinces that every +bachelor has little spruce-trees around his house. The bachelor thinks +we don't suspect his reason, but we know it is because he hopes, some +day, they may come in handy for Christmas-trees. + +We stay for a little while at the house of Ernst and Minna, who came +from Europe more than six years ago. It is a sheer joy to know Minna, +who is a little round-bodied woman, firm-fleshed and wholesome as an +autumn apple. She has been at Athabasca Landing once. She hears there +are trains there now. It may be that Madam saw them. + +Minna had planned a trip to the Landing this summer but it happened she +did not go after all. Ah, well! there is the money saved and she is +sure to see the Landing again. Minna was going to the hospital of the +good sisters to lie in with her fifth baby and Ernst was to stay here +with the children. You may believe it too, that Ernst is no +butter-fingers with children and a most cunning baker of bread. Minna +says that down this way every man can bake bread--and does bake bread. + +The little house by the trail would, of course, miss its mother for a +while, but the garden seeds were in; the children's clothes were mended +to the last stitch, and a parcel of baby's fixings was on its way to +her from Edmonton. Now it happened there was too much important +freight from the boat to carry this parcel and so it was left behind +till the next trip. It was nearly too late and Minna was greatly +perplexed, for surely she was going to see the Landing and how could +she go without the baby's clothing. + +But, at last, the parcel came, and the wagoner who delivered it was to +call the next day on his return trip and take Minna with him over the +portage to the boat. He came, and with him were several passengers. +It was unfortunate there was no woman among them, for Minna had no +neighbours; Ernst had gone down the trail, and her hour was upon her. + +"Mother, she iss sick," explained her little son, "and no one iss in to +come. I am by the door to stand till Father he comes back." It was +nearly an hour before the distressful travellers were able to find +Ernst, but no man ventured past the young sentinel. + +The little daughter was half-an-hour old when Ernst was deposited on +his door-step, but Minna had cared for the child herself. It was too +bad the mother had fallen from the loft and hurt herself, for now, she +cannot go to the hospital and she wanted to see the Landing. Ah, well! +there is the money saved and that is something. It takes much money +for five children. + +"How old is the baby girl?" I ask, as I take my turn in kissing the +mite's forehead, and in wishing that she may be a good little scout +like Minna. + +"She was one week last Tuesday. No! two weeks last Tuesday. Ah! +Madam, I cannot surely say. Ernst I will ask him how old is the baby." + + * * * * * + +Once on the journey we passed a speckled owl in a pine-tree, but she +did not answer to our "Oo-hoo!" neither did she so much as open an eye. +She looks rich unto millions, and thoroughly proof against all appeals. +She is what Cowper called the University of Oxford, "a rich old vixen." +I intend affecting this pose myself when I find the gold at the foot of +the rainbow, in order that I may be extremely insolent to the bankers +and to other offensive collectors. + +Prosper says he often shoots owls who lodge in the fir-trees, and that +he gets two dollars bounty from the government from each one. He does +not know it is accounted a sin to him who kills a bird that has +sheltered in a fir-tree, or an animal that has crouched thereunder, for +this is the tree of the Christ-Child, and a House of Refuge in the +forest to the denizens thereof. To those men or women who love the +fir, its bitter taste on their tongues may be more holy than bread or +wine, and may convey to them an inly grace. + +Also it is wrong to cast away the Christmas-tree, or the ropes of +greenery which have been used for the celebration of Christmastide. +These should be burned upon the hearth as a sweet savour, and the +fire-master should say, "Peace be to this household and to all the +household of Canada." + +The resin of conifers is a more agreeable and a more seemly offering to +Our Lady of the Snow than aloes, or myrrh or spices, so that it behoves +us, her children, to look anew to our censing pots. + +Since leaving Athabasca Landing, we have passed through enough +uncultivated land to solve all the problems of Great Britain which +arise out of unemployed workmen, and out of slum conditions with their +attendant evils. + +As its stupendous acreage, enormous fertility, and its lifeless voids +are daily thrust upon me, I am filled with amazement. Surely no land +was ever so little appreciated by its owners. If there were an ocean +between it and our more populous provinces to the south, one might the +better understand the reasons. This waste heritage can only be +accounted for on the grounds of a lack of interest, and because people +are indolent and like to live softly. Only two members of the Alberta +legislature have ever visited this country, and these two belong here. +It does not need a new Moses to stand and say, "This is a goodly land"; +it needs a new and more drastic Joshua, to take them by the ear and +lead them in. The time is coming when the crops from this land will, +each year, outstrip in value all the gold money in the world, and it +will not be so long either. I intend to buy as much of it myself as I +can afford, and if I can persuade the Christians of my own town to lend +me the money instead of building churches, I shall buy more than I can +afford. I have read much about this country, but I find it better to +come here and tread out the grapes for myself. + +While I have been taking stock mentally of these things, we have +arrived at Soto Landing, on the Lesser Slave River, and already the +Indian women have come out of their tents to watch our movements. +These people are called squatters hereabout, but I prefer to call them +nesters. They sow not, neither do they gather into barns. They don't +care to do either. + +They view us women with a quiet appraising look, but not understanding +"their dark, ambigious, fantasticall, propheticall, gibrish," I cannot +learn their conclusions. The Factor's widow, who is still with us, +heard one of the Indian men describe her hat as a pot, whereupon she +remarked to him in excellent Cree that her pot lacked a handle. If I +were to set down how the other Indians enjoyed this stabbing surprise, +and how they were contorted with laughter by reason of their fellow's +confusion, you would hardly believe me, so I shall not set it down. + +One Indian woman wears a dress that has in it the many shocking colours +of a Berlin-wool mat. She is pleased when we stroke it with our hands, +and I can see she is as proud of it as I am of my dimity bed-gown with +the pink rosebuds on it. + +Dinner is ready on the boat and our appetites are too sharp-set to +permit of delay. We eat and eat just as if eating were our chief and +ever-lasting happiness, and as if life itself lay in a fleshpot. + +This is a larger and better equipped boat than those on the Athabasca +because it is meant for the lake traffic. We do not leave Soto Landing +till three hours past the scheduled time, for Mr. J. K. Cornwall, the +Member of Parliament for the Peace River Constituency, affectionately +known hereabouts as "Jim," has chosen to make the portage afoot. + +This country, from Athabasca Landing to the Peace River, is commonly +described as "Jim's Country," and if you travel it over you will +understand the reason. + +Who supports the stopping-places on the river? Jim's freighters. + +Who cuts the wood on the bank? Jim's Indians. + +Who hauls the passengers, the freight, and the mail-bags over the +portage? Jim's wagoners. + +Who owns the ships on the Athabasca and the Slave? Why, Jim himself. + +How Jim can look his pay-sheet in the eye every fortnight and keep +laughing, is, to my thinking, the miracle of the North. But then it +must be borne in mind that I have never seen Jim's ledger-book, and, as +yet, no one else has except his accountants and bankers. + +The dream of Jim's life has been to lay bare the wealth of the North, +for the good of the North, and every day he is making his dream come +true. + +But I was telling you about Soto Landing. The freight shed here is in +charge of a bachelor whose wardrobe is drying audaciously on the trees. +He says he ties his clothes together with a rope and lets the current +of the river wash them, but I think this statement is what Montaigne +would describe as "A shameless and solemne lie." + +He asks me how long I have been out from Ireland and I tell him three +years. "What was the charge!" he pursues. + +"Stealing the crown jewels," I reply. + +"Oh!" says he, "it's the same time since I left the sod. It was for +killing a landlord." + +Now as this man came from New Brunswick, and as I came from Ontario, it +may readily be seen that we have both become Albertans. + +"Are you not ashamed to deceive a woman like me, and an ignoramus who +is travelling north to gain instruction?" I ask of him. + +"Woman! You're no woman. I mean you're no ignoramus--and, although +you question us, I perceive you know more about the north than all of +us. But seeing you wish to be further instructed, come with me to the +freight shed that I may show you how the wholesale houses pack their +goods. Believe me, Lady, I cut to the root of the matter when I say +the only downright packers in this north country are the Hudson's Bay +Company. You can plainly see this for yourself, and I hope you will +inform the Board of Trade about it when you go home. Here, you will +observe a set of scales, but the weights were insecurely attached and +have been lost. + +"This heap of refuse is the remains of a shipment of crockery that was +crated too lightly. Errant improvidence, I call it. Lady, the pitcher +is no longer broken at the fountain: it is our habit here to break it +on the portage. It is no exaggeration when I say I am worked like a +transcontinental railway system, hammering up boxes or shovelling out +damaged merchandise. + +"Cast your eye up at these chairs in the rafters, six dozen of them by +actual count, sent north by a furniture house last year but delivery +was refused by the purchaser." + +"They look like good chairs," say I, "what is the matter with them?" + +"Matter enough," he continues, "shipped as 'knocked-down' furniture, +four legs to each chair, all of them hind legs. This was a matter of +considerable vexation to the purchaser, who paid cash for the goods and +for their transportation." + +"But the furniture house will send the front legs," I argue. + +"Might as well try to get blood out of sawdust," says he. Now, +personally, I think this simile is an inconclusive one, for I have +known timbermen to sweat great drops of blood into sawdust, and there +is no reason why those drops could not be extracted. + +This freight master is a compelling man, and he says the shippers are +expert sinners and a parcel of ignorant and makeshift people. It may +be he is right: it is not for me to gainsay him, or to further +discompose his temper, when all the evidence is so plainly visible. + +After this discussion, I play with the other children who tumble about +on the hillside. They all talk Cree, and some of them who have been to +school talk French and English. + +One little girl, with the fine insouciance of eight years, says there +is no use praying _Le Bon Dieu_, for He doesn't understand Cree very +well. She has repeated her prayer over and over but she has never had +a soft-faced doll yet. + +Solemn little mother! Her prayer, at any rate, is reasonably specific, +and I can see how one of these days it is going to be answered. + +It is good to rest in the shade of the trees while these +copper-coloured babies jabber about me in soft Cree, and finger my hair +and clothes. Truly, I am very fortunate and have much fulness of +pleasure. I might be that same good girl whom an English playwright +describes as having never compromised herself, and yet the wickedest +child who ever was slapped could hardly have had a better time. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + +ON THE LESSER SLAVE RIVER + + Gitchie Manito, the Mighty, + Mitchie Manito, the bad; + In the breast of every Redman, + In the dust of every dead man, + There's a tiny heap of Gitchie-- + And a mighty mound of Mitchie-- + There's the good and there's the bad.--CY WARMAN. + + +From Soto Landing, the Lesser Slave River bends its course to the north +and west till it empties into Lesser Slave Lake at Sawridge. It is a +small river, being about a hundred and fifty feet wide and about thirty +deep. Owing to its sharp curving banks much care is required in its +navigation. Its banks are heavily wooded and as we pass down its quiet +reaches we seem to have sailed into a dreamful world, where just to +breathe is a delight. I account it sinful to talk in these +surroundings, but one may not hope to enjoy solitude for any +considerable time in a country where women-travellers are sufficiently +rare to arouse a raging curiosity in the breast of every male entity +who comes within reach of her. People like these northmen, who live +out of doors most of the year, are not easily bored. They are +interested in things; they are perennially young, and this, I take it, +is the secret of Pan. + +Now, the trouble about having a man near is that he is always picking +up your things and so making you nervous. I prefer to wait till ready +to move before regaining my handkerchief, my back-comb, my hand satchel +and my scarf. This is why I pretend not to notice the iron-built +person with strong white teeth who has seated himself nearby and who is +watching a chance to restore something. He is what the Irish call +"bold-like." I know what he is thinking about and understand his +motive perfectly. He wants to know if I have ever been north before. +He is the thirteenth man so to wonder. I am, however, severely +purposed not to tell him. + +There is a belief, common in the cities, that no questions are asked in +the bush; that people may travel for days together without divulging +ends. Here is a good place to spend an arrow on this widely droll +deception. An uninquisitive man is as hard to find here as an +unsociable cockerel. Goodness Divine! the chief use of a stranger in +the woods is to keep the denizens of it from dying from _ennui_ and +lack of news. They would consider it the essence of uncordiality not +to show an interest in the affairs of a stranger, especially as the +stranger might possibly have succeeded in smuggling a flash +[Transcriber's note: flask?] or two past the police on the prohibition +line. + +This bush-ranger catches me off my guard when a bulldog fly takes a +piece out of my ear. It is his opportunity to produce a vial of +collodion for the wound. As he pulls out the cork and finds a match to +dip in the mixture, he tells me that the bulldog fly is no sweet angel +and equal to ten thousand times its weight in prize-fighters--a +statement which I do not think it fit to disbelieve. The collodion +having eased the hurt this impudent gentleman draws up his chair and +talks with an immense volubility concerning the species, genera, and +habits of these flies till one might take him for a professor of +entomology. + +The long winter nights in this province enable the denizens of it to +become well posted in any subject which they may elect to pursue. This +was how the late Bishop Bompas, who lived here for over half a century, +became the first authority in the world on Syriac, so that the +_savants_ of Europe were wont to refer their mooted points to this +lonely old prelate for decision, waiting a year, or often longer, for +the answer which was carried by Indians for hundreds of miles down the +out trail to Edmonton. My new friend declares that, like Montaigne, +the bulldog fly has only one virtue and that this one got in by stealth. + +"Yes?" say I, with a rising reflection which delicately hints at an +answer. + +He does not seem to hear me, this cold-chilled, care-hardened +northerner, and goes on stuffing his pipe with exit-plug and searching +through pocket after pocket for a match as if my remark were of no +concernment. He is trying to pretend he has known me for a long time, +and that I was the one who took the initiative in this +acquaintanceship. This is why I became dumb, and why he repeats his +statement. Still I am wordless, whereupon he vouchsafes, with an +exasperating drawl, that the fly's one virtue lies in the fact that it +prefers picturesque food which is very eatable. + +Our parliament should legislate against the cunning arts of these +designing northerners, against which no town-bred woman may hope to set +up an adequate defence, however perfect may be her poise, or fertile +and calculating her brain. + +This person tells me that all a man needs to succeed in the North-West +Provinces is to keep his head hard and his pores open--a recipe, no +doubt, equally applicable in the more southerly regions, and one which +I am supposed to deduct he, himself, has proven with very happy success. + +He has been south getting people to come to the Peace River Country, +the new and unpossessed empire where there are twenty-two hours of +daylight and which will, one day, be belted by a string of cities and +gridironed by a score of railways. It is good to listen to this fellow +talk, for, in his calculations lineal or intellectual, he can measure +nothing less than a mile. He is typical of the great and splendid body +of Canadian and English pioneers who have absolutely no truck with +pessimism. These men and women are opening up this empire and they are +under no misapprehensions concerning it. They are people with a +vision, which vision they are willing to endorse with the best years of +their lives. + +_Kitemakis_, the poor one, who intends writing the book about the white +folk, has drawn near to us and is listening to our talk. We invite her +to join us and, after awhile, she tells us curious legends of the north +in which fear does many times more prevail than love; these, and old +superstitions which catch your fancy sharply and fresh the dusty +dryness of your spirit. + +Although they are in no great credit with historians, it is an odd idea +of mine that the only true history of a country is to be found in its +fairy tales. These seem to be the crystallization of the country's +psychology. On the trail, on the river, in the woods, you may glean +from the Redmen and their mate-women tales that are well veined with +the fine gold of poetry, but which, as a general thing, are +inconclusive and do not serve aright the ends of justice. As you +search into the untaught minds of these Indian folk and pull on their +mental muscle, you must perforce recall the amazing sensation of the +gentleman who took the hand of a little ragged girl in his and felt +that she wanted a thumb. + +Or again, in your Anglo-Saxon superiority you may feel like that +Merodach, the King of Uruk, of whom a philosopher tells us. This +Merodach wished to make his enemies his footstool, so as he sat at +meat, he kept a hundred kings beneath his table with their thumbs cut +off that they might be living witnesses to his power and leniency. + +And when Merodach observed how painfully the kings fed themselves with +the crumbs that fell to them, he praised God for having given thumbs to +man. "It is by the absence of thumbs," he said, "that we are enabled +to discern their use." + +Listen now to this tale of the North: Once there was a smiling woman in +this land and wherever she went she brought warmth with her and light, +so that even the ice melted in the rivers. Her eyes were blue like the +flowers and her skin was white like the milk of a young mother. As she +passed through the land the fish swam out of their caves, the birds +rested on their nests, and even the dead women who were in the clay +stirred themselves when she passed over, for once they had known lovers +and had carried men children. She was vastly kind, this woman, and was +known even to the dear God and the Holy Virgin in the country of the +beautiful heaven. + +Now, there was also in this river land an evil man of impetuous +appetite who was part bear, and had seven tongues, and his arms had +claws instead of hands. And it befell that when he saw the woman and +heard her voice that was sweet like the singing voice of an arrow when +it leaves the bow, he yearned to her with a vehement love and wooed her +with cunning words and with dram songs that she might come to him and +be his mate-woman. + +"So strong am I," he said, "that my blow can break any skull. My skin +is flushed, and my flesh is warm with thoughts of you. My bed is of +soft skins and I will feed you with yellow marrow from white bones. I +am _Mistikwan_, the Head, and I have strength and skill to feed the +mouth of my woman. I am _Askinekew_, the Young Man." + +But the woman flouted him, for he was hateful with his hands of hair +and his seven tongues; besides she knew, this woman, that there were +matters of scandal against him and that the people of the Crees said +_weyesekao_, "He is a flesh-eater," and hid themselves in the trees as +he passed by. + +And because she thus flouted him, the dew stood out on his face like +the juice on the fir-tree, for he loved her most exceedingly. + +But as he drew near and grasped her in his strong arms that could not +be unloosed, the woman's heart became weak as the poplar smoke when it +turns into air. + +And thus he holds her for nine months, this _Askinekew_, the Young Man +who is strong and very mischievous, till she bears him a son, when it +happens that for three months he falls asleep so that the woman goes +free to bring heat and light to the river-land and meat and fish to the +kettles. + +Thus does Kitemakis, "the poor one," tell me the story of winter and +summer and of the birth of the year. + +And Kitemakis, who has "the young lamb's heart among the full-grown +flocks," advises me to hold no converse with left-handed people, for it +is well known in these parts that such have communion with the devils. + +I am bewared too, that if I have a bad dream, that is to say, if I +dream of small-pox, or of white people, I must cut a lock from over my +ear and burn it in the fire. + +Also, Madam is instructed to throw away the wishbone of any bird she +may eat in order that it may grow again and be food for other folk. + +And Kitemakis tells me further that when Amisk, the beaver, dies his +soul lives on. In the happy hunting grounds the beaver was a carpenter +who, through some distemper of the mind, kept working while the moose +were on the runway so that he frightened them away. This caused the +chief hunter to become very angry and he said to the beaver, "Thou +shalt built always, and men shall break down thy work and take thy pelt +for covering. Also, thou shalt eat wood forever." + +I cannot hear any more of these stories for my attention is drawn to a +man who has come close to the ship in a small row-boat. The engine has +stopped and a permit is handed to him over the side of the vessel. The +man looks like a Scotchman, seems like an Irishman, but in reality is a +German, an erstwhile soldier, who makes his livelihood in curing and +smoking fish. He is indulging in a surly and wrong-headed paroxysm +because Elise, his wife, is not on the boat. Elise went to the city to +have her teeth filled and still lingers in the south. A certain rude +fellow with a brass-throated laugh is suggesting of the +soldier-fisherman that Elise may be appreciative of the change of +society and that he is foolish to look for her under two months. +"Better enjoy your permit before Elise gets home; that's my advice," +enjoins the tormentor. + +"About the viskey, not one tam I care," replies the irascible husband, +"it's ma vife I vant. Ma vife she in Edmonton stays"--a praiseworthy +choice on his part which, to our way of thinking, minifies the +oft-urged but yet unproven claim that "A woman's only a woman, but a +good cigar's a smoke." + +As the man pushes off, Baldy, a pucker-faced fellow whose real name is +Nathaniel, assures me that this German is considered "sorta queer" +hereabouts, and that it is nothing short of flat irreverence for a man +to speak so lightly about his permit in a land of such inordinate +thirsts. + +This matter of leaving home for the treatment of sore molars has +suddenly become an important one in the north. Hitherto, the traders +of the Hudson's Bay Company and the missionaries did not need to go to +the city on business, or to see their mother-in-law; their errand was +teeth. But this summer, the Company seems to have waxed over-wise, for +the Inspector of Posts is bringing a dentist. It was only yesterday +that a woman who [Transcriber's note: line possibly missing here] women +alike consider this to be an ill courtesy and hold to the hope that the +dentist may be drowned at Athabasca Landing. The woman who tells me of +it believes when one gives nine-tenths of her time to the Company, the +church, and the household it is not wicked to take one-tenth for +herself. Indeed, there are times when she honestly desires to be +wicked and to take several-tenths for herself. The whole arrangement +she stigmatizes as a graceless one and a blot on the Company's +escutcheon. + +Still, there are drawbacks in being so far from a dentist. It was only +yesterday that a woman who was using the river as her wash-pot, dropped +her new set of teeth overboard. She had not been out for five years +and made the trip with her husband and her two youngest sons at the +cost of much time and money. However amusing the incident might be to +thoughtless onlookers, at the bottom it was almost tragic, and she, at +least, is hoping that the H. B. Co. dentist will meet no dire or +untimely fate before reaching Grouard. This is a healthful-bodied, +healthful-minded woman with a temperament that adjusts itself to life. +She is proud of the fact that she is educating her five sons at home; +that she cooks for the ten men engaged in her husband's saw-mill, and +that she has twelve hundred cabbages in her garden. I am glad she +wears a hoop of diamonds on her finger and that her fur wrap would cost +a fortune in Paris. It means that her husband is no stingy, +unappreciative curmudgeon and that all is well with her. + +Sawridge is at the mouth of the Lesser Slave River where it enters into +the lake of the same name. At present, it consists of a Hudson's Bay +Company post and a telegraph office. Some day, by reason of its +location, it will be a good-sized town. Farther on are the Swan Hills +and the Swan River. This is the river referred to by Lever in _Charles +O'Malley_. The young gentleman whose affairs were in an ill posture +had his choice, you may remember, between going to "Hell or Swan +River." This was a libel on the place and an impudent falsity, for, if +you omit the mosquitoes with their unhandsome manners, one might call +it the trail to Paradise. Besides, if life cut too hard the young +gentleman might have taken his last trail here. It would not have been +a bad death either--a wide sky, a wide sea, and a sudden dip into +immortality--or oblivion. + +On the lower deck, the Indians who travel to Grouard for the Golden +Jubilee of the great Bishop Grouard are whiling away the time by +playing poker. The cards which they use weigh twice as much as when +purchased, but why worry in a land where microbes are unheard of and so +have no pernicious consequence. These Indians have the air of +unambitious men; they have not cared to come into the big Canadian job. +They appear to do little else than eat, sleep, and gamble. But, god of +civilization, what else is there to do except make love, and men cannot +make love to preposterous women who work always. These fellows have, +however, one saving quality, having never formed themselves into +unions. Now that even the farmers have gone over to the enemy, the +Redmen would appear to be our last hope. + +A doctor on the boat who knows all about the Indians, tells me of their +misfortunes, peccadilloes, their thin transitory pleasures and their +love and practise of idleness. But this is not strange, for gossip is +so common in the north that every one knows "the carryings-on" of every +one else from the Arctic circle clear up to the Landing. Indeed, I +have heard tell that these northerners know what you are up to before +you have done it. + +The Indians, the doctor would have me notice, are beginning to chew gum +and hence their teeth and gums are deteriorating. + +The mildewed fellow who is dealing the cards is pestiferous with +disease. His birth was a biological tragedy. The doctor thinks he +could best serve his tribe by dying without delay. + +André, the man who has just won the jackpot, is not the prototype of +the expression "Honest Indian." He is a bad Indian, a most bad Indian. + +"His profession?" I ask. + +"Oh, André is my camp-cook," is the reply, "and when he washes himself +he uses quite a cupful of water." By way of amends, André affects a +stupendous scarf-pin, a watch-chain, and two rings. Ah well! to quote +Mr. Artemus Ward, "The best of us has our weaknesses, and if a man has +jewelry let him show it." Besides, it is entirely thinkable that even +a man like André might have to dress for those whose discernment goes +no deeper than clothes and ornamentation. + +The difference between an Indian and a half-breed lies in the fact that +the Indian is in treaty with the government and lives on a reservation. +The breed is free to come and go, but his blood is just as pure as the +Indian's so far as its redness is concerned. + +In most cases, the children look to their mother as the head of the +family. The doctor says this is quite fitting. Take the case of Marie +there--Yes! the little girl with the precise plaits--she is the +daughter of old Henrietta and a Mounted Policeman. Jacqueline, her +sister who in-toes so queerly, is the result of old Henrietta's fancy +for a fur trader. It can be readily seen how several masculine heads +to the family would complicate matters and that it is wholly desirable +the girls should look to their mother for their lineage. In the north, +as yet, it has not been necessary to cover vices with cloaks. + +The Indian women have fallen on better days since the government passed +a law prohibiting the Indian from selling his cattle without a permit +from the agency, and making it illegal for a white man to purchase. +Previously, the Indian gambled away his animals, leaving his squaw and +papooses to suffer from starvation. + +"The old effigy" asleep in the sun is, I am informed, a chief of +distinction. Like Froissart's Knights, the hereditary chieftain may be +blind, crippled and infirm. His body fordone with age is by them +considered to be full of the spirit of wisdom. He is the giver of law +and keeper of traditions. The Indians have no dead-line in their +tribal codes, it being held in suspension north of 55° with the league +rules and the game laws, a fact which leads to the deduction that what +the world has gained by civilization is fairly balanced by what it has +lost. + +While we have been getting acquainted with the Indians, our ship has +carried us into the finest duck grounds in the world, the teal and +mallard rising from the rice beds in almost incredible numbers. It +seems impossible that their numbers should ever be noticeably depleted, +nor are they likely to be, until Grouard, which we have now reached, +has become the splendid metropolis its people have planned and which, +no doubt, their efforts will one day materialize. + +"We believe," says my medical friend, "that any one who says Grouard +isn't going to be a large city hasn't got things properly sized-up. I +hope you won't go south again, my interesting child," he further +continues; "it would seem like being cut off in the flower of your +days. While sometimes shadowed here, the days are never dull, and if +no one loves you in this burgh, believe me, it will be entirely your +own fault." + + + + +CHAPTER XV + +THE BISHOP OF THE ARCTIC. + + The trail hath no languorous longing; + It leads to no Lotus land; + On its way dead Hopes come thronging + To take you by the hand; + He who treads the trail undaunted, thereafter shall command. + --KATE SIMPSON HAYES. + + +Half a century ago Bishop Taché wrote a letter to France, in which he +asked for some missionaries. In response to this appeal a certain +young Grouard was sent to Fort Garry. When Bishop Taché looked over +the slender stripling he said: "I asked for a man; they sent me a boy." +But a year later he wrote again: "Please send me more boys." This was +fifty years ago, and from that day to this the northern world has had +but one opinion of Grouard--he makes good. He is a worker who sticks +to his text. To-day, he is the head of the Catholic missions in the +far north, and his diocese, until lately, included the very Yukon. + +He is seventy-seven years old (but we don't believe it), with a leonine +head, an unrazored face and a chest like a draught horse; an erect man +who commands the instant attention of whatever company he enters. +Assuredly, he is the type of the sound mind in the sound body. It is +not to be wondered that his attractive personality made him the +cynosure of all eyes, and that his name was on every tongue when, +several years ago, he went to England, there to attend a great +conference of his Church. + +Bishop Grouard is alert in manner and has a kindly consideration for +the poorest person. Attend you, sirs and madams, to observe the Old +World courtesy in its highest perfection, you must see it in the person +of a French gentleman who holds a position of honor in the far, far +north, it is an absolutely truthful courtesy, that has its roots in a +big warm heart, so that it becomes the very bone and fibre of the man. +By way of placating our more southerly dignitaries in what may seem an +invidious comparison, it may be urged that Bishop Grouard's urbanity +has never suffered such cross-currents as the municipal watering cart, +speed-limit fines, or the bill collectors, for, as yet, these +well-conceived but ill-approved institutions are entirely unknown in +the strangely blissful regions north of 55°. + +It is for the fiftieth anniversary of Bishop Grouard's consecration as +a priest that all of us have gathered from Edmonton to Hudson's Hope to +celebrate. We are assembled at Grouard on Lesser Slave Lake, the +missionary post that was built here forty-nine years ago and named +after the hero of this day. Our assembly is what smart society +reporters would describe as "mixed," and the word would be correctly +used; nevertheless, the interest and colour of this occasion are in no +inconsiderable measure due to this very fact. Besides, ours is a +goodly fellowship. + +Here we have Father Orcolan from Rome, who has written books on +astronomy; Jake Gaudette, who was born in the Arctic Circle; Indian +Chiefs from near and far, with their wives and children; big Jim +Cornwall, the Cecil Rhodes of the north; Bishop Joussard, the +coadjutor, a short man with a hard-bitten sun-scorched face; factors +and traders from outlying posts (believe me, right merry gentlemen); +Judge Noel and his legal company, who have been dispensing justice in +the regions beyond; lean-hipped, muscular trappers who toe-in from +walking on the trails; equally lean-hipped river men who toe-out from +keeping their balance on a log; children from the mission schools; +black-robed nuns, doctors, government officials, and stalwart ranchers +in homespun and leather--even bankers. This short gentleman, who looks +as if he had just heard a good idea, is George Fraser, wit and +journalist. The tall man in khaki with the positive shoulders is Fred +Lawrence, pioneer and trader, likewise Fellow of the Royal Geographical +Society; these and other interesting folk, the pictures of whom even my +newly cut quill stops short at delineating. In truth, they are all +here--the world and his wife--excepting only white girls. "It would +seem too much like a special miracle," explains an Irish rancher, "to +find half a dozen colleens set down here in Grouard--something like +finding posies in the snow of December." + +And the good Bishop Grouard is overcome because he doesn't deserve the +homage of these people. "Truly, madame, I did not think to receive all +this honour. I am only an old voyageur, a poor old fellow who gets +near the end of the river." + +"Does the paddle grow heavy, monseigneur?" I ask, "or is it that the +journey is long?" + +"Non, non, madame; it is the thought of home at the end, and the loved +ones." + +"But surely, monseigneur, the end is yet a long way off. Your eyes are +not dimmed, neither is your natural force abated. And did we not this +very day hear you speak to the tribes in six tongues?" + +"Six was it?" queries the bishop. "Six! Ah, well! they seem to come +to me easily. I feel like the man who had only to open his mouth to +have roast ducklings fly therein." + +Now this old northman has a close grip on twelve languages--it was +Father Fahler who gave me the list--so that his modesty is truly +disconcerting in an age wherein vanity seems to vary inversely with +talent. He is a master in the use of Greek, Latin, French, English, +Cree, Eskimo, Rabbitskin, Chippewaian, Beaver, Slavis, Dog Rib, and +Loucheux. + +Bishop Grouard is an exegete and printer of no mean order, having +translated the service book of the Catholic Church into seven languages +and printed them himself. I do not know if the printing press he +brought into these northern fastnesses was the very first, but if not, +it was assuredly the second, for there is only one other. + +What these books have meant to the tribes it is not for mere +terrestrial folk to say, but if the Catholic doctrine of supererogatory +works be a reasonable and true one, of a surety it is a splendid +balance that is laid up to the good bishop's account. In the more +southerly provinces, where people like books, it is an easy matter for +messieurs the publishers to roll out scores of editions to the greedy +public, but up here in the north publishing a book becomes both a joke +and a tragedy. In the first place, people do not care for books; in +the second, the people do not know the alphabet. + +This was how Bishop Grouard came to build schools for the children. He +had to teach the Indians to read. If you care to you may go to the +school across the bishop's driveway and see the children. There are +hundreds of them, or even more, but if you wait awhile we will go +together, for they are giving a play to-night, and at this moment are +rehearsing their parts. It was Sister Egbert and Sister Ignatius who +wrote the play; the theme, I have heard, is an incident in the life of +the bishop. + +But it takes a long time to learn reading; besides, there are many +distractions. And then the older folk whose eyes are smoke-dimmed by +the tepee fires may never hope to con the letters. It were ill +reasoning to suppose so. For these people who are less literate the +kind bishop painted pictures of angels on the walls and on the ceiling +of the church, and he made one of the Crucifixion, over the altar, a +glowing canvas instinct with living reality. The onlooker may truly +say of this what Ruskin said of Raphael's "Transfiguration": "It goes +directly to the heart. It seems almost to call you by name." + +If you have lived long in the north you will have been wondering this +while back how our workaday ecclesiastic got his materials into +Grouard. How came his printing press, his type, his canvass, and his +paints? Where did this man get the furniture for his schools, his +hospitals, his church? Where did he get the boards for all these +buildings? + +The boards, curious person, were cut at his own saw-mill, from which +boards he fashioned the furniture with his hands. "But how," you +persist, "did he bring the machinery for his sawmill?" + +That was easy; he brought it here in a steamboat. Any one could tell +you that. + +"But where did he get the steamboat?" + +Oh! he built the boat himself--the first steamboat on the Lesser Slave +Lake. In it, if he cared, he could carry his printing press and his +canvases also. + +It will not be surprising if the historians of the future appraise +Bishop Grouard's combination of wisdom and action as something keenly +akin to genius. Indeed, they are almost sure to. + +I cannot tell you what the anniversary services meant--it cannot be +expected of any one who is versed in the Thirty-nine Articles of the +English Church instead of the Rosary of the Blessed Virgin--but I came +away from them with languorous impressions of golden robes, silver +censers, and wavering lights, the odour of lilies and lilacs that +wilted in the heat; a suspended cross with an agonized Christ, wan and +attenuated; of purple and scarlet cloths, of dark-haired young priests, +husky and brown-skinned. There were other things like a shepherd's +crook, and smoke of incense, but, most of all, there was a music that +mothered you and stayed with you. In some way or other these old +plaintive songs of Egypt seem fitted to the boreal regions, but why I +cannot explain. + +In the city we must perforce set a stage for a drama, but here Nature +has made a setting for us high on a hill overlooking a wide meadow that +slopes to the bay. You have read something like this in classic myths, +or maybe it was in Shakespeare, but it doesn't greatly matter; the play +is the thing. For myself, I made believe that is the slope of +Parnassus--for the Pythian hero was also a promoter of colonization, a +founder of cities, a healer of the sick, an institutor of games, a +patron of arts. + +It is on this outdoor stage in its June-tide glory that we banquet; +that we sing; that we play our parts. And it is here that Keenosew the +Fish, chief of the Crees, with rapid rush of speech and voice of +military sharpness, presents the homage of his tribe. In like manner +do also the other representatives of other northerly tribes. Each +chief wears a Treaty medal as a pledge from her Gracious Majesty, Queen +Victoria. + +It is here also that a fair-faced woman of our company expresses the +reverence of her sisters of the diocese for Monseigneur the Bishop, +and, as a token of the same, presents to him a plate heaped high with +coins of gold. + +And from this hill it is that we ride through the newly cut road, a +thousand men and women of us in stately procession, but withal gaily +caparisoned. Observe, if you will, our ribbons and fringes of gold; +the little flags in our bridles; our lynx-skin saddle clothes, and the +wreaths of purple vetch that hang from the pommels. Look well at our +black soutanes, scarlet coats, grey homespuns, and yellow moose hides, +for we are proud this day and wear our finest feathers. It is not well +to be disturbed by the untamable naughtiness of our horses, for the +northern trailer, you must have heard, has no stomach for glitter of +trappings, neither does he like the feel of neighbours. As we ramble +down a white aisle of birch and poplar, the feet of our horses tread +out for us the odour of leaf mould, which odour is the panacea of the +world. + +We do not ride with any preconceived plans, or because of any +propaganda. Neither are we knights who sally forth to right wrongs, +albeit we have the truest knights of all with us--he who has snow on +his head but fire in his heart; he who has taught these tribes by +doing..... + +This day we ride without review or forecast. We ride because we are +glad. All we ask of life is room to rove adown this long white pathway +in this young world. It is the best that life can give--room to ride. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + +NORTHERN VISTAS + + My name is Ojib-Charlie, + I like to sing and dance.--CY WARMAN. + + +The reader will excuse my chronicling the Jubilee before telling about +Grouard. I have no excuse other than caprice, nor any precedent other +than the fact that Chinese authors write their stories backward. To +resume then: + +You will remember the medical doctor on the boat was telling me how, +one day, Grouard would be a large city. I wish to go further and +declare it one now in spite of its small population, that is if you +will accept with me the definition laid down by an ancient Jewish +writer who defined a large city as a place in which "there are ten +leisure men; if less than so, lo! it is a village." + +No one seems to be working unless it be the Indians who are training +their horses for the sports that are to take place the day after +to-morrow, which sports will last for a week. This might be the +leisurely land of the hyperboreans where there is everlasting spring +and the inhabitants never toil or grow old-- + + "A land in the sun-light deep + Where golden gardens glow, + Where the winds of the north, becalmed in sleep, + Their conch-shells never blow." + +The first men we meet are the civil-engineers. Nearly every one +surveys here, and even the wild geese run lines along the sky. These +engineers are pleasant-spoken men of proper spirit, who have been +hammered into hardihood by work and weather. Nearly all of them invite +you to eat in their camps: "Come over to my stamping-grounds," says a +youth who looks like a walking pine-tree. There is no doubt in the +world he is lonely for his women-folk whom we happen to know "down +home," for when we accept he smiles and says "Heaven bless you +endlessly!" He gave us a good supper, too, of hot and savoury food, +and the coffee, though served in cups of unbelievable thickness, was +undeniably nectar. + +Afterwards, we walk into the village to get acquainted with the people +thereof, and to secure lodgings. Over the doors of some of the shops +there are signboards written in Cree, that is to say in syllabic +symbols which look like the footprints of a huge bird. + +We are accosted by a gentleman of the Bible Society who wishes to sell +us copies of the New Testament, which book, he says, is lightly +esteemed in the North. He asks me if I belong to my Creator, but I +dissemble in that I have never been able to say God created me without +distinct reservations. There are certain ugly and reproachful traits +in my make up which it seems sacrilegious to attribute to the Deity. +This colporteur has a keen, clean mind--any one can see that--and I +like him for his childlike straightness of soul. + +He is carrying copies of the gospels in the different Indian languages, +but, so far, has sold but few. Doubtless the Indians think with that +Mendizabel, the Prime Minister of Spain, who once said to George +Borrow, "My good sir, it is not Bibles we want but rather guns and +gunpowder." + +The knowledge one picks up on a walk down the street is varied in +character and throws a light on village life several hundred miles from +a railway. + +There are three churches here, also a pool-room and a moving picture +show. It costs fifty cents to see the latter. + +When a trapper is not working he is whittling. This is a bad year for +the trappers: two summers came together. + +Eggs are a dollar a dozen and four loaves of bread may be had for the +same price. Beef sells for twenty-five cents a pound and butter for +sixty-five. + +There is an outcropping of coal on a mountainside twelve miles away. A +sample of the coal has been sent to Edmonton for analysis. + +The main café is built of logs and a notice in English advises the +wayfarer to "Stick to our pies. Never mind the looks of the house," it +further enjoins. "It's the oysters we eat, not the shell." + +The village boasts of a brass-band with twenty instruments. Although +instructed by wire to meet us at the boat to-day, they failed to +assemble, the members of the company having quarrelled over the +selections to be played. + +Lots on main street sell as high as two thousand dollars each. + +A gentleman in tweed suit with capacious pockets and tan leggings which +he has brought with him across the Atlantic, has decided to stand for +the legislature at the next election. "The electors will say," he +assures us, "that I have been drunk. They will say that I have been in +jail, but I shall reply with repartee. You see I've always been +deucedly clever at repartee." + +The Mounted Police Barracks, the Indian Agency, the Hudson's Bay Post +and the Catholic Mission are on the hill above the village. The Church +of England Mission lies out and beyond, on a further hill. The bankers +ride out to the further hill to play tennis with the pretty English +girls who teach in the school. + +When an elderly jocose Irishman so far forgets himself as to say +"darlint" to a breed-girl, he must not be surprised if she draws a wry +face and calls him _muchemina_; that is to say, "bad berries." + +I might write a book on the news to be picked up on this main street, +if a tide of sleep did not threaten to submerge me. In this dry +crystalline atmosphere, one must sleep an hour or two sometimes, +however unwilling the spirit or unique and alluring the things present. + +My room at the lodging-house is the best the place affords in that it +has a cotton curtain for a door, and as yet doors are only used in the +outside walls of the houses. The curtain is not, however, of much +account in that the green lumber of the walls has warped to such narrow +dimensions that the occupier of the adjoining room would have to shut +his or her eyes to keep from seeing you. On the contrary part, you +must of necessity go to bed in the dark unless you wish to fall a +victim to the crafts and assaults of the mosquitoes who are attracted +by the lamp. In a fortnight or so, they will have completely +disappeared, but, in the meanwhile, if you would escape their nasty +niggling ways you must neglect your hair, teeth, and sun-scalded nose. +A real-estate agent was telling me to-day how the mosquitoes often +disappeared in a night, and, to illustrate this fact, related a story +of a Tipperary Orator, who said, "My fellow-countrymen, the round +towers of Ireland have so completely disappeared that it is doubtful if +they have ever existed." + +.... A wagon is leaving this morning for St. Bernard's Mission on the +hill, and by some felicity I am invited to go with it. Bill, who is +the driver, received a bullet wound in a Mexican rebellion; had his leg +broken by a fall from "a terrible mean cayuse"; lost an eye and part of +his nose in a mine explosion, and says, by these same tokens, he will +live to be a hundred unless he loses his head to the government. Bill +was married once down Oregon, way, but his wife divorced him. His wife +was very short-sighted, but, contrawise, her tongue was long. Besides, +she was appallingly like her mother. + +This trail to St. Bernard's, passing as it does through a trail of +lanky poplars and birch in green lacy gowns, is a right pleasant one, +and fills you with the great joy of growing things. + +And also it is very pleasant this morning to shut your eyes that you +may the better inhale the fine brew of the conifers, the reek of the +wild roses, the pungent wafture of the mint from the meadows, and above +all, the subtle incense of the warm spawning soil. This is to have a +happiness as large as your wishes. This is to think thoughts that are +very secret and only half-way wise. + +At St. Bernard's the nuns take me to see their finely manicured garden +with its rows of cabbages, leeks, turnips, radishes and its many herbs +such as parsley, mint and sage. Their potatoes are coming on well and +so are the posy beds. This sweet-breathed garden is tilled by +voluntary labour and held in common, but it must be remembered the +nun's occupation does not afford her any special opportunities for +knowledge of the world at large and its shrewder ways. + +I can easily discern that the pride of this garden are the cabbages, +probably because more care has gone into their culture. Indeed, this +vegetable seems to be peculiarly favoured by all gardeners of all +classes, for even the haughty Diocletian, when asked to resume his +crown, said to the ambassadors, "If you would come and see the cabbages +I have planted, you would never again mention to me the name of +empire." In this garden-plot the sisters have erected a pedestal upon +which stands a fair shining woman, even she who is the mother to their +Lord and wonderful God. + +In order that her labour may become an offering to her tutelary spirit, +every woman should have a statue in her garden embodying her highest +ideal, whether it be of Isis, Mrs. Eddy, or Diana, the "Goddess +excellently bright." Such a statue would tend also to keep her +religion a divine intimacy rather than a creed or an institutional +observance. + +Sister Marie-des-Anges shows me the hospital, and pleasures me with a +delicious cordial which is made out of wild berries and which tastes +better than champagne. + +Those who have an eye for esoteric apartments with etchings and +faint-coloured prints on toned-down walls, would not be impressed with +the wards and offices of this hospital where all the furniture is +home-made. It is, however, cleverly contrived and has the prestige of +being literally the original "mission furniture"--no one can gainsay +it. In this connection, give me leave to transcribe here a passage +which I have met with in the book of Thoreau, the naturalist. "Why +should not our furniture be as simple as the Arab's or the Indian's?" +he asks. "When I think of the benefactors of the race whom we have +apotheosized as messengers from heaven, bearers of divine gifts to man, +I do not see in my mind any retinue at their heels, any car-load of +fashionable furniture." + +I know not the answer of this question unless it be that we of Canada +need practice in the excellencies of those graces which have respect to +personal simplicity and disrespect to communal opinion. I have a mind +to make a trial of this. + +It was in this hospital that "Twelve-Foot" Davis (now in heaven) gave +his instructions to his partner, Jim Cornwall, to take his body on a +sled to the Peace River and bury it on the height of land. + +People in the cities are too busily absorbed in the transactions of +peers and politicians to know northern philanthropists like +"Twelve-Foot" Davis, the first man to introduce steel-traps into this +country and to thus dare the wrath of the omnipotent and indomitable +"Company of Gentlemen Adventurers." You may not know it, but the steel +trap has done as much for the Indian as the self-binder has for the +white man. + +But down here every one knows that "Twelve-Foot" Davis was held in high +esteem, and any man will tell you, as Bill the driver told me, how it +was a full hand this fine frontiersman laid on the Lord's table and +that none of the cards were lacking. + +Twelve-Foot Davis was so called because, in the days of the Caribou +rush, he staked a claim of twelve feet. Each prospector was allowed +one hundred feet and there was no claim left when Twelve-Foot appeared +on the scene. But to be assured in his mind he was not outdone, he +measured the claims and found that two of the prospectors were holding +two hundred and twelve feet. Davis wanted those extra twelve feet and +the prospectors decided to give him a place directly in the centre of +their claims on a spot where a basin of shale lay. From this narrow +claim, Twelve-Foot dug up a large quantity of gold, and this was the +only spot on the entire creek where the least trace of ore was found, +even his neighbours being unable to pan out a grain. It was from this +happening that he derived the name which, because of the question it +carries on its face, would, as a nom-de-plume, be worth a corresponding +amount of gold to an obscure author. + +Bill, who is fairly amenable to bribes, takes me over to the further +hill where the Church of England Mission stands, which Mission was the +spiritual husbandry of the late Bishop Holmes. + +It would be pleasant to tell of this place and of the school, but Bill +is in haste and will not tarry my leisure. It may be that his swaying +motive is another bribe. + +It was only three months ago that the Bishop and his family started for +England, and soon afterwards came the news that he had died in a London +hospital. The teachers tell me the family who went out together on +this holiday are never coming back, in that they cannot afford to take +the journey now that the bread-winner is gone. The furniture is to be +sold and the house will be done-over for another bishop. + +As I walk through the home which for many years has been the most +hospitable one in the north, it is with a mist in my eyes and a painful +tightness in my throat. I touch the chords of Auld Lang Syne on the +piano in honour of Madam, the mother; I kiss the house-flowers for the +love of the young girls who carried them safely over the long, long +winter; I finger the books in the library with affection in memory of +the good Bishop who once told me kindly tales of these Indians who were +his friends. + +And when I, too, have gone, may it happen that some one who understands +will touch my books in like manner, and say good-bye to them for me. I +could not so endure it of myself.... + +... It was six days later at the sports that I received a proposal of +marriage from Prosper, an Indian who is a trainer of horses. It was +not wholly a surprise, in that he had already approached the master of +our party with an overture to buy me. The master had hesitated to tell +me of this for fear I might be offended. "You see, Lady Jane," he +explained, "it is like that case in _Patience_ where the magnet wished +to attract the silver churn." + +"Yes?" asked I, "and what did you say to him?" + +"Oh! I told him he was a master-fool; that you were nothing but a +great cross-examiner who had the misfortune to be born a woman." + +And his reply. + +"He said he did not understand me but he saw you laughed a great deal +and showed your teeth. He says he would not beat you, but would be +very mild and agreeable with you." + +Now, I was not offended, for the proposal from this young Apollo of the +forest only meant I was no longer regarded as a mysterious invader from +another and strange land. + +Why should he not propose? In this northern world distinctions fall +away and all are equal. As a usual thing, the Indian regards a white +woman impersonally or with a half-contemptuous indifference. To him, +we are frail, die-away creatures deplorably deficient in energy, yet, +strange to relate, wholly lacking in the spirit of obedience. Scores +of ill-instructed novelists to the contrary, no Indian has ever +assaulted a white woman. This is an amazing fact when one considers +how, for nearly two centuries, the Indian has guided our women through +the forests; piloted them down the rivers; and has cared for them in +isolated outposts. The Indian has lived rough and lived hard, but, in +this particular, he is morally the most immutable of all God's +estimable menfolk. + +When Prosper pleaded his case personally, he broke ice by requesting me +to accept a pair of doe-skin gauntlets more beautiful than ordinary. +In spite of my declining the gift, he asked "Will you marry with me?" +assuring me, at the same time, that I was his _saky hagen_, or "one +beloved." I would not have to travel far. He is one day from here if +there be wind, but two days with no wind. He likes the noise I make in +my throat when I laugh. The master explained to Prosper, "This is only +a way she has of gargling her throat beautifully," a wicked cynicism +which was lost on the bronze-faced tamer of horses in that gargling is, +to him, an unknown and hence an incomprehensible practice. The master +also advised Prosper to keep the gloves for, if I listened, he would +indubitably need them later. + +Prosper is a hardily-built man with admirable shoulders and a bearing +like Thunder Cloud, the American Indian who was the model for Mr. G. A. +Reid's picture entitled "The Coming of the White Man." Also, Prosper +is daringly ugly. When I tell him I am already married, he says, "You +need not go back. Your man can find many women by the great +Saskatchewan River." + +It may interest the curious to know that Prosper ultimately sold me the +gauntlets for my man, and put away the money with an imperturbable +serenity worthy the receiving-teller of a western bank. + +... The sports were inaugurated by the slaughter of an ox for the +benefit of the treaty Indians. It is foolish to shudder when we see +the throat of a bullock cut. When a bird dips its long bill into the +chalice of a flower it is doing precisely the same act. + +The heart of this bullock was fat, so that good fortune abides with the +tribe. A lean heart is always unlucky. Once Ba'tiste killed an animal +that had hairs on its heart, and Holy Mother! Holy Mother! that winter +he trapped a silver-fox. + +The white men played a game of baseball which would have given cause +for thought to those impersonal pawns known as professionals; it was so +very original. But, after all, baseball is only cricket gone +hysterical, and perhaps the game may be further evolved under the +aurora. Some one must take the onus of initiative. Originally the +game was very primitive and I have heard tell, or I may have read, that +it was really a baseball club which Samson used to kill the Philistines. + +The results of the horse races are not posted, a fact which tends to a +democratic spirit. If you want to see the start or the finish you must +bunch with the crowd at the post. This also enables you to learn how +wonderfully an excited Cree can vociferate: there is no other place in +the world where a more efficient instruction can be had. And when +words fail him, Sir Hotspur says: "Uh-huh!" and makes other sounds in +his teeth like a flame when it leaps through dry rushes. + +The mysteries of straight, place, and show are not probed here and no +Indian throws a race. The best horse always wins. The Cree jockey +rides bareback and beats his horse from the start. This, they tell me, +is necessary because there is no best strain in Indian ponies. They +are as native and unimproved as the horses of Diomedes that roamed the +hills of Arcadia. + +The tents, booths, and dining-rooms skirt the track, and so the squaws +can leave their cooking to engage in their own contests without any +unnecessary loss of time. These include a tug-o'-war, a horse race and +foot races. The men engage in canoe and tub races, boxing bouts, +swimming and smoking contests, bucking-broncho exhibits and other +physical tests for which they have a fondness and natural aptitude. +Gambling is in full swing and no one thinks it necessary to apologize. +Several men squat side by side on the ground and pass a jack-knife from +one to the other under a blanket which covers their knees. The gambler +has to guess in which hand the knife is to be found. It is the same +game as "Button! Button! Who has the button?" + +The drum-song, that rude rough song of the suitor, does not start till +after nightfall. As a general thing, the man sings it in a tent lying +on his back, his face flushed and his eyes suffused. "Hai! Hai!" he +cries with a blurred staccato that is without response, +"otato-otooto-oha-o." + +After awhile, he seems to become hypnotized by the recurrence of this +measured rhythm which is without melody and without gaiety. These +drum-songs are indubitably the survivals of earlier days when the +man-animal roamed through the land and made love-calls in the trees. + +The drum-man has one pronounced characteristic; you can never mistake +him for a Christian. On one of the drums, there was a sun-symbol +marked in blue, but this may have been an accidental ornamentation. Or +it may be the drum-suitor is a Christian who merely claims the +masculine prerogative of changing his principles with his +opportunities. You can never tell. + +But on the whole, the discordancy of the drum is no worse than that of +the fiddle which supplies the music for the dance. Why people say "fit +as a fiddle" I can never surmise, for a fiddle is always becoming unfit. + +One hears much complaint in our province over oak floors well waxed, +but here is a dancing floor that is laid while you wait. Cross-beams +are placed on the ground and over them are put planks of uneven +thickness. When in use, the floor seems almost as active as the feet +of the dancers. + +The crowd is made up of dusky belles from the tribes of the Athabasca, +Slave, and Mackenzie Rivers; many braves, and some few white men whom I +pretend not to recognize. I am like the man Herrick writes about, "One +of the crowd; not of the company." + +The dancing is of a primitive order not unlike the natural movement +which street children make to the strains of the hurdy-gurdy. + +In higher circles, it is known by the name of the turkey-trot. +Scientists classify it under the more dignified appellation of +"neuromuscular co-ordination." + +As compared with a ball, say at Government House, this one has some +marked peculiarities. There are no chaperones, no refreshments, many +sitting-out places, and it is wholly in the dark save for the light of +a tolerant and somewhat remote moon. + +A white woman who watches it is considered by the men of her own race +to be one of five things--stupid, innocent, mean, obstinate, or unduly +curious, whereas to be accurate she may only be a conscientious scribe. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +A COUNTRY WOMAN AT THE CITY RACES + + Still do our jaded pulses bound + Remembering that eager race.--R. W. GILBERT. + + +This favour would never have come to me if I had not found a two-eyed +peacock feather in the paddock. It isn't reasonable to suppose that a +simple, country-bred person from back Alberta-way could have such +story-book luck on her first wager. La-la-la! + +All the way down I kept praying, "Lead not Janey into temptation," +knowing right well I would slay any one who kept me out. I take off my +hat to myself. + +"Dear me!" says John. "One would think you cut your teeth on a bit +instead of a pen." Some people like the idea of betting: some don't. + +At this Woodbine race-course in Toronto, they no longer have turf +accountants. Their days were numbered when careless people started to +call them bookies. They have been succeeded by steel slot affairs +called pari-mutuel machines. The words pari and mutuel would seem to +be almost synonymous, one meaning equal, the other reciprocal. The +reciprocal arrangements are like this; the party of the first part gets +the money; the party of the second part, the experience. "And the +machine?" you ask. (I asked that too.) The machine, which is only an +impersonal way of saying the Jockey Club, gets as its commission five +per centum of all wagers, and I am told it makes as high as eight +thousand dollars the day. There are as many ways of fixing the races +as there are of making bannocks on the Mackenzie River, but you can't +fix the machine. It never gets tired of being good. This being the +case, people must study the science of betting just as politicians +study the ways of the electorate. + +A shrewd-spoken gentleman with ruddy features and fierce white +moustachioes to whom I was introduced in the paddock, told me some of +these rules he had learned. He said "My Good Lady, I can see you have +an honest face, although you come from Western Canada where the people +are exceedingly singular. I will therefore proceed to tell you in +confidence what I know concerning the canons of betting." + +"A tip, so far as I can make out"--and here he flicked a butterfly off +my shoulder--"is a secret told to the whole betting ring." + +"Unless you have money to lose you should bet small till you are using +money which you have won." + +He told me many other rules about gambling, with much eagerness, for he +seemed to conceive a liking for me, but it avails nothing that I tell +them to you, in that no man gives heed to another man's method of +plying the art, thinking his own a vastly greater superiority, in which +respect gamblers do closely approach to the fraternity of the pen known +as authors. + + * * * * * + +This Woodbine race-course is a fair tarrying place, and I enjoy its +beauty with luxurious wonder. Outside its high palings, there are +thickly peopled, fusty streets, for this is the very heart of the city. +Why any place should be called the heart of the city I cannot +conjecture, except that both the civic and human heart are places of +huge trafficking and, above all things, desperately wicked. + +The near foreground is a finely brushed lawn that, here and there, has +burst into flame-red flowers. In the centre of the ring where the +hunters take the hedges, two beautiful elms hold themselves proudly +erect as if to say, "Look at us, O woman of little wit! look at us; we +are finer creations than man, or even than horses." + +Off in the background, with nothing intervening save the elms, little +sailing yachts like white birds, rock and dip in the sapphire blue of +the bay. Strong-built motor-boats scud across the horizon in so +terrific a hurry one can hardly follow their wake for dust. (The +editor will kindly permit me to say "dust.") We watch them, from our +box, three women of us, with a field-glass which we use in turn for all +the world like the three hoary witches who had only one eye between +them. + +I like this landscape better than our prairie. The trouble with the +prairie is that you always seem to be in the middle of it. The garden +of Time and Chance, it has no parts or passions unless, indeed, its +spaces seem unfriendly. It has no mystery, no changeability, no +complexity.... But all this is digressing from the races and from the +beautifully dressed women who look like tall-stemmed flowers. I heard +a man in the next box compute that the feathers worn in the enclosure +had cost a hundred thousand dollars, but no matter what they cost they +were worth it--willow plumes, fish-spines, aigettes, birds-of-paradise, +ostrich mounts, ospreys, and other things I cannot name. Indeed, my +own hat has two bright scarlet wings which cause me no small +satisfaction, in spite of the fact that John says they are not so much +wings as a challenge to combat. Moreover, he says when I am better +civilized, I will know that feathers of any kind are an atavism and no +fit dress for Christian people. It is trying to have a near relative +with such views. The younger men of the enclosure affect Newmarket +coats, or Burberry's, and cloth spats, also field-glasses swung across +their shoulders. They express horse-language emphatically without a +word. The older men who have attained to the dignity of the Bench or +the Cabinet, run to silk hats and frock coats. + +The enclosure is occupied by the favoured few who have boxes and who +are designed by the Grand Stand as "the society bunch." I would like +to write about this distinction, and sometime I will, but just now the +three-year olds are cavorting down the great white-way, for the autumn +cup which has $2500.00 tucked away in its inside. It is on Star +Charter that I have my hard-earned western dollars--egg and butter +money, mind you--and I must pay strict attention to this race. I think +he'll win. The Lord never gave him those legs and that frictionless +gait for nothing. I'm sure of that. + +The horses do not mind their manners at the starting bar, but pick +objections, prance, and kick each other with the most admirable +precision. I have read that when the Otaheitans first saw a horse they +called it "a man-carrying pig." It is not possible to improve on the +definition. + +But, after awhile, the horses make a clean break from the bar and are +off in a spume of dust. Gallant-goers they are, and this is sure to be +a tight race. Their necks are strained like teal on the wing, and +almost you expect to hear a sharp shot and see one tumble. Indeed, +they might be birds in autumn flight, in that they run in a wedge and +seem to obey a collective consciousness. + +The jockeys ride high on the horses' shoulders and they ride for a +fall. The purple and blue jockey holds the lead and he's going some. +The enclosure says he is. + +But the blue and silver jockey is fighting him for every inch and he's +gaining. The enclosure says he is. + +The orange and black jockey is third. He's carrying my egg and butter +money. He'll win though, for the jockey who stays second or third must +get the advantage of the leading horses as a wind-shield. Presently he +will slip the bunch; he's sure to. The enclosure says he is. John +tells me to stop adjuring the jockey, that he will never hear me. + +They've only a little way to go now--only a little way--and the orange +and black is coming steadily to the front. Even John gets excited and +keeps saying, "Good l'il ol' cayuse," and things like that, which are +bad form down East. Steadily on--steadily past the blue and +silver--steadily upon the haunches of the red and blue--now on his +shoulder--now on his neck--and now a neck ahead. This was how the +orange and black won, but you should have been there to see it. + +And to think it all came from finding a two-eyed peacock feather in the +paddock! + +Between races, we visit the paddock, insinuating our way through the +crowd in order to get near the ring where the horses show their paces +to the racegoers who make believe they are judges of speed, condition +and stamina. As a matter of fact, the horses are all very much +alike--wiry, wispy things like lean greyhounds with rippling veins that +stand out in relief, muscles of rawhide, and bell nostrils. There is +little difference in their speed either--a second, two seconds, or +mayhap three--but these seconds are, in their results, so vastly +different to the turfmen that all other contrarieties become as +nothing. The jockeys who know the horses from their hoofs up, and who +ride with instinct, are perhaps the only men who can fairly hazard what +the results will be--or should be. + +They tell me that most of these jockeys die of consumption. This is +probably owing to the fact that they must rigidly train the flesh off +their bones. Napoleon said that Providence always favoured the +heaviest battalions. The dictum has no application to jockeys. Our +Western maxim that a cowboy is only as good as his nerves would be of +more general applicability. + +But while, in the horses themselves, there seems to be little of marked +individuality, think of what volumes could be written on their names. +Here we have Ringmaster, Gun Cotton, Froglegs, Song of the Rocks, +Tankard, Scarlet Pimpernel, Porcupine, Pons Asinorum and other names +which hold a lure. So exactly co-natural are they to our extended +acquaintanceship among the humans back in the Province of Alberta, that +our homesickness vanishes into the sunny blue. + +There were nine horses in the autumn steeplechase and Young Morpheus +would have beat handily had he not fallen on the last jump. The jockey +rocketed over his head and lay still, but Young Morpheus, being a +thoroughbred and no welcher, ran on and came slashing in to the finish. +That horse has a soul like John's and mine, only better than John's. +The prize was carried off by Highbridge, who seemed to be the +favourite, for the enclosure turned itself into a pandemonium. Men and +woman who before were separate entities, became merged into a mass of +frantic arms and white faces that with a pleading voice coaxed the +winner down the homestretch to victory. It is the steeplechase that +probes to the depths mankind's capacity for physical enjoyment. + +"But the jockey was thrown," you say, "and lay still?" Think you we +wear the willow because of it? Not so, Honourable Gentleman. We are +consoled by the well-turned and doubtless truthful reflection that-- + + "Bright Lucifer into darkness hurled, + Was happier than angels quiet-eyed." + + +I did not see any more of the races because I was summoned to the +Government House box and invited to tea with the occupants thereof. +They must have heard what an excellent dairywoman I am, and things like +that, but how they heard I cannot surmise unless John has been telling. + +"I'd like to live in your Province," said the Governor, "living is +mercilessly high there, but money keeps moving; money keeps moving, and +a fellow like me need never go to work without his breakfast." + +In the Directors' room, we refreshed ourselves with little sweet cakes +and tea from a delicious brew. And in this room, I talked with the +handsome, well-mannered women from Kentucky, Virginia, and Hamilton who +have brought thither their horses--about six hundred in all--for this +autumn meet. + +I have made up my mind that John shall not argue me into going home, +not if I have to fall ill from discomposure of spirit, and, as for +Toronto, ever hereafter it shall be to me a new city of Beucephala in +honour of its horses and because of the immutable game-loving +disposition of its people. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + +IN NORTHERN GARDENS + +Away from the beaten tracks there are still by-paths where hyacinths +grow in the springtime.--ARTHUR EDWARD WAITE. + + +Far off in the Southland, it is in the habit of Spring to come lagging +over the land. She is a princess. You can tell it by her manner of +moving, and her fine lady ways. Often, she is greatly bored. + +Under the north star it is different. Spring is a wilding horsewoman, +sweet and graceless, pirouetting a-tiptoe and waving to us kisses. + +Hush! and hold you still, my merry Gentlemen. You may catch them if +you try, and they are not in the least sinful. + +Goldilocks, I call her. + +"A young mother," you say, "and no Columbine." + +Pray thee have it so, for when this season of seven sweet suns has +begun, she is all things to all men. + +What an ado there is when she calls to her flower-children and chides +them to arise and put on their dresses. + +Sleepy heads! Sleepy heads! + +The vi'lets peer out of their green bed and complain of the cold, and +as for the ferns, instead of expanding into fans of green, they curl +themselves into foolish fiddle heads and beg to finish their dream. + +The shy anemone, with flushed face, gets her up first that she may be +with her mother. She is Spring's favourite child, but mark you, the +maiden wears a ruff of fur about her neck, and snuggles into it, just +as the pussy-willow does into his coat of grey. + +Those flowers that have butter-pats to heads come on apace. Some there +are who call them dandelions but we shall call them children's gold. + +Ah! if flowers would only sing. + +How terribly long has been the winter with its tiresome monochrome of +white. Every vestige of colour has been bleached out of the earth like +one would bleach a tablecloth. + +By way of solace, our northern Indian paints his face and wears a +scarlet sash as, by the same token, you and I wear poster coats and +purple plumes. + +It was recorded a day ago that when our dogs run away from us they +always travel southward. There is no doubt in the world they are +seeking colour. + +Over the way from my study-window there is a glass-house where a man +who, aforetime, taught school now grows flowers. The transition is +surely a natural one. + +His is the last conservatory on this hemisphere--at least I've heard +tell it is. + +He lets me walk up and down its long blossom-bordered aisles whenever I +am so minded. Here, in his floral sanctuary, one may take deep +draughts from the warm subtly-scented air till, someway or other, it is +transmuted into the alembic of the soul. + +May no blight fall on his roses or his heart! May God love him and let +him live long! + +This man's roses are of ivory and pink, but a few are red as if they +might be the blood of some great wounded queen. + +Nearly all the roses are long-winged and heavy-headed. They could not +be otherwise when they come and go from the land where dreams are born. +Once, a poet told that the soul of a rose went into his blood. This +was how he came to write the _Idylls of the King_. + +One of the gardeners ties the red roses to stakes and he will not have +it that the habit is cruel. "You may have noticed, Lady"--and here he +tightly draws the cord--"that most folk are hung by their sweethearts." +I almost hate this man. + +Hath not a rose-tree organs, passions, senses? If you prick it does it +not bleed? Verily I say unto you that it hath and it does. + +It is near to April before the lilies are at flood-tide. You must +needs see them before Passion Week when the gardeners cut and send them +to a large hungry place called down the line, where, in prairie +churches of tin and pine and sod, the Eastertide worshippers consider +the lily and sing songs about death and life. + +Not an inch of space is lost in the long lines where, tall and lissome, +the stalks bend and curtsy to the passer-by. The glory of the lily is +short-lived, for always they are cut off in maturity. The message they +give is not one of prophecy and resurrection as the writers have ever +taught. You may hear the message if you are still enough. "There is +no second flowering time" they whisper. "Love while life doth last." + +But, after all, the lilies are white like the snow outside, so that I +esteem the big purple hyacinths better, and the bobbing daffodils. + +There is an osier chair in one room wherein I often sit and watch the +buyers flit from plant to plant. The women who come from the British +Isles choose primroses, while those of Ontario and the other provinces +to the south, prefer a lilac in bloom, marguerites, or +carnations--anything they knew and loved at home. + +The Fraus, Madames, and Senoritas from Europe (every one must have a +blossom for Easter, else where is luck to hail from?) are better +satisfied with heliotropes, azaleas, and claret-coloured cyclamens. + +Our erstwhile teacher places the Norway pines close under the palms; +the tree of shade and the tree of sun that sigh vainly for each other. +I like him for this. He knows that Titiana loved Bottom. He must know +it. + +Very few care for my favourite flower--the narcissus. I always buy it, +and a fern. There are folk who despise ferns because they are nothing +but leaves but I like them for their history. They are the survival of +the fittest; types which Nature, in her great printing-press, never +breaks up. They are the old-timers of the vegetable world. + +Also, I walk down the tomato avenue and take my pick--that is I do if I +have enough money, for, here, at the edge of the world, they are as +expensive as Jacob's mess of pottage. One does not dream of robbing +banks so much as stripping tomato-vines. + +Tomatoes do not ripen out of doors (but you must not tell the Board of +Trade I said so) unless on a sunny slope, or by reason of some other +special dispensation. + +Other vegetables thrive, and the cauliflowers attain a size and +perfection elsewhere undreamed of. + +Never were there such toothsome red radishes as are grown here in the +north, large, firm, and flavorous. They are not so big, though, as the +radishes the Jews used to raise long ago of which it was said a fox and +her cubs could burrow in the hollow of one. I have, however, seen a +pumpkin large enough for a fox-warren, but candour compels the +confession that the gardener fed it daily with milk by means of an +incision which he made in its stalk. + +Our strawberries are not the equal of those grown on the Pacific slope, +but are larger, sweeter and firmer than Ontario berries. + +We do not sit under our own fig-tree (nor, alas, our apple-tree), but +why should we sigh when each summer the sunflower springs up to a +height of twelve or fifteen feet? It is the palm-tree of the north, +only more beautiful. + +The Mormons on their exodus from Illinois to Salt Lake City sowed +sunflower seeds along the trail, and ever since it has been marked by +sunflowers. In the province of Saskatchewan, the Russian refugees +sometimes divide their fields by rows of poppies. In Manitoba, their +hedges are of sweet-peas; in British Columbia, of broom. + +After awhile, when all our real-estate has been sold, and all our +companies have been promoted, we of Alberta shall have time and +inclination to consider our provincial plant. + +Grant us then that it may be the sunflower! + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + +COMMUNING WITH THE RUTHENIANS + +I hear the tale of the divine life and the bloody death of the +beautiful God, the Christ.--WALT WHITMAN. + + +This is my first visit to Mundare, on the Canadian Northern Railway, +and to the Ruthenian Church--the church with glittering domes, the +foundation stone of which was laid by the great Laurier himself. "Who +is this Sir Laurier?" I ask. "Ach! I cannot tell you. He a great man +is," says Michael Veranki, "his hair is like to the wild cotton in +August, and his face is beautiful, even like the face of the great +Archbishop Syptikyi, who is a soldier and a prince, and the like of +whom there never was. Believe me, Messus, he has seven feet high and +has seven tongues wherein to speak." + +"About this Laurier? Ya! Ya! almost I forget. He the stone of the +church placed in the corner, and we drew him in a wagon with six +bullocks. He the King's man is, and a smile in his eyes there comes, +quick, quick, like the wind comes on the wheat. Ya! Ya! we much like +this King's man." + +Nearly all the people are gone into the church and I follow. There are +no seats, so all of us stand, the sexes separated like the sheep from +the goats. + +One's eyes become riveted on the large globe of cut crystals that hangs +from the ceiling near the centre of the church, and the hard white +lights from it strike sharply on my eyeballs like dagger points. All +the people are making reverences and placing something on their +foreheads like oil, but it may be holy water. Know all men by these +presents that I, even I, am the poor ignorant wife of a Protestant +person, and understand not the meaning of these obeisances, nor of this +beautiful fête to which all the Austrian folk of the countryside have +come with not so much as one mouthful of bread to break their fast. +Neither shall one drop of liquid moisten their parched lips for these +three hours unless--Holy Mother and all the Blessed Saints, pray for +our presumption--unless indeed, it might fall to the lot of a woman to +take into her lips the sacred blood from the golden spoon which the +priest dips into the chalice, the holy chalice that is surmounted with +something dazzling like a star, so that no woman may even look thereon. + +Feeling all the while like wild oats amid the wheat, I take my stand by +a pillar close to the door and pretend not to stare. Ere long, a young +girl touches me and tells me she is inquested to bring me to the +sisters. I follow her through the church and into the vestry where a +little nun presses my hands and calls me by name. Once, she was my +escort through the Monastery at St. Albert, over by the Sturgeon River. +Of course I remember her. She is the china shepherdess in black who +says "Please" instead of "What?" and who comes from Mon'real. Also she +lisps, but what odds? Plutarch tells us that Alcibiades lisped and +that it gave a grace and persuasiveness to his discourse. + +She presents me to the other sisters, none of whom speak English, and +invites me out to the monastery to visit. All of the sisters look +middling healthy, not having the parchment-like pallor of the city nuns. + +The service, she explains, is the Finding of the Holy Cross. I must +not think it idolatry when they do veneration, indeed, I must not. +"Eet is what you call--Ah, Madame! I cannot find the word--eet is what +you call--" "A Symbol," I ask. "Oui, Oui, a symbol!" + +With many gesticulations and no small difficulty she tells me how the +Empress Helena, mother of the great Constantine, once had a heavenly +dream which enabled her to discover the very piece of ground wherein +the holy cross was hidden away. It lay under two temples where +heathens prayed to Jupiter and Venus instead of to Jehovah. She caused +these temples to be torn down so as not one stone was left, and +underneath were found three crosses. Being doubtful as to which was +the cross of the Lord Christ, the Empress had all three applied to the +body of a dying woman. The first two crosses had no effect (it was the +good Bishop Macarius, you must know, who helped her), but, at the touch +of the third, the dying woman rose up perfectly whole. + +This is a story worth lingering on, and the little nun would tell me +more about it, only the celebrant priest has come into the vestry and +talks with us before he goes to the basement to change his vestments. + +They are impressive garments which he wears, but one might imagine +their proving correspondingly oppressive. Kryzanowski is the wretched +name of him. He is a large, fair man, this priest, in the full force +of life, with an unmistakable air of distinction. On a snap judgment, +I should place to his credit the ability to deal with a supreme +situation. He is a priest of the Uniat Church, which church, so far as +I may understand, is a compromise between the Greek Orthodox and the +Roman Catholic, the compromise consisting of a prayer for the Pope +instead of for the Czar. + +In our White Alberta much antipathy exists between the Orthodox Greek +Church and the Uniats, and several years ago they had a lawsuit which +they took to the Privy Council in England, and which drove to insanity +one of our cleverest barristers. They are bonny fighters, these +Ruthenians from Galicia, and if they cannot "have the law" on one +another, they may always have the consolation of fisticuffs. And what, +pray, are muscles hard for and skulls thick, except to fight? Riddle +me that! + +Presently, when we shall have tied down and diverted their tremendous +fighting energy into what is usually described as civilization, we +shall, of a surety, find a human voltage here which will send these +Slavic peasants high up the scale where well-conceived and successful +endeavour is weighed and appraised. At present, ah, well! they are +young and positive and he is the best man who survives. + +The little sister brings me back into the church, where she places a +chair for me close beside the altar facing the congregation, an act and +fact which cause me not a little amazement and considerable +trepidation. Will the priest permit an unhallowed woman of lean and +meagre accomplishments--and she a Protestant--to sit so close to the +holy of holies? Will he? + +He does not even appear to see me and swings the censor close, close to +my head, over and over again, with the same free-handed gesture of +Millet's sower. He swings it out and about, hither and yon, till all +my garments smell of myrrh and aloes and cassia; until, like Solomon's +spouse, my hands dropped myrrh. + +Sometimes it is a rude Slavic peasant who swings the censer or lays the +spice on the live coals--a rough-necked man with red-brown hands and +face. He wears a caftan, or long cloak of skin, upon which red leather +is cunningly appliqued in pleasing designs. I doubt not he is from +Bukowina, or "the beech-woods," for the women of that province are +skilled craftswomen. He swings the censer with such deftness, that +were I not benumbed by the languourous odour of the smoke-thick air, I +would be wondering how this queer shock-headed acolyte with his bovine +stolidity came to acquire the revolver wrist in such a high state of +development. Surely it is well I am stupefied, for it might be +irreverent so to wonder. + +But for that matter, all this service belongs to the people and not to +any stilted crucifers or superior choristers smacking of professional +piety. As occasion may demand, an older woman comes forward and snuffs +a candle with her fingers and replaces it with a fresh one. The women +even carry the candles through the church when the ritual so requires +it. They do not appear to have any self-consciousness, but perform +their part gladly and naturally. This may arise from the fact that +they have been accustomed in Austria to taking part in religious dramas +such as The Nativity, which drama they once staged at Edmonton. I did +not see it, but Sister Josephat at the Ruthenian Monastery gave me a +picture of the _dramatis personæ_ taken during a rehearsal. + +"See! See! Madame Lady. See! See!" said Sister Josephat. "Et ees +ver' fonny. _De tree wise men are womens_, womens I tell you. Yes! +the black one too! She is Alma Knapf." + +This drama was vastly appreciated, especially by the younger fry of the +community, who enjoyed seeing the devil carry a Jew off the scene with +a pitchfork and cast him into hell with certitude and great vigour. +The older folk considered this treatment unduly drastic and an +unwarranted loss of useful material. Here in the North, we do not +believe in killing Jews--no, nor even bank-managers--where we are not +infrequently pared to the quick to provide money for real-estate +payments or to margin up against the bad news the ticker-tape has +spelled out. Yes! it would be highly unreasonable to allow the +Ruthenian folk to kill off the Jews and bankers and it would make us +uncommonly sorry. + +... I like to watch these farmer-women carry the tall, white candles +under the dome. It seems like a vision picture or some sense memory +that has filtered down to me through the ages, but what the memory is I +cannot say. Indeed, once I read of a strange country where men used to +run races with lighted candles, and the victor was he whose flame was +found burning at the goal. + +I think the memory which troubles me must be of Jacob's rods which he +made into "white strakes." He performed his rite under the _libneh_, +or white poplar-tree, even as we perform them under the white poplars +of Alberta. + +And while the women march, they chant a weird harmony, the men's voices +coming in at intervals like pedal points. There is no organ, or any +tyrannous baton, but only, "They sang one to another," as the Jews did +at the building of their temple. + +I am strangely, inexpressibly moved by this tone-sweetness. Sometimes +it is massive, triumphal, and inspiring as though the singers carried +naked swords in their upraised hands; or again, it seems to be the +sullen angry diapason of distant thunder in the hills. + +But mostly they sing a pæan or lamentation of the cross, heavy with +unspeakable weariness and the ache of unshed tears. Surely this is the +strangest story ever told. It is as though they sing to a dead god in +a dead world. + +And, sometimes, sight and sound become blended into one, and the sound +is the sobbing urge of the pines ... the people as they rise and fall +to the floor are the trees swayed by the wind. The cross they are +lifting is wondrous heavy, so that it takes four strong fellows. It is +built of oak beams and the figure of the Nazarene is of bronze. As the +lights fall from the windows on the outstretched body, with its pierced +hands and thorn-stung brow, it seems as though the tragedy of Golgotha +is being re-enacted before my very eyes, here on this far-away edge of +the world. The thing is ghastly in its awful realism, so that I am +crushed and confounded. It falls like flakes of fire on my brain, till +my mind's ear catches again and again that most horrifying cry of the +ages, "My God! My God! why hast Thou forsaken me?" + +But I cannot tell you more of this story of the Lord Christ who was +crucified, except that in some way it has become a personal thing to +these worshippers, and, maybe, a joyful one. It must be joyful, for, +at last, they hang a garland of flowers over the upright beams of the +cross and from it draw long, long ribbons of scarlet and white and +blue; which the women carry to the ends of the church like floating +streams of light, and between which the men and children stand to sing +_Alleluia_ and _Alleluia_. + +I know not why the priest stoops to the ground and touches it with +fingers or his lips. Sometime the little sister from Mon'real will +tell me. + +Henry Ryecroft, in his _Secret Papers_, recounts how he used to do this +same thing. "Amid things eternal," he says, "I touch the familiar and +kindly earth." It was in the silent solitude of the night when he +walked through the heart of the land he loved. + +I have always desired to see the mysterious sacrifice known as the +elevation of the host, but, now that I am an arm's stretch from the +altar, I do not look but cover my face with my hands. Only I see that +a dull red flames behind the man's ear when he takes the white wafer, +and the veins of his neck swell as if they hurt. + +But I look into the faces of the women and the men in the front line +who receive the sacred essence from the golden cup and golden spoon, +and almost I can hear what their eyes are saying. What odds about low +foreheads, thick lips, and necks brown like the brown earth when each +has the god within? The Ruthenians--or Galicians, if you like the name +better--may be a sullen folk of unstable and misanthropical temper; +they may be uncouth of manner, and uncleanly of morals, but I shall +always think of them, as on this day, when I saw the strange glamour on +their faces that cannot be described except that it came from a +marvellous song hidden in their hearts. + +There are no seats in the church, and while the sermon is being +preached the people stand--all except the mothers with babies, who sit +on the floor. These babies have pressed their mouths to the sacred +ikon the same as the older folk, and, doubtless, some gracious kindly +angel will guard them ever hereafter. Indeed, I hope so, and that she +will give unto them those things I most crave for myself. + +Father Kryzanowski delivers the sermon in the Ruthenian language. I am +glad, for I am tired of hearing I should be a different person. I +don't want to be, except to have hands of healing and a heart that is +always young. Yes! these are the things I most crave for myself. + +.... Good gentlefolk! will you be pleased to stay and eat brown bread +with us at the wagons, and cheese and hard-cooked eggs? We shall not +give you meat, for we would discourage the beef-trust, and, besides, +this is fast day.... But you shall eat your food off flaxen towels +which we spun and wove with our own hands. Yes! and we have wrought +northern flowers and prairie roses into them. + +And further, believe us, Sirs and Mesdames, we sent five towels like +unto these to Mary, the English Queen, that she might know that we are +now Canadians and no Ruthenians. + +And Michael Laskowicz shall take your picture, Lady, with his picture +box, and you may have Hanka's necklace like as if you belonged to us, +and Anna's head'kerchief which is always in this year's style.... and +we shall clap our hands and laugh and say, "There! There! she belongs +to us, this Mees Janey Canuck, now and without end." ... They are +engaging, these beechwood folk from Austria, and their loving kindness +is like honey to my mouth. + +If it were more genteel, I would like to speak them fair, and to write +books about them, but I have set my face against authorship. I will +not go into the writing business, for I do greatly prefer wealth and +honour, and to have my picture taken on a verandah with my arm around a +pillar as an exampler of a three years of successful life in Alberta +the Sunny. + + + + +CHAPTER XX + +THE SHADOW OF THE SCAFFOLD + +_It was my harassing duty to act as death-watch to the man who wrote +the appended diary. On the day before his execution he made no entry, +although he opened the book several times and once asked me to sharpen +his pencil. I was not present at his execution, but was informed that +he bore himself with dignity and calmness. The crime which he expiated +with his life was the murder of his wife who had left him to live with +another man. He had still one year to complete before obtaining his +degree as a medical practitioner. At his trial, he refused to take +refuge behind his wife's misdemeanour, nor would he permit his counsel +to urge this plea on his behalf_. + +_I have held this unique diary for over a year, not feeling at liberty +to give it to the public while in 'the service of the Mounted +Police_.--E. F. M. + + +_There are yet six days till I die_. + +The words the judge said were "hanged by the neck till dead." Ever +since, they have haunted me like a song that fastens itself on one and +will not be forgotten. The words drag out their ghastly length to the +sound of the Fort bell as it rings the hours. They drawl to the tread +of the sentinel who walks back and forth outside my +cell--_hanged--by--the--neck--till--dead_. + +Does it take a man long to hang? I inquired of my guard, and although +we are not supposed to talk, he laughed nervously and said he had once +read of a doctor who cut down to a murderer's heart three minutes after +the drop fell. There was still enough force in the heart to ring an +electric bell. + +_Five days more_! + +They are a tireless breed, the red-police of Canada, and they have an +eye in the centre of their foreheads that never sleeps. I once heard +there was such an eye, but I forget about it. + +This boy who watches me is nearly my own age, and I can see he is sorry +for me. I will not whimper and wince, but will hedge myself about with +a fence of laughter and bravado. It is the last kindness I can do to +any one. + +I like him better than the priest who visits me. I look at the priest +with curious eyes, this man who in five days will wish me a pleasant +journey into eternity. He it is who will read aloud my burial service +while I yet live. They have no sense of propriety, these men. + +May a murderer talk of propriety? No! but he may think on it, and +write on it, and no one may contradict him. + +This ecclesiastic has never loved a woman and so has never hated one, +nor killed her in his hate. + +Her mouth was like a red wound, but it was evenly pale with her face +before I gave myself to the police. + +God! I did not mean to strike her down; I did not mean to, but I did. +Once, I read that no one was responsible for alienating a woman's +affections but her own husband. If this be true, I murdered her twice. + +I stooped to her as she lay at my feet and straightened her collar, +also I pinned back a strand of hair that had come loose. Margaret is +the best name of all. I like to say it often--Margaret. + +_There are yet four days_. + +It is not given to any living being, man or beast, to know the hour of +his death, else the monstrous horror would drive him mad. Yet, I know +it and am not mad. It must be that I cannot believe it; that nature +protects me with a density through which I may not penetrate, or that +there are yet four days--ninety-six hours! + +When I was at school, I kept a calendar on the wall and struck off the +days till Christmas or Easter, when I would be home again. Most boys +did. + +The guards in the hallways talk of horses and women and, sometimes, +they forget me and laugh aloud. I know they have forgotten me, for +when they remember their voices drop suddenly to a whisper. I heard +one of them tell of a half-Cree he shot through the heart at the time +of the Rebellion. There was, he said, no doubt of its being in the +heart, for the fellow drew up his right leg. + +The tragedy of my approaching death is its impossibility. How can one +realize his execution when the homely smell of hot wheaten bread sifts +into his cell? There is the odour, too, of horse-sweat on the guards +as they come into my cell. They are the Royal North-West Mounted +Police. + +I do not know why they are royal and I am criminal, for, after all, the +distinction between us is of slight consequence. They do by law what I +did contrary to law. The results are the same. On the whole I think +they are the worse: their killing by rule is so monstrously +premeditated. And yet, this side of the subject has never occurred to +me till now that I am the prisoner of the police. + +But why should I carp and gird at these fine fellows? They are only +the instruments of the state, that is to say of the citizens. I +myself, by taxation, have contributed to the expenses of the scaffold +whereon I shall be executed. + +The priest pleads with me that I may not die in my sin. He does not +understand, and I may not tell him, that Margaret died in hers, and +that I must do likewise if I would spend eternity with her. + +He carries the whole dogma of the Church in his face and shoulders, +this old priest, but he is a good man and sincere. His endeavour is to +help and comfort me, but his words are short-armed to relieve my agony. +Surely my soul has descended into hell. + +To-day, he spoke of my mother, but I would not have it. One need not +die a hundred deaths.... + + "Oh! little did my mother think + The day she cradled me + O' the lands I was to travel in, + Or the death I was to dee." + + * * * * * + +My dread is not from fear of the physical pain of hanging, for, after +all, the life of every man and every woman ends in a strangle. It is +that these men will lay their hands on me and bind me with a rope and +that I may not forbid them. The indignity of it is unbearable. The +prison stripes, the handcuffs, the black cap--these are from the +devil's wardrobe. + +It fills me with mute stupefaction, the mental picture I draw of myself +when I am swung out on a rope, a grisly limp nothing of humanity; I who +this minute am young and full of sap and sinew. I cannot endure that +men should look upon my countenance twisted into an inhuman grimace; on +my horribly bulging eyes, and on my tongue hanging out like the purple +petal of the wild flag. It is not decent so to mutilate a man. + +And when they have thus distorted my face, then will they blot out its +hideousness with quick-lime like one would rub an ugly picture off a +slate. + +This malign system of burying murderers in lime, and refusing the body +to friends, doubtless has its origin in the Roman custom whereby the +remains of the Christians were burned to ashes and cast into the river +so that not a vestige would remain. The Romans thought in this way +they would deprive their victims of all hope of the resurrection. + +The guard keeps a light burning at night that he may watch me the +better. It is his duty to deliver me alive to the executioner. If I +were so minded, I could sever the radial arteries in my wrists with my +teeth and he would not know. This is why I laugh out loud and will not +tell why I laugh. + +The wind blows bleak across the prairies and the brittle snow-flakes +that beat on the glass outside the iron-bars have a sound like the +whirr of swords. I wish the wind would blow always, for it lays a +salve on my soul. + +_On the third day_. + +My muscles ache for use in this two-by-nothing cell, and, now and then, +a close-shut but invisible fist hits me under the heart so that I feel +I must fall from numbness. It is stupid and super-brutal to refuse me +space wherein to walk. To-day, I went through some gymnastic exercises +and forgot long enough to hum an air that Margaret and I danced to at +the military-ball at Edmonton less than a year ago. I am not sure of +the words, but they concern "an old grey bonnet with a blue-ribbon on +it." + +My God! but I have been a bungler at living. I have wagered with life +and lost. I know it while I wait here to pay the reckoning and the +knowledge confounds me. + +I keep sifting this question over and over--why is it that men are +hanged by the neck till dead? + +I asked the priest and he quoted the verse about an eye for an eye and +a tooth for a tooth, yet it seems to me people sin more in the +observance of this law than they would in its abrogation. It used to +be said by the Jews there was a time to act for Jehovah by breaking His +commandments. + +There should come to me some severe punishment for the life I have +taken, but it should be remedial in character rather than revengeful. +Innately, I am not a criminal, and for thirty or forty years could be +made to serve my race with the labour of my body and the sweat of my +brain. It does not seem a good policy, nor economic, to kill a man in +order to kill the evil that is in him. + +_Two days_. + +This morning, a silent, fat-faced man with inimical eyes came in and +looked at me, as if appraising my weight. He dared not put his hands +on me for I have yet two days. + +I saw him once before, over two thousand miles from here, in a drug +store in Toronto. The chemist told me this was Radcliffe and that he +liked to play with children. He also said Radcliffe claimed to have +adopted the profession out of purely charitable motives, there having +been so many bunglings by amateur hangmen. + +It is quite true what some one wrote that in waiting for the +executioner to let him drop, society is revenged on the murderer. + +As I sit here writing, there comes sharply to me on the frosty air the +sound of hard hammering. There are two men working on my scaffold. I +can tell from the recurring beats of the metal on metal. + +It is appalling that the monstrous lesson these hammers are thudding +out in the barracks yard has found me too late. It must always be +late, for no man ever dreams that he will mount the scaffold. + +No! I will not whine. I will not be a coward and gag at the gall, +but, oh! I want to live so much. I want to live! + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + +THE BABOUSHKA + + There is a woman and she was wise, + Wofully wise was she.--ROBERT SERVICE. + + +Now Judea was a Province too, only smaller than Canada, and it was +subject to Rome. In Judea, there was a town called Bethlehem, which +means a house of bread. It must have been that wheat was plentiful. + +But this Bethlehem was a small, small place, and the Romans cared not +so much as one finger's fillip that a strange white star waited there +for a little while to light up a birth-bed. + +I do not know if the star did wait, but it should have, for this was +the most momentous birth which history has recorded in that, for all +time, it changed the world's ideals. Its influence could only be +weighed with planets in the balances. The baby's name was to be +Dayspring, and Wonderful, and Emmanuel. + +... It is well the baby lay in a manger else a bullock might have +crushed him with its hoof... + +And having for its central symbols a mother and a baby, this cult of +the Christ can never perish. Its ethics may change; its authority may +wane; its history be impugned, but its symbols are eternal. + +Our idea of gift-giving at the Christ-mass-tide has grown up from the +offering made at the manger by the three wise men who came out from the +East, Casper, Melchior, and Balthasar. The myrrh they offered to a +mortal; the gold to a king, the frankincense to God. + +Whether to God, the king, or the child, all our gifts should first be +brought to the manger, which is only another way of saying that without +love they avail nothing. + +I know a story about these magi, and I will relate it to the children +of the North. It was told to me by Maryam, the ninth girl-child of +Michaelovitch, a Russo-Canadian, in the Province of Saskatchewan. It +is about three wise men and a foolish woman. The woman is called +Baboushka and her heart has become as water. Once, when she was +working in her home, the three wise men passed on their journey to find +the Christ-child and they gave her greeting. "Come with us, +grandmother," they said, "for we have seen His star in the East and we +go to worship Him." + +"Surely I will come," said the old woman, "but the oven is heated for +my bread and I must even now bake it. After awhile, I will follow and +find where this star leads." + +But she never saw the Christ-child because, when her bread was baked, +the star no longer shone in the sky. Ever since she has been +searching, but has never found Him. She it is who fills the children's +stockings on Christmas Eve, and decks the fir-tree on Christmas morn, +because she hopes to find in some poor child she has fed or clothed the +little Lord Jesus whom she neglected hundreds and hundreds of years +ago. Long before dawn on Christmas Day the children in Russia are +awakened by the cry, "Behold the Baboushka!" and they spring out of bed +on the instant hoping to see her vanish out of the window, but no child +has seen aught save only the gifts she has left behind. + +Maryam thinks--indeed, she tells it to the four winds--that the +Christ-child has left Russia and has come to Canada in a big ship with +a shipmaster. + +And so Maryam is full of employment, almost every day, knitting mittens +and long white scarves for babies and poor children. You never can +tell, He may be even here on the prairie, the Christ-child whom the +unwise old Baboushka disesteemed hundreds and hundreds of years ago. +You can never tell. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + +THE HERO PRIESTS OF THE NORTH + + This they all with a joyful mind + Bear thro' life like a torch in flame, + And falling, fling to the host behind, + 'Play up! Play up! and play the game!'--NEWBOLT. + + +"For long years," said a Toronto editor the other day, "this country +has produced few outstanding personalities except politicians." + +Here spoke the little Canadian. By this country he meant the provinces +to the south of the Great Lakes. Think of that! Think of that! + +Why, man dear, north of the lakes we have outstanding personalities to +burn--and we burn them. And, here and now, let me say that under the +northern lights, politicians must, perforce, take a third or even a +fourth estate, for always we have to reckon with the missionary priest, +the business man, and the real-estate agent, before we begin to +consider the politician. Even then, I am not so sure but the editor +and the railway boss take precedence of the politician. In this large, +airy land, politicians are truly but small fry from small +places--inconsequential ephemera, who age in a heart-beat and die. + +If I had realized at the start this was to be a chapter on the +outstanding personalities among the missionary priests, I would have +begun differently. I would have said that the Anglo-Saxon hungers for +heroes, but that the heroes were rare--that this was why the raw, +ragged wolf-land lying about the Hudson Bay and along the stretches of +the Mackenzie River was of deep and peculiar interest, in that it had +the distinction of producing crops of heroes and that the breed never +seemed to run out. + +I would have said that the story of the northern priest is the story of +a man with an ideal, or, if you will have it so, with a dream; that the +dream is one that disturbs his ease and leads him in perils often. + +I would have gone further and shown this boy o' dreams to be at the +same time a supreme realist and, without question, one of the highest +types of human excellence in the last half-century; that he has the +dauntless spirit of the soldier, the enthusiasm of the explorer, the +enterprise of the merchant, and the patriotism of the statesman, and +all for the sole object of helping humanity. In a word, that he is a +special soul and must not be judged as general. + +It is to be regretted I did not begin this way, but, to quote the Roman +governor who gave judgment concerning the Nazarene: "What I have +written, I have written." + +... Among the missionary priests of the North there is, to-day, no +greater outstanding personality than Bishop Stringer of the diocese of +the Mackenzie River. + +I used to know him years agone when he was Isaac Stringer, divinity +student, a lusty young fellow, lean and clean and strong of wind, who +could carry a ball down the field past all antagonists and send it +spinning through the goal. When I say he has grown stout since those +days, you must not make the deduction that he is under-worked and +overfed like other bishops of whom we have heard tell. On the contrary +part, north of 53° it is our profligate custom to starve all +dignitaries. Indeed, it was only last winter that Bishop Stringer, on +his way across the divide from the Mackenzie River to the Yukon, nearly +lost his life from starvation. He and his companion, Charles F. +Johnson, were lost in a mountain fog and missed the trail. Southern +folk who sit in offices and parlours do not grasp the full meaning of +this, and I cannot very well explain except to say that Dante had an +exceedingly fine insight when he made the Inferno foggy. + +For a week, in deep snow and deeper fog, they wandered in and out of +Fool's River, the irony of which could not fail to rub them sore. +Returning to the Fool's mouth, they spent three days making snow-shoes +and cutting up moccasins for webbing. From here they ascended the +height of land and crossed three divides before finding an east-flowing +river. But again the fog descended and now came the fight for life. +On and on they wandered, day after day, scarcely able to see a foot +ahead and more than once treading on the verge of a precipice. + +They had been living on a daily ration of a spoonful of flour and rice +and the half of a red squirrel each. But even this gave out, and the +sorely beset men tried eating moccasin leather, and ended on muckalucks +or messinke boots. For the benefit of the uninitiated, I would explain +that muckalucks are contrived out of raw sealskin. Bishop Stringer has +since told me that when he had divided the food, his companion assigned +the portions, and _vice versa_. This is one of the trail's lessons. +At last, after eleven days of blind stumbling, they came out at an +Indian camp on the Peel River. Twenty miles further down, at the +Hudson's Bay Fort, the factor weighed the much-emaciated men and found +that each had lost fifty pounds. + +In his letter to his wife, who was visiting in Kincardine, Ontario, the +Bishop says of his experiences: "The one thing that made us unhappy was +that you and the others might worry about us when we did not turn up. +But this feeling wore off when it meant a matter of life or death, and +day after day we wondered how long we would last--whether you would +ever hear from us. You can imagine we were much in prayer, and over +and over again reconsecrated ourselves to the Master's service." + +This Bishop of Mackenzie River is surely an outstanding personality, +and reminds me of what Robert Louis Stevenson said of the late John +Chalmers, a missionary of New Guinea: "You can't weary me of that +fellow," he asserted; "he is as big as a house and far bigger than any +church." + +Bishop Stringer's predecessor in the diocese was William Carpenter +Bompas, the Apostle of the North, the man who has been classified by +the Church Missionary Society as "indisputably the most +self-sacrificing bishop in the world." + +His diocese, too, was the largest in the world, consisting of one +million square miles. It had the same peculiarity as Bobbie Burns's +"cauld, cauld kirk"---there were "in't but few." + +William Bompas went North in 1865 and stayed there forty years, coming +out only twice. On the first of these occasions he returned to England +to be elevated to the episcopate. + +The only medical training the Bishop had under gone was a short course +in the treatment of snowblindness, and this when he went to England for +his consecration. This is a form of blindness that causes great +suffering among the Indians, and the Bishop had himself been stricken +with it on several occasions. On one of these, stumbling painfully at +every step, he was led by an Eskimo boy for seventy-five miles. +Writing of his agonies, he says: "They are delights. The first +foot-prints on earth made by our risen Saviour were the nail-marks of +suffering, and for the spread of the gospel, too, am prepared to +suffer." + +Like Stringer, Bompas also endured frequent starvation, but seldom +spoke of it as a personal happening, but rather as applying to +others--a virtue most hard and difficult to be practised. Writing +about it to a friend in England, he said: "Horses were killed for food +and furs eaten at several of the posts. The Indians had to eat a good +many of their beaver skins." + +Another man who endured the privations of the pioneer in this district +is the present Bishop of Keewatin, Joseph Lofthouse. + +The most interesting, and certainly the most romantic story of his +career, is that of his marriage. His sweetheart, a young English girl, +was due to arrive on the yearly vessel of the Hudson's Bay Company. +Lofthouse travelled several hundred miles to meet her, but found she +had not come, being unavoidably detained in England. The following +summer he made the same journey, but this time as the vessel pulled up +the harbour, he was able to single out the lassie's face on the deck. +Yes, sir! if you had lived among Eskimos and Indians all these years, +you, too, would tremble and choke in the throat at the ship's rope hit +the mooring-post. + +But now the young couple found themselves in as trying a predicament as +the Israelites with the sea in front, Pharaoh's army behind, and +unscalable rocks on either side. In a word, there was no minister to +marry them. Things looked badly for them, and the lassie was thinking +of returning home, when it suddenly occurred to the captain that, on +the open sea, according to law, he was entitled to act as a magistrate. +It was not long till the good ship slipped her moorings and stood out +into the sweep of the Atlantic, where to a time-honoured form, the +minister and the girl plighted their troth, symbolized it by the gift +of a ring, and ratified it by the authority of the state, in the name +of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost. + +This is a good enough story to end with, but there are other +outstanding personalities I must mention. + +There is Bishop Holmes,[1] who resides at Athabasca Landing, and who +has had many interesting experiences among the redskins. Like all true +northmen, the Bishop speaks in a quiet, low tone, admirably adapted to +the art of narrative. Once for weeks, he took charge of a Weetigo or +Weendigo Indian, in order to protect him from relatives who sought to +take his life. The man believed himself to be a cannibal, for in some +strange way the idea had been suggested to him. After a time, the +hallucination passed away, and the man returned to the camp. + +Until comparatively recent years, the untutored redmen believed that +people who were insane or in delirium were either obsessed or possessed +of an evil spirit, and that it was necessary to kill them in order to +prevent this spirit from entering into others. The plight of the +relatives in these cases was pitiable; they could not allow a violently +insane man or woman at large, and the killing was usually performed +with great grief. This custom has fallen into desuetude, for, since +the advent of the Mounted Police, the perpetrators are treated as +murderers and accordingly hanged. The most arduous duty of the police +is the bringing in of demented Indians or white prospectors from the +North. It is a task that has, in turn, driven a stalwart redcoat +insane. One's nerves are apt to snap when, for weeks, you sleep o' +nights in the snow roped to a maniac. + +And there was Rev. Henry Irwin, better known as Father Pat. He was a +railroad priest on the Canadian Pacific, and, because of his unselfish +work among them, became the idol of men. There are some misguided folk +who think of a priest as a feeble, microcephalous body with a black +coat, a shovel hat, and a superb ignorance of the ways of the world. +There are, we own, some priests like this, but Father Pat was not one +of them. Indeed, his dress and deportment were such as to often cause +scandal to good church folk who were not so conversant with his noble +deeds and self-abnegation as were the railroad navvies and gold-miners. +Father Pat had only been married a year when his wife and baby died, +and, not so long after, he was found almost frozen to death in a +snow-bank, from the results of which he died. Here was an elementary +man fighting the elements. The North stands at salute. + +Nor were the Roman Catholic missionaries less self-denying, or in any +way smaller men than their Protestant co-workers. There was Bishop +Breynat who froze his feet and amputated his toes with a penknife. +"Sirs, it's bitter beneath the Bear." + +In 1869-70, at St. Albert, the ecclesiastical head-quarters of the +Catholic Church in Alberta, Father Leduc, a complete Christian, nursed +the Indians who were sick with the small-pox until he contracted it +himself. Then the other priests in turn fell in line as nurses until +every man was a victim of the disease. + +It is a scene that reminds one of Sir Walter Scott's romance where the +clansman and his seven sons all fell for the chieftain, stepping forth +gladly into the gap and crying: "One more for Eachim." + +While the priests lay ill an Indian came for one of them to administer +the last rites of the Church to his mother. What was done? You never +could guess unless you lived in the North, so I may as well tell you. +A young priest rolled his blankets closer about, gave orders to his +attendants to carry him to the waiting sleigh, and, in this condition, +made the painful journey. Mattress and all, he was borne into the +sick-room, where he administered the viaticum to the dying woman. + +Father Lacombe, whose good grey head all men know, is the pioneer +missionary of Alberta. He is eighty-three years of age, and sixty-one +of these years have been spent in the service of the North. The story +of his life sounds like a new Acts of the Apostles. In the +science-ridden centuries to come, when these first white wanderers in +boreal regions will be almost mythical characters, tradition will love +to weave about them stories of romance and mystery--dramatic, +preternatural stories such as we frame to-day about SS. Patrick, +Augustine and Albanus. + +Perhaps the most interesting event in Lord Strathcona's visit last year +to Alberta was his meeting again with Père Lacombe. It was in the +Government House gardens at Edmonton, overlooking the Saskatchewan +River. All the guests fell back out of earshot while the aged men +clasped hands and talked over other days and of the boys who had long +since crossed the height of land to the ultimate sea. + +At the present time Père Lacombe is living at Midnapore, near Calgary, +in a home for poor old folk and children, the money to build which he +collected himself. + +... And there is the story of Father Goiffon who was frozen near +Emerson on the eve of All Saints' Day, 1860. It was told to me by +Father Lestanc,[2] who, eighty years ago, was born at Brest in +Brittany. Father Lestanc has been fifty-five years in the West and +North, nineteen of which were spent at St. Boniface under Bishop Taché. +In spite of his extreme age, Lestanc has a hardy-moulded figure, and a +strong, clear voice. One cannot listen to him for long without being +impressed by his affectional force and broad reach of humanity. He is +not clear about things of yesterday, but take him back over the decades +and his memory rings true as a bell. + +Goiffon had been at St. Paul, Minneapolis, making the yearly purchases +for his mission. Among other things he bought a city-bred horse to +carry him home. Fifty years ago St. Paul was seventeen days' journey +from Emerson, on the border-line, and folk travelled in caravans. + +One day's journey from Emerson, Father Goiffon left the party that he +might push on the more rapidly and reach his mission post to say Mass +on All Saints' Day. To use a northern colloquialism, he travelled +light, carrying with him but one meal and no blanket. Neither had he +matches or an axe, for, bear in mind, he was only a young priest, and +he hoped to be in his shack by fall of night. + +Soon after noonday there blew up a blinding snow-storm that made +progress impossible. A usurping, all-invading sheet of snow settled +down over the plains and turned the air into a white darkness. The man +tied his horse to a willow shrub and lay down in the snow. The hours +passed painfully on, but the youth kept his head buried in his saddle +that his face might not freeze. When at last he looked up, he found +his horse dead by his side. I told you a bit ago, it was a city-bred +horse and no trailer. + +And now came the fight for life. The boy priest had no shelter but the +flaccid, unstrung body of his horse, already cold in death. I do not +know about the pain of the night, except that at the edge of day, one +foot and leg were frozen and the toes of the other, so that he could +not stand upright. I wonder if he heard the bell from his home in +France as he lay in the snow! They say men do. Something must have +been sounding in his ears, for he did not hear the caravan as it passed +him in the morning. + +At midday he cut a piece of flesh off the horse and ate it. + +"A crude diet, Mon Père," I remark. + +"Oui, oui," replies the old Breton. "What you Anglais call a +'sleepshod' dinnaire! What would you, Madame? One must browse where +he is tethered." + +The rescue party from Emerson met a man and boy hauling in the stricken +priest on a sledge. They had heard him sobbing in the snow. + +The Indians doctored him for six weeks until his limbs threatened to +drop off, and then sent a runner to St. Boniface to ask Father Lestanc +what they would do with him. This happened fifty years ago, but Father +Lestanc must walk to the window and look out into the garden for a +while before he can trust his voice. + +For men and dogs it was a round run of one hundred and forty miles from +St. Boniface to Emerson, but in twenty-four hours Goiffon lay in Bishop +Taché's palace at St. Boniface, on the banks of the Red River. Dr. +Bunn, the physician at the Hudson's Bay post across at Fort Garry, +awaited his arrival and amputated the already putrefied members. The +next morning Goiffon was found to be bleeding to death; the stitches +would not hold and the veins were open. Nothing could be done but to +calmly await the end. + +Father Lestanc broke the news to the household, whereupon the sorrowing +but withal practical sister in charge of the kitchen placed a caldron +of buffalo tallow on the stove, for, explains my narrator, "a priest's +wake requires many, many candles." + +The little serving-maids under the sister, doubtless whispering over +the sad happenings upstairs, forgot to watch the pot, so that it +"swelled much, Madame," over the red-hot stove till all the house was +on fire. + +Do not scold the girls, but wait till I tell you. Such a thing was +never heard of. It was really Le Bon Dieu who permitted the house and +cathedral to burn. There is no doubt of it, for, when the priest +carried the dying youth out and laid him on the snow, the frost +congealed the blood so that his veins ceased to empty themselves. + +This was fifty years ago, and last summer, Father Goiffon came up from +Petit Canada, near St. Paul, to attend a cathedral service at Winnipeg, +on the site of Old Fort Garry. + +"Oui, Madame, oui, I comprehend when you say _similia similibus +curcantur_. Literally, eet ees a frost kills, a frost cures. Eet ees +a well thing the body ees so adaptive." + +... And once Bishop Grandin was lost in the snow. It was in 1863, near +Fort Resolution on Great Slave Lake. + +With one Indian boy he was crossing the lake on the ice, following in +the wake of a party of Hudson's Bay Company men. The Bishop's dogs +were tired and fell behind. When a storm blew up he lost the trail. +The thermometer was at forty degrees below zero, and the storm was what +Father Lestanc calls a "poudrerie"--that is to say, a storm where the +snow blows up like fine powder. This does not sound unpleasant, but as +an actuality it is, in the extreme North, a sinister snow that bites +your face like driven needles. + +The Bishop had no guide but the wind, and when a storm rises the wind +veers. He gave the dogs their head, but even their homing instinct +failed them in the storm and night, so that they crouched on the ice +and howled in unison with the little Indian boy. + +At dawn the boy said he smelled smoke, for he was an Indian, and smoke +travels far in the clear, winnowed air of the North. + +On looking to the west they sighted land, and after a painful journey +met a dog-train coming toward them with men--the boy's father and +uncle. The priest was celebrating a Mass for the repose of the +Bishop's soul when he arrived, for "Les sauvages," says my informant, +"had declared the Bishop would be frozen to the middle of hees heart. +Ah, leetle Madam! Whom Le Bon Dieu guards are well guarded." + +I did not know about this Father Lestanc before. I thought he was +merely an old Oblate Brother passing from the sixth to the seventh +stage of man's little day. Now I know him for one of the outstanding +personalities of the North, and, as such, would do him honour, even I +who am of the world, worldly. I know things about him that happened +years and years ago when this was no man's land. I know how once he +nursed and buried a young man whose companions had abandoned him to die +at Rat Creek, near Portage la Prairie. + +The man had gone into the Indian camps against the wishes of his +fellow-teamsters who were travelling from Fort Garry to Fort Charlton. +But he was a gamester, and he went. This was how he contracted +small-pox, and the reason his companions were forced to leave him to +fight death for himself with a little supply of pemmican and some +bannocks as his sole backers. You may not have noticed that the life +of a gamester and the race-horse are short ones in the north-west, but +it is, nevertheless, indubitably true, and this case was no exception +to the rule. His name? I do not know. One forgets names in the +oblivious West. + +Father Lestanc rolled the loathsome body in a blanket and decently +buried it, for the buffalo hunters had learned that in cases of +small-pox the healthiest thing a traveller can do is to mind his own +special business. + +"Did any one else catch the disease?" I ask. + +"Non, non, no one else." + +The old man muses a little, for he is growing tired, and this was fifty +years ago. Suddenly memory floods in on him and he shows distress: +"Pardon, Madam, pardon! I took eet. Oui, I took eet." + + + +[1] Since deceased. + +[2] Since deceased. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + +COAL-MINING IN ALBERTA + + Till dazzled by the drowsy glare, + I shut my eyes to heat and light; + And saw, in sudden night, + Crouched in the dripping dark, + With steaming shoulders stark + The man who hews the coal to feed my fire. + --WILFRED WILSON GIBSON. + + +Solon once told Croesus that whoever had the iron would possess all the +gold, but here Solon was taking coal for granted. Iron-mines are of +comparatively little value unless coal-mines are within easy access. I +think of this as I view the underground workings of a coal-mine, +to-day, and of how our Royal Land of Canada has both minerals in +immeasurable quantities. In this Province of Alberta alone, there is +so much coal to burn that it will take a million years. Looking at +this sheer face of coal twenty feet in height, I must perforce recall +Oliver Wendell Holmes's remark that he was not at all nervous about a +certain comet which threatened to destroy the earth, for there was so +much coal in the world he couldn't bring himself to believe it had been +made for nothing. + +In time past, it was said hereabout that coal-mining did not pay; that +the profit of the industry lay in its higher mathematics, by which was +meant the formation of companies and the disposal of bonds and stocks. +The primary work of The Coal Barons, it was further declared, consisted +in laying up treasures on earth for themselves, leaving the +shareholders to find reward in heaven. The "suckers" who purchased +stock were said to have gone through the comparative degrees of mine, +miner, minus. They were "the bitten." + +From the uppermost appearance of things, these remarks would seem to be +warranted, particularly as the true westerner has always something to +sell and has even been known to lie about it, but a closer and more +careful study of affairs shows that, in this grim game, the mine-owners +received neither the honours nor the tricks, that is, unless you are +disposed to count the chicane as one. Most cases, in their futile +efforts to bolster up the exchequer of the company, the barons have +sacrificed their private fortunes, so that their titles may, with +entire propriety be spelled barrens. It was one of these men who +feelingly remarked: "When a man's affairs in this province go rocky, +you may safely reckon on coal being the rock." + +But now that the seven lean years of coal are over and the fat ones are +well begun, now that coal as a revenue producer is only second to +Mother Wheat, we can with calmer and more unbiassed judgment consider +the causes which have hitherto been responsible for its "outrageous +fortune." + +Perhaps the commonest cause of failure has been the lack of adequate +capital. The President's chair in a coal company is no place for empty +pockets. To successfully operate his mine he requires money at any +price. The initial outlay is large, the carrying expenses heavy, the +unexpected demands many. Hitherto, this capital has not been readily +forthcoming. Investors have preferred to buy town lots rather than +industrial stocks. In older and more settled communities the opposite +condition prevails. On the other hand, coal on the cars is cash. The +mine operator takes his bill-of-lading to the bank and draws up to +two-thirds of its face value. This enables him to meet his fortnightly +pay-bill and general mining expenses, but, for two or three years, +until sufficient rooms have been made in the workings of the mine, he +cannot expect it to do more. + +In the meanwhile, there is development work to be done and development +work is expensive. The entries or hallways off which the rooms open +are costly to drive and they must be beamed with great timbers held in +place by tree trunks. Initial surveys have to be made, and expert +superintendence paid for. It is for such work the President requires +ready money and free money. He cannot possibly make his working +expenses to cover those of development in that the same managing staff +is required to handle a small output as a large one. The same is +applicable to the engines and hoisting machinery. + +The second cause which has hitherto hindered successful operations has +been lack of railway facilities and lack of a steady market. Emerson +has defined commerce as taking things from where they are plentiful to +where they are needed. Coal, we have shown, is plentiful; and that it +is needed in the Canadian North-West we need hardly remark, but that it +could not be carried needs explanation. For several years our railways +were lamentably short of equipment, so that the mines had frequently to +close down for days, or even weeks, their bunkers being entirely +inadequate for storage purposes. This meant a severe loss to the mines +in that their men and machinery stood idle and that lucrative contracts +had to be cancelled. + +Probably no industry has suffered so keenly from car shortage as that +of coal-mining. The only people who have received windfalls from this +regretable state of affairs were the dishonest yard-masters who, +unknown to the railway officials, did a secret but withal brisk +business with the rival coal companies that bid for cars. It took a +goodly slice off the profits of each car of coal to grease the large +palm of the yard-master. And who in this pushful, practical age has +ever heard of a car spotter in the railway yards buying a ton of coal? +The plethora of his coal-bin is more to the credit of his wits than his +morals. My mind is fully established in this thing; as a grafter he is +the perfected article. + +It may, however, be said in excuse for the car shortage, that the +demand for coal cars synchronized with that of wheat, the rush for both +being in the autumn and early winter. At first, the pioneer coal +dealers in the villages and towns throughout the west, had neither the +buildings wherein to store fuel nor the money to permit of their +purchasing it, so that orders were seldom given until cold weather had +actually set in. + +While this condition of affairs still leaves something to be desired, +the dealers have had several salutary lessons and are, as a generality, +becoming much more forehanded. The population of the west has also +increased so vastly during these latter years, that the demand on the +dealers, and accordingly on the mines, has gradually become steadier +till, at last, the industry rests upon the well-settled foundation of a +regular demand, a regular supply, and a dependable railway service, in +other words, it fulfils the three conditions laid down in Emerson's +definition of commerce. + +A third difficulty which confronted mine operators, was the securing of +experienced miners. The supply was distinctly inadequate, so that +green hands had to be engaged--homesteaders who wanted to earn money +during the winter, newly-arrived immigrants who took the first job +which came to hand; and farm labourers who came west to take off the +harvest and decided to stay in the country. + +These men, while they came under the union scale of wages, were unable +to do little else for the first winter than spoil their shots of +dynamite, cave in the roofs, and blow out the timbers. The mine +operator, however, rarely became disheartened so long as the green man +didn't blow off his own head for, in this case, the operator would be +called upon by the courts to pay staggering damages to the miner's +heirs under the compulsion of an extraordinary statute known as the +Labourer's Compensation Act. + +But now, in these days of grace, owing to the investment of British and +foreign capital, the unskilled man has been superseded by electric +drillers and cutters--in a word, modern methods are being used in our +mines with the result that we have fewer accidents and losses. + +This application of machinery to the industry has also brought about a +maximum of output with a minimum of expenditure. The development work +can be done with more speed and less expense, so that the old +disabilities under which western operators had to labour will soon be +cancelled out of memory. + +While the application of machinery to mining must indubitably minimize +the probability of strikes, the operators must be prepared to reckon +with these until the end of time, in that throwing down their tools +appears to be the chief occupation of miners. It is hard to account +for this irresponsible vagary unless it be that they receive twice as +much pay as other workmen. Or it may be that they make a fetish of the +union, in which respect they do resemble certain stupid people in the +southern seas who have a worm to their god and are wont to sacrifice +oxen to it. + +Now, miners on strike are persons of no very marked refinement, neither +are they given to logic. What Tennyson says of the Light Brigade is +finely applicable here--"Theirs not to reason why." + +When you meet real strikers nothing counts. You may do everything +which instinct, invention or despair can suggest, except descending to +vulgar invective, yet without the slightest tangible result. No matter +how soothly their employer may speak to them, they are suspicious of +him or her. The intervention must always come from a third party. +These men are the latter-day exponents of the old rule laid down by +Dean Swift for the better direction of servants: "Quarrel with each +other as much as you please, only always bear in mind that you have a +common enemy which is your Master and Lady." + +To find yourself facing a square of irate strikers is to feel yourself +very thin, very colourless, and amazingly inexperienced. It is to +wonder at the rudeness of their speech, the largeness of their mouths, +and to speculate in a Christianly way as to just what screw is loose in +their mental make-up. I know this to be the way of it, for once we had +a strike in a mine which I, with a strutting but misguided assurance, +imagined to be the property of our family. Owing to a former +superintendent having entered into an agreement with the union, I +learned we were holding the mine co-operatively, and that I could not +dismiss the men either individually or collectively. + +The trouble happened in this wise: the president being absent for +several months, it fell to me, as vice-president, to hold the reins. +By reason of the facts that the seam of coal was pinching thin; that +the miners were receiving one-third more than any others in the +locality, and that we were producing on a falling market, we found we +were losing nearly one hundred dollars a day. The superintendent +invited the miners to discuss the matter without prejudice. They did +not disallow the correctness of his contention but refused to consider +a reduction of their wages. They were content to stand by their side +of the agreement and would see to it that the company did the same. + +And here I showed a lack of discretion in allowing this matter to be +discussed, for, while failing to deduce that it was highly preposterous +to kill the goose who laid the golden egg, they still had the +penetration to see that in closing down the mine because of lack of +orders, my primary object was to nullify the agreement. Nothing could +express their unmeasured contempt of the vice-president, and they left +me under no misapprehension as to their opinion of me. They accused me +of playing them, and being guilty of the offence, I was naturally +offended at the accusation. Still, I declined to be led into further +discussion, or to recriminate in kind, so that ultimately I came to +feel strong as one does who is intentionally weak before her enemy. +There was nothing for it. The miners had to walk out, all except the +engineers who pumped the water from the sump. Now, the night engineer +had a face so wicked that he might all his life have been stoking +furnaces in the underworld, and he it was who permitted the men to +enter the shaft and put a stick in the valve of the pulsometer so that +the mine became flooded and several entries caved in. + +I was quite as angry as my temperament allowed, and it would have given +me much satisfaction to have killed them, for, after all, this is a +most effective method of getting rid of your enemies. It was, +nevertheless, no small satisfaction when the superintendent, a +tight-built muscular Englishman, gave the engineer a touch or two that +reminded the onlooker of a piston-rod in action. If might and right +are not the same thing, they ought to be. Two weeks later, the works +were re-opened with other workmen on a new wage scale. On arriving at +the mine the following day, I found our former employees were picketing +it. They had a crow to pluck with me, I could see that. The very air +was portentous. Those workmen were like the horses of Phoebus Apollo +in that their breasts were full of fire and they breathed it forth from +their nostrils and mouths. But while the men were abusive and +loud-voiced, they were never insulting, for even Satan finds it hard to +forge a weapon against a smile and an unwavering courtesy. And, after +all, what can strikers do with a vice-president who is a woman? It +seemed like taking an unfair advantage of them. It was only when we +met the miner's wives that I learned my exceeding limitations; that the +power fell out of my elbow and the stiffening out of my collar-bone. + +When I say "we" I mean William and myself. Now, William was my driver, +and he spent fourteen years in the British cavalry. He had served in +Egypt and South Africa; he had fought his way through a screaming death +at Omdurman and yes, I will say it--William was "a nob" and handsome as +a circus horse. His deference as he lifted me down off the high seat, +his manifest concern for my comfort, and his superb arrogance as he +bade the women "Give over there!" were too much, for even these raging +furies to reckon with. His coolness under a withering fire of +invective restored me to normal and enabled me to stand pat. + +To shorten the story, we had to engage three successive gangs before we +won out. By that time the strikers had become divided, some having +accepted work in other mines, while the remainder became discouraged +and gradually gave up the picket. + +I have dwelt at some length on this matter of strikes because, as yet, +no actual operator has expressed his view point or his feeling under +the ordeal, whereas the strikers have made the street corners vibrant +concerning the villainies of their employers whom they designate as +Capital. In dismissing this phase of mining, I would say a strike is +to be avoided at almost any cost, for, apart from its factor as a +somewhat strenuous builder of character, it is a victory which costs +the operator too dearly both in the expenditure of nerves and of money. + +... Before being led into the discussion of finances and strikes, I had +started to tell you about an Albertan mine and its workings. The theme +is worth picking up again. Before you go down, it is well to have a +look around the machinery-room where the engines pump up the water and +pump down the air. You will also be interested in the great spool or +drum which unwinds the long steel cables by which the cage is lowered +or hoisted in the shaft. One man stands beside it and controls it with +a lever. The man behind the lever needs to be equally as steady and +effective a worker as the man behind the gun, for it is by this cage +the men enter and leave the mine, although they may, if so disposed, +ascend or descend by the escapement or ladder-shaft beside it. + +It is the strict duty of the foreman to examine this drum, these +cables, and the cage every day, and to record his findings in a book +which he is required to keep in compliance with the laws regulating +coal-mines. This man must also carefully test for gas. The +maintenance of the air-circuit is a matter of much concernment to the +operators, for on it depends not only the health and security of the +men but the safety of the mine itself. Carbon monoxide, which is white +damp, is more dreaded by the miners than any other gas because it is +difficult to detect, having no odour, taste or colour. + +The Bureau of Mines in the United States have recently discovered that +canary birds are extremely susceptible to it and, after being exposed +for three minutes to air containing one-sixth of the one per cent, of +the gas, show marked distress. In eight minutes, they fall off their +perches. As a result, many American miners are now using canaries to +watch out for gas while they are at work. + +Black damp, or carbon dioxide, may be detected by its peculiar odour. +It is heavier than air and tends to suffocate fire. After an explosion +has taken place these two gases become mixed and form what is known as +after damp, a mixture which surely destroys all life remaining in the +mine. + +From familiarity with danger, miners become disdainful of it and +careless to a degree that is well-nigh incredible. They will hold +dynamite caps in their mouths for convenience, a risk which pales into +nothingness the ancient simile of the weaned child who plays on the den +of the cockatrice. He is a poor man of low-funk spirit who does not +believe himself quick enough to cross a cage after the signal to ascend +has been given. To run this venture is, to them, a matter of no +moment. I have seen more than one miner caught and crushed through a +slight miscalculation in this respect, but these accidents are so +quickly forgotten that they do not act as deterrents to any noticeable +extent. In truth, there seems little reason to doubt that most of the +sudden catastrophes which result in the loss of many valuable lives, +are the result of some insane risk taken by one man. If these risks +were not among those things which the Deity is said to "wink at," all +miners would have been killed long ago. + +If you feel inclined, you might stop awhile and look at the +skeleton-like tipple of the mine, by which I mean the wooden framework +above it; at the automatic self-dumping skips and at the rocking +screens which sort the coal into the kinds known as lump, egg, and nut; +but the tempestuous torrent of coal from the hopper bottoms of the cars +would drown our talk and assault our eardrums, so, on the whole, it is +just as well to take these things for granted. + +One's first descent into a mine is an experience rather than a +pleasure. To leave the sharp intensity of the sunlight and to be +suddenly dropped into a horrible pit, is to feel oneself rolled into a +tight little ball, with every nerve as hard as a nail. You hope, you +pray, that the long, lithe cables which hold the cage are stronger than +they look. You wonder if you will come out feet foremost in Australia, +and if it will hurt very much. After a second or third experience, the +sensation is one of swift adventuring, but few people care to inure +themselves to this frame of spirit. Arrived at the shaft bottom, you +are made aware with the aid of your cap lamp, of huge square timbers +around you and of a "sump" or well, underneath. It is into this sump +that all the entries of the mine are drained. + +Without realizing it, you will have lowered your voice, for the +darkness and stillness oppress you as though you were bearing a weight +on your shoulders. The air is lifeless and leaden. This is assuredly +The City of Dreadful Night. You feel as if you were the last survivor +in a dead world. But presently, a strong hand will take yours in his +and lead you through the Stygian darkness till your eyes become +habituated to the gloom, when you will become aware of two tracks +stretching away in the channel which has been hollowed out of the coal. +Then you will be warned to step aside and keep close to the wall while +a stocky-car holding probably three tons is, with a vast grinding of +wheels, whirled by you to the cage, there to be hoisted to the tipple. + +Your guide will explain that you are in the main entry or tunnel of the +mine, and that there are other entries at right angles. These with the +rooms which open off them, are surveyed by engineers with great +exactness and according to certain regulations laid down in the mining +statutes. + +Here and there in the blackness, thin tongues of flame move about like +fireflies. These are the lamps in the miners' caps. You have also a +fire-fly in your bonnet, but, of course, it is only visible to the +onlookers. These lamps are like little coffee-pots and are filled +either with carbide or seal oil. In the more modern mines which are +lighted by electricity, lamps are not required so much, although no man +ventures into the mine without one. Faith is not nearly so estimable a +virtue as sight, no matter what the theologians may say. It was a +miner poet (you must not spell it a minor poet) who wrote the lines-- + + "God, if you had but the moon + Stuck in your cap for a lamp, + Even you'd tire of it soon + Down in the dark and the damp. + + Nothing but blackness above + And nothing moves but the cars-- + God, in return for our love, + Fling us a handful of stars." + + +These lamps are the footlights the miners hold up to Old King Coal as +they pierce his sides with their electric drills, and wrench open his +wounds with their ripping charges of dynamite. They call this shooting +the coal, so it is just as well to keep your peculiar fantasies to +yourself. + +In a coal-mine one loses his sense of direction, for there is no heaven +above, no earth beneath--nothing but silence and black impenetrableness. + +And yet, when you are alone in a mine, you may hear a sound like the +sighing of great trees. This is probably the utterance of your own +blood to which you are giving audience as when you put your ear to a +conch-shell; or it may be the surging sigh of the enormous primitive +ferns, sigillarias and lepidodendrons who lay down in these strata as +though for an eternal rest. In the counting-house of the years, vast +cycles have come and gone till, now in these impertinent days of +dynamite and electricity, uncouth, ungentle men have broken their rest +forever. The complaint of the trees is not without judgment. The +thing seems ill-done and almost, of myself, I can hear their tragical +murmurings. + +The temperature in the coal-mine does not vary with the seasons, and +the men believe it healthier to work in this underworld than to be +subject to the changes of climate above. They have also told me that +there is no echo in a coal stratum. I do not know if this be true, +but, of a surety, one's voice does not carry far in the dead air, and +even the shots of dynamite seem to be muffled and indistinct. +Nevertheless, it is my opinion--an irrational one, no doubt--that men +who dig in mines should have music rather than men who eat in cafés. +We need to recast our ideas about these things. + +It makes no difference how you have quarrelled with these miners in a +strike; it makes no difference that once you felt like murdering them +in bulk, it is impossible to follow them day after day through the +working of a coal-mine without seeing something heroic in their crude +bent figures. You may not be able to understand the language they +speak, for many of them are foreign born, but in time you come to talk +to them through the smile, the touch on the arm, or the clap of the +hands, which signals are, after all, the universal language of the +world. Most of these men are kindly disposed and, when left free from +the machinations of the lawyer, are capable of self-sacrifice for their +employer, and even of affection. In every gang of men, whether in +railway construction, lumber camp, or coal-mine, there is always an +unamiable workman of ferocious egoism who is known as the camp lawyer. +The legal fraternity will probably resent this misuse of their name, +and properly so, for this fellow is froward in manner and has the same +loving heart as a tiger. He it is who stirs up all the internal +strifes and keeps them at boiling point. It is an art in which he +greatly excels. In olden days, they called a man of his ilk a gallows +knave, and the epithet was selected with care. Foremen are, nowadays, +beginning to pay less attention to the communion of saints in their +camps and vastly more to the communion of sinners. It is a foreman's +particular business to spot the lawyers early in the game and to deal +with them as the occasion warrants. + +There are many things to be observed down in these black entrails of +the earth, but, before we leave, we will look at the stables. They are +lighted by electricity. It is the work of the horses to haul the cars +to the main entry where they are switched on to the electric cable. It +is commonly believed that horses who live in mines become blind. This +is not true. What they lose is their sense of colour, for in the dark +all things are hueless. These horses are fat-fleshed and healthy, and +are so tame they can almost be mesmerized into talking to you. They +seem highly interested in the story I tell them of how once the +Frenchmen put twelve thousand dead men and their horses down three +coal-pits at Jemappes, and things like that. They appreciate carrots, +sugar-lumps and apples, which have been steadily purloined from the +cook's pantry at the bunk-house, in a way that is positively human. It +would be unkind to enter the mine without carrying a treat for the +horses, but now, having done so, let me bid all of you on the day-shift +a very good fortune, and a safe return to God's blessed sunshine. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + +THE PLAYGROUNDS OF THE WEST + + Come, my love, and let us wander + Cross the hills and over yonder.--CY WARMAN. + + +Banff, in the Rocky Mountains, has been so often called the playgrounds +of the West, that the words have become trite and fail to carry their +true significance. This fact is inevitably borne in on the Canadian +who visits the place, and he wonders to himself why he has failed to +understand it before. + +Assuredly this is my experience as I ride around Tunnel Mountain this +beautiful August day. The road is seven miles long, and from its +winding ascent, one may look across the hills and down the wide valley +where the green waters of the Bow River foam into white over the rocks. +This is the full-robed, full-voiced choir of the mountain temple, but I +do not know what it sings. + +The Valley of the Bow River with its amphitheatre of hills is the +wonder picture of the Rockies, combining, as it does, all that is most +beautiful in are and nature. [Transcriber's note: because of the +oddness of the grammar of this sentence, it may be that one or more +words are missing.] + +Across it, on Tunnel Mountain, is the splendid hostelry of the Canadian +Pacific Railway; warm sulphur springs that bubble up out of the earth, +and a cave of waters which is an extinct geyser, but might be the +matrix of the hills themselves. + +Geologists say that the eastern ranges of the Rocky Mountains are of +the Eocene Age, and that the western ridges are Pliocene, and eons +younger. But these revelations of science are almost as overwhelming +as our ignorance. They tell of the immensity of time but do not sound +it. It is not possible to level them to our mental capacity. + +A wealthy Sheik who once lived in the Land of Uz told us how God +challenged him to answer certain questions about the mountains. + +"Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth?" + +"Who hath stretched the line upon it?" + +"Who hath divided a watercourse for the overflowing of the waters?" + +But Job could not answer so much as one question, and he said, "Behold +I am vile; what shall I answer Thee? I will lay my hand upon my mouth." + +This Job, it would appear, was no ordinary sort of man, and one who was +very wise. + +And ever since, mankind has puzzled itself with these riddles, even as +you and I are puzzled. Sometimes we do not so much as believe in the +great Lord, who is thought to have made this world, and we say, "Aha!" +and other scornful words that are wicked exceedingly. But, up in the +hills, we comprehend God without so much as an effort. He is natural +here. These scenes of sublimity break in on our life's dead level and +show us depth within ourselves unsounded before. Impulses which have +been informulate, and aspirations which the years have strangled are +brought to life and sentience. "Blessed be the hills," say I, and you +must reply, "Amen and Amen." + +This road twists upward easily, but, in one place, they have made it +into stone stairways, with each tread many feet wide so that the horses +can find firm footing. This stairway looks to be a hundred feet in +height. All the horses must go one way round the mountain, and not +turn backwards, for there is no room to pass on the trail. Every +little while, you stop to look at the savage rock forms which surround +you, or at their colours. It was no stinting brush that laid them on. +Opal and wine-red, purple and ochre, splash the rocks with living hues +of wonderful beauty. It is a pity we have not more lavish words for +these transfiguration scenes of Nature. It is foolish to try and +explain them with our worn-out ones. Every traveller realizes this. +For my part, in the mountains, I always feel like that Eton boy of +fourteen, who was at the Battle of Waterloo. His first letter home was +to this effect: "Dear Mamma: Cousin Tom and I are all right. I never +saw anything like it in my life." + +There are few birds hereabout. I have only seen a robin and a hawk. +The hawk hovered above as if undecided what to do and then fell as if +he had been dropped from a plummet. This bird has an instinct for the +straight line that might shame even a Dominion land surveyor. This and +the fact that the hawk has been known to eat mosquitoes, are his only +claims to our attention or respect. All the world knows him for a +predaceous bird, and that his heart is a fierce furnace. + +A nice-seeming man who is working on the road tells me there are many +kinds of animals in the Banff Park, but that they are all preserved. +In the corral there are eighty buffaloes. The corral consists of two +thousand acres. The white-tailed deer are so tame they come up to the +village. There are wolverines, too, and these animals are of so +covetous a nature they will steal even a frying pan. The Indians call +them _carcajous_, which means "the gluttons." + +This man says he was formerly a fur-pup, by which expression he means a +trapper. He left the trap-line because his partner was always +objecting to bacon for dinner. Huh! Huh! to hear him complain, one +might almost think the Lord grew bacon for consumption at breakfast +only. + +Riding up the hill through the green trees, I feel as if I were in the +opening paragraph of a story, and an half expecting at each bend of the +road to meet a knight in armour with a retinue of servants. As he +fails to appear I talk to Swallow, my mare, and she twitches her ears +as though she understands. Indeed, there is little doubt but that she +does. + +"Let us stay awhile here," say I, "and look at this gay young squirrel. +He is enlarging his burrow as if he intended finishing it in five +minutes. He is no hireling squirrel. What say you, Swallow?" + +If a mare can laugh, this one does, but maybe it is only her way of +coughing. + +"And I have an idea, Swallow, that she is inside with four or five baby +squirrels, who think the world is lined with fur and that life consists +in drawing nutriment from a warm breast. This must be the way of it." + +"Step along, my pretty one, and may it happen we shall find the Knight +round the next turn. Do you notice how the green trees grow like a +mane on the hills?" + +Swallow thinks differently. It is her opinion that the dark +needle-like pines stand erect in the same way as the fur on a grizzly's +back. I know this, else why does she shy violently as we make the turn? + +"You are wrong, my pretty one," say I. "These pine-trees are very +religious and much too dignified to attack you and me. Besides, the +needles of the pines drive devils away, and if you carry a sprig of +spruce with you in the woods, no ill-luck will ever come to you. +Théophile Trembly, who is a woodsman and a ranger, told me this. + +"Do not linger, Sweet-o'-my-Heart; the world is young and you and I may +ride forever. + +"These are juniper-bushes, any one can see. Maybe if I were to lie +under one, like the Tishbite did, an angel might touch me. And maybe I +should also find 'a cake baken with coals', and a cruse of water. I +would tell you, Swallow, how it tasted in my mouth, for the Tishbite +forgot this thing. And I would mention where the angel got the coals. +They must have been the 'coals of juniper' of which King David wrote, +for these are, to this very day, the best charcoals in all the world. +Where the divine visitant found the match to kindle the coals... + +"Ah, well! I'll ask the Padre about this, but like as not he'll say, +"An irrevelant and irreverent question, M'Dear!" although it is neither +one nor the other, for it argues well for humanity that an angel, who +is generally portrayed as a rather offish being, should know where to +find a match and how to use it. A lot could be said on this very +point. It pleasures me not a little that an angel from the skies built +a fire out of doors and cooked cakes on it. This surely means that +when the angels take recreation they play at being men and that they +have a kindly feeling for us. It might be that there are more of them +around about than we have any idea, neighbourly-like angel of sap and +sinew, who occasionally bear a hand in our work and who loaf around of +evenings by the campfire. If an angel can cook on an out-door fire, he +must know how to hang a blanket to the windward side, and an angel who +knows this is no nidnoddy fellow, I can tell you. + +"If you were listening more attentively, Swallow, and if I were not +afraid of the Padre finding out, I would push this idea further and say +that, when the angel was through with his meal, he would in all +likelihood be humanely tired and would fall asleep on a heaped up +mattress of fir needles and dried juniper leaves. These, as is their +wont, would whisper immemorial secrets to him, so that he might come in +time to be a little more tolerant of our failings and to wonder if it +were altogether fair that the soul of a man should be damned for his +body's needs. He might even think the same about a woman's soul. It +cannot fail to vastly affect an angel's opinions when, instead of +looking down from the sky, he lies on a bed of leaves and looks up at +it. The whole colour and texture of his ideas must be altered. I +believe he would come to feel that religious truths should vary to suit +the needs of humanity, as those needs change, and that religion should +serve men rather than men religion. + +"A young god-man said something about this one day in a wheatfield, but +he was reproved by his wincing hearers whose descendants are with us to +this very day." + +This conversation has become too philosophical for Swallow, whose ears +are sweetly holden and who shows her wish to change my thought by +single footing whenever we come to a level stretch. Doubtless, she +hopes to draw my attention to her easy and right pleasant gait. If I +owned her we might become great cronies. + +On the top of the mountain to which we have come, the leaves on the +deciduous trees seem smaller and about the size of rabbits' ears. On +my way hither, I passed bluebells, ferns, heather, roses, wild cotton, +and painter's brush, the plant which combines colour with heat. From +several thousand feet below comes up to me the bellow of the train's +engine, that makes long hollow echoes among the peaks. A peculiarity +of the north is that the sounds seem only to emphasize the silence and +loneliness. This engine makes an ill-noise, but without the railway, +these mountains must have remained unseen to all except a hard-muscled +and adventurous few. For this reason, we must feel something of the +gratitude of the Chief of the Blackfeet Indians, who, in 1885, because +of the friendly spirit of his tribe towards the builders, was given a +pass ticket over the Canadian Pacific Railway by the President thereof. +The ticket was given him in a carved frame. The letter in which he +acknowledged the courtesy read like this: "I salute you, O Chief, O +great One! I am pleased with railway key opening road free to me. The +chains and rich covering of your name writing; its wonderful power to +open the road show the greatness of your chieftainship. I have done. + + his + "Crow X Foot," + mark. + + +Standing on this hill and looking off into the sky, I and my horse seem +poised in mid air. It wouldn't be so hard to fly. Hitherto, I have +been following pleasure as something to be caught, and, of a sudden, I +have ridden into it. Don't you know me? I am Columbine pirouetting on +the white horse of the North. + +Don't you know this is summer time on the hills where Nature has wealth +to spill like a mad-woman and spills it? On this mountain-top, there +is a wandering wind soft as a child's caress. I must make the best of +it and of the fierce radiance of the sunshine, for, sooner than we +bargain for, the Lord in his derision may send a cutting blizzard and +it will be cold, so cold. + +As I ride homeward down the trail, I lift up my voice and hallo to the +sun for joy. You may call this mountain madness if you care to. Don't +you know that it matters not a finger's fillip what any one says about +a climber's mood or manner once she has reached the heights? Barbed +arrows fall off in this rarefied air, and this, I take it, is the great +reward of the climb. + +There are other compensations on the heights. You may shut your eyes +and have a vision of the land that lies beneath you ... let us say a +vision of Mother Canada and her nine daughters, and of the part they +are destined to play in history. You may open your eyes again to +ponder how they will grapple with the problems of race assimilation; of +arbitration and war; of morals and politics; and of labour and capital. +You will conclude that nothing unfair can exist long in this land of +wide spaces, and that Canada is sure to think and act greatly. And +right here is a good place to repeat her prayer which it rests with +each of us to answer-- + + "Bring me men to match my mountains; + Bring me men to match my plains; + Men with empires in their purpose + And new eras in their brains." + + +When you are come down off the mountains there are other things to be +seen at Banff, like the golf-links, the aviary, and the museums, but +you will enjoy the water pastimes best, that is, if you are a Canadian +or an American. The European will be shocked to see the sexes bathing +together at this famous spa, for in Europe, it is their wish to bathe +privately even in the ocean. + +The outdoor swimming pool is a sulphur water, and comes up from the hot +underworld. The pool is set in a splendid quadrangular court of grey +stone, open to the sky, but shielded to windward with glass. +Red-lipped flowers drip over its pillars, adding vastly to the charm of +the scene. The pool is flanked on the hotel side by retiring-rooms +which are as luxurious and sleep inviting as those of ancient Rome or +Pompeii. Overhead, the guests may look down into the green waters and +watch the bathers spring from the diving-boards or cavort about like +young dolphins, tritons, or lightsome naiads. No matter how phlegmatic +you may be, you will wish to tarry here indefinitely and to rest from +your labours, for a voluptuous languor slides into your veins till even +the mountains round about seem illusory and unreal. Here it is +"Paradise enow." With this alchemy of water and sun and these electric +currents of earth and sky, you could hardly expect aught but healing +and enchantment. + +But the attendants will not let you stay too long in the water, for it +is not wise to accumulate any more sulphur on your person than is +necessary to strike a light, for, owing to our proximity to the +magnetic pole, most of us are already dynamos. + +At the fall of day, a storm rises in the hills. These seem to come +close together and whisper, and the sound is like the whirr of swords. + +Many people who are wise talk about storm spirits, so there must be +such ... poor distracted beings who wring their hands and moan in black +discord. It may be they are the souls of murdered folk, and those who +have been executed, and they cry curses on all who live and love and +laugh. You must be afraid of them if you are like me. My windows look +down on the Valley of the Bow and out upon a riot of hills. There is +nothing more beautiful in the girth of the Seven Seas, but, to-night, +this scene is awesome and full of strangeness. The black clouds are +laced with streaks of lightning, or it may be that the spirits thrust +out red tongues in derision. + +Lord, how it blows! and I am afraid of this thunder and the shouting of +the storm. The wind grapples with the trees as though they were living +creatures and it makes no difference that they crouch and cry for +mercy. It is Bendan, the Pine Wrestler, who is out there, and when +angry he can pluck up a young tree with his little finger or break it +with a push of his shoulder. But he does not do this often; he only +wrestles to make them strong. + +It is better for a woman to go down to the great stone dining-hall with +its yellow floor, where there is music, and dancing, and love-making. +It is a pretty play even to the onlooker. Or in the big central +rotunda, which is the heart of this hostelry in the hills, she will +find "there is always fine weather," and "the good fellows" are from +all over the world and have strange stories to tell Canadian folk who +stay in the North. In the cavernous fireplace, spruce logs burn redly, +and by their light you may decipher the words on the mantelpiece: "The +world is my school; travel our teacher; Nature our book, and God our +friend." Overhead, in the fourth gallery, a deep-voiced singer is +taking us into captivity. Listen, then, for it is only in music that +critics are taken captive: literature has no such thraldom. It is +about a perfect day that the singer sings, and this is what she says-- + + "And this is the end of a perfect day, + Near the end of a journey too; + But it leaves a thought that is big and strong, + With a wish that is kind and true. + For Memory has painted this perfect day + With colours that never fade, + And we find at the end of a perfect day + The soul of a friend we've made." + + + + +CHAPTER XXV + +THE OVERLAND TRAIL OF '98 + +Out of the North there rang a cry of Gold!--TOM McINNES. + + +Only this spring, a widow near Edmonton sold her quarter-section to a +real-estate syndicate for eighty thousand dollars. She was one of the +women who "stayed at home with the stuff" while her husband fared forth +in search of gold at the time of the Klondike stampede in 1897-8. He +died on the trail, and ever since the woman has ploughed the lone +furrow both literally and metaphorically. + +The handsome reward of her industry and pertinacity calls to mind that +fable of Æsop's where the young men found that the hidden treasure +their father had described to them was in the yield the soil had given +after they had industriously digged it over. + +We were talking about this the other night, and the humour and +tragedies of the gold stampede, over the last bottle of +champagne---positively the last--that remained of the most prolonged +and celebrated spree that ever took place in the North. The vintage +was a _Koch Fils_ of 1892 and, therefore (to save your mental +arithmetic), I may add, twenty-one years old. It was brought in by the +Helpman Expedition, familiarly known to the local wiseacres of the day +as "The Helpless Proposition." + +Did it taste well? + +I do not know. + +I like lemonade with maraschino cherries better than champagne, but the +party were agreed that it was excellent drinking. One said it had a +pulse; another, that European grapes sucked in more sun than those +grown in America; "The stuff that makes the world go round," remarked a +third. Assuredly it looks well, thought I, and the bubbles caper like +they were alive. + +Under the balm and stimulus of the champagne, the men (all of them +old-timers) were not indisposed to talk concerning the party who +brought it into the country and of the things that befell them. Also, +they tell about the other parties who attempted to reach the +gold-diggings by the overland route from Edmonton. These were +heart-breaking tales, with, here and there, a golden thread of humour +showing up in the black fabric of despoliation and defeat. + +The thirty members of the Helpman Party came from Great Britain. They +were unfortunate from the start. They arrived at Edmonton on Christmas +Eve, one of them, Captain Alleyn, being ill with pneumonia, from which +disease he died a couple of days later. He was the artist of the +party, and correspondent of Reuter's News Agency. + +His was the first military funeral held in the North, so that it was an +event around which much interest centred. + +The expedition was under the command of Colonel Helpman and Lord +Avonmore of Gortmerron House, County Tyrone, known to the local folk by +the unkind name of "Lord 'Ave-one-more." He died last year in Ireland. +"A truly remarkable man, my dear," said an old lady of our lemonade +group, "and always he talked of smashing niggers." + +All provisions and supplies for the gold crusade were brought from +England, except the horses, and the duty thereon amounted to several +thousand dollars. In truth, they were provisioned under War Office +approval, for, said they, "We are English gentlemen and must travel as +English gentlemen." Baled hay and hay-choppers, baths, beds, tents, +sanitary conveniences, and other impedimenta were imported by the +train-load. + +These Canadian men will have it, moreover, that the Britishers brought +in snowshoes for their horses, which gear they were wont to designate +as "bloomin' tennis racquets." I might have believed this +extraordinary statement had I not guessed that my narrator gleaned his +idea from the _Voyages and Explorations of Samuel de Champlain_, for +these imperturbable northmen never so much as blink an eye when adding +the inevitable pinch of spice to a story. + +It is quite true though that the party did bring enormous supplies of +"arrested" foods, egg powders, Westphalian hams, almost unlimited +quantities of tinned ptarmigan, woodcock, plum-pudding, and other +toothsome delicacies well calculated to pique the most jaded and +club-debauched palate. Unfortunately, on being opened, nearly all +these delicate edibles were found to be spoiled, so that the travellers +were forced to exist on such crude diet as pig's face, rice, and beans. + +But the liquors still remained. Allah be praised!--barrels and cases +of it; yes! even kegs and demi-johns--brandy, burgundy, benedictine, +claret, champagne, and canary--these and other brands which I forget, +for my interest was attracted from the list to the wistful faces of +these historians who think with love and longing on those rare old, +fair old golden days that are gone beyond recall. + +On their arrival at Edmonton, the commanders of the expedition were +informed that a prohibition law was in force in the Yukon and that, in +consequence, no spirituous liquors could be carried across its borders. +This being the case, there was nothing for it but to drink the liquors +in Edmonton. They had no licence to sell it, and to pour it upon the +unappreciative prairie would be manifestly absurd--even wicked. This +is why I was correct in saying that our vintage of the night was the +last bottle of the most prolonged and celebrated spree that ever took +place in the North. In truth, it was an Homeric carousal. + +The spree lasted for six weeks, and fights with their legal sequences +were frequent. To use the most generally approved northern expression +of the day, "They just fit and fit," so that more than once the good +Archdeacon of Alberta had to pour oil and balm into the broken bones +and brittle nerves of the combatants. Indeed, he went so far as to +have them nursed in his own home. He is a hale-hearted, fine-fibred +gentleman, our Archdeacon. + +It is hardly fair, however, to lay the entire spree to the credit of +the stampeders. The population of Edmonton, in the late nineties, +consisted of fifteen hundred people, and all the male portion of it +used their utmost endeavours to prevent any good liquor going to waste. +The gentry of the community were invited to partake, but the hewers of +wood and drawers of water who had been engaged to exercise the +pack-horses by walking them up and down, these, and the disorderly +arrant idlers who hung on the borders of the camp, helped themselves. +Their motto was the same as Lord Nelson's--"Touch and take." Indeed, +the speedy manner in which they relieved the expedition of any +encumbering wealth was truly most astonishing. They have a theory in +the North that everything belongs by right to the man who has the +greatest need. Now, the need of the North is a very big pocket and +there are holes in it. + +Ultimately, the party got away. They took the Swan Hill route that +leads to the Old Assiniboine Crossing, but spring had already set in so +that the trails were deep with water, and the muskegs were bottomless +pits. + +The leader of the expedition (by which they meant the foreman as +distinct from the director) was Mr. Matthew Evanston O'Brien, an Irish +solicitor and erstwhile Chief of Police in Australia. It is also said +he was an English secret-service man. He died in April of this year at +Wetaskawin, Alberta, where he was practising law. + +The breeds and other packers who accompanied the party became insolent +and purposely lost their loads. One man smashed the camp stove and +dropped it into a river; others lost tents; while some found hay and +oats as hard to hold as quicksilver. Being badly sheltered and +underfed, nearly all of their hundred horses died, so that long +afterwards teamsters coming to the south picked up wagon loads of +harness besides other useful gear. In a word, like the man who tried +all the rheumatism cures, the members of the Helpman Expedition were +"done good." + +Some of the party got as far as Fort Simpson on the Mackenzie River, +but in the end every man, greatly chastened in spirit, turned back to +Edmonton, where some of them were stranded for several months before +money came to take them on to England. + +Do not laugh at their misfortune. It is not seemly so to do, for, in +all this wildly-warring world, there are few more bitter cups than the +failure of a big financial coup in the which you have invested your own +(and alas!) other people's money. + +Besides, few of the scores of parties who started fared any better, +while many faced worse. Some of them, like the Moody Expedition, +returned because they could not make over two or three miles a day, +they having to fell the impeding timber. At this rate of travel, the +journey would have occupied five years. + +Other crusaders returned because they had no food or money, a condition +that scarcely makes for progress or health. + +Still others came back because they had fallen out by the way, for the +trail has the satanic peculiarity of developing all that is surly, +selfish, or yellow in human nature. People who are tired, ill, and +hungry lift the curtain of their character and forget to let it fall, +so that the result is disillusionment to all concerned. Not a few men +who started in on pronouncedly amicable terms, eating from the same +plate both actually and figuratively, came out brimful with umbrage, +hatred and pique. Murder on the trail may be almost a natural impulse. + +But all the derelicts who returned had one well-defined peculiarity +(albeit a negative one), they came in quietly by the back trails--they +who had gone forth full-fed and wanton as young gophers. The North had +rolled out their individuality like one might roll out dough. They +were "the bitten;" gaunt-eyed starvelings; tatterdemalions who might +have posed for Rip Van Winkle or The Ancient Mariner. The North is a +goodly country and attracts goodly men, yet, even here, one may lose +both his sense and his competence. + +"Did no one succeed?" I ask. + +"Oh yes!" replies a jocund old gentleman who has lived here these +thirty years. "One man got through by hook or crook--chiefly crook. +He was a real-estate agent and insurance broker." + +Further questions elicit the fact that this broker was not so much a +stampeder as an absconder. He was short in his returns to the +insurance company and took this means of avoiding arrest. At least, so +it was rumoured. He left Edmonton in the late winter with no money, no +food--nothing but a small hand-satchel containing collars and blank +premium forms. All the way along he insured the trailers on the +straight life, endowment, or accident policies, or for sick benefits. +They were far enough on the trail to realize that there was a distinct +possibility of their requiring one, if not all these premiums, so our +broker found fat pickings. Resides, each trailer had begun to think +lovingly and longingly of his family at home, and of what a comforting +compensation a ten-thousand dollar policy might be to them in the event +of his death. Indeed, it seemed almost like swindling the company to +take out a policy on this journey. But what would you? Here was their +properly certified agent with the requisite papers to boot. One must +take what the gods send. + +At Athabasca Landing, our broker man stole a boat and made his way down +the river. He fed at each camp he encountered; related how he had +become separated from his party, and how he was hurrying forward to +rejoin them. Under the circumstances, it was only natural that his +hosts should supply him with enough food for a day or two. Besides, it +would never do to let him die of starvation and he carrying their good +money and insurance policies in his satchel--the little black +hand-satchel wherein he kept his collars. + +He reached Dawson early in the rush, but we do not know how it fared +with him there---whether he crushed his money from stones or bones--for +it was probable he took a new name, and, needless to say, he did not +return via the overland route to Edmonton. + +Two others who reached the northern Eldorado were Jim Kenealey and Jack +Russell. It took them two years to get in. Russell struck pay-dirt in +the Cape Nome District, but Kenealey, after abandoning several claims, +came out penniless. He died recently at the Cameron House, Strathcona, +of which hotel he was proprietor. Kenealey, who came from Peterboro', +Ontario, in the early eighties, was a clever sleight-of-hand artist and +one time had an encounter with an Indian, it being natural and entirely +reasonable that the Indian should demand the fifty cents that Kenealey +claimed to have taken from his ear. + +"But there were others who reached the gold zone," explains a lawyer +who was, in those days, a cub-reporter, type-setter, and I know not +what besides. "I have forgotten their names, but you may find them in +the files of _The Bulletin_." + +One of these parties comprised four men, Martin McNeeley from Sault +Ste. Marie, Michigan, George Baalam, W. Schreeves and W. J. Graham. + +Schreeves and Baalam reached Dawson safely; Graham was drowned on the +way, and McNeeley, who injured his foot, was left behind by the others +somewhere near the Devil's Portage. + +Some months afterwards, Mr. E. T. Cole of Pelican Rapids, Minnesota, +with his party, stumbled upon a small tent in which they found a +terribly decomposed body. It was McNeeley's. By his side there was a +knife, a compass, a rifle, twenty-five rounds of cartridges, twenty +pounds of flour, some meat, matches and wood. The following excerpts +are from his diary-- + +"December 28, 1897--My partners deserted me and tried to cripple me +further by taking my grub. + +"January 5, 1898--Walked eight miles on my awful foot and am crippled +on an Island alone. The pain of my foot is terrible." + +The files reveal another tragedy in which two men from Brantford, +Ontario, were the principals--the Strathdees. + +Mr. A. C. Strathdee was one of the early stampeders. He went north +with sixteen pack-horses. His only companion was his son, aged +twenty-two, W. Harvey Strathdee, a member of the Dufferin Rifles. They +camped one night beside the Taylor Trail that leads to Nelson. In the +morning, while cooking breakfast, Harvey sighted a moose and, +straightway, started in pursuit. At noon he had not returned and his +father, becoming anxious, tried to follow the trail, but +unsuccessfully. At night, the now frantic man lit a fire and shot off +his rifle in the hope that Harvey might see or hear them. He did this +for eight terrible days and eight more terrible nights, till he +realized that further delay would endanger his own life. In these +eight days, half of his horses died from lack of food, the man being +afraid to shift camp in case Harvey might find his way back. + +Further on, he met James and John Fair of Elkhorn, Manitoba, who +returned with him to spend yet eight other days in unavailing search. +At Dunvegan, Mr. Strathdee engaged a white man, an Indian, and a +dog-train to go in and make quest till spring. Then he came back to +Edmonton, where he exacted promises from the journalists to forward to +him at Brantford any report that might come in from the trails +regarding the lost youth. + +For a long time nothing came but, one day, some Indians brought in word +how on their way north nearly a year before, they fell on the fresh +trail of a lost white man and had followed it up. They knew he was +white for he wore boots, and that he was lost because of his uncertain, +round-about course. They found his body on a mountain between two +logs. His arms were outspread and his cartridge belt and rifle lay by +his side. The trees around had been burned, and the Indians were of +the opinion that he had set them on fire to try and attract his +father's attention. + +That the public of Canada and the United States had little idea of the +hardships to be endured on the overland trail was evidenced by the fact +that a number of women attempted to take it. Some of them wore +ordinary clothes with plumes in their hats, but the more knowing ones +were attired in jaeger skirts and jerseys, also they wore jaeger caps +that covered the face except for the nose and mouth. In their belts +they carried six-shooters. + +Letters were received here asking if the writers could get through to +the Klondyke on bicycles; if there were good boarding-houses on the +way, and if the Indians were troublesome. + +For the instruction of the stampeders, the Honourable the Minister of +the Interior, then Mr. Frank Oliver, issued a special number of _The +Bulletin_, which was the farthest north newspaper, mapping out the +route and the distances between the points. + +By the shortest and best travelled trails, the entire distance from +Edmonton to the Klondyke was 2,728 miles. This route was via the +Athabasca, Great Slave, Mackenzie and Peel Rivers. From thence it +crossed to Summit, La Pierre House, and down the Porcupine River to its +junction with the Yukon River. From this point to Dawson was the +home-run. + +There are said to be sixty-eight roads to heaven, but this road to +Dawson is not one of them. + +Each man had six pack-ponies to carry in his supplies, which consisted +of 900 lb. of food and 150 lb. of clothing and hardware, making in all, +1,050 lb. The ponies cost from twenty-five to thirty dollars, and it +was conservatively estimated that the supplies cost $250.00. + +The food was calculated on the basis of the Mounted Police rations and +was supposed to last a year, being doled out at the following ration +per man, per day: flour 1-¼ lb., beef 1-½ lb., bacon 1 lb., potatoes 1 +lb., apples 3 oz., beans 4 oz., coffee or tea ½ oz., salt ½ oz., butter +2 oz., sugar 3 oz. + +With praiseworthy discretion, many of the Old-Timers opened up depots +to supply the parties with outfits, but, on the whole, there was no +over-charging or money-grabbing such as one might have expected. On +the contrary, the prices that prevailed were from 25 to 75 per centum +less than those of to-day. Flour was $2.50 per hundredweight; bacon 11 +cents per pound, evaporated apples 8 cents, rolled-oats 3 cents, +raisins 10 cents, and black tea from 25 to 40 cents. Pack-saddle +blankets cost $2.00 a pair, and large grey blankets $3.25. Long arctic +socks cost from 50 cents to $1.00, sweaters from $1.00 to $1.50, and +cardigan jackets from $1.00 to $2.00. + +Many kinds of costumes were affected. Some men were clad in fur from +head to feet; others wore khaki, or sheepskin coats; and in one party +every man had a coonskin coat. + +Nothing, however, caused so much excitement in the burgh as the various +modes of conveyance that were planned and built by the gold-seekers. + +"Texas" Smith started alone on the longish trail with all his +provisions packed in three barrels. These were equipped as rollers or +wheels with a platform on top for sleeping purposes. He calculated +that on the rivers the barrels would act as floaters and so could be +comfortably navigated. + +Texas travelled nearly nine miles before the hoops came off. He was +able to retrace his steps to town by the beans the barrels shed on the +road. They took his photograph, and that of his conveyance, before he +started but, on his return, good-naturedly refrained, for it was +distinctly noticeable that Texas had the air of having eaten the canary. + +Breneau Fabian, a Belgian, invented a boat which, being intended for +all elements, was constructed from galvanized iron. He called it +Noah's Ark. It was built in two parts with a hinge in the middle. +When open, it could be used on the river, for it had a keel; or on the +snow, for it had runners. If he cared to, he could close up his boat +by means of the hinge--that is, it would turn over, one part on top of +the other, in which shape it was a caravan with wheels attached. His +yoke of oxen were to be killed at Athabasca Landing and salted down as +food for the journey. + +For the information of the curiously inclined, I might say that until +recently, Fabian's Ark served as a float at all civic processions such +as Labour Day and the Queen's Jubilee, but it has had its day and its +scrap heap. + +Another man, whose name I could not learn, built an ice-boat on the +Saskatchewan River. He had figured out that he could reach the +placer-diggings by means of sails, thus acquiring a distinct monetary +advantage over the folk and fellows who had horses, in that sails would +not require to be fed with hay and oats. + +Be it said to the credit of the folk and fellows that they cherished no +grudge in their hearts, for, the sails refusing to act, they loaned him +fourteen teams wherewith to haul his ice-boat on to the bank. + +Considering the length and nature of the trail, perhaps the most +bird-witted scheme of reaching the Klondike was that evolved by the "I +Will" Steam-Sleigh Company of Chicago. They ought to have known better. + +They built a train of four cabooses or cars, the motive power of which +was steam. A marine boiler and engine were imported from the United +States, upon which they paid $500.00 custom toll. Also, they imported +a revolving drum equipped with teeth, similar to those used on the +log-roads in the big timber-limits, and sprocket-wheels, band-chains, +and other things no mortal woman could be expected to remember. All +the cars were on steel-runners. The one behind the engine contained +fuel; the second was the living car, while the third held supplies. + +Everything was packed and loaded ready for the hour of starting before +the builders had tested the machine. All Edmonton was assembled to see +the sight, while scores of Indians squatted around and stared like +gargoyles. The workmen, with an air of high concern, twisted a bolt +here, or a belt there; oiled a hub, or did one of the hundred things a +mechanic does to an engine and boiler when he would have you believe he +is earning his pay. + +It was a proud moment when one of the builders stepped forward and +touched his hat to a blue-uniformed official--a moment, too, that was +fraught with serious issues, for the blue-uniform said, "_Let her go_!" +All Edmonton ceased to breathe and the Indians looked almost pale. + +There was a vast creaking; a shudder as if the caverns of the deep were +opened; the wheels turned--and turned--and turned, and with each turn +buried the machine deeper into the earth, there to remain till the day +that Kenneth Macleod bought the marine boiler and engine for his +sawmill. They say he bought it for a song, but no one ever heard the +song. Ah! but those were right royal days for the Old-Timers, the like +of which can never be. + +I nearly forgot about the three cabooses. These stampeders who did not +die of scurvy, hardship, starvation, or accident, and who returned via +Edmonton, used the cabooses for shelter while they wrote home for money. + +It was a long time before they were free of occupants. + + + + +CHAPTER XXVI + +A SONG OF THIS LAND + +Out of the North comes tumult, say they who are poets, and clangorous +challenge to battle. + +True, O Poets! And out of the North come men of robust mood who will +keep our nation's honour, for this is a country where courage and truth +are inborn; a land which sways the souls of its citizens unto high +endeavour. From this country where, of old, dwelt the bow-bearers who +were eaters of strong meat, will come high-hearted men of loyal temper, +for this is the world's House of Youth. This shall be its nurse of +heroes. + +Money-flingers and careless, are these Northmen, says another, and +wasters of wealth. + +True, O Sir Time Lock, but when the gods would be thrifty they give +their money away. The Gods are master-spenders and have learned the +wide wisdom of being foolish. Do you follow me aright? + +And this is the wisdom of our Northmen who have well tamed Dame Fortune +and have set their sure brand upon her. + +But, if money sticks not in their purses, and if they haggle not over +coins, yet are these men businessful with a purpose for large +enterprise. In these latitudes, we have deep-counselled companies of +traders who, while they love the sweet power of money, have ever +bartered fairly, and know that 'mine' and 'thine' are different words +which rhyme well in all reckonings. I have sure grounds for knowing +this, and am minded to say, "Hail! and all hail!" + +The North is a numbed and haggard land of and snow, say many voices. +In its vast voids lives a dark spirit which lures men on and tricks +them so that they come, in time, to love that which punishes them. And +if by some fair hap they are led into other and softer climes, then do +they fret and fever for the wolf-lands of the Yukon or the Mackenzie, +as though some secret and unforbidden magic had entered their blood +forever. + +I will not speak contrariwise to these men, for it is meet that I +should speak fairly. The love of the North, like the fiery kiss of +genius, is a sorrowful gift, and none can say whether it is greater in +joy or pain. She is an exacting mistress, this white-bodied, +rude-muscled North, and, of times, she breaks and hurts a man till he +drags his brokenness away to die. Yet, is she beautiful and +passionately human; full of vigour and drunken with life, and her house +stretches from the dawn to dayfall. + +And why should men complain of the stabbing cold and of the +unrestricted range of the young winds? Why do they wish to regulate +God's snow and rain? What could be more hateful to men than +unfaltering sunshine and ever-flowering fields? + +In the winter of the fortressed North, animals turn white as do the +birds and the very earth itself. All were pallid and colourless but +for the yellow belt of the setting sun and the black-green tree shadows +that fall toward the pole. The rivers cease their singing; the birds +are silent, and all is stilled to the bounds of the world save only the +sonorous wind which is the breath of Claeg, the Bound One, who is the +earth. Here, the north-east wind is Lord Paramount, and the Crees and +Chipewyans have long known that Death comes from his direction. + +Listen! I made an error, to say that all is stilled, for, of occasion, +there is the mewl of the lynx; the yap of the timber wolf as he gives +tongue in pursuit of _ah-pe-shee moos-oos_, the jumping deer; the +howling infamy of the huskies seeking their meat from God; the raucous +roar of the hulking moose blind with rage of love. + +Listen! I made an error to speak of an all-whiteness, for, where the +Aurora pins her colours to the sky, it is like unto an angry opal. +This is Beauty Absolute. Her swinging swords of flame none have +measured: who shall tell the measure of this land? + +But listen! It is not beyond our understanding that men should feel +the urge of this Northland and its strange enticement. Some there are +who speak of it as the lure of the North; the fret of spring, or the +call of red gods. Surely we may understand aright if we do but watch +the birds flock hither of spring-time, and how the fish fight up +against the streams though it be to suffer and to die. These cannot +resist the drag of the magnetic pole, any more than you and I who have +souls and are feeling folk! + +But it is not always frigid here, for we have springtide and the season +of seven sweet suns. "Good morrow!" shouts the tired Winter in the +time of melting snows. "Good morrow!" shouts back the nimble Spring as +he throws a mist of green over the young aspens. "Come fly with me and +touch the sun," pleads the eagle to his sweetheart. "Come with me and +be my love," woos Kiya, boatman of the Athabasca; "already the young +birds are in their nests and soon they will fly away. Soon will the +time of mating be past." + +Aye! but the summer winds are honey-mouthed. + +Aye! but the skies are star-enchanted, and there are fair stories I +might tell about yellow grain fields and of red lilies like blown +flame, but none save those who are prairie rangers would understand +aright. + +Besides, there are woolly-mouthed men and chattering daws who say +secretly that we of the North are boasters, and that we tell ill tales. + +But though we are impeached, yet will we say that our song is tinged +with no lie. We are young men, and sowers of grain, and it is pleasant +to glorify the largess of our harvest. + +We are boasters, they tell, and full-mouthed, but why should we keep +hidden and unshared the all-golden treasures of our fields? We will +not hide this thing in our hearts, but, with fair speech, will sing it +in a million-voiced canticle of praise. There is no need that we sing +restrainedly of our goodly dower, or in measured words, for we are no +servile race of hirelings, but free men and proclaimers of this land. +Because we are witnesses that the talent of our country is folded in +the fecund earth, we will speak aloud to our neighbouring Saxons of +friendly mind, and to the brotherhood of the soil throughout the +universe. We will speak with them concerning our gold, and vineyards, +and fine flour; of our forests, and fisheries, and apple orchards, till +their veins stir as with the tang of old wine. These folk have need to +know that in the North prosperity groweth widely; that here the +unbelievable is achieved. This is the true fairy-land where swineherds +and barbers, and much labouring men are raised to riches and power. +Here is a dining-hall whose friendly feast is spread for all. Here +every man may come and eat of our cakes and melons, of our honey and +fat things. + +The North has no need of an interpreter: it has need of heralds. Then +ho! for our fierce and beautiful country; our strong and fertile +country. + +We will send these tidings Europeward and the far-delivered message +shall not fall to the ground. It is a blithe young tune we shall sing, +with a resonant chorus of "Canada, O Canada." + +Fitting is it that we should sing to the Isles of Britain, for from +them is the birth of this breed and theirs is the royal stamp we bear +upon our fighting arm. We are the wide-ruling seed of the Saxons and +ever shall we answer to the rally of the race. All hands around! We +will pledge the homeland of Britain! + +And who will sing this song of the North? Sit you here till we talk of +this thing. I pray you prompt my pen as it forgets. + +They have come hither to sing it from Ottawa, which is the Place of +Councils, and the sovereign city in this fair house of Canada. + +Hither have they come from the tobacco plantations of Essex; the yellow +cornfields of Lambton; the luscious peach groves of Kent, and the +vineyards of Welland. These are lusty fellows and of fine fibre. + +Here are men of consideration from the thick-leaved apple orchards of +Nova Scotia and from the dairy steadings of Oxford. Have you never +heard concerning the round towers of Oxford which are stacks of grain, +and of the herds of black bulls which feed fatly on her meadowlands? +Then it is small knowledge you have of this Dominion and the bright +fortunes of its people. + +Others have joined our chorus who are from mailëd Quebec, which is the +eye of Canada; from Montreal, whose traffickers are among the +honourable of the earth, and from Niagara, where, with subtle cunning, +men have bridled Neptune, the Lord of Waters, and have made his trident +into one of fire. + +These courtly and free-handed fellows have hailed from Toronto. +Beautiful Toronto! The city of work and play. I like well its stately +homes and its women with honey-throated voices. And, here where I +write at Edmonton under the aurora, these men of the Southern Provinces +have assembled with our lads of the North and West who are +leather-fleshed and hard-sinewed, but withal, comely. This is Edmonton +on the Saskatchewan, which the bow-bearers call by another name, +meaning the great river of the plains. This is the stranger-thronged +city of the North; the city that has merited a cheer. It is here our +glorious Lady of Alberta has placed her throne whereunto all her sons +come up that they may pay her tribute of honour. + +To this place come the farmer-folk from the wheatlands of the queenly +Peace, and the priests and trappers from the Athabasca, which the +bow-bearers call by another name, meaning the great river of the woods. +And hither come the traders and road builders from the pass between the +cleft mountains where, of old, dwelt Jasper of the yellow head; these, +and the horse-taming men from young Calgary. We who love games and the +glory of them, stand at salute. + +These are the men from Winnipeg, the Mother City of the North. Honour +upon honour be to her! + +Right pleasant is it to present the likely-looking lads of Regina and +of the deep soiled plains of Saskatchewan. On the plains, the +straight-blowing wind is scented from the grassed headlands dappled +with flowers. On the plains, dwell strong, glad men in the joy of +their youth. On the plains there lives some common mother of the +common weal, who is the ancestress of our kings to be. + +These others whom I have held back until now that your attention might +not falter, are the dauntless, high-adventuring men who crossed the +mountains to where the land lieth soft to the sea. These are the men +of the new appointed city of Prince Rupert; the men of the fortunate, +fair-built city of Victoria, and those of sure-seated Vancouver. May +they build strongly and well. It is seemly that the forefront of our +royal House of Canada should be of far-shining splendour. + +We have high delight in this Province of British Columbia; in its +unshorn hills that are furrowed with rifts of roses, in its +fair-watered fruitlands, and in the rice and silk ships that come +reeling down its bays. This is a new-peopled land of fostered folk +and, of times, men's hearts fail them lest these stranger-guests march +not in step with the genius of the race. We who are your sister +provinces, O Columbia by the Sea, stretch forth our hands to you and +pray you as sentinels to keep our portals straitly, but, +notwithstanding, that you be wise in love to all things living.... +And, now, to the hither side of the mountains have come these western +men of erect spirit to sing with us the song of the North and of Canada. + +I wish my pen might tell you of our song, but this were a hard task, +for while our voices are tuned to one chord our themes are manifold. +Whatsoever things a man may desire, these may he find in his Mother +Canada. Some men sing of her ample skies and the incorruptible glory +of them; of her changing climes, limitless fields, and law-loving +spirit. Others have pleasant cause of song in the rivers that give +water to the people; in far-strung wires and clear highways to the sea; +and in her great institutions of beneficence which conserve the moral +energies of the citizens. + +Some, in voice which sounds like supplication, sing that a sense of +safety may be preserved in our homes, and that sweet tranquility may be +the lot of our aged folk. + +Others would have it that our ballot-strips fall from clean hands, and +that no man thinks only of his own Province but of the well-being and +good health of all. + +May our children, O Canada! have strong bodies and souls above the +lusts of gain, urges one, and let the women of our Dominion be skilled +in mother-craft, but with their house windows open to the intellectual +breezes of the world.... And I, of myself, am stirred to do tribute of +praise. I am thy child, O Canada, dear Mother! How shall I have +wisdom to order my words aright? O my lips sing this song! Sweet, my +pen, tell this tale, for the fullness of my heart has made heavy my +hand. + +I will make a crown of maple leaves for you, and will twist them with +flowers of the lily. See! I bring you native flowers; mint and roses +and clover blooms. I bring you golden-rod and marigolds, and berries +that are red. Take these from my hands, Good Mother! My heart is awed +and I cannot speak aright. + +Listen! All of us who sing to you have joined hands--Northmen and +Southerners and men of the coast-line. It is our wish to tell your +glory aloud that all may hear. It is wiser still to leave a part +untold that the world may the better know it. + +Hail to thee, O Canada, and hail to the flag! We who are thy children +salute thee! + + + + +THE END + + + + +T. H. BEST PRINTING CO. LIMITED, TORONTO + + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Seeds of Pine, by Janey Canuck + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SEEDS OF PINE *** + +***** This file should be named 32409-8.txt or 32409-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/2/4/0/32409/ + +Produced by Al Haines + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +https://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at https://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +https://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at https://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit https://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including including checks, online payments and credit card +donations. To donate, please visit: https://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/32409-8.zip b/32409-8.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..58cc1a1 --- /dev/null +++ b/32409-8.zip diff --git a/32409-h.zip b/32409-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..99fd9fe --- /dev/null +++ b/32409-h.zip diff --git a/32409-h/32409-h.htm b/32409-h/32409-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..fbfdd9d --- /dev/null +++ b/32409-h/32409-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,11045 @@ +<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> +<HTML> +<HEAD> + +<META HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> + +<TITLE> +The Project Gutenberg E-text of Seeds of Pine, by Janey Canuck +</TITLE> + +<STYLE TYPE="text/css"> +BODY { color: Black; + background: White; + margin-right: 10%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; + text-align: justify } + +P {text-indent: 4% } + +P.noindent {text-indent: 0% } + +P.poem {font-size: 90% ; + text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10%; } + +P.letter {text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10% ; + margin-right: 10% } + +P.intro {font-size: 90% ; + text-indent: 4% ; + margin-left: 10% ; + margin-right: 10% } + +P.footnote {text-indent: 0% ; + font-size: 80%; + margin-left: 10% ; + margin-right: 10% } + +P.transnote {text-indent: 0% ; + margin-left: 0% ; + margin-right: 0% } + +P.finis { font-size: larger ; + text-align: center ; + text-indent: 0% ; + margin-left: 0% ; + margin-right: 0% } + +</STYLE> + +</HEAD> + +<BODY> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Seeds of Pine, by Janey Canuck + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Seeds of Pine + +Author: Janey Canuck + +Release Date: May 18, 2010 [EBook #32409] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SEEDS OF PINE *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + +</pre> + + +<BR><BR> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +SEEDS OF PINE +</H1> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +<I>By</I> +</H3> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +JANEY CANUCK +</H2> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +Author of +<BR> +"Open Trails", etc. +</H4> + +<BR><BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent" STYLE="margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%"> +"<I>A handful of pine-seeds will cover mountains +with the green majesty of the forest, and I, too, +will set my face to the wind and throw my +handful of seed on high.</I>"<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 4em">—<I>Fiona Macleod</I></SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +TORONTO +<BR> +THE MUSSON BOOK COMPANY LIMITED +</H3> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H5 ALIGN="center"> +Copyright, Canada, 1922 +<BR> +THE MUSSON BOOK COMPANY, LTD. +<BR> +PUBLISHERS +<BR> +TORONTO +</H5> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +<I>Affectionately dedicated to<BR> +my four brothers;</I><BR> +<BR> +<I>Thomas R. Ferguson, K.C.<BR> +Gowan Ferguson, M.D.<BR> +Harcourt Ferguson, K.C.<BR> +Honourable Mr. Justice W. N. Ferguson</I><BR> +</H3> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +CONTENTS +</H2> + +<TABLE ALIGN="center" WIDTH="80%"> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">Chapter</TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> </TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">I </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap01">WESTWARD WITH THE GRAND TRUNK PACIFIC</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">II </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap02">A FRONTIER POST</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">III </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap03">TO THE BUILDERS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IV </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap04">BEHIND THE HILLS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">V </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap05">THE END OF STEEL</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VI </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap06">BITTER WATERS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap07">MOTORING TO ATHABASCA LANDING</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">VIII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap08">COUNTRY DELIGHTS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">IX </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap09">AT THE LANDING</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">X </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap10">ON THE ATHABASCA RIVER</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XI </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap11">SOME NORTHERN PIONEERS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap12">AT THE PARTING OF THE RIVERS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap13">ON THE PORTAGE</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIV </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap14">ON THE LESSER SLAVE RIVER</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XV </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap15">THE BISHOP OF THE ARCTIC</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVI </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap16">NORTHERN VISTAS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap17">A COUNTRY WOMAN AT THE CITY RACES</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XVIII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap18">IN NORTHERN GARDENS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XIX </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap19">COMMUNING WITH THE RUTHENIANS</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XX </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap20">THE SHADOW OF THE SCAFFOLD</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXI </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap21">THE BABOUSHKA</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap22">THE HERO PRIESTS OF THE NORTH</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXIII </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap23">COAL-MINING IN ALBERTA</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXIV </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap24">THE PLAYGROUNDS OF THE WEST</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXV </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap25">THE OVERLAND TRAIL OF '98</A></TD> +</TR> + +<TR> +<TD ALIGN="right" VALIGN="top">XXVI </TD> +<TD ALIGN="left" VALIGN="top"> +<A HREF="#chap26">A SONG OF THIS LAND</A></TD> +</TR> + +</TABLE> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap01"></A> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +SEEDS OF PINE +</H2> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER I +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +WESTWARD WITH THE GRAND TRUNK PACIFIC +</H4> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +"'What went ye out into the wilderness to see?' They answered thus, +'So that we might not see the city.'"—SIR WILLIAM BUTLER. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +The new steel trail the railway men are laying from Edmonton leads away +and away, I cannot say whither. For these many days I have had an +anxious desire to follow it and the glories thereof. I am tired of +this town and of the electrical devices that appear and re-appear in +the darkness like eyes that open and shut—wicked eyes that burn their +commercial message into my very soul. I am sick of these saucy, +swaggering streets and of sundry of the townspeople. Come you with me +and let us travel down the ways through the heart of the summer! We +shall have breeze and sun in our eyes, and breeze and sun in our +hearts. If you like not the prospect, pray, come no further, for we be +contrary the one to the other and no way-fellows. +</P> + +<P> +As we climb on the train this morning, it seems as though our quest for +quiet is to be cheated by the wallowing wave of humanity that threatens +to submerge us. Who are these close-nudged folk and whither away? +</P> + +<P> +She who runs may read them for hard-headed, white-handed men in search +of "prospects"; brown-throated homesteaders; real-estate agents out for +talking points and for snap fortunes; mining engineers with dunnage +bags—young fellows all in the full force of life—these, and "the +gang," who are ill-looking men and rather dirty. The gang fare forth +to work on the railway grades. They are always ganging—that is +going—for the words are strictly synonymous. The gang going to the +city meet the gang coming out. And so in everything they are +retroactive, and fight much, and swear, to give weight to their +differences of opinion. In one thing only is the gang agreed, no navvy +has yet been found who disputed the axiom that the Boss is a yellow +canine. +</P> + +<P> +There is a sprinkling of women, too, and we talk to each other in the +friendly manner of the country. A couple of them are half-breed girls, +with drooping feathers and skirts that have a hiss. Surely their men +are industrious Indians. Both are cinched into their clothes like a +cayuse into its pack-saddle. Both have skin the colour of brown coffee +into which milk has been poured, and always they are fussing with their +pinned-on curls. "The judicious Hooker" once watched some women doing +this, and he said they were "a-dilling and burling their hair." No one +may ever hope to strike out a more apt expression. The younger of the +girls has an indiscreet mouth and desirous eyes. I should not be +surprised, if one of these times our little brown woman found these to +be a mortgage on her soul somewhat difficult of discharge. And the +usury, little woman, it troubles me, the usury! +</P> + +<P> +The farmer's wife who shares my seat came to this province ten years +ago from the United States. Her husband made entry for a homestead and +she built the house, outbuildings, and fences on it, and bought the +implements with money she had saved from school-teaching. The first +year, their crop was frozen; the second, it was hailed out; and the +third, a spark from the threshing-machine burned their wheat stacks. +Their horses died and they had to incur debt for others. All this +time, the woman supported the household with the returns from her +poultry yard and dairy. These last years have been fat ones, thus +enabling them to save sufficient money to send two of their sons to the +business college in Town. The eldest girl is walking with the young +man on the adjoining farm and a wedding is brewing. +</P> + +<P> +To my thinking, this homely, ill-accoutred woman is something like a +heroine, and it is a pity the end of her troubles is not yet. Her +husband, who appears to be a flabby-spirited fellow, has always wanted +to, and has finally decided that he will sell the farm and go to the +town to keep a boarding-house. She is opposed to the move and has been +in the town endeavouring to protect her interests in the property, but +finds she is unable so to do. Because of this she has decided to buy +the farm from him and has the agreement ready for his signature. I am +astounded by her hardihood. She has the soul of a warrior. If the +recalcitrant spouse refuses to sell—no, I won't tell what she intends +doing, for I am willing to wager you, even to the half of my kingdom, +that he sells. +</P> + +<P> +The woman is proud, I can see, and accordingly careful to enlarge on +her man's good qualities, but it takes no acuteness to read through her +assurances that he is a pessimist and one who always draws tails in the +toss of life. +</P> + +<P> +The readers who have come with me thus far may here swing off key, but, +People Dear, you would be wrong; she is not chastising him; she is +mothering him. It is a remarkable trait in the make-up of a good woman +that she can, in critical junctures, not only be her own mother but may +also act in this capacity to the husband of her children. It is this +same office the Holy Ghost performs in the Trinity. +</P> + +<P> +The newsy is giving the last call to breakfast. He is a full-lifed +young man, with a cock-o'-my-walk air. I would not be surprised if he +were hatched out of the egg of a pouter-pigeon. He serves meals as far +as Edson, from whence we will be transferred to a construction train +and trust to manna being rained down from heaven. His tables are +crowded with guests, and we sit close like kernels on an ear of corn. +For breakfast, there is tea; there is coffee; there are pork chops, and +other fat foods which are made palatable by the sprightly addition of +sour pickles. Indeed, you may credit me, this breakfast is not one to +be sniffed at. I drink pannikins of tea that is very strong and green, +and fearlessly ask for more. If there is a happier woman in the North +than myself, I have never heard of her. I quite agree with you; our +pouter-pigeon serves the public far more effectually than do the +cabineteers, or even the bishops. +</P> + +<P> +We are yet in the wheat belt and the wheat is at flood-tide. When I +see a large stand of grain that is breast-high I say, "Well done, Good +Fellows!" and "Haste to the in-gathering!" The field hears my +salutation to the sowers and bows a million heads to me. And it says, +<I>shibboleth! shibboleth!</I> (If you would pick up the talk of the fields +you must be still and listen.) +</P> + +<P> +The Hebrews, with ears a-tilt, caught this whisper, and so their word +for an ear of wheat was "shibboleth." It was this word the Ephraimites +lisped and so betrayed themselves to Jephthah. The difference was only +one of an aspirate. What they said was sibboleth. +</P> + +<P> +Now, while one can tell the sound of ripe wheat, no word is exactly +descriptive of the odour thereof. When I am not tired my pen almost +catches it. The odour is an intangible something between dryness and +colour, and the sign that expresses it can only be revealed. +</P> + +<P> +It is the mental habit of people to think of wheat as only so many +bushels of inert matter that is bought and sold on margins by half-mad +men, whereas, in all the world, wheat is the thing most richly alive. +It won't die, not for thousands of years. We would put jars of wheat +in the corner-stones of our state buildings, even as the Egyptians +buried it in tombs of rock. It is the only food we could pass down the +centuries to posterity, and apart from its scientific value, there is +little doubt posterity would appreciate the gift infinitely more than +those stupid name-lists of still stupider people. The grain should be +of the highest grade, with the name of the grower and the exact +location of his farm added thereto. +</P> + +<P> +Yes! let us tuck away these northern wheat grains till England becomes +a republic; the United States a kingdom; and until the yellow peril has +turned white. Let us lay them safely aside for that day when labour +and capital have become one, or till a still later epoch when instead +of sex in soul, there shall be soul in sex. Then take them out, +Posterity, and crush them into a sacramental wafer that all the world +may eat of it as a loving pledge from the twentieth century. +</P> + +<P> +If you think this too long to wait, perhaps you will recall that while +the seven sleepers slept, Cæsar was superseded by Christ. Now, the +time they slept was for the lives of three men. +</P> + +<P> +In handling wheat, you have doubtless noticed that it is not only alive +but possesses a markedly developed will-power. It is ever resisting +conquest. They tell me that in the part of the exchange called the +pit, you cannot beat back wheat. Some men have succeeded for a while, +but always it has rolled in and smothered its erstwhile victors. Try +to hold a handful and the task is well-nigh impossible. It slides +through your fingers and causes your palm to open involuntarily. It +wearies a man to hold wheat tightly for long. Oats may be held and +other cereals, but not wheat. Its tendency is to fall to the ground +and reproduce. Thus, it is age-old but still eternally young. It is +the true Isis and no one has lifted its veil. I tell you men, there is +something uncanny and almost wicked about a thing that refuses to die, +and it so small as a grain of wheat. +</P> + +<P> +As a whole, this country is not beautiful, but now and then, there come +striking pictures. Here are pleasing lakelets a-flush with ducks; tall +cotton-woods which I name the maidens because of their fluffy +hair—these, and lush meadows, over which range regiments of asters, +sunflowers, and yarrow. It is a magic lantern fantasia with an +occasional muskeg to represent the waits between views. On the muskegs +the trees are so thin and straight they fairly scratch your eyes. +</P> + +<P> +Oh! but it is hot this day, and every leaf seems a green tongue thrust +out with thirst. The sun is making amends for his insulting reticence +of last winter. The Indians call him Great Grandfather Sun, but why, I +do not know. +</P> + +<P> +The houses of the homesteaders are built of poplar lumber, +weather-stained and ugly. Others are of logs chinsed with mud and +moss. All are small and favourable neither for hospitality nor +reproduction. Some day, when a large acreage is under crop, pretty +bungalows with brave red paint, will edit the scene as in the older and +more settled districts of the north. +</P> + +<P> +At every station, land seekers get out and disappear into the trees as +if the country ate them up, and, indeed, I am not so sure but it does. +</P> + +<P> +A baby gets off too—a new baby that has come from the city hospital is +being brought home. You would fancy a baby was a miracle the way the +men look at it and ask questions. Her name is Annette. She was born +on duck-day. Her father works in a saw-mill. We crowd to the window +to watch him meet Annette, for we would see the gladness on his face. +He is an admirably strong man, with the hard sinews of a wolf. He has +surely gone through the mill to some effect. I think he likes Annette, +but he looks most at the small mother and he has the mate tone in his +voice. +</P> + +<P> +The women ask me concerning my husband, and I say, "Oh yes! I have a +husband up here, somewhere—a big, fair man—I wonder if you have seen +him." +</P> + +<P> +They are discreetly silent, but I can see they are hoping I'll catch +him. This is not a case of duplicity on my part but rather of +kindness. It is one's stoutest duty to convey colour and snippets of +gossip of women, who, for the long winter months to come, are to remain +in these wilds. You must understand that gossip is not wicked up +North. Besides, this word actually means a sponsor at baptism—an +office recognized by all the world as one of unimpeachable +respectability. +</P> + +<P> +At Wabamun there is a great sweep of forest, but, a year ago, a great +fire raged here and large patches of burnt trees assault the eyes. +Hitherto, the homesteaders have had a two-handed harvest, one from +their lovely lake and the other from the land, but, nowadays, their +richest harvest comes from the summer tourists, who are building up a +popular resort at this point. Summer girls are trespassing on the +berry-patches, once the sole preserve of Indian maidens, and Ole +Larsen's fishing grounds are full open to sailing yachts and electric +launches. Such fish as Ole could catch, and such fish as his Frau +could cook! Always, I bowed my head over my plate and said the Indian +grace, "Spirit, partake." Ole can tell where the fish are to be found +in certain seasons by the movements of the birds. The fish feed on +flies and rise to the surface for them, whereupon a t gull or duck will +fall with plummet-like pounce. White-fish bite in the autumn. +"Yumping yiminy, dey yust do." +</P> + +<P> +The remains of the railway construction camps have almost disappeared, +and only the bleached bones of horses mark out the long trail of the +grading gangs. +</P> + +<P> +Here are the grades I descended a couple of years ago while prospecting +over this ground. What slopes these are to put a horse down. They are +like those described at St. Helena, upon which you might break your +heart going up or your neck coming down, with the additional risk of +being arrested as a trespasser. On this place where we once ranged for +coal-rights, the real-estate agents have sub-divided the surface into +desirable building lots, that sell from three to five hundred dollars +the lot. +</P> + +<P> +One day, this lake shore will be a hive of industry, for deep in her +loins Mother Earth had hutched her riches of coal and fire-clay, and, +mayhap, more minerals that are precious. Once, in drilling here, our +men came upon black sand with a showing of gold, but it petered out, +after a couple of inches. It was with great difficulty they were +persuaded to go on with the drilling instead of going to town to file +on claims. +</P> + +<P> +Already there are several towns along this lakefront—that is to say, +towns consisting of three or four tents or houses. In the earlier days +of the North each settlement was commenced with a fort, now it is begun +with a railway station. The next building to be erected is the station +agent's house, which is quickly followed by a restaurant, and a general +store with a post-office. This is the axis from which the homesteaders +radiate into the surrounding country, and, presto! before you know it, +there is a bank, an implement shop, a church, a hotel, and the other +conveniences of modern civilization including mortgages. +</P> + +<P> +Already you may see trails like long black welts across the +land—trails that appear to fare forth without any preconceived plan +and to hold a lure in their far reaches for happy-go-idlers like you +and me. There is no telling what we might find on them a goodish way +off. The only straight trails made in this North land are made by the +engineers, and as you look down the lines you may readily see that they +lead into the sky. I like greatly the unthanked, unknown engineers who +beat out these paths for the people who are to come after. No trumpets +herald their coming, or announce the leagues they have herded behind, +but I tell you these fellows are a commonwealth of kings, and we may as +well stop here for a moment and stand at salute. +</P> + +<P> +And after the engineers came the builders with their sinews of steel to +bind the trail. It is this steel strength that makes the land to bud +and blossom. It is creative. Well and truly has a builder said that +the land without population is a wilderness, and the population without +land is a mob. Yes! it is a steel idol we worship in this country and +not one of gold, and we do refuse to grind it to powder and drink +thereof, no matter what any Moses or Aaron may say. +</P> + +<P> +This last hour I have been in mind-to-mind talk with a young Englishman +who does not think much of Canada. He speaks of our dismal +respectability, our tombstone virtues, and our provincial +small-mindedness. We call our gardens yards, and have no manners to +speak of. Indeed, nothing but a major operation could remedy our +boorishness. +</P> + +<P> +Now, all he says is quite true <I>but I don't believe it</I>; besides, his +English-sure way of summing us up is irritating to my sense of +patriotism. +</P> + +<P> +In some places up here he has had to sleep in puppy's parlours, which +means with his clothes on. This must have been uncomfortable in that +he still wears leather puttees which are the true hall-mark of men from +the British Isles. He talked about our cold winters and how unbearable +they were, just as if the cold were not the sepia the North shoots +forth to protect herself from joyous loafers. I did not say this, for +one cannot be polite and patriotic at the same time, and it is well to +be polite ... only I remarked that one of these cold days we will shut +off the Gulf Stream instead of sending it out to heat up England. +</P> + +<P> +I have no doubt he has private means, for he has travelled widely and +is a well-educated man. He came here to have a go at homesteading. +"Have you succeeded?" I ask. He does not reply except to ejaculate, +"Farming—my hat!" whereupon we both laugh, he at the Canadians and I +at the English. +</P> + +<P> +The average youth from England finds it trying to be stripped of +precedent, and there is nothing approximating Canadian homestead life +in London. We too often forget this and so fail to make allowances for +his prejudices and lack of adaptability. Our government mounts him and +puts his foot in the saddle, but he must set the pace himself. One can +hardly expect the government to do more, but yet, it seems a pity so +much excellent material is annually lost to the Dominion because we +have not the time or means to work it up. It will take some years to +manipulate the crude European immigrants into the mental and physical +trim of this Britisher and to inculcate them with equally high +political standards. We do not recognize this, or maintain an easy +passivity to it, until at some election crises our hearts fail us for +fear because of the preponderance of the foreign vote in educational +and moral matters. +</P> + +<P> +And the Englishman and I speak of subjects of grave import, and of how +it is not seemly that we trade too freely with foreign peoples +(especially with the States of the American Union), neither is it loyal +to our most Christian King, George V. "Wealth at the expense of +loyalty is not a thing to be desired," says the Englishman, "and +Colonials do well to preserve the integrity of the Empire," to which +dictum I make no reply, not being able to gainsay him. I could wish +though that he tell me how we are to avoid so doing. +</P> + +<P> +This dear lad would go into literary work if we read anything in Canada +besides statistics, sporting news, and crop forecasts. In the +contemplation of our sordid practicability, he is lost in astonishment. +"No, madam, I shall not do it, and I shall tell you my reason," says +he. "If you write with a sense of life or colour along will come some +weighty, grim fellows whose business it is to write stock +quotations—leaden creatures, believe me—and they will distinctly +sniff and sneeze out the word 'impressionistic,' by which they mean +fanciful. Sons of bats! If once they tried to frame an impression in +black and white they might have some proper comprehension of the word. +Any uncouth man can state facts, but it is the telling what the facts +stand for that hurts. A coarse man cannot take impressions except from +a closed fist, which impression he would probably describe as a 'dint +in the pro-file.' Such an one hears no farther than his ears, +although, in not a few cases, this might be no inconsiderable distance." +</P> + +<P> +"No, I will not become the local <I>littérateur</I>," continues the lad, "to +be received by the community with a mingling of pride and sarcasm. I +tell you what I will do: it is better to be a real-estate broker, in +that all conditions tend to what you Colonials call 'a dead sure +thing.' It is the only business in which a man reaps where he does not +sow. I will surely be a real-estate man. This I will be." +</P> + +<P> +We are come to Edson now—the terminus of the passenger route—but I am +going to describe it in another chapter, for it would be ungrateful to +bulk it with other events because of the sense of adventure I enjoyed +from my visit thereto. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap02"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER II +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +A FRONTIER POST. +</H4> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +The new world which is the old.—TENNYSON. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Have I told you about Edson and its prospects? No! ah, well, never +mind, I shall do so by and by, when I have talked to the citizens. +</P> + +<P> +While biding my time for a seat at the lunch-counter, I will walk up +and down the station platform. Every minute men are arriving to await +the out-going train to the city. They come and come, apparently from +nowhere, till there are quite a hundred of them. Of course, they +really come from up the street (I should have said from the streets, +for there are two, or, perhaps, three streets), having recently arrived +from the grading camps somewhere up in the mountains. We are going +there to-morrow, or maybe the next day, and then we shall see the +habitat of these battling, brown-throated fellows who nose the stream +of flesh-pots and feed on hunks of brawn. +</P> + +<P> +The men philander about, or sit on the platform planks, and loll lazily +against the sun-warmed wall. They count their money, smoke, and talk, +but on the whole they are quiet. Also they stare at me like they were +gargoyles and whisper the one to the other. This is not because of +rudeness—not at all! Even the white armoured Sir Galahad would find +it difficult to be knightly in the circumstances. For months they have +done naught save stake out and measure up, shovel gravel, dig ditches, +set transits, sweat and swear, for a railway, you may have heard, is +built with heavier implements than batons, pens, or golfsticks. No +woman has come near them except certain will-o'-the wisps whom the +Mounted Police did straightway turn back to town. Their lives have +been filled full of contest, hardship, and loneliness, so that every +mother's son desires, above all else, that some woman (she may be +either saint or sinner) put her hands upon him and tell him he is a +truly fine fellow and worthy to be greatly loved. This is why they +will give her all their money and not because they are of the earth +very earthy. +</P> + +<P> +Do you waggle your head at me! Do you? Then I care not a straw. It +only means you do not comprehend the ways of men at our frontier posts. +</P> + +<P> +Some men are here preparing to take the wagon trail to Grand Prairie in +the Peace River District. This trail, they tell me, is one hundred and +fifty miles long, and may be traversed in six days, a journey which +from other points formerly took as many weeks. Hitherto, it has seemed +the faraway edge of the world, a place for none save the adventurous +blooded and sturdy, but in this day it seems to lie at our very door, +for, in the North, one hundred and fifty miles is merely a stone's +cast. In the spring, fifteen thousand homesteads will be thrown open +for entry, so that presently it will seem that all creation is trekking +this way. +</P> + +<P> +And why not? It requires no fore-vision to know that the land has a +future above anxiety. Up this trail there is a new world to be +possessed, an unequalled empire, in which men may go hither and yon as +they please. It gives my feet a staccato movement to think of it. +Some city folk there are who might fear the trail, but this were +foolish. It is good to ride on a long trail and laugh out loud for +sheer joy. On the trail, the ear of Society is closed and there are +smoked goggles on her eyes. +</P> + +<P> +I have been talking to a stripling from Nova Scotia, who has been here +these four months. When first he came, there were but three girls in +the village; now, there are eighteen. As a result of this increased +immigration, the weekly dance is better attended and is more amicable. +</P> + +<P> +Besides his outfit, this Nova Scotian is taking in a year's provision +to his homestead, and so has been working to secure a sufficiency of +money. He hopes to get a steading that will one day become a town +site. This is the dream of every northern farmer: it is the gold at +the foot of the rainbow. Perhaps, my Boy o' Dreams may find it. Who +can say? Providence keeps a closer eye on farmers than we imagine. As +yet, the boy has not persuaded any girl to accompany him to Grand +Prairie. I would go myself only (I had the reason a minute ago but it +has escaped me); what was it? Oh yes! I remember now, I am already +married. The Land of Cockaigne could not have been situate in the +North, for in that most blessed land every Jack has his Jill and found +no difficulty in keeping her. No! it was never in this latitude. +</P> + +<P> +I went to two hotels before I could find a room. I should have +registered at once instead of loitering at the station. In the first +hotel they could eat me, but to sleep me was out of the question. In +the second, a stout well-looking German—or, as I prefer to call him, a +coming Canadian—took possession of me, remarking in one breath, but +with an air of great punctilio, "You would in my house put up? Der +conductor-man he so told me you to me might come. This my wife is. +You should become to each other known. She a bed for you will +get—water!—towels!—whatsoever Madam she may desire." +</P> + +<P> +"Urbanity" is the one word that fits the German, my host. His Frau, +who is of the pure Teutonic type, has a heart of great goodness, with +emotions that lie close under the exterior. +</P> + +<P> +All might have been well with me at this hotel, but, unfortunately, in +descending the closed-in stairway, I stepped on a sleeping cat and +plunged headforemost to the bottom.... "Der drouble mit you," says my +host, "a crick in der back is." The cat's "drouble" seems to be +paralysis. +</P> + +<P> +Some one has said that reserve is a sign of great things behind. Sweet +Christians! this is entirely true; I realized it to the full while +holding back the tears and assuring the assembled household I was not +even jarred. I am proud of the way I behaved, and sorry my own folk +were not there to see. Now, they will never believe it. +</P> + +<P> +One of the maids brought me brandy which I did not drink, but after +awhile, my hostess fed it to me in what she called canards. You dip a +lump of sugar into the cognac and transfer the lump to your mouth—that +is all. You could never believe how nice they taste, or how curative +they are for "crick" in the back. +</P> + +<P> +Before long I am able to limp down the street and call on the doctor. +I used to know him in days when we both lived farther south. But any +way, a previous acquaintanceship would have made no difference. We do +not need introductions at a frontier post like this, for there is an +undercurrent of good fellowship which understands that the stranger who +talks to you is not necessarily a scalawag, with subtle designs on your +purse or your person. Any one who fails to grasp this plainly obvious +fact is either a newcomer or a solemn humbug. +</P> + +<P> +This doctor has charge of the hospital car that lies in the station +yard, and most of his time is spent travelling from camp to camp down +the line of construction. I saw the car to-day, or rather I nosed it, +for the smell of iodoform came siftingly through like dry cold. It is +owned and operated by the railway company for the benefit of their +employees. At certain stations along the line, the company have placed +cottage hospitals where emergency cases are treated. Those who have +fevers or require major operations, are usually taken to the city. +</P> + +<P> +Long ago, when the earlier railroads were being constructed it was not +possible to supply such life-saving appurtenances, so that nothing +remained for the wretched fellows but to drag themselves away and die +like hurt dogs. There is a current aberration that the golden age was +"once upon a time," but, in my opinion, it is here and now, or at least +it will be when every municipality has instituted classes to teach +policemen the difference between drunkenness and a fit. I will say a +prayer about this some of these days. One must be business-like. +</P> + +<P> +As he builds up and smokes a cigarette, the doctor tells me that the +navvies and teamsters have a singularly critical taste in the matter of +medicine. They do not like tablets or medicine with an innocent +flavour. Unless it be distinctly pungent, they feel cheated. +</P> + +<P> +"Do you accede to their demand?" ask I. +</P> + +<P> +"I do, Good Lady," says he. "It is modesty that prevents my describing +to you the excellency of my flavours" (and here he assumed a truly +sagacious air): "my medicines have 'nip' to them and a body that is +really desirable. They are indescribable, but most they approach the +little girl's definition of salt—'that which makes potatoes taste bad +when you do not eat it with.' +</P> + +<P> +"I see, Dear Lady, you are still of inquisitive mind," says this Man of +Medicine. "Yes! I can see that and I dare say you will put me in a +book, so I shall not rise to your questions—not I! Let us prefer to +talk of how we shall invest our money when we sell our lots, and things +like that." +</P> + +<P> +"Real-estate is a valuable asset in this place," continues he, "if you +buy it 'near in' on the original town site, but three miles out of the +subdivisions, it is equal in value to a pop-corn prize. And yet who +can say? Who knows? In these new places, the bread we cast on the +sub-divisions has a way of returning to us in meat and pie and cake. +It is often the height of wisdom to be foolish. That singularly +unattractive person on the doorstep across the way—the shrunken, +hollow-stomached one—has made much money in buying and selling." +</P> + +<P> +"Do you believe me?" he asks with some trace of heat; "then pray heaven +speak!" For I have fallen into silence. But I will not speak—not one +word—but only smile in an enigmatical way, for the stop I am pulling +out is one of intended indifference. It is about the navvies and +teamsters I would talk and not of hollow-stomached men who gather much +money. +</P> + +<P> +The doctor rolls up two cigarettes and offers me one. +</P> + +<P> +"You will smoke?" asks he. +</P> + +<P> +"No!" says I, "not till I am sixty." +</P> + +<P> +"Let me see your palm and your nails. Humph! Lady, you had better +start now as a mere matter of expediency. Why not try this one? +Where's the use of a mouth and an index finger if you do not smoke?" +</P> + +<P> +Now, I cannot say why I do not smoke, except that there are so many +reasons why I should, and so I return to our first topic and ask, "Does +your medicine make the men well again?" +</P> + +<P> +"No, no, decidedly no!" he replies—"they allow me to hold no such +illusion. The talismans they carry, work the cure—a bear's tooth, a +lucky penny, or the image of a calendar saint. A snake's rattle is a +panacea for anything but a broken heart. Time was when men only choked +on grape seeds as did the old poet chap, Anacreon, but in these days, +the navvies get appendicitis from them. It would be offensive to +suggest other causes, in spite of the fact that most of them never +taste grapes. No! it would not be right for me to put my patients in +the wrong and shockingly poor policy." +</P> + +<P> +"Have you much trouble with drunkenness?" I query. +</P> + +<P> +"Not a great deal!" he makes answer, "for the Mounted Police have a +disconcerting habit of probing into bales of hay and of finding false +floors in wagons. They have fifty-fox power, these police fellows, +although I have heard tell that a gallon or more of whisky has been +within roping distance of them and escaped. A bottle that gets by them +is worth ten dollars, but the navvies declare whatever it costs it is +worth it. But, dear me, there are other liquids for inordinate and +uncritical thirsts, such as——" +</P> + +<P> +"Your medicine?" I suggest, whereupon our conversation abruptly ends, +for he will be no longer beset by me; and he will not give me a bottle +of liniment for "crick" in the back; no, not if I die in Edson, without +even a graveyard started wherein to bury me. He supposes Providence +knows his business, but how ever woman came to be made is a mystery far +beyond his wit's end. +</P> + +<P> +Huh! Huh! I am tingling to scratch this man's eyes out, but I only +call him a brown pirate. +</P> + +<P> +Do you think I care so much as a snap of the fingers for the medicine +of this spiteful doctor of the countryside? Not a bit of it! One of +the navvies will give me a talisman if I cannot find the cordial tree +for which I search. It grows in the North, and the fruit gives life to +strong people and faintness to the weak. It was Théophile Tremblay who +told me about it. He lives always in the woods. Once, he found the +tree but he was afraid to eat of it, for how could he know whether he +was strong or weak? He has heard tell that, in the tree, there is a +wood's-woman and that sometimes she laughs aloud, but he thinks it may +be a soul or something like that. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="60%"> + +<P> +The only drawback to happiness is the peculiar impermanence of its +character. Happiness is a large, comely person, but, withal, as +elusive as the smallest sprite. Such hours of pain as I spent last +night on this wretched sagging bed—I who was so happy only +yesterday—with nothing to look at save a little lamp with a flame like +a bleary red eye. Truth to tell, it was the eye that looked at me. It +stared till I became hypnotized, when by the blessing of God, I fell +asleep. +</P> + +<P> +This morning, I am consumed between a desire to get up and one to lie +still. In all such crises of the will, it is better to follow the line +of least resistance, and so I lie in bed. My hostess brings me an +amazingly pungent liniment which she calls "Herr the Doctor's +medisome." It came last night, but Daisy, who is a waitress, neglected +to deliver it. Perhaps the sarcastic advice which the doctor set down +for me under the word "Poison," may have frightened Daisy. +</P> + +<P> +"She a lump is, that Daisy!" says the Frau. "Believe me, Madam, for I +know. I tell her a thing to do and she doing it keeps on, till I to +stop tell her. Then I to her explain that she is not for ever to stop, +nor for ever on to go, and all the time, about everything, I have her +so to tell." +</P> + +<P> +The Frau pours on the liniment with generous measure and rubs me till I +prickle with it, and feel for all the world like a wet newspaper caught +in a wire fence. She rubs me with a used-to-things way until I beg her +to desist. I should not be surprised if Herr the Doctor took this +means of venting his spitefulness on me. +</P> + +<P> +The Frau tells me she had a vision once. I wish to experience a +vision, or a miracle, but nothing comes to me save presentments which +have their terrible plain origin on the basis of cause and effect. Her +vision was about heaven. She saw heaven quite distinctly and the +streets were really made of gold. There were no children there, but +only men and women, so that there must be a special Paradise for boys +and girls. The Frau believes heaven will be a failure because there is +no division of the sexes provided for. How, she would like to know, +could a woman enjoy heaven with men there all the time looking at +everything she does. It would be an impossible situation. +</P> + +<P> +After awhile, Daisy brings me a meal. There is a tremendous finality +about the way she sets down a tray. Daisy, in spite of her name, is +not so much a housemaid as what they used to call a stout serving +wench. She is courtly neither in figure nor manners. Her hair is +puffed out over her ears and drawn down low, till her head looks like +the husk of a hazel nut. But what odds? Daisy is splendidly plebeian +and really of more value to the community than a writing person who +falls downstairs. She cannot see for the life of her how I happened to +come out here, and so I am apologetic and find it necessary to explain. +She asks permission to try on my hat and tells me she has ordered a new +one from Edmonton. It is to have three "ostridge" feathers. +</P> + +<P> +To assure me that the cat I stepped upon is not dead, she descends to +the kitchen and returns with it. The cat seems all right except that +it sags in the middle, but Daisy says this is because it has just been +fed. I am glad I did not kill it, in that I always associate a cat +with Diana Bubastis, the Egyptian goddess who presided over childbirth, +and who was represented with a feline head. Indeed, Bubastis is said +to have transformed herself into a cat when the gods fled from Egypt—a +play of gods and women and cats that has continued even to this very +day. +</P> + +<P> +After dinner, I am able to go down to the sidewalk where I fribble away +the hours agreeably enough. It is a sun-shot afternoon, but the air is +cool to one's skin, and grateful after the scorching heat of yesterday. +</P> + +<P> +Some civil engineers who came in on the train with me are playing +baseball on the road. These are no æsthetic feeblings, these merry +gentlemen, but a sturdy breed, upstanding and handsome, with skin like +the colour of well-seasoned saddles and a smell of burnt poplar in +their hair. I think the rough clothes they wear throw their good looks +into relief. Or it may be that the people <I>are</I> better looking in the +North and have better physiques. It must be so, for the South has in +all ages drawn upon the northern blood for rejuvenation just as, in +these days, they need hard wheat to tone up their softer varieties. +</P> + +<P> +I write of them as merry gentlemen because this fornight agone I had +been watching them make ducks and drakes of their savings. When they +come to Town, which they do once or twice a year, they cannot be +accused of nearness. Each mother's son holds to the amended maxim of +this country, "Hard come, easy go." "Jack ashore," I called one the +other day. "Possibly so! Possibly," answered the delicious boy, "but +I prefer to think of myself as March—in like a lion and out like a +lamb." +</P> + +<P> +The whole Town is a foraging pasture for the engineers on vacation. +They buy everything they do not need, from gramaphone records and +swearing parrots to Gibbon's <I>Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire</I>. +They yell into the telephones as if it were a lung tester, and it makes +their hearts dance like daffodils to hire taxicabs for the day, boxes +at the theatre, and to give suppers and dances to all and sundry of +their acquaintances. Neither are they laggards in love. They are +vastly appreciative of the girls, and I am told go sweethearting with a +directness there is no possibility of misunderstanding. It is well the +girls do not take them too seriously, for they are roving bachelors +all, and would seem to be as faithful as the poet who vows his love for +Kate, and Margaret and Betty and Sweet Marie. +</P> + +<P> +Yet, once in a blue moon, an engineer and a girl make decision "to be +man and wife together," and to live in a shack on the Residency, much +to the annoyance of the townsmen, who dislike the engineers, being +inordinately jealous of them. +</P> + +<P> +The game of baseball which the engineers carry forward on the highway +is strenuous rather than scientific. Things that are considered +important in the league matches have no significance here. As I watch +the pitch and toss of the ball, it occurs to me that this game has +filtered down the ages from the primeval woods where orang-outangs +threw nuts from tree to tree. They pitch them that the young lady +'rangs might admire their cleverness and good form. You may credit me +this was the way of it. +</P> + +<P> +A Chinaman and some Indians are also watching the game. The Indians +think it fine fun, and fetch and carry the lost balls like spaniels +retrieving sticks. I like the Indian men for several reasons, but +chiefly because they are shrewd riders; have a sovereign indifference +to appearance, and never quarrel over theology. +</P> + +<P> +The game of ball was not completed, the interest of the players being +diverted by a blindly vindictive fight between a staghound and a +bulldog. I did not see the conclusion of the fight, but the honours +lay with the bulldog. "For you must know, Dear Lady," explains one of +the engineers, "that all things considered, the grip on the throat is +an eminently practical one." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap03"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER III +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +TO THE BUILDERS +</H4> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +To the builders of the highway, that skirt the canyon's brink,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">To the men that bind the roadbed fast,</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">To the high, the low, the first and last,</SPAN><BR> +I raise my glass and drink!—EVELYN GUNNE.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +As yet, there is no passenger service from Edson to the End of Steel. +Several day coaches are run, but they are chiefly for the use of the +engineers and workmen. This is how I happen to be the only woman +aboard pulling out for the mountains across this newly-made trail. +</P> + +<P> +Do not misunderstand me; it is the railroad that is new. The trail +that runs by its side was an old one when Columbus discovered America, +and beaten deep with feet, and also it is a long trail, for it leads +through to the Pacific Ocean. For centuries, it was the only mark of +human interference in this waste that is world-old. It is a trail of +lean hunger and bleeding feet, one that has ever been prodigal of +promise, but wary of accomplishment. Surely this is so, for once over +it stumbled and swore those half-mad men known as the Caribou +Stampeders—these, and other unwept, unhonoured fellows who fared into +the wilderness for what reasons even the wise Lord knoweth not. If the +bones of the red and white folk who have travelled this long, long +street were stood upright, I doubt not they would make a fence of +pickets for us all the way. +</P> + +<P> +I have no sooner thought this thing than it happens there is a dry +stirring and, in an eye-wink of time, the dead men have taken on flesh +and colour. They must have been keenly near. Grim, plainish fellows +are they, not unlike the gang around me, but rougher-clad and more +hairy. They are powerful and full-lifed men, I can see that, and the +rough-necked one with the trail stride and mop of curly hair is +Alexander MacKenzie, a Scotchman from Inverness, but late of Messrs. +Gregory & Co.'s counting-house. He is "down North" endeavouring to +open out a trade with the Indians, obtaining a foothold they doubtless +call it; his masters, the Nor'-West Fur Company—for monopolists are +always sensitive to terms. His is a continental errand (mark this +well), for he is the first white man to cross the Rockies, and to tell +us what lies over and beyond the hills where the sun goes down. Honour +to Alexander MacKenzie, Esq., of Inverness, say I! Some day, when +Messrs. the Publishers give me fuller royalties, I shall surely build a +cairn to him on the height of land e'er it falls away to the Western +Sea. +</P> + +<P> +This man lived more than a century ago, and yet, as his figure fades +back into nothingness, we see this other figure close by. It is David +Thompson, the Welshman, who has recently discovered a river, and has +called it by his own name. Also, he has captured the Astoria +fur-trade, and has established a trading post, which future generations +will know as Kamloops. +</P> + +<P> +And here is Sir George Simpson, Resident Governor of the Hudson's Bay +Company. He likes to travel with pipers who go before him, piping as +he enters a fort in order that Lo, the Red Man, may be properly +impressed. +</P> + +<P> +The ugly person with the harshly aggressive features is Sir James +Douglas. He looks as fully open to convincement as a stone pavement. +This spalpeen near by is none other than young Lieutenant Butler of +Ireland. He is gathering material for a volume he proposes to call +<I>The Great Lone Land</I>. I like the way he carries his head. Who runs +may read him for a fighter with a fighter's build. +</P> + +<P> +But on they go, and on, this long procession of pioneers, till we can +only call out their names as they file by—Dr. Hector, Daniel Harmon, +Viscount Milton, Alexander Henry, Dr. Cheadle, and other lean, +laborious fellows, long since passed into the shadows. Dead men do +tell tales. You may hear if you care to listen. +</P> + +<P> +And what a strange thing has come to pass in these latter months! The +tenuous, twisting trail—that very old trail—has been superseded by a +clean white road that is like to a long bowstring. Its impotent, +creeping life has given way before the gallant onslaught of pick and +spade, chain and transit, and before monstrous lifting machines which +have other names, but which are really leviathans. +</P> + +<P> +Hitherto, it may be said of this land what was once said of Rome, that +the memory sees more than the eye. This is no longer true. Before we +realize it, Baedeker will be setting down a star opposite the name of a +fashionable hotel in the Athabaska Valley, and the whole of this +morning world, from end to end, will be spotted with a black canker of +towns. Right glad am I to go through it this day with a construction +party, and for my own satisfaction to mentally tie together the threads +of the Past and Present. And who knows but in a century from now some +curious boy in one of these towns may find this record in an attic +rubbish-heap, and may rejoice with me over the knotted threads. (I +love you, boy! you must know this.) +</P> + +<P> +My fellows of the Way, who are young engineers, tell me the peculiarity +of each cut and grade and the difficulties they encountered. They do +not speak of stations but of "Mile 48" or "Mile 60," by which they mean +48 miles from Wolf Creek. The railway, when completed, will measure +3,556 miles. They talked of other matters mathematical, much to my +bewilderment, but from which I, for myself, ultimately deducted that +while the genie who built Aladdin's palace in a night was the champion +contractor of fairy-tale countries, he is not to be mentioned in the +same breath as these master-men who blaze out this metal highway +towards the sea. +</P> + +<P> +Each engineer lives on a residency which is twelve miles long, and it +is his duty to supervise the work of grading in his division. This +duty occupies about eighteen months, when he is moved on to another +residency. +</P> + +<P> +The men placed in a residency camp are an engineer, an instrument man, +a rod man, two chain men and a cook. Over these camps, there are +placed the chief engineer at Winnipeg; the divisional engineer at the +End of Steel; and assistant divisional engineers, who may locate at +different points from fifty or sixty miles apart. +</P> + +<P> +The grading itself is built by contractors, and sub-contractors, down +to station men, who with the aid of spades, picks and wheelbarrows, +built a hundred feet. All these are paid by the yard and according to +the nature of the soil or rock. The station men work from five in the +morning until nine or ten at night, and make from five to ten dollars a +day each. The blasters are known by the uneuphemistic title of +"rock-hogs." +</P> + +<P> +The first engineers who scouted had a hard time in their unsplendid +isolation, but now that the rails are catching up, life on the +residencies is more pleasant than one might imagine. The shack is +fairly warm and comfortable and the Powers that Be supply to the men an +abundance of the best food procurable, with a reasonable portion of +dainties. The Powers doubtless recognize the distant advisability of +keeping the engineers and their assistants in health and temper, for +after all, nothing is so expensive as sickness. Still, the men are by +no means petted. It is true that one engineer has a pair of sheets, +but these are the talk, and possibly the envy, of all the residence's +on the line. When visitors come to his residency they sleep between +the sheets, while their chivalric host betakes himself to the long desk +that is built for map work. +</P> + +<P> +Each residency has a gramophone, and some of them have small +menageries, including pet bears. In the summer, after hours, the men +have outdoor games such as baseball and tennis. They have been able on +several occasions to secure a sufficiently large attendance of women to +have a dance. It may happen that the engineer is married and that his +wife has girl-visitors, which party may be augmented by a visiting +contingency from the residency twelve miles further down the grade, or +some such fortunate happening as this. It is a heyday, I can tell you, +when this happens. +</P> + +<P> +They do not quarrel in the residencies as missionaries do at their +posts, although a man sometimes gets moody. All through the winter +they talk over everything they did when last in town, and what every +one else did. Between times, they can watch the married engineers and +declare how much better the bachelors are situated. Purple grapes were +ever sour. They told me about other things, but I forget them; +besides, they are secrets. +</P> + +<P> +One of the engineers gathers me some flowers at a wayside station, +concerning which the others, with full-throated laughter, propounded +riddles. +</P> + +<P> +"When did he ast-er?" "How much did the rose raise?" "Who gave Susan +her black eye?" These, and other problems of peculiar interest to +young bloods, the solution of which we shall never know till flowers +learn to speak plainer. +</P> + +<P> +The riddle, "Why does the willow weep?" elicits a discussion on music, +and on the sound of the wind in the pines. One man says he has read +somewhere that violin makers construct their instruments out of the +north sides of trees. He does not know if this be true, but I think it +must be, for the urging of the north wind in the trees and the soft +calling of the violin, are one and the same. They both allure to a +land where no one lives. You must have observed this yourself. +</P> + +<P> +One rueful rascal with no civic conscience, and an overweening +appreciation of his sex, gives it as his opinion that this is an +ill-reasoned theory. He declares the sound to be a screeching +crescendo that has its origin in an implacable quarrel between the wind +and the pines. The wind is a suffragette, a woman of determined +grievance, who would be better of bit and bridle and possibly of gag. +She makes the pine a butt for her insult and ridicule and a target +against which she lashes the hail and drives her shrewish snow. When +not grappling his throat with her plaguing, pestilent fingers, it is +only because she is recoiling to strike again. She calls this "a spell +o' weather." +</P> + +<P> +It is a bitter monologue this leather-fleshed, lathy-framed fellow +gives me, and I takes it as a body blow, but I answer not a word, for I +have heard it said, or perhaps I have read it, that the meek will own +the earth; besides—you can try it yourself—nothing so puzzles the +understanding of mortal man as a woman who refuses to go on defence. +Her silence fills him with a gnawing uneasiness similar to that one +feels when he has swallowed a tack. +</P> + +<P> +And yet I would like to tell him he has overstated his case; to point +out that the trees are cross-grained to the wind; that their green +spectacles prevent their seeing things in proper perspective, and that +they are deep-rooted in obsolete prejudices. Sir Pine cannot escape +being an intractable old person, seeing that woman's suffrage was not +the rule seventy-five years ago, or more, when he was born. Yes! I +should have liked to say this, but it is almost as equal satisfaction +to score a verbal chicane. +</P> + +<P> +I think, perhaps, the men felt my silence more than I intended, for +they argue the anti-suffragist out of countenance, although I have no +doubt they secretly and sincerely agree with him. To change the +subject, one of them brings me a caged squirrel he is taking to his +residency. Punch is a well-groomed squirrel and has an immoderate +tongue. His owner says that in the mountains these red squirrels +collect and dry mushrooms. They group them on a rock, or fix them in +the forks of young trees, ultimately banking them in hollow logs. He +is trying to tame Punch, but then we have all heard of the American who +tried to tame an oyster. +</P> + +<P> +Punchinello is as active as pop-corn in a pan. He is a squirrel with a +job, and not nearly so light-minded as he looks. His job is to go +round and round on a wheel but never to make progress, for the wheel is +so swung that it revolves with him. I am appalled by the absolute +inutility of it. What a life! What a life! Wearing out a wheel and +himself at one and the same time. "Let him go when you get to the +woods," say I, "it will be kinder. You have heard of those Eastern +folk, who, when they wish to praise Allah, buy birds and set them free." +</P> + +<P> +"No! I have not heard," he replies; "tell me about them." +</P> + +<P> +"There is no more to the story, that is all." +</P> + +<P> +"But I don't see the application when a fellow does not want to render +praises. I invested part of my savings at the races and the tenor of +my success was markedly uneven. I bought town lots, hoping to sell +before the second payment—'Stung'—Yes! it's as good a word as any. +The father of my best girl has cursed me to the tenth generation." +</P> + +<P> +"For what?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! for a newspaper item which concerned me. I will allow it would +have been just as well had it not appeared, but there it was! There it +was! No! I cannot see any special reason why I should set the +squirrel free. Besides" (and here he speaks softly and with a kindly +persuasiveness, as if he had butter in his mouth), "this Punchinello is +a sweet-toothed fellow, and the cook will feed him daintily; he has no +store set by for the winter; no drey, no mate; he is not properly +furred for exposure, and he would not know how to protect himself +against the hawks and stoats. Surely, you would not have him go free? +I tell you the thing would be cruelty itself, and I will not do it." +</P> + +<P> +You see, he does not know this matter is a personal one with me, I mean +the wheel that goes round and never gets anywhere. If he did it would +probably make no difference, for the peculiarity about his arguments +are their sincerity and wisdom. I always did suspect that Providence +was a large serene young man with a strain of steel in him. +</P> + +<P> +At Bickerdike, all the engineers I knew got out. Some are stationed +here; some await orders, but most of them go down the branch line that +is under construction from this point. Bickerdike is largely a tent +town, although, as yet, it is the metropolis of the Grade. I heard one +man on the train tell another it was "one of these here high-society +places where folks dance on a plank floor and don't call off the +figures." I promise to visit at Bickerdike on my return trip with some +friends I have not seen for years. No matter where you come from, it +would be almost impossible to drop off at any of these little frontier +posts without meeting some one you knew elsewhere, so representative is +the population of this Northern country. +</P> + +<P> +At each post the same question is asked the newly-arrived passenger. +"Well, what's the news along the road?" To-day the news concerns a +wash-out near the End of Steel, and doubts are expressed as to the +possibility of our getting through. +</P> + +<P> +At Marlboro, the people are talking of their cement industry, and at +the next station lumber is the topic. They are making the lumber out +of spruce. The small logs have been converted into railway ties. Some +of them are crossed. If ever you have "taken out" ties you know what +this means. As you likely haven't, I'll tell you. The railroad +contractor, when he rejects a tie, crosses the end of it with a blue or +red pencil. Once an acquaintance of mine, by name Jerry Dalton, took +out a cut of ties in the Province of Saskatchewan. One day Jerry—an +accurate man rather than a placid one—was stamping about somewhat more +rampageous than a baited bull. +</P> + +<P> +"What is the matter now, Man Jerry!" I asked; "you are always having a +big sorrow." +</P> + +<P> +"Sorrow ith it?" lisped Jerry at the top of his tall voice. "Look at +them d—— ties (begging your pardon, ma'am). Look at them ties! Does +that turkey-faced, muddle-headed idjit of a contractor think I'm +running a Catholic themetery? Crosses ith it? It's crosses he's after +giving Jerry! Troth! an' it's a crown I'll be puttin' on him." ... +</P> + +<P> +And so as I look at this pile of crossed logs by the wayside, I am +wondering who is the rascal responsible for the Catholic themetery. +</P> + +<P> +These mills belong to a Northern timber chief whose large holdings have +made them turbulent. They have called him a timber-wolf, and other +names that are smart rather than polite. As a matter of fact, any man +who pays the government dues and converts the trees into lumber for the +use of the settlers, deserves all the emoluments that can possibly +accrue. On account of floods and fires, lumbering is a precarious +industry, and the majority of operators fail thereat or carry a +nerve-grinding overdraft at the bank. +</P> + +<P> +And did you ever stand on the heights and watch a rising, ripping flood +bear out your booms and incidentally the year's logs? If you have, my +good little man, you'll be sensible to something closely approximating +a tender regard for the timber-wolves. This play of lamb and wolf is +frequently disastrous to the wolf. +</P> + +<P> +I would like to rest off here to see the whip-saw bite into the logs; +to watch the long white boards as they fall from the carriage, and to +drink in their refreshing odour, for the whole essence of the North is +concentrated in the odour of the spruce. +</P> + +<P> +Big Eddy takes its name from the whirlpool formed by the confluence of +the McLeod River and the Sun Dance Creek. The creek is an impetuous, +capering stream that leaps to the McLeod as a little laughing girl +would throw herself into the arms of her father. This is the fairest +tarrying place I have seen this way, and fit for a ball-room of the +dryads. Down in the valley beside the great bridge, the divisional +engineer has built him a wide house of logs, with hospitable porches +and chimneys that suggest generous fireplaces. I covet his right, +title and ownership thereto. They say this engineer is seventy-eight +years old, but I don't believe it. +</P> + +<P> +"Beyond all doubt he is," says one of the train officials; "believe me, +he has eaten up his teeth at the work of building roads, and he has a +heart of great goodness." +</P> + +<P> +"A strong man, is he?" I ask. +</P> + +<P> +"Why, I cannot say, only that he sticks to his work and takes the trail +with the best of them. The men say he is 'sun-ripened,' which I am +convinced means something praiseworthy, for every man is his friend." +</P> + +<P> +The Canadian Northern Railway Company is running a line immediately +parallel to this of the Grand Trunk Pacific, and as I look out of my +window I can see the men at work on the rival road. They are the +primal ploughers of the land, these railway fellows, and can cut a +valley out of a hill, like it were the rip of a brutal blade. To my +thinking, this is an enterprise of high heart and bravery..... And +yet, as I watch them at work, heaping up a grade, they seem small to +me, and paltry, like dirty boys intent on nothing more serious than +mud-pies. In some places, they build through marshy dunes that are +coppery-brown and tawny-red. Walking in these places is like walking +upstairs all the way, or like treading in deep straw, forms of exercise +most certainly concomitant with heart disease and a hackney gait. +Westward they go and Westward, these uncouth moving pictures of the +landscape, that change well-nigh as quick as those on a canvas, but +always it is a picture of a grade, a new cut, a gridiron of ties, and +long, long trails of steel. I tell you, these trails are the +heartstrings of the North. +</P> + +<P> +But you must not think that the only builders are the men. The horses, +mules and oxen help. Some folk there are who mislike the oxen, but +these are foolishly prejudiced and ill-informed. The ox, it is true, +has a tiresome straddling gait, and his brain is small in comparison +with the bulk of his head, but contrariwise he retains a stolid +reliability that keeps him at his job. Once inspanned, he has no +desire to kick over the traces or to explore foreign parts; he doesn't +bite his trace-mate, or engage in any of those little playful jinks so +strangely peculiar to northern horses and northern men, not he ... the +ox is a good sort, and one who strictly attends to business. He is an +animal that walks in the light. There are northern men who will +doubtless resent these remarks, so I may as well explain that my +comparisons have been prompted by the conduct of "the gang" which +offends my sense of decency. +</P> + +<P> +The "happy low lie down" all over the car in various stages of +intoxication. How hideous they are with their unshaven faces, open +mouths and yellow teeth! Abroad they are silly; at home they are +heart-scalds. As they sprawl over the floor like huge primeval toads, +I am consumed by a desire to kick them with my boots. Drunkenness is a +disgusting, unfleshed sin. +</P> + +<P> +And yet, these prostrate fellows are hardly more offensive than those +still able to sit up and debate about nothing. As controversialists +they remind me of the characters in <I>Alice through the Looking-Glass</I>, +who want "to deny something and don't know what it is." When any +over-wise babbler feels himself worsted in an argument, he says to his +opponent, "You are a liar." While fairly popular, this argument can +hardly be considered a logical one. It can be claimed, however, to +cover the whole ground, and to be a masterpiece of brevity. +</P> + +<P> +One fellow, who reeled through the car in a molluscous invertebrate +condition, stopped by my seat to tell me he was my friend for life. He +was old enough to have known better, and I was glad when a glorious, +tall stranger collared the fellow and hurtled him down the aisle like a +hockey-player would hurtle the puck. +</P> + +<P> +Soon afterwards the train's agent, a civil-spoken young man, came into +the car and took me into his caboose. I knew something fortunate would +happen on this journey.... And to think it came just as my nomad +spirit had failed me, and I was utterly crumpled with weariness and +hunger. +</P> + +<P> +I would here desire to reiterate my belief that Providence is a large, +serene young man, with a strain of steel in him. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap04"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER IV +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +BEHIND THE HILLS. +</H4> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Behind the hills, that's where the fairies are,<BR> +Behind the hills, that's where the sun goes down."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +I fell asleep in the cupola of the caboose and dreamed that my head was +a rubber band holding too many notes, and that it was going to snap any +second. "Hit's the bloomin' haltitude in your 'ead, Ma'am," explained +a Cockney later, and I expect he was right, for we have made an ascent +of over one thousand feet since leaving Edmonton. +</P> + +<P> +When I awake the train is standing stock-still. Here is the trouble! +the heavy rains have been playing havoc with the newly-made grades that +have hardly been shaken down to stay, and progress is necessarily slow +till the proper ballast has been laid on. Outside, on the grade, the +fireman is swearing with remarkable precision. His language is not +exactly that described by the Prayer-book as "comfortable words," but +then, a man who fires up with slack coal when the thermometer is +sometimes thirty degrees below zero naturally becomes proficient in the +use of secular expletives. +</P> + +<P> +I open my window above him and say very distinctly, "Wicked man! swear +not by the Lord Christ." Then I lean back so that he may not see me. +It must have surprised him to hear such a reproof in this no-woman's +land. Out he goes and looks up and around, and up again, but I keep +well hidden. That writer who conceived the horror of <I>The Wandering +Voice</I> was no nid-noddy fellow, I can tell you. +</P> + +<P> +As I was thinking this very thing, a voice close behind said to me, +"Wicked woman! play not the oracles," and almost I fell out of the +cupola with fright. It was the glorious tall stranger, and he was +laughing mightily. I almost hated him. Indeed, I quite hated till I +saw the joke and laughed too. +</P> + +<P> +He had been reading in the opposite bunk and, incidentally, watching so +that I might not roll out, for it is a high climb to the cupola bunk, +and there are no sides to it. He says that he is an engineer and that +the boys who left the train at Bickerdike gave him instructions to see +that I got through all right. Did I say mean things awhile ago about +certain northern men? Did I? Well then, I am a spiteful jade and my +tongue should be split. +</P> + +<P> +He has yellow fruit for me, and cherries, but hands them out carefully, +for the smell of steam from the stove shows that dinner is deliciously +imminent. The cook is turning cakes on a pan with a spat like the +sound of clog-dancers on the stage. He turns them with a grace and +intelligence which I may never hope to equal. I have an idea his elbow +and wrist work on ball-bearings. +</P> + +<P> +The glorious tall stranger whose name is <I>not</I> Burney (but it will do +as well as any other) tells me he was reared down by the Miramichi +River. He went back East to see his mother last Christmas, but it took +her some days to get used to the grown man who had left home a lad. I +can see this thing in my mind's eye. His mother is very clever and has +a beautiful face. He need not have told me this. It is true of every +man's mother "back home." +</P> + +<P> +Burney was among the first men who scouted for the railway to the West +and helped run the try-lines. Falling into the pose of the +raconteur—one very natural to the northman—he tells me tragic things, +and some that are both tragic and humorous. +</P> + +<P> +One of these was about a Mounted Policeman who was sent out from his +post to bring in a murderer. It was terribly cold weather, the mercury +almost falling out of the tube. Now, the wanted murderer is the +wariest game in the world, and to take him in those mountains one needs +boldness and caution in the right proportions—that is to say +ninety-nine per cent. of the former, and one per cent. of the latter. +The policeman who was sent out was only a stripling, but there was no +yellow in him save the streak on his trouser-legs. The round journey +was one hundred and twenty miles, but, alone and unaided, he brought in +his man, not even waiting to sleep. Almost immediately on a fresh +mount, he again started out from the post, but this time to bring in +the corpse. The second hundred and twenty miles were terribly long and +arduous ones, and the cold cut like a blade. By shutting your eyes you +can see and feel this thing: the two frost-covered horses plodding +through the bleak and sterile mountains that are grim as eternity—no +sound save the cry of starveling wolves, or the white whine of the +sleepless wind, these and the sharp-drawn breath of the men. No! we +must be mistaken. Only one man breathes, the other seems strangely +still, and his lips are tight shut. There is something peculiarly +defective in his stony eyes and stony face. If you look closer you can +see he is roped close to the horse, and that he doesn't give to the +lope.... God of men and beasts! that is a dead man that rides through +the snow, and he rides to confront his slayer.... And when the two +reached the police post, the live dare-doing man was found to be +terribly exhausted from hunger, lack of sleep, and the long, long ride, +so that his brittle nerves were like to snap in two. This was how they +came to give him the stimulants which in some way (it is not for a +tattling civilian to say the way) had not entirely worn off when he was +summoned to give evidence at the inquest. +</P> + +<P> +The auditory consisted of engineers, and chainmen from the residencies +who resented this grim sitting with a murderer, a judge and accuser, +and the white, stark man on the table, whom presently they would put to +bed with a spade. They were sitting austerely upright with grave faces +as became the occasion, when it came upon them suddenly that the police +stripling was intoxicated. It is true he faced the judge with an +uncompromising attitude and stood erect, and "at attention" as if a +perpendicular rod braced his body from his crown to his heels, but when +the judge's glance wandered for the fraction of a moment, the stripling +would wink prodigiously at the engineers, and in an unholy manner that +threw them into suppressed convulsions. The thing was grievously +grotesque. It was as though a stone altar-saint had suddenly awaked +and had put his fingers to his nose in a way that was sinister. Comedy +with her wry face was peeping through a tragic mask. It is a way of +hers. +</P> + +<P> +It was not until the judge observed the policeman constantly dropping +his papers and picking them up in a stiff unjointed way, that the +reason of the court's commotion became apparent to him. +</P> + +<P> +"What is the rest of the story?" you ask. I do not know. I am a +reviewer of books and never go so far as the end. +</P> + +<P> +Sirs and Mesdames, but it is an athletic feat climbing out of the +cupola of a caboose. I stepped on the shoulder of Burney, who is +admirably strong, and then down to a chair. The brakesmen enter the +cupola off the roof and have a way of sliding to the floor backward. +It looks easy, and if I were alone, I would surely try it. +</P> + +<P> +There were four of us for dinner, and we had pork and beans, beefsteak, +potato-cakes, rolls, peaches and coffee. The butter was tinned, but +withal toothsome, and so was the milk. The butter is shipped here from +Nova Scotia, and is supplied to all the camps on the road. I help the +cook clear away the dishes, but he thinks me rather unhandy, for I +upset both the sugar and salt. He comes from Kilmarnock in Scotland, +and is a nice lad, I can see that. He has a thicket of hair that +stands erect from his head like a growth of young spruce, and he always +looks as if he had just heard some good idea. His latest idea, he +confides, is a job with the purveyors who contract for the supplies for +all the grading camps on the line. +</P> + +<P> +Hitherto, I have always looked upon a caboose as something commonplace, +but now, I know it may be truly a Castle of Indolence. I have a sweet +tooth for this kind of life, and have no objection to continuing it for +a month. Journalists, and important people with stamped passes, go on +private cars, but the advantage of mediocrity is that you can travel in +a caboose and need not view the scenery as a commercial commodity. +When I can think of what to say, I will write a story called "The +Romance of a Railway Van." Its setting will be in the hills. The +heroine will be a southern girl of probably twenty summers (with a +corresponding number of winters). She shall be no fine die-away lady, +but middling strong and built to go out in all weather. Each move of +the romance will be made by invisible kelpies, ogres and dryads, who +will say "Ha! Ha!" and "Ho! Ho!" and who will clap their hands when +the wicked flourish, or valour wins against the odds. But I never +could think this story out, so I pass it on to you. +</P> + +<P> +At the McLeod River the grades begin to spy into the mountains. These +mountains have all the bewilderment of an elusive dream, and in the +thin northern air seem nearer than they really are. There is a +come-hither look about them. It is well, at first, to thus see from a +distance, for to stand against a mountain is to lose one's sense of +proportion and symmetry. +</P> + +<P> +At Prairie Creek the road runs high up on a ridge to the south of the +Athabaska Valley, so that it looks like a ribbon of steel basted on to +the hills. The Athabaska River is wide and swift here, and has what +the Japanese call the language of line. The Cree Indians call it the +<I>Mistahay Shakow Seepee</I>, meaning thereby the great river of the woods. +A semi-spectral mist rises off its waters, as if it were an incense to +the mighty spirit, Manitou. +</P> + +<P> +It would be well if I, one of the first of the tourists who, world +without end, will travel through these hills, could tell how they +impress me, but I am crushed into a wordless incompetency. I cannot +speak the language of this land nor interpret its spirit. These hills +of White Alberta have something to say, but they will not say it. It +must be true what the essayist wrote, that you cannot domesticate +mountains. +</P> + +<P> +There appears to be no life here, nor any form of sentience, but when +it is dark, the grizzly bear, the lynx, the moose, and other +night-things, will move out for purposes of life or death. +</P> + +<P> +Alexander Mackenzie, who entered these defiles one hundred and +twenty-five years ago, wrote down that the Atnah Indians believed all +this land was made by a mighty bird whose eyes were fire, the noise of +his wings thunder, and the glances of his eyes lightning. This bird +created all things from the earth except the Chipewyans, who were made +from dogs. Now the Chipewyans and the Atnahs were not on borrowing +terms. +</P> + +<P> +These were the times when the Indians were as plentiful in the +Athabaska Valley as dandelions in a meadow, and they told this +Mackenzie of Inverness how, in the good old days, their ancestors lived +till their throats were worn out with eating and their feet with +walking. +</P> + +<P> +The Athabaska Valley is enclosed by a circle of the hills, the two most +prominent of these being Roche Perdrix, or Folding Mountain, and Roche +Miette. The latter peak takes its name from the French word <I>roche</I>, +meaning "rock," and <I>miette</I> which is the Cree for sheep, this because +of the mountain-sheep which make it their home. It is 8,000 feet high +(I give you the height because it is not legal to go down the line +without so doing). Somewhere, near here, at Fiddle Creek, at a height +of 1,200 feet above the railway, there are wonderful hot springs +concerning which Burney talks learnedly. I pretend to understand all +about sulphuric anhydride, and carbon dioxide, and 127 degrees +Fahrenheit, but do not really know if there are things which should be +remembered or forgotten. +</P> + +<P> +Other of the peaks which enclose the Valley are Roche Ronde, Roche +Jacques, Bullrush and Roche Suette. Off to the west, the range of +hills silhouetted against the sky is known as the Fiddle Back Range. +These are crowned with snow, but as the sky changes, take to themselves +its moods—coral-red, opal, stone-blue and a mellow, purple glow, which +blend and shift like the weird fantasy of the auroral lights. +</P> + +<P> +It is an idea of mine that these hills are the lair of the running +winds which for past eons have swept in bitter streaks across the +prairies, winnowing them like a thresher would winnow grain. +Seven-leagued boots have they and no man has tracked them down. How +could a man when they fling dust in his eyes? They are the bitter +scouts of the North who fight as they go. I have no doubt their home +is hereabout. It might be found if we had time to stay, but this would +take too long, for you must surely understand these winds are +non-resident to a degree that is nothing short of scandalous. +</P> + +<P> +At this point, we ought in all propriety to talk about Brule Lake, +which is not a lake at all, but an enlargement of the river. We should +nudge each other and remark that this is Jasper Park; that it consists +of 5,450 square miles, and that it is held in perpetuity for the +nation. I should ask, "Why do they call it Jasper Park?" and you, my +fine fellow-farer, should tell me how old Jasper Hawes was one of "the +gentlemen adventurers" of the Hudson's Bay Company, and doubtless a +purposeful man and clever. "But why do they call this defile 'the +Yellow Head Pass?'" I should further query, whereupon you ought to +reply, "I perceive you are an untaught person else you had heard how +this Jasper Hawes had hair the colour of September wheat in the sheaf, +so that the Indians called him 'Tete Jaune' or 'Yellow Head,' much +after our mischievous manner of turning about on the street to look +after a lady who is flaxen." +</P> + +<P> +Yes! we should say all this, and more, but it might sound like the +private car "write-up," so we had better not. Besides, our engine has +come to a sit-still and will not go a step farther. The gossip we +heard at Bickerdike about the wash-out has been verified. The +officials in the private car are in no very graceful temper over this +landslide, and some of the men on the firing-line who dug and blasted +and built the grade, are going to have their hearts cut out because of +it. +</P> + +<P> +The trouble is that these vastly particular officials conceive of the +mountain into whose body they have slashed as a dead thing—dead as +pickled pork—whereas it is splendidly alive. Because of the malapert +efforts of the builders, the mountain has shaken its monstrous sides +with laughter till the tears ran adown its face and washed out their +puny sticks and stones. One might hint this to the officials, but one +is scared to. They belong to the unamiable sex and are showing an +anger highly disproportioned to the cause. Indeed, I saw a very +special official put the hot end of his cigar in his mouth. Sometime +to-night, a few flat cars will come from the End of Steel to convey the +gang thither. The gang will climb up one side of the wash-out and down +the other, and I will too, if the train's agent will let me, but from +his hard-baked, non-committal manner, I glean he is predetermined to +take me back to Edson in the caboose. +</P> + +<P> +The men have lighted a fire in the hills, and this fire seems to be the +kernel of the land. Strange elemental figures appear and disappear in +the darkness as though they were performing unnamed, unholy rites. +They seem human but, perhaps, they are spirits, for I have some +splendid clues that these mountains are the haunted house of the world. +</P> + +<P> +Here, there are eyes that watch you all the time, but they are hidden; +and if you have a listening ear you may hear voices that call. The +gods come close in the hills. They go whispering about in the night +and calling your name. +</P> + +<P> +Foolish folk there are who say that the world is old, and that all its +songs are sung. There is a new song that can never be told, else I +would tell it to you. Only it may be heard. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="60%"> + +<P> +A man whose face is covered by the dark is spinning a yarn about an +engineer lad on this grade who truly loved an Indian girl. This is +what he says— +</P> + +<P> +"She died a week ago, and the lad was with her. It is a beautiful +story, but I know another like hers. It is about a butterfly that had +specks of gold on its wings." +</P> + +<P> +I did not see the gang climb down the crevasse and up the other side, +but I heard the low lorn echo from the train roll up along the crags +and die away in the snows. The train's agent said I could go to the +End of Steel if I insisted, but I was not to insist. This is why I am +travelling back to Edson. Only I am disappointed much, but he says I +may come again soon, when no one shall disallow me. It would have been +all right for me to go with the gang, and I could have taken care of +myself: any woman could who has been years and years "in society." +</P> + +<P> +The agent and the Scotch boy have made a bed for me on a wide bench +with my blankets and cushions. If little private, the bed looks wholly +comfortable. +</P> + +<P> +"You'll be after loosenin' your collar," says the young person from +Kilmarnock as he fluffs up another cushion, "an' ye 'ull be takin' off +baith your shoes an' your stockin's. I'll be keepin' the daftie loons +out o' the car till ye get a bit o' sleep." +</P> + +<P> +For the benefit of the nervous readers I may add he does not say, +"ye'll be layin' off your bloose," but these are such nice lads I could +do so with absolute propriety. +</P> + +<P> +And they turn the lamp low and shade it with paper while I am asking my +prayer. And I pray, "Spirits of the Mountains and Rivers, be not angry +with me for talking in the hills. Gods of the North, strong Gods who +watch over little children and us older ones, let me sleep in quietness +this night, and at last bring me home in safety where all the lights be +white ones." +</P> + +<P> +And I press my lips to the palm of my heart-hand to say "Amen," and to +let the gods know I love them. To let them know I love them! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap05"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER V +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE END OF STEEL. +</H4> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +I love the hills and the hills love me<BR> +As mates love one another.—MACCATHMHAOIL.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +It is over a year since, in the last chapter, I was turned back from +the End of Steel because of a wash-out on construction, and now I am +come back, but this time, through the kindness of the Grand Trunk +Pacific Railway, on a through service, electric-lighted, +fast-scheduled, no-fare excursion. And on this occasion, I am not the +only woman on the train but merely one among a hundred, for this, you +must know, is the triennial excursion of the women journalists and +authors of Canada. The men present may be counted on one hand. The +engineers who travelled with me last time have gone on further to new +outposts. +</P> + +<P> +"What are they doing?" you ask. I'll tell you. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"They are busy building railways on<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The map's deserted spot,</SPAN><BR> +Or staking out an empire in<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The land that God forgot."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Doers of deeds are these men and the world has salted them with curious +and stern experiences. To my way of thinking, Dinny Hogan, boss +contractor, with his blue eyes that are the blue of steel, is a bigger +man than the First Lord of the Admiralty and his work is of more +permanent value to the Empire. It was only the other day that Dinny +made an arch of "coyotes"—that is to say, of round holes—in one of +the mountains, and into them he packed fifty carloads of gunpowder. +The reader may find it difficult to follow this idea, but no doubt he +could if he saw where Dinny removed the mountain in one shot. This +would seem to be a kind of big game shooting which has all others +vanquished into nothingness. This is a wonderful trail through the +mountains—the pass called the Yellowhead—a level ribbon of land along +which the steels are laid for most of the way. But in some places, a +road has been blasted out just to show how the mountains can be beaten. +These lords of earth and sky, when called upon, must bow their +unwilling necks to the yoke of steel. And no proper-spirited person +can stand in this pass without feeling the challenge of the hills and +without an immutable desire to conquer them. This I take it is the +spirit of the buccaneer. +</P> + +<P> +The highest mountain in these Rockies is Robson, called +<I>Yu-hai-has-kun</I> by the Indians, meaning thereby a high, winding road. +The Alpine Club of Canada intend, one of these times, to erect a châlet +at Mount Robson so that they may attempt to scale it often. Three men +succeeded in making the ascent this very summer. They were roped +together for thirty hours, and when they had come down again, their +faces were seen to be cut and greatly marred. These men spoke fine and +glorious things concerning the hilltop, and of how they looked down +upon five hundred other peaks, but, in strait and narrow minds like +ours, these climbs may be accounted only as strange follies. I have +talked to Clausen Otto about these things, for he has been a guide +hereabout these ten years or more, and is a notable man of affairs. He +said I was only a terribly lame dog in front of a terribly high stile, +and then, fearing that his comment was truthful rather than polite, +Otto proceeded to salve my feelings by explaining how the desire to +climb glaciers was an ill-regulated one, and that what the Bible said +about sucking honey out of a rock was "plumb foolishness." +</P> + +<P> +Once, he was climbing with a hunter of goats when a bear came swiftly +over the glacier-clad peak of the mountain. They were greatly puzzled +to know why the bear had climbed so high, and why it dashed across the +summit. Surely there was something remarkable on the other side of the +peak. After climbing several hours they made the ascent and looked +over. "What do you think we saw?" asked Otto. +</P> + +<P> +"Give it up," said I. +</P> + +<P> +"I wish we had too," said Otto; "there was nothing on the far side but +another glacier." +</P> + +<P> +Perhaps, the literary critics will help me decide if Otto meant this +for the parable of the climber or whether he was only singularly adept +in the art of suggestion. +</P> + +<P> +You do not see Mount Robson till you have passed by. Our train stops +to let us look aright, but cloud curtains obscure the turrets of this +great temple of stone. Like a sorrowful Caryatid it stands erect under +the burden of the sky. But, after awhile, the veil is rent asunder and +a tingling flood of light spills itself on the snow in blurs of garnet +and blue and gold which scintillate and blend like the colours of a +shell: Of a surety, the North has the alchemy that transmutes base +metals into gold. +</P> + +<P> +What else may one see at Robson in this dream of summer Canada? Come +near till I whisper! You may see white horses—and roan—and chariots +of fire, but not every one can. This is one of the mountain's secrets. +</P> + +<P> +And if you listen you may hear what the hills talk about, but you must +listen. One mountain who is not so solemn as you might imagine wishes +to deny that he is of the earth, earthy. +</P> + +<P> +"Bosh!" he said, and "Stuff! Any one who hasn't moss on his eyes can +see I am of the rocks, rocky!" +</P> + +<P> +"Mark me and be astonished!" boasts a stupendous fellow near by whose +face is furrowed by snow-slides. "I am a western mountain. Beat me if +you can!" +</P> + +<P> +"I used to be a fish plantation," remarks a chalky-looking individual. +"It was in the cretaceous period and I lay underneath the sea." +</P> + +<P> +"Lobster plantation?" queries the western one. +</P> + +<P> +"No, you froward ignoramus," replies the fossiliferous fellow, "I +consist of Inoceramus problematicus, Faseiolaria buccinoides, and other +aristocratic mollusks of the which you have never even heard." +</P> + +<P> +... Overhead, an aweless eagle, rising wing above wing says to his +sweetheart, "It is my opinion God made these mountains for no other +reason than that you and I might build our nest in them....." +</P> + +<P> +There is, in this region, a body of water called Maligne Lake, and +Jules DuBois, a trapper, whose son is married to 'Toinette, the niece +of the second cousin of Pierre, whose mother-in-law was the third wife +of Black Moccasin, the chieftain, once told me that this lake is +dreaded by the Indians because there are no fish in it. This is why it +is called "maligne." It frets Jules at the heart to go near it, for he +has heard how the fish have been frightened away by a dead man who +lives there. This man can see without eyes and his face is like a +fungus with white teeth. When he laughs there is a noise in his throat +like the crackle of tamarack twigs, freshly lighted. +</P> + +<P> +Because of the glaciers on these hills and the warmth of the summer in +the valleys, this atmosphere seems like that of an eternal spring. +Just to breathe it is a delight. Here the air strokes you into +quietness till you forget the tearing hurry of life; the fretting +uneasiness that rasps, and the hurt that comes of the fight. This is a +sating of one's desire for the spiritual. And should you wish for a +token you may stay awhile and drink of the water that cascades over the +rocks. This is living water. This is the good wine of the hills. You +may drink it in remembrance. +</P> + +<P> +I am very sorry I must die some day and miss these wilding joys and the +odour of the trees and flowers, but it is my comfortable hope that when +I return to Claeg, the Round One, who is called the earth, I shall be +evolved into a pine-tree and grow happily in this mountain pass. Then +will other people come to, even as I come to these trees, and say, +"Good morning, my friend! I have been lonely for you." +</P> + +<P> +The pines are our fellow-creatures and more closely related to us than +anything that has roots in the earth. They speak to our inmost being. +A group of pines will restore sanity to the disdistracted and sorrowful +mind, for they are cordial trees, and in quietness and confidence is +their strength. The pines are never tremulous or trivial, neither do +they fade or die. Other trees are green for awhile, but these all the +while. +</P> + +<P> +... Pippa, the little maid who sang for the world's hurt, came out of +the woods, as likewise the Nazarene who died for it. +</P> + +<P> +Upland growths are the pines as befitteth the gods of the arboreal +world. They are northern trees, "the chief things of the ancient +mountains, the precious things of the lasting hills." Their history is +writ far back in the black strata of the carboniferous age, and that +they will be the last trees to disappear off the earth, who can +gainsay? As for me I shall not be persuaded otherwise though a man +rise from the dead to tell me. +</P> + +<P> +And now we have come to Jasper, where we have two hours to rest off and +talk to the men of a construction camp who have struck work for the day +in order to see the train come in. Of course, it does not take all +their day for this, but there were the preliminary toilet preparations +to make and the walk in and out. Such newly shaven chins; such freshly +brushed clothes; such irreproachable boots! Who could have expected it! +</P> + +<P> +Like the ascetics who of old-time went into the wilderness and found +themselves dreaming of scarlet lips and white arms, so these fine +fellows are ever fancying a comely woman gliding across their trail; a +distressed damsel who needs to be fed and carried for long, long +distances and sheltered in a low-built house of logs that is +well-warmed and well-provisioned, with no other bachelor nearer than a +hundred miles. +</P> + +<P> +The bachelors will doubtless deny this sweet dalliance with a vehement +fervour, but it has the matter of fact virtue of being true, and is no +whimsey of mine. A year ago it was, in a prize competition, I was +called upon to read over a hundred short stories, or more properly +speaking, human nature studies. An amazingly large proportion of these +came from northern camps, and in nearly every case the afore-mentioned +situation was the theme. The variation from this concerned a young +Englishman of education who is notified that he has inherited wealth at +home but prefers to stay with his woodland wife—a beautiful Indian +girl—rather than return to the granitic conventions of the old world, +and to the busy idleness that goes by the name of society. +</P> + +<P> +And why deny that their hearts are a-brim with dreams, for these are +beautiful reveries and worthy the most chivalrous of knights. Since it +was given me to look into the recesses of their minds I have liked them +better than ever and am many times heartily glad. Any woman who is a +gentleman would. +</P> + +<P> +And here Opportunity has spilled a whole trainload of women before +them—old and young, wise and otherwise. It would be tempting the +patience of Providence if they didn't meet the train, these bachelors +who would gladly lose a rib. +</P> + +<P> +"Such a waste of excellent material," says a poetess who looks over the +bachelors with an appraising eye. "How big they are! Someway or +other, they make me think of steel girders." +</P> + +<P> +"Ragingly handsome, I call them," says a petite miss who edits a page +on a big eastern daily. "Do you think it possible, Lady Jane, that +they—could—have—holes—in—their—socks?" +</P> + +<P> +"Not only possible, My Dear, but highly probable," I reply. +</P> + +<P> +"What odds?" asks Cy Warman, the poet. "It is recorded that President +Taft was noticed to have a hole in his sock when he took off his boots +in a Tokyo tea-room." +</P> + +<P> +"I am persuaded," remarks an historian who has been listening, "that it +is the duty of the Prime Minister of Canada to import wives for the +bachelors who live on the frontiers. He has most excellent precedent +in the case of Talon, the Intendant, who in 1670, because of the +disparity of the sexes in this country, imported one hundred and +sixty-five young women. Moreover, Talon specified that in sending out +these girls from France, the King should see that they had good looks +and were strong and healthy." +</P> + +<P> +"My fellow-women!" interrupts a society reporter, who is an incarnation +of frankness, "lend me your ears; I won't need your money. I intend +coming here to live. No longer will I remain a martyr to good form. I +am weary to death of musicales and other entertainments of an +objectionable character. I intend to quit the 'best circles,' the +'local coteries,' and the '<I>haut noblesse</I> in favour of a man with a +bungalow at Jasper, and for these delectable mountains with the glories +thereof. Now, what do you say to that?" +</P> + +<P> +"Taken," replies a distinctly masculine voice in the rear—a voice that +might come from a steel girder—whereupon the rest of us discreetly +retire to allow for the arrangement of preliminaries. Love is born +through effrontery more often than we think. +</P> + +<P> +When we have achieved the sights of Jasper we entrain for Tete Jaune +Cache, a beautiful moping place on the Fraser River. All the way along +we pass through the fastnesses of the hills, places of glamour and +mystery, and perhaps of fear. Here our eyes are pleasured with an +illusive perspective or an uncertain silhouette; a fantastic rock-form +cut out by the cruel chisels of the ice; a precipitous gorge up which +the adventurous trees have stormed in darkened files; a welt of green +where the moss has healed the hurt of the avalanche; a snow-born river +with its white-toothed angry waters, a splash of ice called a +glacier—a steady, long-living splash obedient only to the sun. +</P> + +<P> +The artists with us talk of values, vistas, truth of space, +chiaroscuro, mellowness of effect, and transparence of air. Perhaps +they are right, but it seems to me that when Nature stretched her stone +canvas in the Rockies she did not trouble with the trivialities of +pleasing prettiness or technical nicety. She brushed in her colours +with a boldness of mass and outline, with an energy and expression that +stagger. There is no ambiguity about them. She used primary colours +and never hesitated. Royal purple, the orange light of fire, and the +sickening red in which Tintoretto has painted the wounds of his +martyrs, she here emphasized by the "cold virgin snow" on the peaks. +</P> + +<P> +For uncounted centuries, silence has brooded over the beauty of these +imperturbable hills and over their unpathed, desolate places which only +the eyes of the gods have seen. It is well with me this day that I +journey through them, for here, as in Eden, the terrestrial and +celestial may be one. It is well, too, that in passing I may shut my +eyes and mentally sing the song of the land as it came hot from the +heart of a poet in his home at the foot of these hills— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Oh, could ye see, and could ye see<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The great gold skies so clear,</SPAN><BR> +The rivers that race the pine shade dark,<BR> +The mountainous snows that take no mark,<BR> +Sunlit and high on the Rockies stark<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">So far they seem as near.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +But could ye know, and forever know<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The word of the young Northwest;</SPAN><BR> +A word she breathes to the true and bold,<BR> +A word misknown to the false and cold,<BR> +A word that never was broken or sold,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">But the one who knows is best."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +At Tete Jaune Cache, they are preparing to "strike camp" and move on to +Mile 149. This has been the supply station for all the outposts, which +means more than you may think, for the Railway Company furnishes an +amazingly generous and varied bill-of-fare to its employees. +</P> + +<P> +Don't ask me what you can get here, for I won't tell lest the urban +epicures whose jaded palates need tickling should start out in a body +for this lodge at Tete Jaune. +</P> + +<P> +And the leading man in the kitchen has the most substantial merit and +can roast a sirloin of beef or bake a cake of prodigious bigness for +the men's supper just as he can cunningly and designedly contrive a +pimento bisque, an omelette espanol, or shrimps à la créole for the +boss and his company. I'll not tell another word about the fare, but, +believe me it is "with such cookery a monkey might eat his own father." +</P> + +<P> +Te' Jaune, as it is familiarly called in the North, is situated on the +Fraser River. Because of the snow melting on the mountains, the Fraser +is swollen as if the waters surged from underneath. While we wait, +swart, husky-looking men are putting off to Fort George in primitive +craft built of squared logs. These boats are called scows. They are +carried along by the current which is from six to eight miles an hour, +and are guided by means of a paddle with a vast yellow blade. +</P> + +<P> +As the men pass on and wave their hands to us, a fret falls on me to go +with them along this river-road to its very end, and if you are of my +kin you would want it too. We would live sturdily; we would be sopped +in sunshine, and God would give us joy. +</P> + +<P> +At Te' Jaune there are many tongues spoken, for the workmen hail from +all over the universe. Of late, we have heard much about these +foreigners and of "those nations which we, so full-mouthed, call +barbarous." Certain Canadians are enwrathed and utterly discomfited +because of them. It is their desire to tidy up the country by sending +the "alien offscourings" to where they belong. They tell us that our +manners will become corrupted and our institutions imperilled by them. +</P> + +<P> +This fear of strangers is not peculiar to our country and age. +Strangers have, in all lands, been looked upon as enemies to the +commonwealth, and consequently to be avoided or extinguished. +According to Flavius Josephus, when Moses came to die he said, "Oh you +Israelites and fellow-soldiers.... I would advise you to preserve +these laws to leave none of your enemies alive when you have conquered +them, but to look upon it as for your advantage to destroy them all, +lest if you permit them to live, you taste of their manners and thereby +corrupt your own proper institutions. I do farther exhort you to +overthrow their altars and their groves and whatsoever temples they +have among them, and burn all such, their nation and their very memory +with fire; for by this means alone the safety of your own happy +constitution can be secured to you." +</P> + +<P> +The Jewish constitution was not worth the price asked; neither is ours. +This should be far from the spirit of Canada—"the manless land that is +crying out for the landless man." Canada is the child of the nations +and our husky provinces have need of these husky peoples. Not only +must we open wide our doors and bid them a good welcome, but having +entered, it must be our endeavour to weld them into a seemly and +coherent whole. +</P> + +<P> +This is a task which is half accomplished e'er it is begun, for the +Russian, the Italian, the Scandinavian and all our immigrants are eager +to be like the Canadians, to speak our language, to wear our clothes, +and to think, talk and walk like us. Their differentiation is a burden +to them and they desire to drop it as quickly as possible. +</P> + +<P> +These Coming Canadians from Europe are of a fine advantage to this +country where thousands of miles of roads and railways are to be built, +in that they perform the more onerous tasks of digging and drainage +which the Canadian, British, and American turns from as menial and +unworthy. It would be a wide mistake for us to turn back from our +sea-ports these unlearned and common peoples who seek entrance—as +foolish as the farmer who would fear a large yield of wheat lest he +could not thresh it, or a banker who dreaded an inrush of gold lest he +could not count it. +</P> + +<P> +It was Michael Gowda, a Ruthenian living at Edmonton, who expressed for +his people their feelings of loyalty towards the land of their adoption +in a poem entitled "O Free and Fresh-home Canada"— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"And are you not, O Canada, our own?<BR> +Nay, we are still but holders of thy soil,—<BR> +We have not earned by sacrifice and groan<BR> +The right to boast the country where we toil.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +But, Canada, our hearts are thine till death,<BR> +Our children shall be free to call thee theirs,<BR> +Their own dear land where, gladly drawing breath,<BR> +Their parents found safe homes, and left strong heirs.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Of homes, and native freedom, and the heart<BR> +To live and strive and die, if need be,<BR> +In standing manfully by honour's part<BR> +To guard the country that has made us free."<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap06"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER VI +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +BITTER WATERS +</H4> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +I +</H4> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +They could not drink of the waters of Marah, for they were +bitter.—<I>The Pentateuch</I>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"Tweet, my little plover! Thy lips are like unto the bleeding +strawberry." +</P> + +<P> +Wasi, the father, smiled indulgently on this child-play, cooing +chatter, and sweet-flavoured words of his girl-wife as she fondled +their wonder-eyed baby. +</P> + +<P> +And in truth, it was a round dimpled baby—a cunning, cuddling papoose +that looked for all the world like a live bronze. Wasi did well to +smile. +</P> + +<P> +The older Braves had sneered at Wasi, "the Yellow Pine," for had he +not, they asked, breathed the breath of his squaw till his heart was +even as faint and soft as a squaw's heart. But Wasi of the swart face +heeded not their gibes for he loved Ermi with the flaming love known +only to men of hot heart and greedy senses. +</P> + +<P> +"Lazy one, to sleep till sun is high," merrily chided Ermi. "Little +Ninon has been awake since the dawn raised the meadow-larks." +</P> + +<P> +Wasi rose hastily, for he would take the trail early to the sun-dance, +and it was four suns' journey to the North. +</P> + +<P> +Once, Ermi had gone when she was ten spring-tides old, but the +cruelties of the scene with its shrill jubilations, had bitten +themselves into her memory. Her brother had been one of the candidates +for the coveted title of "Brave," and she had seen the wooden skewers +thrust through the muscles of his chest by which he was suspended to a +tree and from which he only freed himself by tearing away the flesh. +Since then, she had been to the mission school at St. Albert, and the +nuns had taught her that the body was holy, "a temple," they called it, +and that the sun-dance was sinful exceedingly. +</P> + +<P> +Father Lament at the cathedral had christened her Agatha, for she had +come to them in February on the day of the virgin-martyr of Sicily. +But Wasi was a Pagan, and called her Ermi. +</P> + +<P> +Ermi busied herself laying out Wasi's beaded moccasins, his bow of +cherry-wood with its leathern thong, and his arrows of Albertan +willows, that were winged with eagle feathers and tipped with iron. +</P> + +<P> +All the while she sang a quaint song about love. +</P> + +<P> +"Why singest thou thus!" asked Wasi. "'Tis the foolish song of the +hunters from the south-land." +</P> + +<P> +But Ermi laughed as she sang— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"'Twas odour fled<BR> +As soon as shed,<BR> +'Twas morning's winged dream;<BR> +'Twas a light that ne'er can shine again<BR> +On life's dull stream."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Then, as Wasi held his pony, Ermi kissed her brave and rested her +slight little body against him with love speaking in every line of its +limp abandon. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +II +</H4> + +<P> +Outside, the smouldering sun sank earthward in a drapery of blood-red. +In the tepee, the fierce dryness of the hot winds breathed on the baby +that lay dying by the open door. +</P> + +<P> +The Indian women feared the measles more than any other plague, and so +Ermi had been alone all the days, save only for the medicine-man who +had come to her thrice. He would drive out the evil spirits who had +caused the sickness, but Ermi only shook her head and held little Ninon +the closer. Once, she had seen him sear the flesh of Cheneka with a +burning piece of touchwood, and he had sucked the blood from the breast +of Kon. Besides, Ermi was a Christian and worshipped always at the +shrine of the great white virgin. +</P> + +<P> +The hours passed, horrible hours, and still in her loneliness and +parching anxiety she cried for the life of her baby, cried the prayers +of impotence to omnipotence. Already the baby-face was old and tired, +but the mother crooned and rocked her all through the night till, at +dawn, the wearied eyelids drooped over the darkened eyes for the last +time. The dove had found no rest for the sole of her foot. +</P> + +<P> +Ermi knew where there lay a great stone in the coulee off by the river +bank. She would carry her baby thence and bury it under the stone, +safe from the grovelling of wolves. +</P> + +<P> +Then she washed the tiny form and combed the tangles from the soft +hair, looping it back from the face with a band of scarlet. "After +all," she mused, "life has no beauty so wonderful as death." +</P> + +<P> +And because it was the tribal belief that if a corpse were carried +through a door, the next person following would shortly die, Ermi put +Ninon through the window, for Wasi would come home soon and the dread +fate might fall on him. +</P> + +<P> +Gathering the little clod of flesh in her arms and pressing it closely, +the dry-eyed mother set out on her journey across the wide-lying +plains. On and on she walked, trudge, trudge, trudge, under a brazen +sky that looked down pitiless and tearless. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! If Wasi were here," she thought. "He would carry the spade and I +would hold little Ninon only. If Wasi were here!" +</P> + +<P> +The ground reflected heat to her weary soul and body, and the weight of +the world seemed to crush her frail being. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, Mother of God! Sweet Mother of God!" she moaned. "How the sun +burns, and I am very tired." +</P> + +<P> +But the women of the Braves are in pain and weariness often, so Ermi +staggered on till she reached the coulee, with its boulder that had +been carried hither by the river when it overflowed its banks at the +last springtide. +</P> + +<P> +Laying her burden in the shadow of the rock, Ermi hollowed out an +earthen cradle for the baby. She lined it with green, too, just as +they had done at school when any one died, and then passionately +kissing Ninon, she wrapped a bit of blanket about her, for the living +would have the dead sleep soft and warm. +</P> + +<P> +Ermi tried to think a prayer, but she had forgotten them all since the +nights when Ninon was sick. She could not think of even one. She only +noticed that the white butterflies swam lazily to and fro like floating +blossoms, and that the sunflowers were wondrously beautiful as they +punctuated the rank, shaggy grass with gold. Lissome lilies swayed +gently in the hot breeze and made blotches on the earth like spilled +wine. +</P> + +<P> +At midday, the lilt of a lark stabbed the air, and the sound roused +Ermi, for she rose sharply to her feet and sang with hoarse voice and +stiff lips— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"'Twas odour fled<BR> +As soon as shed;<BR> +'Twas morning's winged dream;<BR> +'Twas a light that ne'er can shine again<BR> +On life's dull stream."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +The startled gophers darted into their cover and waited. When they +looked again, the mother had packed the little form in clay, had rolled +to the stone and lay face down wards on the earth. It was early dawn +when she rose from her vigil. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +III +</H4> + +<P> +As Ermi neared the house, she saw that Wasi had returned, and with +bursting heart she ran to tell him of their sorrow. His face grew sad +and stern as he listened, but again, it lit up as he took her by the +hand and led her to see Asa, the woman he had brought as a wife to his +hut. Asa, who would be to her as a sister, one whom she would love in +the place of Ninon, the child. +</P> + +<P> +There are half-hours that dilate to years, and Ermi seemed to have +suddenly grown cold. It was as though the vampire vixen who haunts the +muskeg swamp had suddenly sapped her youth. Ermi spoke nought, only +she laughed like Kayosk, the sea-gull, as he flies across Lac Wabamun, +a loud laugh and bitter, like the taste of sleugh salt in summer. +</P> + +<P> +She knew the unwritten laws of their tribe permitted polygamy, but she +knew not that, even in his best love, a man's heart is never entirely +absorbed, that no Wasi ever belongs wholly to any Ermi, knew not that +this is the tree of woman's crucifixion. +</P> + +<P> +And Wasi endeavoured to comfort her, but she was only silent and +motionless. He told her of the great sun-dance, and of the feastings, +and of how the sisters of the youths had cut little pieces of flesh +from them, but the youths cried not, for they were no weak women. +</P> + +<P> +Then Ermi moved around gently and prepared food for Asa, who wore a +wreath of yellow blossoms wherewith Wasi had crowned her. +</P> + +<P> +Sometimes, as she moved to and fro, she stopped as in a dream to look +at the glowing and beautiful body of her rival. The woman was lithe as +a sapling, her cheeks were like wild red roses, and her mouth was like +to a bow and arrow when it is set. Asa's hair was blue-black, but her +skin was almost white, for her father had been a pale face, one of the +Company's men at Fort Edmonton. +</P> + +<P> +But Ermi neither spoke nor complained, even when she read in Wasi's +eyes strange depths of passion as he looked on the lovely stranger. A +few days agone, she would have torn this woman to pieces, but there was +no rage in her heart now. The world had hardened around her, and she +could not cut through. +</P> + +<P> +And so four moons filled and waned, and darkness and sun passed +unheeded to the stricken Ermi, for the light had gone out of her life, +and from the heavens too. +</P> + +<P> +The women who loved her, and even Asa, tried to break her apathy, but +guessed not that her wound was past all surgery—that her life was a +bitter marah into which no tree of healing could fall. +</P> + +<P> +Some said the sun had kissed her when she carried little Ninon to the +coulee, and others said it was the touch of God, for the world has +always a name for a broken heart. +</P> + +<P> +Once the wife of Tusda told her that Ninon was better off and not +needing her in the least, but this only made Ermi's heart the more dull +and leaden. Wazakoo thought that Ninon might have grown into such a +wicked woman as the bold Asa, but the words were an insult to the +innocent eyes, the little unsullied feet, the lips pure as thought of +God, which the mother's eyes called up. +</P> + +<P> +"Very soon, you will go also," added Taopi, but it bewildered Ermi the +more to know that the little piece of ground on which she stood was +crumbling too. +</P> + +<P> +Another moon waned and yet she served the household. In her brain the +fire still burned on. Without, on the plains, the wind made a black +discord like the sobbing cry of a starved wolf, and, sometimes, it was +most like the whine of a whip-thong. Manitou walked about the earth +and the leaves faded and fell from the trees. Manitou blew with his +breath, and the river became like flint. At the wave of his arms the +animals hid away in the ground and the birds forsook their nests in the +wild rice and flew far off to the south-land. +</P> + +<P> +But all the days the baby called to Ermi, and often it wailed. One day +the voice wooed her unto the snow, out into the sheeted storm that +turned the air into a white darkness. Streaks of bitter wind screamed +across the prairie. The snow cut her face with stinging lash and the +cowering cold cut into her very bones. But still, without ceasing, the +baby called to her. Now and then, she almost clasped it, and her soul +swooned, but something intangible, impalpable ever waved her back. +</P> + +<P> +And then Ermi understood that the night was closing in and that she had +come a long, long way. She would go back to Wasi, for she had +forgotten about the other woman. The fire would be low, he would need +her and she must find him, however weary the trail. +</P> + +<P> +But even as she resolved, the woman sank limply to where one finds +dreams and soft reveries and where church bells toll the vesper hour. +Her hands clasped her rosary, but she did not pray. She only maundered +softly the foolish song of the hunters from the southland— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"'Twas odour fled<BR> +As soon as shed;<BR> +'Twas morning's winged dream;<BR> +'Twas a light——"<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Once at school, she could not solve a problem and so she broke the +slate. She remembered it quite well; it was a question in the rule of +three. "How foolish!" she mused, and Ermi smiled as she remembered. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="60%"> + +<P> +The morning dawned brightly in the coulee where a stone covered a +little grave. There was nothing to be seen, nor anything to suggest +that it was here Ermi had lain down to dreams. The snow had hidden her +well in its white bosom, but somewhere, somehow, Ermi, the Indian +woman, was working out the pitiful problem of life on another slate. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap07"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER VII +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +MOTORING TO ATHABASCA LANDING +</H4> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"I'll tell the tale of a northern trail,<BR> +And so help me God, it's true."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +I dreamed three times that I was taking this trip, and here it has come +to pass. +</P> + +<P> +Our party consists of an editor from Vancouver; an editor from +Edmonton; a Member of Parliament, a chauffeur, and myself. I feel +guiltily feminine. +</P> + +<P> +The road is one hundred miles long and connects Edmonton with the +North. Over it are hauled all the supplies for the settlements and +trading posts clear down to the Arctic. Once arrived at Athabasca +Landing, the supplies are loaded on to scows or, in the winter, to +sleighs, and from thence carried to their destination. I secretly call +this the Trail of Sighs, for to the freighter it is a long and weary +way, especially in these later days when editors, M.P.'s and graceless +witty bodies whirl past him at forty miles the hour in motors that are +quite mad. Some day a teamster will kill a chauffeur for sheer spite. +Even now the fuse is fizzing round the magazine, or whatever you call +the gasoline receptacle under the seat. +</P> + +<P> +It would be hard to declare how long this trail has been used, but I +would say for a century at least. From Edmonton for a few miles out, +it is called the Fort Trail because—allowing for a slight +divergence—it goes to Fort Saskatchewan, the head-quarters of the +Mounted Police in this district. From thence, it is called the Landing +Trail. +</P> + +<P> +But soon this whole country will be shod with steel, for, even now, you +may see navvies building grades as you pass along the trail, and next +week the first railway to the Landing will be opened for traffic. I +tell you, these railways are creating a new heavens and a new earth +however much the freighters may object. It is true, the trail will +lose in interest once the lumbering stage coaches and heavily laden +"tote" wagons have disappeared. When there are no long whips that +crack like pistol shots; no night encampments around blazing fires, and +no browsing cattle with tinkling bells, much of its picturesqueness +will have been surrendered to the implacable cause of civilization. +</P> + +<P> +From this time forth, the men who travel the trail will work for a +wage. They will forget the feel of frozen bread in the teeth; the hard +earth underneath them and the rough blanket against their chins. Yes! +and they will also forget the fine elemental thrill that comes from +hitting a running moose at long range, or a slithering wolf that lurks +privily in a covert of kinikinnic. The pity of it! +</P> + +<P> +No longer will our trail know the tired huskies, and still more tired +runners, who each year, come February, make this homestretch to the old +fur-market. The enormous bundles of fur that each spring sell for a +million dollars to the bidders from Vienna, St. Petersburg, London and +Chicago, will, for the future, figure as only so many untanned hides, +as per bill of lading, instead of precious peltry or—supposing you to +have sight and insight—"the lives o' men." +</P> + +<P> +Our first stopping place is Battenberg, by the Sturgeon River. The +place is not named for the lace as you might conjecture, but in honour +of the son-in-law of her late Majesty, Queen Victoria. It is here the +rural telephone wire comes to an end but if you are inclined to be +finicky, it is not well to telephone. I tried it and had a +conversation with Central in the which she expressed her opinion of me. +I cannot complain that it was not informing. +</P> + +<P> +The motor in which we travel has a record, not for speed, but as having +made the farthest north trip on its own power. Last winter, Jack Kydd, +our chauffeur, took it down the Athabasca River, on the ice, as far as +the Pelican Rapids—that is to say, 225 miles north of Edmonton. "The +make of the car?" you ask. I would tell you straight off and, later +on, would endeavour to collect a bonus from the manufacturers were it +not for the uncompromising prejudice of the publishers and their +editors. Men are like that. +</P> + +<P> +But I was telling you about Jack Kydd! His talent as a chauffeur is +one that trails no feathers and he is a fine, likely looking lad. This +day, I saw him pull the remains of a stump out of the road without +breaking the axle. Such a performance should be rated as a religious +act like the planting of the pipal tree in India. +</P> + +<P> +All the way along, our road is contested by farmers' dogs who surge out +from the shacks in a vain endeavour to regulate our speed. The dog is +an incurable motophobe who says everything profane about motors that +can be said. +</P> + +<P> +Here is a morose young bull contesting the high way with us, refusing +to budge an inch, and facing the motor with a menace. He is a +grim-visaged brute and built for battle like an ironclad. His +challenge to combat is a very dagger stroke of sound. Although the +M.P. wagers fifty dollars on the motor, we do not try conclusions, but +discreetly take to the side of the road at an angle that is truly +appalling. +</P> + +<P> +Even the calves are not afraid of the car and make their perilous bed +in the middle of the road, thus causing us to reduce our pace to a +legal one. Indeed, the only animals frightened of it are the horses. +Its huge black snout and great goggle-eyes must make it seem to them +like some monstrous, unthinkable brute. And, all considered, the +horses are the wisest of the animals—-wiser even than men—for the +yellow peril—is as nothing to the black one. +</P> + +<P> +Still, we are having a mighty good time. When the road is clear, the +car spreads her wings and flies. Her gentle pliancy seems incompatible +with her hurtling force. Each moment, she accumulates momentum so that +we feel a sensation of tremendous power without pity. For the nonce, +we are potential murderers and pigmy men had better have a care how +they lounge across our paths. This mad car doesn't know a hill when +she comes to it and even sings a long-metre song on the ascent. She +might fairly be considered to have conquered gravitation. On! On! +with bird-like swoop she goes, fairly skimming the ground and taking +the corners just as if she knew what was there. +</P> + +<P> +You can never believe how stretched out the world is till you motor +this way north and see the long ribbons of road that unfold at every +turn, the silver illimitable distances that suggest both a mystery and +an invitation. I love these open trails, and to be of the earth earthy +is not so wicked after all. +</P> + +<P> +Gur—r—r—umph! Our 50 H.P. had dwindled to less than one-pony power +and we haven't a leg to stand on. I will never say we burst a tyre: we +cast a shoe. +</P> + +<P> +"It is neither, Madam," said the Vancouver editor who was helping to +prise up the wheel. "It is a valvular disease. Our viary accident is +the result of a vicious valve that, of its own volition, has put a veto +on our volacious voyage." +</P> + +<P> +"Avant!" retorts the editor from Edmonton. "I will vouch that the +accident to the vitals of our vehicle was a voidable one and arose from +violent vibrations and vulgar velocity." +</P> + +<P> +"Your verbose verdicts will never make the vamp or fill the vacuum," +says the more practical M.P. "Bring me the vade-mecum this instant, +you vacillating vagabonds." +</P> + +<P> +I cannot think of any assonant words so I am content with fining each +man a "V" or "vifty" days. I told you I was guiltily feminine. +</P> + +<P> +Sitting at the side of a road, waiting for a plaster to dry on a valve, +is about as exciting an occupation as knitting. Men should see to it +that women learn to smoke if only that the women may take breakdowns +more placidly. I can understand smoking becoming a means of grace. +Besides, the sun is very hot this day and burns my face and neck to a +vivid scarlet. Each man in the party produces a talcum tin for my +alleviation. "Sunny <I>Alberta</I>!" snorts the British Columbian, "<I>Sunny</I> +Alberta! a place of sun, believe me, for people who would prefer shade." +</P> + +<P> +This newly acquired habit of the modern man in carrying a talcum tin is +one that, hitherto, has escaped print. I here set it down for your +consideration. +</P> + +<P> +While we are at work, three handsome boys drive up and stop to talk +with us. I take their photograph while they pose for me on a stump. +They are real-estate fans, so that their heads are full of +"propositions," their pockets full of maps. They have imagination, +unflagging industry, facility of expression, and love of +country—qualities which are sure to bring them to the front in their +gainful pursuit. +</P> + +<P> +The illustrious financiers who come yearly to this province to deliver +much kind advice and sage instruction, warn us to beware of these boys +whom they are pleased to call "wildcatters," just as if we were the +first to spend our money on the evidence of things hoped for, the +substance of things not seen. The trouble which follows from +over-investment in real-estate futures is attributable, not so much to +the wildcatters, as to the unknown author of the multiplication table. +Multiplying is our favourite occupation in Alberta even as it is in +some other provinces I know of. Up here, every one who has a tongue +talks about his "turn-over"; his "c'mission"; his "stake." Those who +haven't tongues are the listeners. And it is a good thing to have a +stake in this North-West Canada—very good. I have never yet met a +person who regretted having one, but there are many regret they have +not. I could tell you more about the real-estate situation only Jane +Austen says if a woman knows anything she should strive superlatively +to conceal it. +</P> + +<P> +Fifty miles from Edmonton, we cross the Arctic watershed, so that from +this point it is strictly proper to say down North, although the fall +is only two feet to the mile. It is at this height of land that we +look around and mentally spy out the country. We talk about the +incomparable wheat fields of Grande Prairie; the water-powers of the +Peace River; the oil-fields at Fort McMurray; the natural gas at +Pelican Rapids; the timber berths and asphaltum of the Athabasca; of +the coal, salt, fisheries, furs, and minerals spread all over and under +this new and unrivalled Northland. And all this riches lies at our +very feet—<I>ours for the taking</I>. "Hungry and I feed them," says the +North. "Naked and I clothe them; thirsty and I give them——" +</P> + +<P> +"No, it doesn't," says our chauffeur. "You can't get anything to drink +beyond the Landing. The North is strictly a prohibition country." +</P> + +<P> +"Dear me!" whines a person in the back seat, "and we are dreadfully out +of tea." +</P> + +<P> +At five o'clock, we stop at Eggie's for supper. Eggie broke land here +fourteen years ago, and ever since has kept a stopping place for +travellers. There is no need of his transporting eggs, butter, meat, +grain, and vegetables to market, for the market comes to him. He makes +hay when the sun shines, and also in the dark. As a result, he has +accumulated sixty thousand dollars in money and gear. So far as I +know, there is no eating-house with a record in any way comparable. +</P> + +<P> +Eggie Jr. is a telegraph operator. His instrument is back of the cook +stove over against a window. When he is away from home his young +sister works the code. She picked it up while tending the stove. You +can never tell what is up the sleeve of these pioneering women. I told +her she was the sixth wise virgin. "The other five?" she queried with +a glint of laughter in her eyes. There are other folk having supper at +Eggie's. The man with the long slouchy stride is a land surveyor. +They grow on every bush here. +</P> + +<P> +That crisp-mannered youth with the honey-coloured hair is going down +north to cap a gas well. In what better task can a youth engage than +to conserve power, heat, and light for humanity? Dear young man! +</P> + +<P> +Their driver quotes Cicero, and swears in Cree. He is a living example +of what whisky can do for a Bachelor of Arts who entirely devotes +himself to it. +</P> + +<P> +By six o'clock we are again on the road, and passing through a rolling +park-like country dotted with clumps of cottonwood, birch, poplar, and +spruce. Sometimes, we pass lush meadow upon which graze full-fleshed +cattle and comfortably rotund sheep. On one farm, a man is burning +dead brushwood. There is no keener pleasure than, here and there, to +thrust a core of fire into long grass or brushwood, and to watch the +red tongues of flame as they greedily lap it up. As yet, no farmer has +written about it, but this is only because farmers are afraid of +literary critics. It is a pity the workers are so frequently +inarticulate, thus leaving their joys and sorrows to be imperfectly +sensed by onlookers. But, Hear, Oh Men! and rejoice with me for at +this game I am not a mere onlooker, having once burnt over twenty-eight +acres. In making these fires, there is a kind of madness that takes +possession of you so that you pay no heed to the shrivelling of your +shoes; to the scalding cinders on your hands; or the inky blackness of +your face and clothes. Indeed, it would not be surprising to +ultimately learn that the direful task assigned to Lucifer is not +wholly without its compensations. +</P> + +<P> +At long intervals, we pass fat little shacks that spread over the land +instead of stretching up. At one of these, we stop to get cold water +in the engine. +</P> + +<P> +"Any news moving?" asks the bachelor who is overlord to the shack. +</P> + +<P> +He does not wait for an answer, but proceeds to inform us that the +prime knowledge a man needs for homesteading is the art of cooking in a +frying pan. +</P> + +<P> +His homestead is a ranch; not a rawnch. The difference, he explains, +is that the former pays sometimes; the latter never. +</P> + +<P> +He very kindly invites me to see his swineyard, the special pride of +which is a heavy thoroughbred called "Artful Belle" ... O la! la! la! +</P> + +<P> +As he upholsters his pipe with a stuffing of cut-plug, her master would +have me observe that Belle's face is "dished" and that her eyes are +free from wrinkles of surrounding fat. Indeed Belle is no waddling, +commonplace sow; no mere animated lard keg, for she has been bred to +the purple with great care. +</P> + +<P> +"A bacon hog?" I ask. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes, madam," he replies, "but in order that her bacon may be of the +desired streakiness I feed and starve her alternately." +</P> + +<P> +It makes a vast difference to a sow whether her ears stand up or lie +down. Belle's ears are 'pliable' and 'silky.' Her hair doesn't comb +straight either, but tends to swirls and cowlicks which are +proof-positive of her blue blood in the same way that a cold nose is in +a woman. +</P> + +<P> +I made a grave error, too, in speaking of Belle as red. Every swine +husbandman knows the technical word for her particular colour is +"mahogany." She has already farrowed two litters of six, the members +of which inherit their mother's fatal beauty. He tells me other things +but I forget them, except that pigs can see the wind, and that they are +older than history. +</P> + +<P> +We take a photograph of this bachelor homesteader and promise to print +it in a city paper under the caption, 'Wife Wanted.' In the North, we +call a bachelor, 'an anxious one.' +</P> + +<P> +The last miles of our journey are heavy going because of the hills and +stones, and our motor makes a lugubrious noise internally that is +wholly at variance with her velvet wheels, well lubricated machinery, +and the comfortable roundness of the corner seats, as if a plump and +smiling matron had suddenly started to swear. +</P> + +<P> +We reach Athabasca Landing at half-past ten while daylight still +lingers. Our complexions are somewhat impaired, but the man who +settles the bill for the steaks and coffee says there is nothing wrong +with our appetites. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap08"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER VIII +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +COUNTRY DELIGHTS +</H4> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Sometimes, I go a-fishing and shooting, and even then I carry a +note-book, that if I lose game, I may at least bring home my pleasant +thoughts!—PLINY. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +I am fishing for graylings, but so far have caught none, my case being +similar to that of one Chang Chi-Ho, who in the eighth century, "spent +his time angling but used no bait, his object not being to catch fish." +</P> + +<P> +And truth to tell, I have not even the grace of an object, unless it be +to talk to the men folk who are lading the big flat scows called +"Sturgeon-Heads," for the trip down the river. +</P> + +<P> +By these right pleasant waters of the Athabasca, you are no longer +guided by duty but throw a rein on the senses. You do things because +you want to do them, and not because you ought to. This is owing to +the fact that the time-table loses its thrall north of 55°. I intend +stopping here a long while. +</P> + +<P> +It is a sun-steeped day, and the river looks like a bed of sequins. +The sun, although it is strong in Alberta, doesn't seem to ripen people +like it does farther south. I can see this from the way people give me +greeting and from how they tell me all that is in their hearts. +</P> + +<P> +Antoine hears that far off in that place called Montreal they dig worms +out of the clay for bait, and that these worms have neither shells nor +fur. This must be "wan beeg lie," for how could the worms keep from +freezing? It is not according to reason. These white men with trails +in the middle of their hair say these things so that the Crees, who are +very shrewd rivermen, will go to live in Montreal. +</P> + +<P> +I heartily concur with Antoine. I have been to Montreal myself and +have never seen so much as the sign of an earth-worm. They tell queer +yarns, those Eastern fellows who come from down North to write books +and buy land, but Antoine and I won't be fooled by them. Indeed, we +won't. +</P> + +<P> +Antoine caught a pike the other day without a line, but he lost it +again. It was the biggest fish he ever caught, but this is only +natural, and is no new thing, for ever since the first slippery fish +slithered through the hands of primeval man, it has always been the +biggest one that got away. Where these biggest fish foregather +ultimately has always been a mystery to me. Some day, we shall +discover a piscatorial paradise with millions of them in it. +</P> + +<P> +Antoine presents me to Captain Shot, an Indian who has been on this +river for forty-eight years. The Captain is seventy-three, and his +name is really Fausennent. He is called "Shot" because he was the +first man to shoot the rapids of the Athabasca. I say that Antoine +"presents me" but I say it advisedly, for the North levels people, by +which is meant the primitive north where they live with nature. In +this environment, the man who builds boats and supplies food or fuel, +is the superior of the man or woman who writes, or pronounces theories. +I may be able to hoodwink the people up south as to my importance in +our community, but it is different here. And this is as it should be. +</P> + +<P> +Captain Shot is engaged in building a boat for the Honourable the +Hudson's Bay Company, and there is even a smoking-room in it. But, +Blessed Mother! it is no trouble to build a boat now—none at all, for +presently the railway will be completed and the boilers and metal +fixings will come in over it, but in the old days—that is to say up +till now—it was different. When the Northern Navigation Co. brought +in the boilers for their boats, they hauled them a hundred miles over +the trail from Edmonton, and it took seventy-two horses on each boiler. +</P> + +<P> +"Didn't the government help any?" I ask. +</P> + +<P> +Oh yes! the late government at Ottawa tried to help transportation by +sending in fifty reindeer; but the Captain has heard tell that some men +swore terrible oaths at the government, and set their dogs about eating +up the deer, for these men hold a kind of an idea it is railways the +country hereabouts needs, but he is not quite sure as to the rights of +the story. +</P> + +<P> +There are four hundred men employed here at the Landing in building +scows and transhipping. Only a few of the scows are brought back, for +they have to be tracked up by power of man. For this reason, a new +flotilla is built each year. +</P> + +<P> +Captain Shot has many estimable sons, all of whom are rivermen and +shipbuilders. They could hardly be expected to disgrace their name by +becoming mere farmers or teamsters after the unwisdom of the white +man's way. Ho! Ho! the idea of any one wishing to become a farmer. +</P> + +<P> +But I was telling you about the scows. Unless you sat here catching +fish, you could never believe how much stuff can be packed into a scow. +As I watch the men at work, I think of Mark Twain's ambitious blue-jay +who tried to fill a house with acorns. Still the men do not seem +lacking in confidence, and keep wading backward and forward through the +water with sacks of flour, slabs of bacon, chests of tea, crates of +hardware, tins of stuff, and treasures in boxes that can only be +guessed at. I am hoping the biggest box contains dolls, ribbons, +work-bags, picture books, peppermint bull's eyes, and things like that, +for a mission school Christmas-tree somewhere down near the Arctic. I +am almost praying that it does. +</P> + +<P> +The smaller boxes are called permits, and each contain six bottles of +whisky. These are for the pioneering gentlemen at the different posts +who are delicate, and who honestly desire to get strong. +</P> + +<P> +Each permit is signed by a doctor so that the liquor must be considered +strictly as medicine. Irritating people who fail to understand that +there are only two licensed hotels between Edmonton and the North Pole, +sneer about there being a thousand delicate men on the rivers; but, for +my part, I am inclined to stand by the doctors, although I have always +held the clinical thermometer to be the only thing about the medical +profession with an integrity beyond question. +</P> + +<P> +If any one should glean from reading these lines that all there is to +loading a scow is to load it, he or she is a much misled person. The +last bale is hardly stowed away till two of the men have disappeared. +No one saw them go, least of all the Boss, but any one can see they are +not here now. The Boss is a creature of steel who seems to forget +there is much to be done in the last hour or two before a boatman +leaves the Landing for the stretched out journey beyond. Various +purchases are to be made; people are to be seen; drinks are to be had +against a long, long thirst, to mention nothing of new vows to Marie, +Babette, and Josephine. +</P> + +<P> +After awhile, the voyageurs are all rounded up with the exception of +Luke. The best the Boss can say for Luke is that he has been given a +Christian name. Jake is sent to fetch him. Luke turns up, but Scotty +must find Jake. Luke isn't drunk either—not he. It's the scow that's +drunk. Who said Luke was "fuller'n a goat," I'd like to know. +Ultimately, the Boss starts off to get Scotty and Jake. He gets them, +and he sits them down in a highly decisive manner, only to find that +Bill, and Jean Baptiste, and One-eyed Pete have gone up town for a +dunnage bag they left at the Grand Union Hotel.... The Boss looks +eight feet tall when he is angry, but, otherwise, to the unseeing eye, +he is only a young factor, or maybe an independent trader, intent on +his work like scores of other ordinary, unaccounted workmen. +Contrawise, the eye of imagination may see in him an adventuring +gentleman launching a craft that is to traverse for hundreds of miles +through many and diverse waterways, carrying with it a veritable cargo +of blessings to the far and lonely outposts of the North which, as yet, +are little else than names. +</P> + +<P> +The rivermen push off from shore with their oars till, in the centre of +the stream, the current catches them and carries them along. This is +their only method of locomotion, to float and float with the stream. +They have a steering-pole in the scow similar to that which may be seen +in pictures of old Roman galleys, and when, because of darkness, the +voyageurs wish to stay their course, they make to shore by its aid, +even as the Romans did more than two thousand years ago. To make the +simile complete, I stand on the bank and repeat the invocation of the +Roman poet: "Oh ship that conveyest Virgil to Greece, duly deliver up +the precious life entrusted to thy care."... +</P> + +<P> +If I hadn't jerked the crown of an old hat out of the river under the +impression that it was a fish, Justine would not have laughed out loud +and I would not have had an excuse to get acquainted with her. She has +been sitting nearby this half-hour. Her name isn't really Justine and +I forget what it is. She is the prettiest breed-girl in the country +and, by the same token, the frailest. "Believe me, Madam," explained +an old officer of the Mounted Police, the other day, "those eyes were +never given her for the good of her soul. She is a little +worth-nothing person like all the other breed-girls." +</P> + +<P> +This man despises breed-women and he has made a sufficiently intimate +study of them to form an opinion. He wishes they were all dead. "For +an absolute truth, Madam, listen to me. For years, these women have +paddled their canoes up this river with kegs of contraband liquor +a-swing from ropes beneath and none of the force ever suspected. They +were so monstrously civil, they would even give us 'a lift' if we +desired it. I was highly surprised when we found them out, and so +disgusted with myself that, for a time, I thought of becoming a +type-setter. By Jove! you know; a fellow doesn't expect to find a keg +outside a canoe. Now does he?" +</P> + +<P> +But I am not one of those who believe there are good women and bad +women. Some are elemental and others are not; that is the only +difference. I will maintain this to the very day my tongue wears out. +</P> + +<P> +Justine's white father must have had a head and shoulders of the most +perfect classical type. As she sits on the beach with a light shawl +drawn down over her head, this girl resembles greatly the Madonna of +Bouguereau. I tell her this, and we talk for a long while. She thinks +my suggestion that she marry a riverman, or a trapper, and have quite a +large family, a wholly foolish suggestion. It causes her to think +little of both my discernment and my knowledge of men. Rivermen, she +would have me understand, hardly ever come home, and when they do, only +to get drunk and beat their wives. A white man won't marry a breed +girl, nowadays, and if he should give her his heart, he expects it to +be returned sometime. Still, Justine considers his transient +affections to be preferable to those of the breed's, in that a white +man seldom strikes his girl. Justine gives me a short lesson in Cree, +and, among other words, I learn that <I>saky hagen</I> is the equivalent of +"one I love," and that <I>nichimoos</I> means "sweetheart." The former is +usually applied to a child, the latter to an adult. +</P> + +<P> +When I ask Justine to tell me a story about the North, she complies +because she has been educated in a mission school and speaks English +well. And then she is not in the least afraid of me since I showed so +lamentable a lack of insight about marriage. Now listen to the story. +</P> + +<P> +Once a mallard who was sick of love asked a blackbird to marry him. +"Marry me," he said, "and I will give you fish to eat and wild rice. +And when the sun is hot, I will hide you in the rushes and keep you +under my wings." +</P> + +<P> +And so they lived together as man and wife and the blackbird bore her +husband three sons, but soon he tired of her and made believe he was +dead so that she went away and left him in peace. +</P> + +<P> +And then the mallard went in search of another wife.... It was a story +I craved of Justine, and lo! she has told me a parable. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap09"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER IX +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +AT THE LANDING. +</H4> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +A city founded is no city built<BR> +Till faith becomes prolific by the fathering tale<BR> +Of good report and all-availing effort.—J. M. HARPER.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +The sweet of life is something small,<BR> +A resting by a wayside wall<BR> +With God's good sunshine over all.—R. W. GILBERT.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +This is the rainy season at Athabasca Landing, so that the streets are +very muddy. Long ago, it was like this in Edmonton, my continuing +city, but when we were come to a very considerable puddle our escorts +carried us. This is why big, fine-looking men were in high demand. +</P> + +<P> +But, this day, by some strange providence, the glut of rain has abated +and the clemency of the sky fills me with an importunate inclination to +gad about and use my eyes. There are no moments to be lost, to-morrow +it is sure to be raining again. Never was land more golden; never one +more grey. +</P> + +<P> +Here at the Landing, it makes no difference where one goes in search of +diversion, for it is to be found in all directions and every foot of +the way. This morning I preferably take to the hill back of the town, +for the water has drained off it to the river and the footing is good. +</P> + +<P> +The hill is held by the Honourable the Hudson's Bay Company, who have +owned it time out of mind. It hurts the Company to sell land, for they +are the true lineal descendants of that classical tree which groaned +with torture when a limb was dissevered from its trunk. This being the +case, they may be expected to hold the hill until the municipality +taxes it away from them. +</P> + +<P> +Ignorant people like the wheat-sellers of Winnipeg, speak of this +settlement as a new place, a mushroomic upstart of yesterday, whereas +it was an old post before Winnipeg was thought of. North of the +Landing, there are thirty thousand people who depend on the local +rivermen to bring down their year's supplies, so that this is a place +of no small concernment and it has seven streets, you might say. As +yet, its houses and public buildings do not run to paint or useless +ornamentations, and there is a stolid practicability about its front +doors. +</P> + +<P> +But about the hill: Terry, who is in "the Mounted," tells me it is a +walk of three cigarettes to the top of it, but two if you step lively. +This Terry has a bold and busy fancy, and if he cared to write, he +would, like Xenophon, be "an author of wonderful consequence." Once, +he tried to set down a story, but it was like trying to make a fire +with a wet match. +</P> + +<P> +Aha! Terry, Aha! you have said it exactly—defined it to a +hair's-breadth—the plight of the authors who would rise up on wings as +eagles but only they faint and are weary. A wet match! What greater +or more invincible deterrent could exist to the kindling of a fire? If +Terry's manners were less adroit and his hair less curly, I could +almost love him. I am half-purposed to anyway. +</P> + +<P> +And now that we are on matters literary I wish to announce that some +day, when my thoughts have come to issue, I intend writing an article +on the evil taste of pen-handles. There are several million dollars in +store for the man who will manufacture handles that are toothsome—say +of licorice, cinnamon, or sassafras wood, or of some composition +agreeable to the palate. The connection between the tongue and the pen +is a much closer one than generally recognized. +</P> + +<P> +We might even have pleasantly medicated pen-handles guaranteed to +stimulate our addled heads, or—Heigh, my hearts of the fourth +estate!—to fill us with an irresistible desire to work when there is +music and laughter downstairs, or a horse and sunshine out of doors. +The invention of such a pen could not fail to be imparted as +righteousness.... The roses are in full blast, and all the way along I +walk the earth in a fine rapture. On the hill-top, there is a spread +of blue hyacinths like a torn veil that has been thrown to the earth. +Here, in bewildering array, grow wild parsnips, feverfew, painter's +brush, mint-flowers, and lilies that flame riotously across the sheens +and greens of the open ways. I love the crimson glories of these +lilies; they seem to bring grist to life. Indeed, there is no question +but they do. +</P> + +<P> +The poplars and cottonwoods are hanging out long tassels of woolly +silver. It is a pity these do not pledge fruit like the tassels of the +Indian corn. Mayhap, some day, a scientist will cause the black poplar +to produce something for the sustenance of the North. Even the honey +which the bees store in its cavities becomes bitter and acrid to the +taste. Or it may happen we shall discover a cordial substance which +will transmute the tassels of the poplar into something else—say into +mulberries. Long ago, the English orchardists believed such things to +be possible, for, in the fourteenth century, one wrote down that "a +peach-tree shall bring forth pomegranates if it be sprinkled with +goat's milk three days when it beginneth to flower." +</P> + +<P> +It is good to be here this day enjoying the pleasant amity of the earth +and sky. One may draw physical and spiritual renovation from both. It +is very good to feel on one's face the soft-handed wind that is seldom +still. This is the kindly unrestricted breeze which brings gifts to +the North and West. It blesses the grain by swaying it to and fro, for +the word "bless" means literally to fructify. On some such day as this +I will come back here from the dead. +</P> + +<P> +On this hill, the Hudson's Bay Company, the world's oldest trust, have +erected their storehouse and factor's residence. These are log +buildings, austerely square and ugly in the extreme. In the factor's +garden is an old sundial which adds the needed touch of romance to the +place; also, it connotes a fine leisureliness. +</P> + +<P> +The erstwhile typical régime of a Hudson's Bay fort is a phase of +existence which shortly will be sponged off human memory. It has never +been as fully explained to me as I could desire, but as nearly as I can +make out, the staff of a well-manned post consisted of the factor and +chief factor, the trader and chief trader, an accountant, a postmaster, +two or more clerks, a cooper, a carpenter, a blacksmith, and labourers, +the work of the last mentioned being to haul water, cut wood, and +secure meat. There were also as many cooks as required. Food was +sometimes scarce, so that the men were required to lick their platters +clean. Contrariwise, they drank not a little of heady beverages which +they are said to have "carried well." +</P> + +<P> +The Indian's idea of a house is a different one to the trader's. It is +not a place to be lived in, but exists merely as a shield from the +weather. Accompanied by Goodfellow, a frowsy, stump-tailed dog from +the hotel, I visited the Indian houses hereabout. Goodfellow came with +me, not as a protector, but because he wouldn't be driven back. He is +a reprobate cur, forever spoiling for a fight; a natural born feudist +who lives in a state of violent excitement. Terry says he is "no +bloomin' lap-dog," but a four-legged incarnation of the devil himself. +Sometime soon, this dog's day will be over, for he is surely going to +die of lead poisoning. +</P> + +<P> +All the way to the Indians, with a stupid malignity, and in defiance of +the plainest laws of fence, Goodfellow gave chase to every cat and +rabbit and bit every cow. It is not open for me to say what I thought +of him, except that his conduct was solidly wrong. It was, +accordingly, of high gratification to the rancour I hid in my heart +when the Indians' huskies made short shrift of him. Like Humpty +Dumpty, it will be hard to put him together again. They are no dealers +in sophistries, these wide-mouthed wolf-dogs, with their wicked teeth, +and would fight against the stars in their courses. +</P> + +<P> +When the women have beaten them off and learn I am not offended +concerning Goodfellow's drubbing, they are pleasant to me. A thin, +pock-marked squaw invites me into a shack or, more properly speaking, +into a baby-warren which fairly bristles with a flock of semi-wild +children, for, as yet, the squaws have not deliberately ceased from +having children. +</P> + +<P> +What I said awhile ago about the Indian's house applies equally to his +children's wearing apparel. It shelters rather than ornaments. Their +clothes seem to have no visible supports, but are held to their small +fat bodies by some inexplicable attraction. One may see the same +phenomenon on the apostolic figures on stained glass windows. +</P> + +<P> +A chocolate-coloured baby with blackberry eyes is propped against the +wall in a moss bag, and looks for all the world like a cocoon that +might any moment push off its sheath and take to wings. +</P> + +<P> +An unsavoury mess of entrails is stewing in a black pot and filling the +house with an unpleasant odour. I try not to show my repugnance lest +my hostesses consider the white woman to be proud-stomached with no +proper appetite for lowly faring. I tell them as I take down the +blanket from the door—not untruthfully you understand, but as a small +matter of immediate expediency—how it is light one desires rather than +fresh air, and that it is hard to see aright when one has been walking +in the sunlight. +</P> + +<P> +This Hudson's Bay blanket is, next to <I>uskik</I>, the kettle, the one +indispensable thing in an Indian household. It serves as a door, a +coat, a carpet, a bed, and for other things which it boots not to +mention. It is, therefore, well to be explanatory when one removes it +from its place, just as it is wise to apologize when one pokes an +Englishman's fire of coals. +</P> + +<P> +Mrs. Lo tells me the old woman who is making moccasins is <I>Naka</I>, which +word, she explains for my better understanding, is the Cree for "My +Mother." Naka is a very old woman and "can no English say." Neither +can she be considered as typical of Whistler's mother. +</P> + +<P> +There are amusing things to be done in this shack. For instance, you +may by signs and smiles make Naka, my mother, to understand how you +greatly desire to sew upon the moccasins she holds, and Naka may, in +the amiability of her disposition, accede to your importunity. +</P> + +<P> +As thread, deer sinew is not so easily manipulated as you might +imagine; indeed, I should say it is distinctly uncontrollable. The +audience, in spite of its manifest efforts at politeness, is +nevertheless widely diverted. Who would have thought a white woman +could be so droll in the woods, and so very stupid? +</P> + +<P> +Huh! Huh! she may be so stupid that even old Naka, who is a proper +woman with her needle, has to scrub the air with her arms and show her +yellow gums in laughter. +</P> + +<P> +Their always wakeful curiosity leads the maidens to enquire as to what +might be inside a white woman's hand-bag, and that they may +sufficiently know about this matter, the white woman empties it upon +her knees. Immediately, the articles are passed around for appraisal +and approval. Bank cheques! ... <I>Oui</I>! <I>Oui</I>! The men who work on +the boats get these. The girls know how it is talking [Transcriber's +note: taking?] paper to get money. +</P> + +<P> +My penknife, pencil, note-book, purse, and handkerchief are duly +examined and quietly commented upon, but a package of tablets packed in +a silver paper, and small tube of cold cream, cause no small flutter in +our circle. When I am through demonstrating their use, every one's +breath is laden with the odour of mint, and their hands with that of +roses. Um—m—m—mh! +</P> + +<P> +The women feel my arms, try on my bracelet and rings, and ask me to +take off my hat that they may see my hair, which, alas! is devoid of +all waywardness and coquetry. I can see they are disappointed in this +and think me what Artemus Ward calls "a he-looking female." +</P> + +<P> +In one shack to which the girls accompany me, an emaciated, coughing +boy is bed-ridden and near to death. Lili Abi has him in her arms, and +he may not go free. +</P> + +<P> +Who this Lili Abi, or Lilith, is does not certainly appear, but, +according to the Rabbis who wrote of old time, she is the first wife of +Adam and queen of the succubi. Some there are who declare this to be +an ill-framed story, and a conceit of the fancy, but others hold it as +a creed that she lives by sucking the blood of children till they fade +away and die. It is from Lili Abi that we get our word lullaby. The +malific lullaby she sings has come nigh to breaking the heart of +humanity, but, one day, it shall happen that a sure and strong-handed +scientist will get a strangle hold on Lili Abi and pierce her to death +with his slender but omnipotent needle. +</P> + +<P> +Amil, who is the lad's father, says, "I am mooch scare' 'bout leetle +boy, for sure. I ees pray all tam to de holy mother. Mabbe he ees get +well... la bonne chance ... mabbe non! Leetle boy sing all de tam when +he ees well." +</P> + +<P> +Amil has never been to the south, or over the mountains, but he has +heard much about these countries. He has been told how, in the United +States, they do not believe in the pope and get married many times. He +has also heard that the Yankees mean to conquer Canada and pull down +the tricolor. +</P> + +<P> +Michele Daubeny, who once went across the mountains to where the +fish-eaters are, told him that the ocean never freezes. But this +Michele has a tongue which is not straight, also he has been known to +steal fur out of the traps, so that Amil does not know what to believe. +</P> + +<P> +"I have mak rip'ly," says Amil, "dat mabbe by'me by, I ees tak de trail +dem queeck an' see <I>kickekume</I>, de great sea water, to myse'f." +</P> + +<P> +And when I leave the shacks and go back towards the village, I fall in +with some swart broodlings, who are shooting with arrows. At first, +they will have none of me until I make the mortifying confession and +concession that I cannot shoot and desire greatly to be taught. After +this, nothing could exceed their pedagogic enthusiasm. Apollo, prince +of archers, could do no better. +</P> + +<P> +In the pale face, the hunting instinct, while never entirely lost, is +still greatly modified. In the red man it is a passion. Watch this +little lean-bellied Indian as he stalks his game. The bird rises and +settles again a few yards away. The boy trails it up closer and closer +with a feline softness of tread, a queer slurring movement that belongs +only to animals of prey, and then, standing taut and tense as a +finely-bred setter making game, he concentrates the whole energy of his +body on one piercing point and sends his arrow home. +</P> + +<P> +The bow-and-arrow stage through which these Indian lads are passing +corresponds in the white boy to that inevitable condition of +development known as gun fever. In our city, at a highly immoral +price, we dress up in khaki the boys of the lower classes, give them +guns, and call them scouts. I like the Indian way better. Of course, +there is this to be said for our method, that it instils a martial +spirit into the youngsters so that when they are grown larger we shall +have no lack of soldiers. This is a statement so obvious and axiomatic +that it hardly needs writing down. +</P> + +<P> +Well, so be it! How else are our bonds to be protected? And may not +the lower classes be relied upon to constantly produce batches of boys +to step into the ranks? Yes! I believe in Boys' Brigades and in war. +I have some bonds myself. +</P> + +<P> +In the village, several homesteaders who are trending northward to the +Peace River country, have drawn up to the hotel. Their wagons are +piled high with farm implements and household stuff which they +purchased at Edmonton. +</P> + +<P> +All of these people are topful of enthusiasm, being of wise and gallant +mind. Indeed, the whole country seems surcharged with it and even the +poplars clap their hands. The settlers will tell you the only knocker +here is Opportunity. There is always a mirage in the pioneer's sky +which, God be praised, he manages to haul down bit by bit and pin to +the solid earth. "The pins!" you ask. Ah yes! I may as well tell +you; they are surveyors' stakes and tamarack fence-poles. +</P> + +<P> +I have some little talk with a woman who is resting on the balcony +while her horses are being fed. She comes from the United States and, +until her marriage three months ago, practised her profession as a +trained nurse. Her husband is going to make entry for a homestead, and +when, in three years, he has "proven up," they will open a store in one +of the villages. By that time, the railway will have reached their +district. Here is a woman of varied interests and many pursuits; one +with more than an arm up her sleeve. I am doubly sure of her +practicability now that she has told me of the stuff she has packed in +the corners of the wagon, and in the narrow spaces between the +household utensils. She has seeds for her kitchen garden, also sweet +peas, mignonette, sunflowers, hollyhocks, and pansies. The firebox of +her stove contains a hand sewing-machine, while the oven is the +receptacle for a guitar, some music a surgical case, a box of +medicines, a small looking-glass, two metal candlesticks, a roll of +coloured pictures for her walls, a few thin paper classics, stationery, +fishing-tackle, and a well-stored work-bag. The matches she carries in +a case with a close top, while the groceries are packed in tin bread +boxes which will serve the same end in her new home. Besides their +cooking utensils, toilet articles, clothing, blankets, and tent, this +couple carry a rifle, a shot-gun, ammunition, and other small but +useful things like a map, a compass, and an almanac. The wagon has a +canvas top. +</P> + +<P> +One man who is also heading for the far north tells me he has sold +everything from painkiller to mining stock. Of late, he has been +selling real-estate, but the bottom has dropped out of this business. +For the future, he intends raising potatoes on the land instead of +prices. He has "cleaned up" eight thousand dollars in real-estate, but +he wishes me to understand he made this honestly by taking options on +property and selling before the options came due. +</P> + +<P> +With remarkable precision of language, he explains how the slump in +real-estate is chiefly due to those large, didactic gentlemen of slow +conscience and insulting superior manner who come here by the trainload +and tell the North she is still a flapper, and that it is unbecoming of +her to do up her hair and lengthen her skirts, after which cheap and +unsolicited advice, they take themselves and their pestiferous money +homewards. +</P> + +<P> +Their opinions are quoted from the Atlantic to the Pacific, which I +must know takes in Spruceville, till the bankers are seized with the +complaint known as cold feet—pest take them!—and "get orders from +headquarters" to close up all outstanding accounts. These banker +fellows, my informant says, lose their beauty sleep, but as far as he +can see, lose nothing else. A business man may be potentially rich and +yet be put into bankruptcy by a corporation, the spoils going to the +corporation, or its manager. There should be a law against elderly +wide-jawed financiers who prophesy hard times because, with them, the +wish is father to the thought. There is nothing in all the world they +desire so much in order that they may, by their phenomenal rates of +interest, pillage the country to their heart's satisfaction. So +gainful is their pursuit, my friend will not be at all surprised if, at +the last day, it is found that these tongue-lolling financiers have a +lien on heaven; indeed, he believes this to be inevitable. Owing to +the fact that we are unaccustomed to it, the process of thinking is a +somewhat painful one to us of Alberta, but it is wonderful what flashes +of illumination come to us sometimes. +</P> + +<P> +To-day, the first train of cars has entered this place. It belongs to +the Canadian Northern Railway Company. For many years Edmonton was +known as the last house in the world. This, of course, was not +literally true, and it would be hard to state where or which is the +ultimate hearth-stone in this very good land of Canada, but assuredly +Edmonton was the last post-office and, until this year, the End of +Steel. To-day, this road is born. When will it die? We fall into a +way of thinking it is here for eternity, but railways vanish like +everything else. Even the great Appian Way, which lasted for over two +thousand years, has, in these last centuries, become little more than a +name. +</P> + +<P> +To build even one of our railways, a hundred forests are sacrificed, +and, in the uncanny gloom of the dead country which lies in the heart +of the earth, thousands of bowed, grim workers toil, Vulcan-like, for +the iron to make its spikes and nails. +</P> + +<P> +The railroad seems like a huge centipede with rails for the body, ties +for the limbs and smoke for the breath. The men who stand by her side +are the waiters who feed her with coal and slake her thirst with water. +Sometimes, when she is weary of the freightage these men lay upon her, +she rises and crushes it to atoms. Men call this happening "a broken +rail" or "an open switch," but we know better. +</P> + +<P> +Or we may think of the railroad as a streak of light through desolate +places telling the pioneer to be strong and of good courage with the +hope of better days. +</P> + +<P> +Or, again, it is a belt which binds the lustrous provinces of the East +and West into the eager land of Canada. What odds that the belt, +partaking of its environment, is rocky here or sandy there, so long as +it be really a belt? +</P> + +<P> +No one can truly say when this road will die. It may be—if one may +hazard so saucy a suggestion—that the airships will kill her by taking +her traffic in men and merchandise. And maybe the great-grandchildren +of the "Coming Canadians" who arrived this year from Scandinavia or +Austria, will plough long furrows on her right-of-way and haul off her +bridge timbers for firewood. Guesswork all! +</P> + +<P> +I might have gone on musing about this railway until now, and computing +what its advent means to the North, the country which has hitherto been +the land of the dog and the canoe, had not a commanding voice bade me +come and "drape" myself with the crowd beside the first train in order +to have my picture taken. +</P> + +<P> +"I won't go! not a toe," said I, but I went, for no woman who is even +fairly normal can successfully resist having her photograph taken. She +always hopes it will turn out better than the last one, and I hoped so +too. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap10"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER X +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +ON THE ATHABASCA RIVER +</H4> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +I am but mad north-northwest: when the wind is southerly, I know a hawk +from a handsaw.—<I>Hamlet</I>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +All the world is a deluge of rain when we leave Athabasca Landing, and +we wait at the hotel till the last minute, hoping the storm may abate +in order that we may reach our steamer without losing too much starch. +But the horn is making the asthmatic lamentations, meaning thereby that +everybody should be aboard, so we say good-bye to all at the hotel; +promise to be good; to take care of ourselves; and to come back soon. +I say "we" because it is journalistic etiquette to be impersonal, but +actually there is only myself, the other passengers having gone down to +the river over an hour ago. +</P> + +<P> +It is a troublous jaunt which I make, for a streak of wind turns my +umbrella into a cornucopia; the fat drops of rain splash into my eyes; +I take the wrong turn, get mired and lose my rubber shoes. When the +river is reached, I find the descent to the steamer is buttered with +mud and so steep that sliding is the only method of locomotion possible. +</P> + +<P> +A vastly tall man stands on the gangway at the foot of the hill; holds +out a pair of arms that must measure ten feet from tip to tip and says, +"Come on, lady." The lady comes, but with such impact that we nearly +go through to the opposite side of the steamer. Our final resting +place is on a banana crate, which, in all conscience, is yielding +enough, the fruit proving to be over-ripe. The passengers are +distinctly amused, but the freight master is in no gallant temper over +it and disapproves of the whole affair. I could tell you what he said +to the vastly tall man, but you would have to come very close to hear +me. +</P> + +<P> +After supper, which consists of beef with stuffing, macaroni with +cheese, pork with beans, white fish, stewed tomatoes, escalloped corn, +boiled potatoes, walnut pickles, catsup, soda biscuits, pumpkin-pie, +apple-pie, currant buns, cocoanut cake, cheese, coffee, stewed figs, +tooth-picks and other things which I cannot remember, I crawl to the +deck to find out where Grouard is, and how we are to get there. +</P> + +<P> +Although thither bound, my knowledge of its location is shamefully +vague. Here is what I learn. We sail north and west on the Athabasca +River till we come to Mirror Landing, at the confluence of the +Athabasca and Lesser Slave River, at which point we leave the steamer +and make a portage of fourteen miles to Soto Landing. This portage is +to avoid the government dams which have been built to make the Lesser +Slave River navigable. At Soto Landing we embark on the <I>Midnight +Sun</I>, another steamer of the Northern Navigation Company, and travel on +till we enter Lesser Slave Lake, down which we journey to its extreme +western end, where Grouard sits on a hill overlooking a bit of the lake +called Buffalo Bay. Without mishaps, we ought to reach Grouard in four +or five days, but no one will cut off our heads if we loiter a bit on +the way. +</P> + +<P> +There are about thirty male passengers on board and seven women. This +half-hour I have been talking to a plausible prolix villain whom it +would be easy to like greatly. He is going to make three million +dollars from his oil-wells on the Mackenzie River. He says so himself. +He has been down north for several years and walks like one who has +been used to the spring of a snowshoe beneath his foot. His clothes +have the odour of the forest—that is to say of leaf mould, poplar +smoke and spruce resin. He went to England two years ago to persuade +Grandfather Bull to invest in oil and asphaltum, but was not as +successful as he could desire. "I figure," he says, "it will take +another century to convince Grandfather, and by that time the fourth +generation of America 'Coal-oil Johnnies' will have squandered the +dividends on actresses and aeroplanes. Pouf! these Americans have no +idea the world belongs to the Lord." +</P> + +<P> +It was well I agreed with him so civilly, for he said, "If you wish to +invest in some oil-stocks, Madam—and no doubt you will after what I +have told you—I will see to it that you get in on the ground-floor and +no questions asked." +</P> + +<P> +Now I did not like to inquire of him what is meant by the ground-floor, +lest he should think me the veriest ignoramus, but I am persuaded it +means something most excellent, for I have frequently heard promoters +mention it to people like me, who have not much money to buy with. +</P> + +<P> +This man originally hailed from New Zealand, but he tells me that +country is no good; it is too far from Fort McMurray. At Fort McMurray +life is one round of pleasurable anticipation and all the day seems +morning. Who can tell at what moment a gusher may shoot into the +clouds and blot out the sun itself? Then it's gorged with gold we +should all be—those of us on the ground-floor—and are millionaires, +with hundreds of universities and public libraries to give away. What +would be the use of having oil and hiding it under bushels of rocks, +we'd like to know. +</P> + +<P> +At this point the purser explains that the steep ascent to our right is +called Bald Hill. It can be seen from a long distance, and is one of +the features of the landscape from which, in the winter, the freighters +measure distances—a kind of millarium or central milestone. Surely +this is a country of vast horizons, both mentally and visually. +</P> + +<P> +About every twelve miles we pass a stopping place where the winter +freighters and their teams are fed. These houses and stables are built +of logs and are sheltered by the forest. I prefer to say they have a +roof-tree, the words seeming to suggest a good deal more. In spite of +their splendid isolation, these stopping places do an excellent +business and, while warm and well-provisioned, are still somewhat in +the rough. The purser says this roughness is not worth regarding, for +while here is the country a fellow roughs it, in the city he "gets it +rough." +</P> + +<P> +"And that reminds me, ladies, of my errand to you," he continues; "you +are probably aware there are only sixteen bunks on this boat and eight +mattresses. You, of course, will use your own blankets and pillows, +but I perceive you have not secured mattresses. It would be +wonderfully easy if you were to carry off one, or even two, from the +priests' state-rooms, for at this very minute the priests say prayers +on the lower deck." +</P> + +<P> +"And believe me," he concludes in a highly chivalrous manner, "you two +ladies have an unquestionable right to the mattresses, so that I shall +consider your act to be one of perfect propriety." +</P> + +<P> +Thus encouraged by the pursuer I proceeded with my room-mate to seize +our "unquestionable rights," but, approaching the priests' door, my +heart failed me, and our undertaking seemed a plain and undeniable +demonstration of wickedness like the robbing of a child's bank. They +are such quiet, well-deserving men, these eight black-smocked Brothers +who are going North to the jubilee of the great Bishop Grouard, the +like of whom there never was. Also, they are very polite, and the one +who is an astronomer and comes from Italy, picked out the tenderest cut +of beef for me at supper. +</P> + +<P> +"Pray don't be silly," snorted my room-mate, "the rules of their Order +say distinctly they shall deny themselves and not sleep softly. +Besides, when men take terrible vows that they will never get married, +it is a woman's stoutest duty to steal their mattress whenever the +opportunity serves." +</P> + +<P> +She also told me with rapid brevity some names which Clement of +Alexandria, a Father of the Church, applied to women in the early days +of the Christian era. She had read about them in a history...... +</P> + +<P> +In the falling of the night, at the mauve hour, our ship having been +made fast, we go ashore and talk with the Indians who are camped here +in a wigwam. One of the passengers, who has lived among the Crees for +many years, tells me I express myself with redundancy in that the +literal meaning of wigwam is camping-ground. She says the Indians have +many grotesque folk tales, which are told by the men. Each story has a +moral which they desire their wives to consider from an educative +standpoint. Once there was a man whose <I>utim</I> (that is to say his dog) +used to turn into an <I>iskwao</I>, or woman, when it became dark. She had +yellow hair and her arms were white and soft like the breast feathers +of a young bird. This happened long ago, before the Indians were +baptized and when people were not so pious as they are now. Any man +can do the same thing to this day if he happens to know the magic +formula. +</P> + +<P> +There is also a tale about a woman of the woods whom we, in our +scientific conceit, call the echo. Once when her man was away for many +moons on the great <I>sepe</I>, or river, the woman took another husband, so +that when her man came back she flouted him and slapped his face. That +night the moon changed her into a voice, and now she calls for her +husband to come and love her, but he only mocks at her. +</P> + +<P> +This habit of the husbands in telling tales with palpable deductions +attached would seem to be common to other races than the Indians, for +the Romans, likewise, had a story about the echo. It appears that +Jupiter confided to Madam Echo the history of his amours, and when she +told his secrets among her friends she was deprived of speech and could +only repeat the questions which were asked of her. The Cree story is +the better one. It has a fine human motive which the other lacks, and +also it drops, a much-needed tribute on the worn altar of domesticity. +</P> + +<P> +When a fire is lighted with birch bark and tamarack knots, we sit +beside it and are more merry than you could believe. +</P> + +<P> +The sweetheart of Jacques dances for us to the well-cadenced rhythm of +a Tea Song. I cannot spell her Indian name, but it means "Fat of the +Flowers," by which term they express our word "nectar." The cree is a +droll language. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Ha! He! ne matatow,<BR> +Ha! He! ne saghehow."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +she chants and rechants as the fitful flames make sharp high-lights on +her dark skin, causing her to appear as the flying figure of a bronze +Daphne, and, in truth, the boughs of the trees lend likeness to my +fancy, for as she dances into them, they seem to absorb her, even as +the laurel absorbed the Grecian nymph of old time. +</P> + +<P> +Translated literally, the words of the Tea Song read thus— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Ha! He! I love him,<BR> +Ha! He! I miss him."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +This is a supremely cunning song, in that it utters in six words (if we +exclude the interjections) the summary of all the love songs which have +ever been written—"I love him: I miss him." I am glad it was framed +in the unsophisticated North. +</P> + +<P> +And Fat of the Flowers sings another song which is addressed to her +lover. She is lonely for him, our interpreter explains, but drinks her +tears in silence. Sometimes his presence comes to her in the hour of +twilight, and she kneels to it as the poplar kneels to the wind. When +he returns to the camp fire she will give to him a blanket made out of +the claw skins of the lynx, and a white and scarlet belt from the young +quills of the porcupine. +</P> + +<P> +I can see that her honeyed words are agreeable to Jacques and give him +fullness of pleasure, for there is a tell-tale joy in his face that +refuses to be hid. +</P> + +<P> +Jacques, who is a riverman, was educated at a mission school on the +Mackenzie, and he tells me that Fat of the Flowers is nearly as +"magneloquent" and clever as a man. He is almost sure there is a +little white bird that sings in her heart. +</P> + +<P> +After a time, our dusky friends steal away one by one to their rest, or +two by two. The ship lolls lazily on the bank and there is no sound +save the whimper of the fire and the deep breathing of some over-tired +sleeper, but once a sleeper laughed aloud. +</P> + +<P> +I step carefully between the recumbent forms on the deck lest I hurt +them or disturb their quietude. I am sorry now that I stole the +mattresses. Surely I am a bitter sinner and unlovely of heart. +</P> + +<P> +In the morning, when I told the Brothers how I had privily taken the +mattresses because I disapproved of their vows concerning marriage, and +because of the unseemly remarks Clement of Alexandria had applied to +women in the early days of the Christian era, they laughed again and +again with much hilarity. Indeed, one of the Brothers said he +applauded my moderation and marvelled that I was good enough to leave +their blankets and pillows. Another gave it as his opinion that +Clement's pleasantry was a shabby-minded one and needlessly sarcastic, +the result of an ill-governed disposition. But this Brother, like the +others, took full care to evade the question I had raised as to +celibacy.... +</P> + +<P> +What Clement of Alexandria said was that women, like Egyptian temples, +were beautiful without, but when you entered and withdrew the veil, +there was nothing behind it but a cat or a crocodile. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap11"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XI +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +SOME NORTHERN PIONEERS +</H4> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Through these shores amid the shadows, with the apparitions pressing,<BR> +Pioneers! O Pioneers!—WHITMAN.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +In the morning, soon after sunup, we continue our joyous journey on the +Athabasca, but the birds are out and about before us. An occasional +duck rises off the water sharply with a whir of wet wings, but +generally they are self-complacent and play at last across the road +with the ship, just as if they sought trouble and despised it. The +young ducklings, who have only taken to water these few days agone, +form themselves into tiny rafts and one might almost expect to see a +fairy step aboard them. The fish jump out of the water, praying to be +caught. They look like strips of silver ribbon. Mr. Patrick O'Kelly, +who is also watching their come and go, declares this to be a sign of +rain. "When birds fly low, lady, and when fish swim near the surface, +it is well to bring in the clothes off the line." He also says that +the plover's cry indicates rain, even as does its name—the <I>pluvoir</I>, +or rain-bird. +</P> + +<P> +There are few birds to be seen, except an occasional hawk, who seems to +have no other object than to curvet about and display his clipper-built +wings for our admiration. Sometimes he soars into the skies in order +to exercise a keen vision that covers half the province, or, again, he +appears to hang in the air with an invisible string, so perfect is his +poise. It is foolish to call hawks ravening birds and to impute evil +motives to them. We only do this because they like chickens and other +gallinaceous fowl whose end we should prefer to be pot-pie. This is +not a reprobate taste on the hawk's part, for, of course, he has never +read the game-laws, nor the Book of Leviticus, and cannot be expected +to know that certain flesh, in certain localities, in certain seasons, +is the particular appurtenance of the <I>genus homo</I>. In truth, we are +so uninstructed in these laws ourselves that the government must, +perforce, keep game-wardens and the churches must keep preachers to +educate us more fully. +</P> + +<P> +The Athabasca River, Mr. O'Kelly calculates, is about eight hundred +feet wide and about twelve feet deep. Its current is about five or six +miles an hour. The less said about its colour the better. At +Athabasca Landing they use the water as a top-dressing for the land. +</P> + +<P> +I get on well with Mr. O'Kelly because he does not mind answering +questions, and I am rather stupid and do not understand irony, a fact +now published for the first time. +</P> + +<P> +Mr. Patrick O'Kelly started on "his own" thirty years ago in Manitoba. +His name isn't really O'Kelly, but in this country a name is neither +here nor there. He homesteaded one hundred and sixty statute acres, +but to be a farmer one had to possess a capacity for waiting and he +didn't possess it. After this, he became a prospector. Now, in +prospecting, a man does not have to wait: his money is always +discernible to the eye of faith. Mr. O'Kelly still holds his on this +unnegotiable, spiritualistic plane. In the meanwhile he is boss of a +big lumber camp over Prince Albert way. He used to be a captain on +this river, but he doesn't captain any more. Some of these days he +intends to take a wander back home. He hears that northern folk are +foreigners in the South. This last remark is made with a rising +inflection as if an answer were expected. +</P> + +<P> +Who would have thought such a pathetic fear to be lurking under so +confident and so square-shouldered an exterior? I can see now why Mr. +O'Kelly finds it hard to get away. Without letting him know that his +secret is suspected, I try to explain how it is the northerners who +have changed. We pioneers talk of going home but we really never go +back—that is the person who went away. This may be equally true of +all migrants who go into a far country, whether it be Abraham who went +into Ur of Chaldea, or Reginald of Oxford who goes into Saskatchewan. +</P> + +<P> +There are several scribes on board, and one of them, "a editor in human +form," gives us greeting and joins our company. He is a thin, straight +young fellow with a likeable face, but his hair is shockingly awry. +</P> + +<P> +"So you are an editor," says Mr. O'Kelly. "Your unpeaceable tribe has +committed much damage in this country." +</P> + +<P> +"What do you mean by calling us a tribe? I conceive that you are an +old fool and perhaps a liberal in politics. Although I am an editor, +and by no means proud, I consider myself to be much better than you." +</P> + +<P> +"Young person! you mean you are no worse," answers Mr. O'Kelly, "but, +in faith, I meant no offence and I am not a liberal." +</P> + +<P> +Being thus reassured, the editor proceeds to discuss his difficulties +with us. He has been treated with great unfairness in one of the +northern towns. They gave him a fine mouthful of promises when he went +there, but they gave him nothing else. They failed to pay their +subscriptions and their advertisements, so that he had to leave the +place naked and ashamed. Some day, he is going to write a story in an +American magazine and describe this town as a real-estate office in a +muskeg. It will be marrow to his bones, and he will let the magazine +have the story for nothing. +</P> + +<P> +Or, worse still, he will tell the truth about all the leading citizens; +he will set it down without equivocation or shadow of turning. +</P> + +<P> +"But you wouldn't do this latter," I argue; "only a man with ink for +blood could do so terrible a thing." +</P> + +<P> +"On the contrary, lady," snaps he, "I shall take blood for ink, that is +what I will do." +</P> + +<P> +"But," said I, "you must expect to be beat a few times in your life, +little man, if you live such a life as a man ought to live, let you be +as strong and healthy as you may." This was quite a clever answer, and +I wish Charles Kingsley had not said it first, then it would have been +original with me. +</P> + +<P> +This young editor talks with so much vigor and so many gesticulations +one might think he was acting a picture for a biograph machine. It is +a pity his political heroes do not avail themselves of his services. +As a fighter, the dear lad would have a fine genius if properly +incited; also, he has a marvellous vocabulary of flaming adjectives. +</P> + +<P> +There is an Indian woman on the ship who is married to a white man, who +seems most kind to her. The northern woman who interpreted the Toa +Song for me, says this man believes the world well lost for love, his +heart being very full and his head very empty. You will observe that +this northern woman is a philosopher, probably owing to the fact that +she has had little to read and plenty of time to think. She was born +in this country over fifty years ago but was educated in the South. At +the age of sixteen, she married a Factor of the Hudson's Bay Company, +and is now his widow. This year agone she has been in Europe, but has +returned once more to her native North with its hidden wilds and yet +unhappened things. I tell you that some secret presage lies upon this +land, and one who has sensed it must come back again and again to its +intangible allurement. It may be the strong, austere spirit of the +land that holds one; or the vast voids of the sky, with their blue and +gold, and blue and silver. Or it may be that Tornarsuk, the great +devil of the Arctic, who rides on the wind, steals from their breasts +the midget souls of humans so that they belong to him and must follow +whither he wills. It is not for me to know the reason, or to tell it +to you, for I am southron born and cannot construe aright. +</P> + +<P> +Time was when this woman only tasted flour once a year. It was in New +Year's Day, when her mother baked cakes for the gentlemen who came to +pay their respects to her—the doctor, the missionary, the clerks at +the post, or the visitors from other posts. On the first of these +occasions her mother, with an ill-grounded confidence, passed the plate +of cakes to the earliest visitors so that there were no cakes left for +the callers who came afterwards. +</P> + +<P> +When flour became more plentiful, it was her mother's custom to have +cakes every Sunday evening. A cake was baked for each member of the +family and one for the plate. No one dreamed of taking the last cake. +It would have been accounted a gross breach of etiquette to have done +so, and one not to be thought of. +</P> + +<P> +"But what became of it?" I ask; "who ate it ultimately? Surely some +one knew?" +</P> + +<P> +Apparently no one did, for I am answered by a lift of one shoulder, +suggestive of ignorance and possibly indifference—a little defensive +shrug which precludes further intrusion into the subject. It is unkind +of her to leave me with this worrying problem, for there are fifty-two +cakes a year to be disposed of, and I may never hope to dispose of them +alone. +</P> + +<P> +The Indian woman who has the white husband gives me bon-bons from a box +she purchased in Edmonton last week. Nothing so makes for confidence +in women as to eat sweets together. Authors write much about breaking +bread and the sacredness of salt, but, in actual life, nothing cements +friendship like chocolate drops. This is why the woman opens her heart +to me and says she desires to write a book—a great book about the +white people of whom she knows many things. I have no doubt she does, +and that if she put down all that is in her heart without one glance at +the gallery and without trimming her language to the rules of syntax, +her book would be the literary sensation of the year. +</P> + +<P> +She wants to know if ever I wrote a book. Now, once I did, but it was +a simple book, so that wise people did not care so much as one finger's +fillip for it, but, sometime, I am going to put all their counsel +together and compose a really great one. It will not be disjointed, +but will flow along without a break in the smooth, natural way people +talk when they are alone with their families. It shall concern psychic +phenomena, yearnings, root-causes, the untrammelled life, strange +decadencies, and things like that. It shall be paradoxical, +epigrammatic, erudite, even vitriolic. I will pierce the self-conceit +of these Canadians and tell them they have need to mend their manners; +that they are primitive beasts—even <I>Diprotodons</I>. +</P> + +<P> +Now the <I>Diprotodon</I> was a kind of ferocious kangaroo, carnivorous and +predaceous, which lived in the Tertiary Period and had a skull three +feet in length. Those who are not of this species, I shall designate +as fanatics who cling to worn-out shibboleths over which they snarl +like pestilent dogs; or prigs who affect neurotic cults that are +exceedingly false and not native to this country. I will be superior +and insufferably arrogant so that they may be vastly annoyed with me +and rage like the Psalmist's "heathen." I shall not be kindly to any, +nor say them fair words, no matter how much I may desire to, nor how +much it hurts me to tell lies. +</P> + +<P> +Then will the wise people take their pens in hand to say that "This +writer is possessed of the discriminating sense to an extraordinary +degree. She has vision, luminosity, verve, technique, and artistic +self-restraint—these, and other palpable qualities which bid us hope, +in spite of all which has been said to the contrary, that the time is +not so hopelessly remote when Canada may lay some small claim to having +a literature of her own." +</P> + +<P> +Oh Me! Oh Me! This is what they will say, and I will laugh in my +throat and in my sleeves. I win not care the point of one pencil what +they say, so long as they refrain from using the adjective breezy. +When a northern woman goes visiting and the wise people wish to be +kind, they all apply this word to her. When the dubious visitor looks +into the dictionary for the exact meaning of breeze, she finds it +stands for either an uproar or a gentle gale. People have been +murdered for less obvious errors, so that all wise people will please +to be forewarned. +</P> + +<P> +If you were to ask here what the Indian woman wished to write in a book +about the white people, I would not be able to tell you, for, at this +juncture, we all forgot to talk and crowded to the prow of the vessel +to see a moose that swam boldly ahead of us in the river. He kept far +enough away to be out of range, so that no one shot him. I use the +word shot in deference to the untaught urban folk into whose hands this +book may pass. What the men really desired was to "trump" him. +</P> + +<P> +We did not see him take to the bank, for we took to the bank ourselves +in order to load wood for the engine. He is a worthy gentleman, the +moose, and should be well esteemed. Dropped in a thicket, hunted by +wolves, unprotected save by his sharp hoof, which, however, will rip +anything softer than a steel plate, he ranges the forests till his +antlers are full-branched, and then, at the age of three, without +costing the Province or the Indian a cent, he tips the scales at a +thousand pounds of meat. +</P> + +<P> +We are invited to the tent of Mrs. Jack Fish, who receives us seated. +This is not owing to any lack of hospitality on her part, but because +she is very old and quite blind. The Oblate Brothers say she is over a +hundred years old, and truly she might pass for the honourable +great-grandmother of all Canada. Her son, with whom she lives, minds a +wood-pile on the Athabasca, but in the winter he has a house of logs at +Tomato Creek to which he retires. All Indians live in tents from +preference, and not from the sordid reason assigned them by the +would-be poet who declares that "Itchie, Mitchie lives in a tent," for +"He can't afford to pay the rent." There are no rented houses in this +country, and no man has ever heard of a landlord. Every person holds +his house, or his several houses, in fee simple. In Great Britain, +these residences would be designated as "shooting boxes." +</P> + +<P> +Neither would it be a sign of mental superiority on the part of the +traveller to consider Jack Knife's job a menial one. Banking +situations or provincial politics may have an importance in the fence +country, but in boreal regions the prime test of intelligence is a +knowledge of how to handle a boat or an axe. +</P> + +<P> +Madam, our hostess, informs the Factor's widow that she keeps quite +well except for an evil and tormenting spirit in her chest. She +desires to know who are in our company, and when she learns that the +<I>Okimow</I>, or Great Chief of the Peace River Country, is one of us, she +asks for tobacco. Ah! the Chief at Fort Edmonton would be generous to +her, but he is dead now and there is no tobacco to soothe her pain. +When she was young, her people fought with the Blackfeet tribe in the +Bear Hills, and many of the Crees were scalped. She fled through the +forests to Fort Edmonton, carrying her two children on her back, but +there was much rain and almost she was drowned crossing the rivers. +That was many, many nesting-moons ago, and now she is old and her pipe +is empty of tobacco. +</P> + +<P> +"Is the kind lady going down the river to find a man?" +</P> + +<P> +No! the kind lady has white hair and her man is dead. +</P> + +<P> +"May be it is the <I>Okimow</I>?" +</P> + +<P> +No! the <I>Okimow</I> has a wife in the South with brown hair. +</P> + +<P> +Ah well! Ah well! but it was different when she was young. Then every +woman's skin was full of oil and there were many braves who loved her. +</P> + +<P> +After she has been led into the open, and has had her picture taken +with us, the great <I>Okimow</I> takes her back to her blankets and fills +her lap with a heap of pungent tobacco. It will be many moons before +our honourable great-grandmother requires a fresh supply. "An old +straggler," that is what I call her, after the beggar-woman who asked +Sir Walter Scott for alms. +</P> + +<P> +The religion of the gentle Nazarene has cut the fighting sinews of the +Indians. This was why the Christianized Hurons were brushed off the +earth by the tigerish and unapproachable Iroquois. The Hurons became +soft, and being soft, they became a prey. In some inexplicable way, we +Anglo-Saxons have managed to keep our bumps of veneration and +combativeness well partitioned or estranged and so keep mastery of the +changeling tribes who permit them to commingle. This is why the +Indians are a dying race in a new country. This is why our honourable +great-grandmother whimpers for tobacco instead of hurling us over the +bank and throwing her camp-fire on the top of us. I could almost find +it in my heart to wish that she had. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap12"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XII +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +AT THE PARTING OF THE RIVERS +</H4> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Think o' the stories round the camp, the yarns along the track<BR> +O' Lesser Slave an' Herschel's Isle an' Flynn at Fond du Lac;<BR> +Of fur and gun, an' ranch, an' run, an' moose an' caribou,<BR> +An' bulldogs eatin' us to death!<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em">Good-bye—Good-luck to you!"</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Mirror Landing, where we leave the boat to make the portage to Soto +Landing, is on the Lesser Slave River, at its confluence with the +Athabasca. Its name has been well chosen, for the Lesser Slave River +is a clear stream, and shows a kindly portrait to all who look therein. +A telegraph office, an official residence, a stable, and storage sheds +are the only buildings. What is to be done with the portaging party, +whom we have met here and who go back to Athabasca Landing on our boat, +is beyond a mere woman to say. Both parties must spend the night here; +there is only one bunk to every twenty persons, and those who hold +possession utterly refuse to sleep outside with the mosquitoes and +bulldog flies. Once I read a story in the Talmud which I considered +wholly fabulous. It was about a mosquito saving the life of David when +Saul hunted him upon the mountains. I no longer doubt this story, my +incredulity having vanished this day with my courage. A mosquito is +big enough to do anything. +</P> + +<P> +A member of the Royal North-West Mounted Police, truly a most +formidable appearing man, insisted on searching our luggage for +contraband liquor. I was sorely displeased, and could have dealt him a +clout with all my might, for the froward manner in which he turned out +my things to the public view. He might have known if I carried a +flask, it would be in my coat pocket. His only find was an unbroached +bottle of elderberry wine which a rancher's wife was bringing home for +her dinner-party next Christmas. Be it said to the youth's credit that +upon the circumstances being explained to him he returned the wine to +her. He had no authority for so doing, but assuredly he had the +countenance of a great example Yahveh of the Jews having aforetime +"winked at" certain breaches of the law which He considered to be the +better kept in their non-observance. +</P> + +<P> +The liquor taken by the police is either given to the hospital at +Grouard or poured on the ground as a libation to Bacchus and his +woodland troup. It is very foolish to ask the officer in command if +his men ever drink themselves, for he will say, "Pooh! Pooh!" and use +other argumentative exclamations that will fright you out of your wits. +You would almost think the subject was loaded, and it takes a soft look +and a wondrously soft answer to turn away his wrath. +</P> + +<P> +Early in the evening I was invited to browse at the official residence, +and I had a good time; that is to say, I found it distinctly +entertaining. "I would say that you are very welcome," remarked my +hostess as she held out both her hands, "were it not that it seems an +understanding of the fact. I have read your <I>Sowing Seeds in Danny</I>, +and feel that I know you extremely well." +</P> + +<P> +It was fortunate I did not tell her she had confused me with Mrs. +McClung, for she gave me eggs to eat that were most cunningly scrambled +with cheese; also many hot rolls sopped in butter, and yellow honey in +its comb. +</P> + +<P> +This is a ramblesome bungalow and very comfortable. Musical +instruments, couches, big cushions, book-shelves and pictures take on a +peculiar attractiveness when they are the only ones in a hundred miles +or more. +</P> + +<P> +After supper we read <I>Phil-o-rum Juneau</I>, by William Henry Drummond, +and discussed its relation to the French Canadian legend, <I>La +Chasse-Gallerie</I>. Of all our Canadian legends, I like it the best, and +it may happen that you will too. It tells how on each New Year's Night +the spirits of the woodsmen and rivermen are carried in phantom canoes +from these lonely northlands back to the old homesteads in the south, +where, unseen and undisturbed, they mingle with their friends. The +father embraces his children; the lover his maiden, the husband his +wife, and once more the son lays his head on his mother's lap. All of +the voyageurs join the feast, the song, and the dance, so that no man +is lonely in those hours, neither is he weary or sad. It is a better +thing, I make believe, than even the communion of saints. But just +before the dawn comes, the wraith men find themselves back on the +Athabasca, the Mackenzie and the Slave, and no one speaks of where he +has been, or of what he experienced, for all this he must keep hidden +in his heart. +</P> + +<P> +When, over a century ago, the legend first sprang to life, there were +none save men to travel like this, but now, of times, a woman may +travel too. I know this for a certainty in that each New Year's Night +I go myself. In my dug-out canoe—delved from wishful thoughts and +things like that—I take my hurried way across prodigious seas of ice +where never living foot has fallen; adown ill-noted trails through +silver trees; by hidden caverns that are the lairs of the running +winds; over dark forests of pine and across uncounted leagues of white +prairies which light up the darkness, till I come to the warmer +southland, where youths and maidens make wreaths of greenery, and where +mellow-voiced bells ring out the dying year. +</P> + +<P> +And when those who are my own people feel their hearts to be of a +sudden rifled of love; that some one has brushed their cheek, or that a +head is resting on their shoulder, then do they know the exile has come +back, for I have told them it will be thus. +</P> + +<P> +And you, O my readers of the Seven Seas, now that we are friends and +know each other closely, will you of New Year's Night be keenly +watchful too. +</P> + +<P> +It was here that our conversation wheeled off from the consideration of +this legend to the northern postman. In the final summary he must be +classed among those peerless fellows who, because of their courage and +incredible endurance, have won for Canada this myriad-acred but +hitherto waste heritage. No man here who puts his hand to the mail +bags must ever look back; he must have the quality of keeping on +against the odds. He is the modern young Lord Lochinvar, who stays not +for brake and stops not for stone. Often his route is stretched out to +hundreds of miles, and there is no corner grocery where he may thaw out +his extremities while mumbling driftless things about the weather and +the government. +</P> + +<P> +Presently the railways will have taken over his perilous profession, +and he will exist only as a memory of pioneer days. For this reason I +took great heed while my host talked concerning him and of the +qualities which go into making a successful postie under the aurora. +He must be agile, light of weight, abstemious, trustworthy, tireless, +thewed and sinewed like a lynx, and, above all, he must have +wire-strung nerves. In a word, his profession requires a strong will +in a sound body. +</P> + +<P> +"Does it ever happen that the mail is not delivered?" I asked. +</P> + +<P> +My host hesitated, and made three rings of smoke while he considered +the answer, as though he would be sure-footed as to his facts. +</P> + +<P> +"Sometimes it is not delivered, Madam," said he; "there may be an +untoward happening, in which event its delivery depends upon the +recovery of the carrier's body." +</P> + +<P> +When he made another three rings of smoke he proceeded with the story. +"Yes! the mail-carrier in this country is a special person and must not +be judged as general. He deserves a much better reward than he gets. +To my thinking, it is a vast pity poetic justice so frequently fails. +It may be that some day you will write a story about us Northmen, and +if you do, be sure you set down how Destiny so often blue-pencils our +lives in the wrong places. We will read your book down here, all of +us, just to see if you have been true to us instead of laying up for +yourself royalties on earth." +</P> + +<P> +"And where do you bury a postman who dies with his mail-bags?" I +further pursued. +</P> + +<P> +"Holy Patriarch!" he ejaculated. "You don't think he is carried back +to Athabasca Landing? His body is cached in a tree and the police are +notified. When they give their permission, and when the ground is +thawed out in the spring, we bury him just where he died. It may, +however, interest you to know that the letters 'O.H.M.S.' are cut on +his tombstone." +</P> + +<P> +"'O.H.M.S.'" I repeated. "Don't you mean 'I.H.S.,' <I>Iesous Hominum +Salvator</I>, the same as we write over our altars and on our baptismal +fonts?" +</P> + +<P> +"No!" he replied, "I mean 'O.H.M.S.'; the same as they stamp on +government letters which are franked '<I>On His Majesty's Service</I>.' You +see the work of delivering the mails down this way, while extremely +arduous, must never for a moment be considered as menial. The carrier +is a servant to none save His Imperial Majesty, George the Fifth, of +England." +</P> + +<P> +They are all gamblers, these Northmen: they play for love, for money or +for the mere pleasure of the play, and Boys of our Heart, like the +mail-couriers and the striplings of the Mounted Police, gamble with the +elements for life itself. +</P> + +<P> +"Ah, well!" remarked my host, as he put away his pipe for the night, +"these fellows know the rules and dangers of the game when they 'sit +in,' and while twenty-six of the cards are black, it is just as well to +bear in mind that there are an equal number of reds." +</P> + +<P> +On my return to the ship at midnight, I found that some one had seized +and was occupying my state-room on the nine-tenths of the law idea. +She seemed to be a woman turbulent in spirit, and, accordingly I left +her in possession: also, I left her door open to the mosquitoes, who +are evil whelps and more tutored in crime than you could believe. +</P> + +<P> +The purser, a very agreeable and well-behaved man, gave up his office +to me, but I did not rest well, in that a whirligig of jubilant +mosquitoes was occupying it conjunctively. Being full-blooded and +sometimes inclined to be rather mean, I endeavoured to accept this +retributory plague as a chastening which might prove beneficial to both +body and soul. +</P> + +<P> +In the morning all the reckonings of the trip were settled at a desk +beside my bunk, the men moving around with the prehensile tread of the +villain who goes round a corner in the moving-picture films. I +pretended they had not awakened me, and breathed with much regularity, +but all the while I was stealthily peeping. They would not have +understood if I had made objections to their entering, for here, at the +edge of things, all men are gentlemen, or are supposed to be. +Conventionality would be actual boorishness, and a woman must try and +earn for herself the title of a good scout, it being the highest +encomium the North can pass upon her. +</P> + +<P> +Before leaving the ship for the portage, we backed into the Athabasca, +and, after travelling two or three miles, unloaded a vast deal of +freight at a little tent town on the bank. Here and there, through +this country, you come upon these white encampments, which mean that +the iron furrows of the railway are steadily pushing the frontier +farther and farther north. This was the first load of freight to be +brought down the Athabasca for the building of the Grand Trunk Pacific +Railway. It was only rough hardware truck, but, withal, amiable to my +eyes, standing, as it did, for the end of a long rubber between fur and +wheat. You would like the looks of the young engineers who took charge +of the stuff. They were no muffish sick-a-bed fellows, but brown with +wind and sun, hardy-moulded and masterful. One of them has written +something about life on the right-of-way, which he intends sending me +to touch up a bit for a paper. It augurs well for a country when its +workers love it and want to write about it. +</P> + +<P> +And even so, My Canada, should I forget thee, may my pen fingers become +sapless and like to poplar twigs that are blasted by fire. And may it +happen in like manner to any of thy breed who are drawn away from love +of thee. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap13"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XIII. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +ON THE PORTAGE +</H4> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +We sing the open road, good friends,<BR> +But here's a health to you.—WILLIAM GRIFFITH.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +As one watches the efforts of the wagoners to store away the valises +and rolls of blankets without ejecting the passengers, one remembers +that Cæsar's word for baggage was impedimenta. But Prosper, our +wagoner, is the best packer on the trail, also he can sing, "I've got +rings on my fingers." +</P> + +<P> +"It is strange there are so many dingy half-breeds in the world," says +the person by my side who objects to her blankets being tied on behind. +"To my thinking there is no colour to compare with white. 'Ishmaels,' +I call these breeds." +</P> + +<P> +Prosper's bearing under her choleric criticism is so superbly apathetic +that I like him swiftly and completely. Any one can see that he is a +man of substantial qualities and not to be excited by fidgety women. +</P> + +<P> +It is fourteen rough miles from Mirror Landing to Soto Landing, along a +black trail that lifts and dips through the tall ranks of the poplars +and pines. The scenery offers no great varieties except those of light +and shade, vista and perspective. +</P> + +<P> +Whenever we pass through a thick-knit stand of pines, the people in the +wagons are instinctively reticent and subdued, but, upon emerging into +open space where there are only birches to throw a shimmering wayward +shadow, 'tis observable that every one laughs or sings. It was <I>La +Marseillaise</I> the eight Oblate Brothers sang, and once they broke into +a French ballad the theme of which was— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Mary, I love you,<BR> +Will you marry me?"<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +The team on our wagon is a badly mated one. The off beast trots like a +sheep and has a way of hanging her head as if some one had told her a +story too shocking to contemplate: while Lisette, the nigh mare, +although strong as a steel cable, picks objections to every foot of the +way either with a kick or an idiotic sidelong prance. Now and then +Prosper, who knows the whole truth about Lisette, and who looks more +religious than he really is, advises her as to her forbears and +predicts as to her posterity, but, like Job's wild ass, this +whimsical-minded trailer "scorneth the multitude of the city and +regardeth not the crying of the driver." +</P> + +<P> +"She's a female voter, she is," says an Englishman, who has been back +home on a visit, "and it's a tidy bit of walloping she needs." +</P> + +<P> +The London suffragettes would have been pleased with our opinion of +their countryman and that we were able to express it in the exact +words. After a full and unreserved apology from the frightened +traveller, we, in turn, retracted the indecorous charge that he was a +ridiculous pinhead, and a man of low understanding, whereupon peace +once more reigned in our wagon. It is astonishing what pernicious +consequences may follow from the kicking of a wayward-minded mare on +the trail. Most of the frontier tragedies are attributable to this +very thing. +</P> + +<P> +Anderson's stopping-place which we are passing used to be the only +house between Grouard and Athabasca Landing, and accordingly is a +notable landmark. Anderson is still unmarried. It is forced upon the +notice of a traveller in these North-Western Provinces that every +bachelor has little spruce-trees around his house. The bachelor thinks +we don't suspect his reason, but we know it is because he hopes, some +day, they may come in handy for Christmas-trees. +</P> + +<P> +We stay for a little while at the house of Ernst and Minna, who came +from Europe more than six years ago. It is a sheer joy to know Minna, +who is a little round-bodied woman, firm-fleshed and wholesome as an +autumn apple. She has been at Athabasca Landing once. She hears there +are trains there now. It may be that Madam saw them. +</P> + +<P> +Minna had planned a trip to the Landing this summer but it happened she +did not go after all. Ah, well! there is the money saved and she is +sure to see the Landing again. Minna was going to the hospital of the +good sisters to lie in with her fifth baby and Ernst was to stay here +with the children. You may believe it too, that Ernst is no +butter-fingers with children and a most cunning baker of bread. Minna +says that down this way every man can bake bread—and does bake bread. +</P> + +<P> +The little house by the trail would, of course, miss its mother for a +while, but the garden seeds were in; the children's clothes were mended +to the last stitch, and a parcel of baby's fixings was on its way to +her from Edmonton. Now it happened there was too much important +freight from the boat to carry this parcel and so it was left behind +till the next trip. It was nearly too late and Minna was greatly +perplexed, for surely she was going to see the Landing and how could +she go without the baby's clothing. +</P> + +<P> +But, at last, the parcel came, and the wagoner who delivered it was to +call the next day on his return trip and take Minna with him over the +portage to the boat. He came, and with him were several passengers. +It was unfortunate there was no woman among them, for Minna had no +neighbours; Ernst had gone down the trail, and her hour was upon her. +</P> + +<P> +"Mother, she iss sick," explained her little son, "and no one iss in to +come. I am by the door to stand till Father he comes back." It was +nearly an hour before the distressful travellers were able to find +Ernst, but no man ventured past the young sentinel. +</P> + +<P> +The little daughter was half-an-hour old when Ernst was deposited on +his door-step, but Minna had cared for the child herself. It was too +bad the mother had fallen from the loft and hurt herself, for now, she +cannot go to the hospital and she wanted to see the Landing. Ah, well! +there is the money saved and that is something. It takes much money +for five children. +</P> + +<P> +"How old is the baby girl?" I ask, as I take my turn in kissing the +mite's forehead, and in wishing that she may be a good little scout +like Minna. +</P> + +<P> +"She was one week last Tuesday. No! two weeks last Tuesday. Ah! +Madam, I cannot surely say. Ernst I will ask him how old is the baby." +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="60%"> + +<P> +Once on the journey we passed a speckled owl in a pine-tree, but she +did not answer to our "Oo-hoo!" neither did she so much as open an eye. +She looks rich unto millions, and thoroughly proof against all appeals. +She is what Cowper called the University of Oxford, "a rich old vixen." +I intend affecting this pose myself when I find the gold at the foot of +the rainbow, in order that I may be extremely insolent to the bankers +and to other offensive collectors. +</P> + +<P> +Prosper says he often shoots owls who lodge in the fir-trees, and that +he gets two dollars bounty from the government from each one. He does +not know it is accounted a sin to him who kills a bird that has +sheltered in a fir-tree, or an animal that has crouched thereunder, for +this is the tree of the Christ-Child, and a House of Refuge in the +forest to the denizens thereof. To those men or women who love the +fir, its bitter taste on their tongues may be more holy than bread or +wine, and may convey to them an inly grace. +</P> + +<P> +Also it is wrong to cast away the Christmas-tree, or the ropes of +greenery which have been used for the celebration of Christmastide. +These should be burned upon the hearth as a sweet savour, and the +fire-master should say, "Peace be to this household and to all the +household of Canada." +</P> + +<P> +The resin of conifers is a more agreeable and a more seemly offering to +Our Lady of the Snow than aloes, or myrrh or spices, so that it behoves +us, her children, to look anew to our censing pots. +</P> + +<P> +Since leaving Athabasca Landing, we have passed through enough +uncultivated land to solve all the problems of Great Britain which +arise out of unemployed workmen, and out of slum conditions with their +attendant evils. +</P> + +<P> +As its stupendous acreage, enormous fertility, and its lifeless voids +are daily thrust upon me, I am filled with amazement. Surely no land +was ever so little appreciated by its owners. If there were an ocean +between it and our more populous provinces to the south, one might the +better understand the reasons. This waste heritage can only be +accounted for on the grounds of a lack of interest, and because people +are indolent and like to live softly. Only two members of the Alberta +legislature have ever visited this country, and these two belong here. +It does not need a new Moses to stand and say, "This is a goodly land"; +it needs a new and more drastic Joshua, to take them by the ear and +lead them in. The time is coming when the crops from this land will, +each year, outstrip in value all the gold money in the world, and it +will not be so long either. I intend to buy as much of it myself as I +can afford, and if I can persuade the Christians of my own town to lend +me the money instead of building churches, I shall buy more than I can +afford. I have read much about this country, but I find it better to +come here and tread out the grapes for myself. +</P> + +<P> +While I have been taking stock mentally of these things, we have +arrived at Soto Landing, on the Lesser Slave River, and already the +Indian women have come out of their tents to watch our movements. +These people are called squatters hereabout, but I prefer to call them +nesters. They sow not, neither do they gather into barns. They don't +care to do either. +</P> + +<P> +They view us women with a quiet appraising look, but not understanding +"their dark, ambigious, fantasticall, propheticall, gibrish," I cannot +learn their conclusions. The Factor's widow, who is still with us, +heard one of the Indian men describe her hat as a pot, whereupon she +remarked to him in excellent Cree that her pot lacked a handle. If I +were to set down how the other Indians enjoyed this stabbing surprise, +and how they were contorted with laughter by reason of their fellow's +confusion, you would hardly believe me, so I shall not set it down. +</P> + +<P> +One Indian woman wears a dress that has in it the many shocking colours +of a Berlin-wool mat. She is pleased when we stroke it with our hands, +and I can see she is as proud of it as I am of my dimity bed-gown with +the pink rosebuds on it. +</P> + +<P> +Dinner is ready on the boat and our appetites are too sharp-set to +permit of delay. We eat and eat just as if eating were our chief and +ever-lasting happiness, and as if life itself lay in a fleshpot. +</P> + +<P> +This is a larger and better equipped boat than those on the Athabasca +because it is meant for the lake traffic. We do not leave Soto Landing +till three hours past the scheduled time, for Mr. J. K. Cornwall, the +Member of Parliament for the Peace River Constituency, affectionately +known hereabouts as "Jim," has chosen to make the portage afoot. +</P> + +<P> +This country, from Athabasca Landing to the Peace River, is commonly +described as "Jim's Country," and if you travel it over you will +understand the reason. +</P> + +<P> +Who supports the stopping-places on the river? Jim's freighters. +</P> + +<P> +Who cuts the wood on the bank? Jim's Indians. +</P> + +<P> +Who hauls the passengers, the freight, and the mail-bags over the +portage? Jim's wagoners. +</P> + +<P> +Who owns the ships on the Athabasca and the Slave? Why, Jim himself. +</P> + +<P> +How Jim can look his pay-sheet in the eye every fortnight and keep +laughing, is, to my thinking, the miracle of the North. But then it +must be borne in mind that I have never seen Jim's ledger-book, and, as +yet, no one else has except his accountants and bankers. +</P> + +<P> +The dream of Jim's life has been to lay bare the wealth of the North, +for the good of the North, and every day he is making his dream come +true. +</P> + +<P> +But I was telling you about Soto Landing. The freight shed here is in +charge of a bachelor whose wardrobe is drying audaciously on the trees. +He says he ties his clothes together with a rope and lets the current +of the river wash them, but I think this statement is what Montaigne +would describe as "A shameless and solemne lie." +</P> + +<P> +He asks me how long I have been out from Ireland and I tell him three +years. "What was the charge!" he pursues. +</P> + +<P> +"Stealing the crown jewels," I reply. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh!" says he, "it's the same time since I left the sod. It was for +killing a landlord." +</P> + +<P> +Now as this man came from New Brunswick, and as I came from Ontario, it +may readily be seen that we have both become Albertans. +</P> + +<P> +"Are you not ashamed to deceive a woman like me, and an ignoramus who +is travelling north to gain instruction?" I ask of him. +</P> + +<P> +"Woman! You're no woman. I mean you're no ignoramus—and, although +you question us, I perceive you know more about the north than all of +us. But seeing you wish to be further instructed, come with me to the +freight shed that I may show you how the wholesale houses pack their +goods. Believe me, Lady, I cut to the root of the matter when I say +the only downright packers in this north country are the Hudson's Bay +Company. You can plainly see this for yourself, and I hope you will +inform the Board of Trade about it when you go home. Here, you will +observe a set of scales, but the weights were insecurely attached and +have been lost. +</P> + +<P> +"This heap of refuse is the remains of a shipment of crockery that was +crated too lightly. Errant improvidence, I call it. Lady, the pitcher +is no longer broken at the fountain: it is our habit here to break it +on the portage. It is no exaggeration when I say I am worked like a +transcontinental railway system, hammering up boxes or shovelling out +damaged merchandise. +</P> + +<P> +"Cast your eye up at these chairs in the rafters, six dozen of them by +actual count, sent north by a furniture house last year but delivery +was refused by the purchaser." +</P> + +<P> +"They look like good chairs," say I, "what is the matter with them?" +</P> + +<P> +"Matter enough," he continues, "shipped as 'knocked-down' furniture, +four legs to each chair, all of them hind legs. This was a matter of +considerable vexation to the purchaser, who paid cash for the goods and +for their transportation." +</P> + +<P> +"But the furniture house will send the front legs," I argue. +</P> + +<P> +"Might as well try to get blood out of sawdust," says he. Now, +personally, I think this simile is an inconclusive one, for I have +known timbermen to sweat great drops of blood into sawdust, and there +is no reason why those drops could not be extracted. +</P> + +<P> +This freight master is a compelling man, and he says the shippers are +expert sinners and a parcel of ignorant and makeshift people. It may +be he is right: it is not for me to gainsay him, or to further +discompose his temper, when all the evidence is so plainly visible. +</P> + +<P> +After this discussion, I play with the other children who tumble about +on the hillside. They all talk Cree, and some of them who have been to +school talk French and English. +</P> + +<P> +One little girl, with the fine insouciance of eight years, says there +is no use praying <I>Le Bon Dieu</I>, for He doesn't understand Cree very +well. She has repeated her prayer over and over but she has never had +a soft-faced doll yet. +</P> + +<P> +Solemn little mother! Her prayer, at any rate, is reasonably specific, +and I can see how one of these days it is going to be answered. +</P> + +<P> +It is good to rest in the shade of the trees while these +copper-coloured babies jabber about me in soft Cree, and finger my hair +and clothes. Truly, I am very fortunate and have much fulness of +pleasure. I might be that same good girl whom an English playwright +describes as having never compromised herself, and yet the wickedest +child who ever was slapped could hardly have had a better time. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap14"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XIV +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +ON THE LESSER SLAVE RIVER +</H4> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Gitchie Manito, the Mighty,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Mitchie Manito, the bad;</SPAN><BR> +In the breast of every Redman,<BR> +In the dust of every dead man,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">There's a tiny heap of Gitchie—</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And a mighty mound of Mitchie—</SPAN><BR> +There's the good and there's the bad.—CY WARMAN.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +From Soto Landing, the Lesser Slave River bends its course to the north +and west till it empties into Lesser Slave Lake at Sawridge. It is a +small river, being about a hundred and fifty feet wide and about thirty +deep. Owing to its sharp curving banks much care is required in its +navigation. Its banks are heavily wooded and as we pass down its quiet +reaches we seem to have sailed into a dreamful world, where just to +breathe is a delight. I account it sinful to talk in these +surroundings, but one may not hope to enjoy solitude for any +considerable time in a country where women-travellers are sufficiently +rare to arouse a raging curiosity in the breast of every male entity +who comes within reach of her. People like these northmen, who live +out of doors most of the year, are not easily bored. They are +interested in things; they are perennially young, and this, I take it, +is the secret of Pan. +</P> + +<P> +Now, the trouble about having a man near is that he is always picking +up your things and so making you nervous. I prefer to wait till ready +to move before regaining my handkerchief, my back-comb, my hand satchel +and my scarf. This is why I pretend not to notice the iron-built +person with strong white teeth who has seated himself nearby and who is +watching a chance to restore something. He is what the Irish call +"bold-like." I know what he is thinking about and understand his +motive perfectly. He wants to know if I have ever been north before. +He is the thirteenth man so to wonder. I am, however, severely +purposed not to tell him. +</P> + +<P> +There is a belief, common in the cities, that no questions are asked in +the bush; that people may travel for days together without divulging +ends. Here is a good place to spend an arrow on this widely droll +deception. An uninquisitive man is as hard to find here as an +unsociable cockerel. Goodness Divine! the chief use of a stranger in +the woods is to keep the denizens of it from dying from <I>ennui</I> and +lack of news. They would consider it the essence of uncordiality not +to show an interest in the affairs of a stranger, especially as the +stranger might possibly have succeeded in smuggling a flash +[Transcriber's note: flask?] or two past the police on the prohibition +line. +</P> + +<P> +This bush-ranger catches me off my guard when a bulldog fly takes a +piece out of my ear. It is his opportunity to produce a vial of +collodion for the wound. As he pulls out the cork and finds a match to +dip in the mixture, he tells me that the bulldog fly is no sweet angel +and equal to ten thousand times its weight in prize-fighters—a +statement which I do not think it fit to disbelieve. The collodion +having eased the hurt this impudent gentleman draws up his chair and +talks with an immense volubility concerning the species, genera, and +habits of these flies till one might take him for a professor of +entomology. +</P> + +<P> +The long winter nights in this province enable the denizens of it to +become well posted in any subject which they may elect to pursue. This +was how the late Bishop Bompas, who lived here for over half a century, +became the first authority in the world on Syriac, so that the +<I>savants</I> of Europe were wont to refer their mooted points to this +lonely old prelate for decision, waiting a year, or often longer, for +the answer which was carried by Indians for hundreds of miles down the +out trail to Edmonton. My new friend declares that, like Montaigne, +the bulldog fly has only one virtue and that this one got in by stealth. +</P> + +<P> +"Yes?" say I, with a rising reflection which delicately hints at an +answer. +</P> + +<P> +He does not seem to hear me, this cold-chilled, care-hardened +northerner, and goes on stuffing his pipe with exit-plug and searching +through pocket after pocket for a match as if my remark were of no +concernment. He is trying to pretend he has known me for a long time, +and that I was the one who took the initiative in this +acquaintanceship. This is why I became dumb, and why he repeats his +statement. Still I am wordless, whereupon he vouchsafes, with an +exasperating drawl, that the fly's one virtue lies in the fact that it +prefers picturesque food which is very eatable. +</P> + +<P> +Our parliament should legislate against the cunning arts of these +designing northerners, against which no town-bred woman may hope to set +up an adequate defence, however perfect may be her poise, or fertile +and calculating her brain. +</P> + +<P> +This person tells me that all a man needs to succeed in the North-West +Provinces is to keep his head hard and his pores open—a recipe, no +doubt, equally applicable in the more southerly regions, and one which +I am supposed to deduct he, himself, has proven with very happy success. +</P> + +<P> +He has been south getting people to come to the Peace River Country, +the new and unpossessed empire where there are twenty-two hours of +daylight and which will, one day, be belted by a string of cities and +gridironed by a score of railways. It is good to listen to this fellow +talk, for, in his calculations lineal or intellectual, he can measure +nothing less than a mile. He is typical of the great and splendid body +of Canadian and English pioneers who have absolutely no truck with +pessimism. These men and women are opening up this empire and they are +under no misapprehensions concerning it. They are people with a +vision, which vision they are willing to endorse with the best years of +their lives. +</P> + +<P> +<I>Kitemakis</I>, the poor one, who intends writing the book about the white +folk, has drawn near to us and is listening to our talk. We invite her +to join us and, after awhile, she tells us curious legends of the north +in which fear does many times more prevail than love; these, and old +superstitions which catch your fancy sharply and fresh the dusty +dryness of your spirit. +</P> + +<P> +Although they are in no great credit with historians, it is an odd idea +of mine that the only true history of a country is to be found in its +fairy tales. These seem to be the crystallization of the country's +psychology. On the trail, on the river, in the woods, you may glean +from the Redmen and their mate-women tales that are well veined with +the fine gold of poetry, but which, as a general thing, are +inconclusive and do not serve aright the ends of justice. As you +search into the untaught minds of these Indian folk and pull on their +mental muscle, you must perforce recall the amazing sensation of the +gentleman who took the hand of a little ragged girl in his and felt +that she wanted a thumb. +</P> + +<P> +Or again, in your Anglo-Saxon superiority you may feel like that +Merodach, the King of Uruk, of whom a philosopher tells us. This +Merodach wished to make his enemies his footstool, so as he sat at +meat, he kept a hundred kings beneath his table with their thumbs cut +off that they might be living witnesses to his power and leniency. +</P> + +<P> +And when Merodach observed how painfully the kings fed themselves with +the crumbs that fell to them, he praised God for having given thumbs to +man. "It is by the absence of thumbs," he said, "that we are enabled +to discern their use." +</P> + +<P> +Listen now to this tale of the North: Once there was a smiling woman in +this land and wherever she went she brought warmth with her and light, +so that even the ice melted in the rivers. Her eyes were blue like the +flowers and her skin was white like the milk of a young mother. As she +passed through the land the fish swam out of their caves, the birds +rested on their nests, and even the dead women who were in the clay +stirred themselves when she passed over, for once they had known lovers +and had carried men children. She was vastly kind, this woman, and was +known even to the dear God and the Holy Virgin in the country of the +beautiful heaven. +</P> + +<P> +Now, there was also in this river land an evil man of impetuous +appetite who was part bear, and had seven tongues, and his arms had +claws instead of hands. And it befell that when he saw the woman and +heard her voice that was sweet like the singing voice of an arrow when +it leaves the bow, he yearned to her with a vehement love and wooed her +with cunning words and with dram songs that she might come to him and +be his mate-woman. +</P> + +<P> +"So strong am I," he said, "that my blow can break any skull. My skin +is flushed, and my flesh is warm with thoughts of you. My bed is of +soft skins and I will feed you with yellow marrow from white bones. I +am <I>Mistikwan</I>, the Head, and I have strength and skill to feed the +mouth of my woman. I am <I>Askinekew</I>, the Young Man." +</P> + +<P> +But the woman flouted him, for he was hateful with his hands of hair +and his seven tongues; besides she knew, this woman, that there were +matters of scandal against him and that the people of the Crees said +<I>weyesekao</I>, "He is a flesh-eater," and hid themselves in the trees as +he passed by. +</P> + +<P> +And because she thus flouted him, the dew stood out on his face like +the juice on the fir-tree, for he loved her most exceedingly. +</P> + +<P> +But as he drew near and grasped her in his strong arms that could not +be unloosed, the woman's heart became weak as the poplar smoke when it +turns into air. +</P> + +<P> +And thus he holds her for nine months, this <I>Askinekew</I>, the Young Man +who is strong and very mischievous, till she bears him a son, when it +happens that for three months he falls asleep so that the woman goes +free to bring heat and light to the river-land and meat and fish to the +kettles. +</P> + +<P> +Thus does Kitemakis, "the poor one," tell me the story of winter and +summer and of the birth of the year. +</P> + +<P> +And Kitemakis, who has "the young lamb's heart among the full-grown +flocks," advises me to hold no converse with left-handed people, for it +is well known in these parts that such have communion with the devils. +</P> + +<P> +I am bewared too, that if I have a bad dream, that is to say, if I +dream of small-pox, or of white people, I must cut a lock from over my +ear and burn it in the fire. +</P> + +<P> +Also, Madam is instructed to throw away the wishbone of any bird she +may eat in order that it may grow again and be food for other folk. +</P> + +<P> +And Kitemakis tells me further that when Amisk, the beaver, dies his +soul lives on. In the happy hunting grounds the beaver was a carpenter +who, through some distemper of the mind, kept working while the moose +were on the runway so that he frightened them away. This caused the +chief hunter to become very angry and he said to the beaver, "Thou +shalt built always, and men shall break down thy work and take thy pelt +for covering. Also, thou shalt eat wood forever." +</P> + +<P> +I cannot hear any more of these stories for my attention is drawn to a +man who has come close to the ship in a small row-boat. The engine has +stopped and a permit is handed to him over the side of the vessel. The +man looks like a Scotchman, seems like an Irishman, but in reality is a +German, an erstwhile soldier, who makes his livelihood in curing and +smoking fish. He is indulging in a surly and wrong-headed paroxysm +because Elise, his wife, is not on the boat. Elise went to the city to +have her teeth filled and still lingers in the south. A certain rude +fellow with a brass-throated laugh is suggesting of the +soldier-fisherman that Elise may be appreciative of the change of +society and that he is foolish to look for her under two months. +"Better enjoy your permit before Elise gets home; that's my advice," +enjoins the tormentor. +</P> + +<P> +"About the viskey, not one tam I care," replies the irascible husband, +"it's ma vife I vant. Ma vife she in Edmonton stays"—a praiseworthy +choice on his part which, to our way of thinking, minifies the +oft-urged but yet unproven claim that "A woman's only a woman, but a +good cigar's a smoke." +</P> + +<P> +As the man pushes off, Baldy, a pucker-faced fellow whose real name is +Nathaniel, assures me that this German is considered "sorta queer" +hereabouts, and that it is nothing short of flat irreverence for a man +to speak so lightly about his permit in a land of such inordinate +thirsts. +</P> + +<P> +This matter of leaving home for the treatment of sore molars has +suddenly become an important one in the north. Hitherto, the traders +of the Hudson's Bay Company and the missionaries did not need to go to +the city on business, or to see their mother-in-law; their errand was +teeth. But this summer, the Company seems to have waxed over-wise, for +the Inspector of Posts is bringing a dentist. It was only yesterday +that a woman who [Transcriber's note: line possibly missing here] women +alike consider this to be an ill courtesy and hold to the hope that the +dentist may be drowned at Athabasca Landing. The woman who tells me of +it believes when one gives nine-tenths of her time to the Company, the +church, and the household it is not wicked to take one-tenth for +herself. Indeed, there are times when she honestly desires to be +wicked and to take several-tenths for herself. The whole arrangement +she stigmatizes as a graceless one and a blot on the Company's +escutcheon. +</P> + +<P> +Still, there are drawbacks in being so far from a dentist. It was only +yesterday that a woman who was using the river as her wash-pot, dropped +her new set of teeth overboard. She had not been out for five years +and made the trip with her husband and her two youngest sons at the +cost of much time and money. However amusing the incident might be to +thoughtless onlookers, at the bottom it was almost tragic, and she, at +least, is hoping that the H. B. Co. dentist will meet no dire or +untimely fate before reaching Grouard. This is a healthful-bodied, +healthful-minded woman with a temperament that adjusts itself to life. +She is proud of the fact that she is educating her five sons at home; +that she cooks for the ten men engaged in her husband's saw-mill, and +that she has twelve hundred cabbages in her garden. I am glad she +wears a hoop of diamonds on her finger and that her fur wrap would cost +a fortune in Paris. It means that her husband is no stingy, +unappreciative curmudgeon and that all is well with her. +</P> + +<P> +Sawridge is at the mouth of the Lesser Slave River where it enters into +the lake of the same name. At present, it consists of a Hudson's Bay +Company post and a telegraph office. Some day, by reason of its +location, it will be a good-sized town. Farther on are the Swan Hills +and the Swan River. This is the river referred to by Lever in <I>Charles +O'Malley</I>. The young gentleman whose affairs were in an ill posture +had his choice, you may remember, between going to "Hell or Swan +River." This was a libel on the place and an impudent falsity, for, if +you omit the mosquitoes with their unhandsome manners, one might call +it the trail to Paradise. Besides, if life cut too hard the young +gentleman might have taken his last trail here. It would not have been +a bad death either—a wide sky, a wide sea, and a sudden dip into +immortality—or oblivion. +</P> + +<P> +On the lower deck, the Indians who travel to Grouard for the Golden +Jubilee of the great Bishop Grouard are whiling away the time by +playing poker. The cards which they use weigh twice as much as when +purchased, but why worry in a land where microbes are unheard of and so +have no pernicious consequence. These Indians have the air of +unambitious men; they have not cared to come into the big Canadian job. +They appear to do little else than eat, sleep, and gamble. But, god of +civilization, what else is there to do except make love, and men cannot +make love to preposterous women who work always. These fellows have, +however, one saving quality, having never formed themselves into +unions. Now that even the farmers have gone over to the enemy, the +Redmen would appear to be our last hope. +</P> + +<P> +A doctor on the boat who knows all about the Indians, tells me of their +misfortunes, peccadilloes, their thin transitory pleasures and their +love and practise of idleness. But this is not strange, for gossip is +so common in the north that every one knows "the carryings-on" of every +one else from the Arctic circle clear up to the Landing. Indeed, I +have heard tell that these northerners know what you are up to before +you have done it. +</P> + +<P> +The Indians, the doctor would have me notice, are beginning to chew gum +and hence their teeth and gums are deteriorating. +</P> + +<P> +The mildewed fellow who is dealing the cards is pestiferous with +disease. His birth was a biological tragedy. The doctor thinks he +could best serve his tribe by dying without delay. +</P> + +<P> +André, the man who has just won the jackpot, is not the prototype of +the expression "Honest Indian." He is a bad Indian, a most bad Indian. +</P> + +<P> +"His profession?" I ask. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh, André is my camp-cook," is the reply, "and when he washes himself +he uses quite a cupful of water." By way of amends, André affects a +stupendous scarf-pin, a watch-chain, and two rings. Ah well! to quote +Mr. Artemus Ward, "The best of us has our weaknesses, and if a man has +jewelry let him show it." Besides, it is entirely thinkable that even +a man like André might have to dress for those whose discernment goes +no deeper than clothes and ornamentation. +</P> + +<P> +The difference between an Indian and a half-breed lies in the fact that +the Indian is in treaty with the government and lives on a reservation. +The breed is free to come and go, but his blood is just as pure as the +Indian's so far as its redness is concerned. +</P> + +<P> +In most cases, the children look to their mother as the head of the +family. The doctor says this is quite fitting. Take the case of Marie +there—Yes! the little girl with the precise plaits—she is the +daughter of old Henrietta and a Mounted Policeman. Jacqueline, her +sister who in-toes so queerly, is the result of old Henrietta's fancy +for a fur trader. It can be readily seen how several masculine heads +to the family would complicate matters and that it is wholly desirable +the girls should look to their mother for their lineage. In the north, +as yet, it has not been necessary to cover vices with cloaks. +</P> + +<P> +The Indian women have fallen on better days since the government passed +a law prohibiting the Indian from selling his cattle without a permit +from the agency, and making it illegal for a white man to purchase. +Previously, the Indian gambled away his animals, leaving his squaw and +papooses to suffer from starvation. +</P> + +<P> +"The old effigy" asleep in the sun is, I am informed, a chief of +distinction. Like Froissart's Knights, the hereditary chieftain may be +blind, crippled and infirm. His body fordone with age is by them +considered to be full of the spirit of wisdom. He is the giver of law +and keeper of traditions. The Indians have no dead-line in their +tribal codes, it being held in suspension north of 55° with the league +rules and the game laws, a fact which leads to the deduction that what +the world has gained by civilization is fairly balanced by what it has +lost. +</P> + +<P> +While we have been getting acquainted with the Indians, our ship has +carried us into the finest duck grounds in the world, the teal and +mallard rising from the rice beds in almost incredible numbers. It +seems impossible that their numbers should ever be noticeably depleted, +nor are they likely to be, until Grouard, which we have now reached, +has become the splendid metropolis its people have planned and which, +no doubt, their efforts will one day materialize. +</P> + +<P> +"We believe," says my medical friend, "that any one who says Grouard +isn't going to be a large city hasn't got things properly sized-up. I +hope you won't go south again, my interesting child," he further +continues; "it would seem like being cut off in the flower of your +days. While sometimes shadowed here, the days are never dull, and if +no one loves you in this burgh, believe me, it will be entirely your +own fault." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap15"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XV +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE BISHOP OF THE ARCTIC. +</H4> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +The trail hath no languorous longing;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">It leads to no Lotus land;</SPAN><BR> +On its way dead Hopes come thronging<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">To take you by the hand;</SPAN><BR> +He who treads the trail undaunted, thereafter shall command.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 3em">—KATE SIMPSON HAYES.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Half a century ago Bishop Taché wrote a letter to France, in which he +asked for some missionaries. In response to this appeal a certain +young Grouard was sent to Fort Garry. When Bishop Taché looked over +the slender stripling he said: "I asked for a man; they sent me a boy." +But a year later he wrote again: "Please send me more boys." This was +fifty years ago, and from that day to this the northern world has had +but one opinion of Grouard—he makes good. He is a worker who sticks +to his text. To-day, he is the head of the Catholic missions in the +far north, and his diocese, until lately, included the very Yukon. +</P> + +<P> +He is seventy-seven years old (but we don't believe it), with a leonine +head, an unrazored face and a chest like a draught horse; an erect man +who commands the instant attention of whatever company he enters. +Assuredly, he is the type of the sound mind in the sound body. It is +not to be wondered that his attractive personality made him the +cynosure of all eyes, and that his name was on every tongue when, +several years ago, he went to England, there to attend a great +conference of his Church. +</P> + +<P> +Bishop Grouard is alert in manner and has a kindly consideration for +the poorest person. Attend you, sirs and madams, to observe the Old +World courtesy in its highest perfection, you must see it in the person +of a French gentleman who holds a position of honor in the far, far +north, it is an absolutely truthful courtesy, that has its roots in a +big warm heart, so that it becomes the very bone and fibre of the man. +By way of placating our more southerly dignitaries in what may seem an +invidious comparison, it may be urged that Bishop Grouard's urbanity +has never suffered such cross-currents as the municipal watering cart, +speed-limit fines, or the bill collectors, for, as yet, these +well-conceived but ill-approved institutions are entirely unknown in +the strangely blissful regions north of 55°. +</P> + +<P> +It is for the fiftieth anniversary of Bishop Grouard's consecration as +a priest that all of us have gathered from Edmonton to Hudson's Hope to +celebrate. We are assembled at Grouard on Lesser Slave Lake, the +missionary post that was built here forty-nine years ago and named +after the hero of this day. Our assembly is what smart society +reporters would describe as "mixed," and the word would be correctly +used; nevertheless, the interest and colour of this occasion are in no +inconsiderable measure due to this very fact. Besides, ours is a +goodly fellowship. +</P> + +<P> +Here we have Father Orcolan from Rome, who has written books on +astronomy; Jake Gaudette, who was born in the Arctic Circle; Indian +Chiefs from near and far, with their wives and children; big Jim +Cornwall, the Cecil Rhodes of the north; Bishop Joussard, the +coadjutor, a short man with a hard-bitten sun-scorched face; factors +and traders from outlying posts (believe me, right merry gentlemen); +Judge Noel and his legal company, who have been dispensing justice in +the regions beyond; lean-hipped, muscular trappers who toe-in from +walking on the trails; equally lean-hipped river men who toe-out from +keeping their balance on a log; children from the mission schools; +black-robed nuns, doctors, government officials, and stalwart ranchers +in homespun and leather—even bankers. This short gentleman, who looks +as if he had just heard a good idea, is George Fraser, wit and +journalist. The tall man in khaki with the positive shoulders is Fred +Lawrence, pioneer and trader, likewise Fellow of the Royal Geographical +Society; these and other interesting folk, the pictures of whom even my +newly cut quill stops short at delineating. In truth, they are all +here—the world and his wife—excepting only white girls. "It would +seem too much like a special miracle," explains an Irish rancher, "to +find half a dozen colleens set down here in Grouard—something like +finding posies in the snow of December." +</P> + +<P> +And the good Bishop Grouard is overcome because he doesn't deserve the +homage of these people. "Truly, madame, I did not think to receive all +this honour. I am only an old voyageur, a poor old fellow who gets +near the end of the river." +</P> + +<P> +"Does the paddle grow heavy, monseigneur?" I ask, "or is it that the +journey is long?" +</P> + +<P> +"Non, non, madame; it is the thought of home at the end, and the loved +ones." +</P> + +<P> +"But surely, monseigneur, the end is yet a long way off. Your eyes are +not dimmed, neither is your natural force abated. And did we not this +very day hear you speak to the tribes in six tongues?" +</P> + +<P> +"Six was it?" queries the bishop. "Six! Ah, well! they seem to come +to me easily. I feel like the man who had only to open his mouth to +have roast ducklings fly therein." +</P> + +<P> +Now this old northman has a close grip on twelve languages—it was +Father Fahler who gave me the list—so that his modesty is truly +disconcerting in an age wherein vanity seems to vary inversely with +talent. He is a master in the use of Greek, Latin, French, English, +Cree, Eskimo, Rabbitskin, Chippewaian, Beaver, Slavis, Dog Rib, and +Loucheux. +</P> + +<P> +Bishop Grouard is an exegete and printer of no mean order, having +translated the service book of the Catholic Church into seven languages +and printed them himself. I do not know if the printing press he +brought into these northern fastnesses was the very first, but if not, +it was assuredly the second, for there is only one other. +</P> + +<P> +What these books have meant to the tribes it is not for mere +terrestrial folk to say, but if the Catholic doctrine of supererogatory +works be a reasonable and true one, of a surety it is a splendid +balance that is laid up to the good bishop's account. In the more +southerly provinces, where people like books, it is an easy matter for +messieurs the publishers to roll out scores of editions to the greedy +public, but up here in the north publishing a book becomes both a joke +and a tragedy. In the first place, people do not care for books; in +the second, the people do not know the alphabet. +</P> + +<P> +This was how Bishop Grouard came to build schools for the children. He +had to teach the Indians to read. If you care to you may go to the +school across the bishop's driveway and see the children. There are +hundreds of them, or even more, but if you wait awhile we will go +together, for they are giving a play to-night, and at this moment are +rehearsing their parts. It was Sister Egbert and Sister Ignatius who +wrote the play; the theme, I have heard, is an incident in the life of +the bishop. +</P> + +<P> +But it takes a long time to learn reading; besides, there are many +distractions. And then the older folk whose eyes are smoke-dimmed by +the tepee fires may never hope to con the letters. It were ill +reasoning to suppose so. For these people who are less literate the +kind bishop painted pictures of angels on the walls and on the ceiling +of the church, and he made one of the Crucifixion, over the altar, a +glowing canvas instinct with living reality. The onlooker may truly +say of this what Ruskin said of Raphael's "Transfiguration": "It goes +directly to the heart. It seems almost to call you by name." +</P> + +<P> +If you have lived long in the north you will have been wondering this +while back how our workaday ecclesiastic got his materials into +Grouard. How came his printing press, his type, his canvass, and his +paints? Where did this man get the furniture for his schools, his +hospitals, his church? Where did he get the boards for all these +buildings? +</P> + +<P> +The boards, curious person, were cut at his own saw-mill, from which +boards he fashioned the furniture with his hands. "But how," you +persist, "did he bring the machinery for his sawmill?" +</P> + +<P> +That was easy; he brought it here in a steamboat. Any one could tell +you that. +</P> + +<P> +"But where did he get the steamboat?" +</P> + +<P> +Oh! he built the boat himself—the first steamboat on the Lesser Slave +Lake. In it, if he cared, he could carry his printing press and his +canvases also. +</P> + +<P> +It will not be surprising if the historians of the future appraise +Bishop Grouard's combination of wisdom and action as something keenly +akin to genius. Indeed, they are almost sure to. +</P> + +<P> +I cannot tell you what the anniversary services meant—it cannot be +expected of any one who is versed in the Thirty-nine Articles of the +English Church instead of the Rosary of the Blessed Virgin—but I came +away from them with languorous impressions of golden robes, silver +censers, and wavering lights, the odour of lilies and lilacs that +wilted in the heat; a suspended cross with an agonized Christ, wan and +attenuated; of purple and scarlet cloths, of dark-haired young priests, +husky and brown-skinned. There were other things like a shepherd's +crook, and smoke of incense, but, most of all, there was a music that +mothered you and stayed with you. In some way or other these old +plaintive songs of Egypt seem fitted to the boreal regions, but why I +cannot explain. +</P> + +<P> +In the city we must perforce set a stage for a drama, but here Nature +has made a setting for us high on a hill overlooking a wide meadow that +slopes to the bay. You have read something like this in classic myths, +or maybe it was in Shakespeare, but it doesn't greatly matter; the play +is the thing. For myself, I made believe that is the slope of +Parnassus—for the Pythian hero was also a promoter of colonization, a +founder of cities, a healer of the sick, an institutor of games, a +patron of arts. +</P> + +<P> +It is on this outdoor stage in its June-tide glory that we banquet; +that we sing; that we play our parts. And it is here that Keenosew the +Fish, chief of the Crees, with rapid rush of speech and voice of +military sharpness, presents the homage of his tribe. In like manner +do also the other representatives of other northerly tribes. Each +chief wears a Treaty medal as a pledge from her Gracious Majesty, Queen +Victoria. +</P> + +<P> +It is here also that a fair-faced woman of our company expresses the +reverence of her sisters of the diocese for Monseigneur the Bishop, +and, as a token of the same, presents to him a plate heaped high with +coins of gold. +</P> + +<P> +And from this hill it is that we ride through the newly cut road, a +thousand men and women of us in stately procession, but withal gaily +caparisoned. Observe, if you will, our ribbons and fringes of gold; +the little flags in our bridles; our lynx-skin saddle clothes, and the +wreaths of purple vetch that hang from the pommels. Look well at our +black soutanes, scarlet coats, grey homespuns, and yellow moose hides, +for we are proud this day and wear our finest feathers. It is not well +to be disturbed by the untamable naughtiness of our horses, for the +northern trailer, you must have heard, has no stomach for glitter of +trappings, neither does he like the feel of neighbours. As we ramble +down a white aisle of birch and poplar, the feet of our horses tread +out for us the odour of leaf mould, which odour is the panacea of the +world. +</P> + +<P> +We do not ride with any preconceived plans, or because of any +propaganda. Neither are we knights who sally forth to right wrongs, +albeit we have the truest knights of all with us—he who has snow on +his head but fire in his heart; he who has taught these tribes by +doing..... +</P> + +<P> +This day we ride without review or forecast. We ride because we are +glad. All we ask of life is room to rove adown this long white pathway +in this young world. It is the best that life can give—room to ride. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap16"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XVI +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +NORTHERN VISTAS +</H4> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +My name is Ojib-Charlie,<BR> +I like to sing and dance.—CY WARMAN.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +The reader will excuse my chronicling the Jubilee before telling about +Grouard. I have no excuse other than caprice, nor any precedent other +than the fact that Chinese authors write their stories backward. To +resume then: +</P> + +<P> +You will remember the medical doctor on the boat was telling me how, +one day, Grouard would be a large city. I wish to go further and +declare it one now in spite of its small population, that is if you +will accept with me the definition laid down by an ancient Jewish +writer who defined a large city as a place in which "there are ten +leisure men; if less than so, lo! it is a village." +</P> + +<P> +No one seems to be working unless it be the Indians who are training +their horses for the sports that are to take place the day after +to-morrow, which sports will last for a week. This might be the +leisurely land of the hyperboreans where there is everlasting spring +and the inhabitants never toil or grow old— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"A land in the sun-light deep<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Where golden gardens glow,</SPAN><BR> +Where the winds of the north, becalmed in sleep,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Their conch-shells never blow."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +The first men we meet are the civil-engineers. Nearly every one +surveys here, and even the wild geese run lines along the sky. These +engineers are pleasant-spoken men of proper spirit, who have been +hammered into hardihood by work and weather. Nearly all of them invite +you to eat in their camps: "Come over to my stamping-grounds," says a +youth who looks like a walking pine-tree. There is no doubt in the +world he is lonely for his women-folk whom we happen to know "down +home," for when we accept he smiles and says "Heaven bless you +endlessly!" He gave us a good supper, too, of hot and savoury food, +and the coffee, though served in cups of unbelievable thickness, was +undeniably nectar. +</P> + +<P> +Afterwards, we walk into the village to get acquainted with the people +thereof, and to secure lodgings. Over the doors of some of the shops +there are signboards written in Cree, that is to say in syllabic +symbols which look like the footprints of a huge bird. +</P> + +<P> +We are accosted by a gentleman of the Bible Society who wishes to sell +us copies of the New Testament, which book, he says, is lightly +esteemed in the North. He asks me if I belong to my Creator, but I +dissemble in that I have never been able to say God created me without +distinct reservations. There are certain ugly and reproachful traits +in my make up which it seems sacrilegious to attribute to the Deity. +This colporteur has a keen, clean mind—any one can see that—and I +like him for his childlike straightness of soul. +</P> + +<P> +He is carrying copies of the gospels in the different Indian languages, +but, so far, has sold but few. Doubtless the Indians think with that +Mendizabel, the Prime Minister of Spain, who once said to George +Borrow, "My good sir, it is not Bibles we want but rather guns and +gunpowder." +</P> + +<P> +The knowledge one picks up on a walk down the street is varied in +character and throws a light on village life several hundred miles from +a railway. +</P> + +<P> +There are three churches here, also a pool-room and a moving picture +show. It costs fifty cents to see the latter. +</P> + +<P> +When a trapper is not working he is whittling. This is a bad year for +the trappers: two summers came together. +</P> + +<P> +Eggs are a dollar a dozen and four loaves of bread may be had for the +same price. Beef sells for twenty-five cents a pound and butter for +sixty-five. +</P> + +<P> +There is an outcropping of coal on a mountainside twelve miles away. A +sample of the coal has been sent to Edmonton for analysis. +</P> + +<P> +The main café is built of logs and a notice in English advises the +wayfarer to "Stick to our pies. Never mind the looks of the house," it +further enjoins. "It's the oysters we eat, not the shell." +</P> + +<P> +The village boasts of a brass-band with twenty instruments. Although +instructed by wire to meet us at the boat to-day, they failed to +assemble, the members of the company having quarrelled over the +selections to be played. +</P> + +<P> +Lots on main street sell as high as two thousand dollars each. +</P> + +<P> +A gentleman in tweed suit with capacious pockets and tan leggings which +he has brought with him across the Atlantic, has decided to stand for +the legislature at the next election. "The electors will say," he +assures us, "that I have been drunk. They will say that I have been in +jail, but I shall reply with repartee. You see I've always been +deucedly clever at repartee." +</P> + +<P> +The Mounted Police Barracks, the Indian Agency, the Hudson's Bay Post +and the Catholic Mission are on the hill above the village. The Church +of England Mission lies out and beyond, on a further hill. The bankers +ride out to the further hill to play tennis with the pretty English +girls who teach in the school. +</P> + +<P> +When an elderly jocose Irishman so far forgets himself as to say +"darlint" to a breed-girl, he must not be surprised if she draws a wry +face and calls him <I>muchemina</I>; that is to say, "bad berries." +</P> + +<P> +I might write a book on the news to be picked up on this main street, +if a tide of sleep did not threaten to submerge me. In this dry +crystalline atmosphere, one must sleep an hour or two sometimes, +however unwilling the spirit or unique and alluring the things present. +</P> + +<P> +My room at the lodging-house is the best the place affords in that it +has a cotton curtain for a door, and as yet doors are only used in the +outside walls of the houses. The curtain is not, however, of much +account in that the green lumber of the walls has warped to such narrow +dimensions that the occupier of the adjoining room would have to shut +his or her eyes to keep from seeing you. On the contrary part, you +must of necessity go to bed in the dark unless you wish to fall a +victim to the crafts and assaults of the mosquitoes who are attracted +by the lamp. In a fortnight or so, they will have completely +disappeared, but, in the meanwhile, if you would escape their nasty +niggling ways you must neglect your hair, teeth, and sun-scalded nose. +A real-estate agent was telling me to-day how the mosquitoes often +disappeared in a night, and, to illustrate this fact, related a story +of a Tipperary Orator, who said, "My fellow-countrymen, the round +towers of Ireland have so completely disappeared that it is doubtful if +they have ever existed." +</P> + +<P> +.... A wagon is leaving this morning for St. Bernard's Mission on the +hill, and by some felicity I am invited to go with it. Bill, who is +the driver, received a bullet wound in a Mexican rebellion; had his leg +broken by a fall from "a terrible mean cayuse"; lost an eye and part of +his nose in a mine explosion, and says, by these same tokens, he will +live to be a hundred unless he loses his head to the government. Bill +was married once down Oregon, way, but his wife divorced him. His wife +was very short-sighted, but, contrawise, her tongue was long. Besides, +she was appallingly like her mother. +</P> + +<P> +This trail to St. Bernard's, passing as it does through a trail of +lanky poplars and birch in green lacy gowns, is a right pleasant one, +and fills you with the great joy of growing things. +</P> + +<P> +And also it is very pleasant this morning to shut your eyes that you +may the better inhale the fine brew of the conifers, the reek of the +wild roses, the pungent wafture of the mint from the meadows, and above +all, the subtle incense of the warm spawning soil. This is to have a +happiness as large as your wishes. This is to think thoughts that are +very secret and only half-way wise. +</P> + +<P> +At St. Bernard's the nuns take me to see their finely manicured garden +with its rows of cabbages, leeks, turnips, radishes and its many herbs +such as parsley, mint and sage. Their potatoes are coming on well and +so are the posy beds. This sweet-breathed garden is tilled by +voluntary labour and held in common, but it must be remembered the +nun's occupation does not afford her any special opportunities for +knowledge of the world at large and its shrewder ways. +</P> + +<P> +I can easily discern that the pride of this garden are the cabbages, +probably because more care has gone into their culture. Indeed, this +vegetable seems to be peculiarly favoured by all gardeners of all +classes, for even the haughty Diocletian, when asked to resume his +crown, said to the ambassadors, "If you would come and see the cabbages +I have planted, you would never again mention to me the name of +empire." In this garden-plot the sisters have erected a pedestal upon +which stands a fair shining woman, even she who is the mother to their +Lord and wonderful God. +</P> + +<P> +In order that her labour may become an offering to her tutelary spirit, +every woman should have a statue in her garden embodying her highest +ideal, whether it be of Isis, Mrs. Eddy, or Diana, the "Goddess +excellently bright." Such a statue would tend also to keep her +religion a divine intimacy rather than a creed or an institutional +observance. +</P> + +<P> +Sister Marie-des-Anges shows me the hospital, and pleasures me with a +delicious cordial which is made out of wild berries and which tastes +better than champagne. +</P> + +<P> +Those who have an eye for esoteric apartments with etchings and +faint-coloured prints on toned-down walls, would not be impressed with +the wards and offices of this hospital where all the furniture is +home-made. It is, however, cleverly contrived and has the prestige of +being literally the original "mission furniture"—no one can gainsay +it. In this connection, give me leave to transcribe here a passage +which I have met with in the book of Thoreau, the naturalist. "Why +should not our furniture be as simple as the Arab's or the Indian's?" +he asks. "When I think of the benefactors of the race whom we have +apotheosized as messengers from heaven, bearers of divine gifts to man, +I do not see in my mind any retinue at their heels, any car-load of +fashionable furniture." +</P> + +<P> +I know not the answer of this question unless it be that we of Canada +need practice in the excellencies of those graces which have respect to +personal simplicity and disrespect to communal opinion. I have a mind +to make a trial of this. +</P> + +<P> +It was in this hospital that "Twelve-Foot" Davis (now in heaven) gave +his instructions to his partner, Jim Cornwall, to take his body on a +sled to the Peace River and bury it on the height of land. +</P> + +<P> +People in the cities are too busily absorbed in the transactions of +peers and politicians to know northern philanthropists like +"Twelve-Foot" Davis, the first man to introduce steel-traps into this +country and to thus dare the wrath of the omnipotent and indomitable +"Company of Gentlemen Adventurers." You may not know it, but the steel +trap has done as much for the Indian as the self-binder has for the +white man. +</P> + +<P> +But down here every one knows that "Twelve-Foot" Davis was held in high +esteem, and any man will tell you, as Bill the driver told me, how it +was a full hand this fine frontiersman laid on the Lord's table and +that none of the cards were lacking. +</P> + +<P> +Twelve-Foot Davis was so called because, in the days of the Caribou +rush, he staked a claim of twelve feet. Each prospector was allowed +one hundred feet and there was no claim left when Twelve-Foot appeared +on the scene. But to be assured in his mind he was not outdone, he +measured the claims and found that two of the prospectors were holding +two hundred and twelve feet. Davis wanted those extra twelve feet and +the prospectors decided to give him a place directly in the centre of +their claims on a spot where a basin of shale lay. From this narrow +claim, Twelve-Foot dug up a large quantity of gold, and this was the +only spot on the entire creek where the least trace of ore was found, +even his neighbours being unable to pan out a grain. It was from this +happening that he derived the name which, because of the question it +carries on its face, would, as a nom-de-plume, be worth a corresponding +amount of gold to an obscure author. +</P> + +<P> +Bill, who is fairly amenable to bribes, takes me over to the further +hill where the Church of England Mission stands, which Mission was the +spiritual husbandry of the late Bishop Holmes. +</P> + +<P> +It would be pleasant to tell of this place and of the school, but Bill +is in haste and will not tarry my leisure. It may be that his swaying +motive is another bribe. +</P> + +<P> +It was only three months ago that the Bishop and his family started for +England, and soon afterwards came the news that he had died in a London +hospital. The teachers tell me the family who went out together on +this holiday are never coming back, in that they cannot afford to take +the journey now that the bread-winner is gone. The furniture is to be +sold and the house will be done-over for another bishop. +</P> + +<P> +As I walk through the home which for many years has been the most +hospitable one in the north, it is with a mist in my eyes and a painful +tightness in my throat. I touch the chords of Auld Lang Syne on the +piano in honour of Madam, the mother; I kiss the house-flowers for the +love of the young girls who carried them safely over the long, long +winter; I finger the books in the library with affection in memory of +the good Bishop who once told me kindly tales of these Indians who were +his friends. +</P> + +<P> +And when I, too, have gone, may it happen that some one who understands +will touch my books in like manner, and say good-bye to them for me. I +could not so endure it of myself.... +</P> + +<P> +... It was six days later at the sports that I received a proposal of +marriage from Prosper, an Indian who is a trainer of horses. It was +not wholly a surprise, in that he had already approached the master of +our party with an overture to buy me. The master had hesitated to tell +me of this for fear I might be offended. "You see, Lady Jane," he +explained, "it is like that case in <I>Patience</I> where the magnet wished +to attract the silver churn." +</P> + +<P> +"Yes?" asked I, "and what did you say to him?" +</P> + +<P> +"Oh! I told him he was a master-fool; that you were nothing but a +great cross-examiner who had the misfortune to be born a woman." +</P> + +<P> +And his reply. +</P> + +<P> +"He said he did not understand me but he saw you laughed a great deal +and showed your teeth. He says he would not beat you, but would be +very mild and agreeable with you." +</P> + +<P> +Now, I was not offended, for the proposal from this young Apollo of the +forest only meant I was no longer regarded as a mysterious invader from +another and strange land. +</P> + +<P> +Why should he not propose? In this northern world distinctions fall +away and all are equal. As a usual thing, the Indian regards a white +woman impersonally or with a half-contemptuous indifference. To him, +we are frail, die-away creatures deplorably deficient in energy, yet, +strange to relate, wholly lacking in the spirit of obedience. Scores +of ill-instructed novelists to the contrary, no Indian has ever +assaulted a white woman. This is an amazing fact when one considers +how, for nearly two centuries, the Indian has guided our women through +the forests; piloted them down the rivers; and has cared for them in +isolated outposts. The Indian has lived rough and lived hard, but, in +this particular, he is morally the most immutable of all God's +estimable menfolk. +</P> + +<P> +When Prosper pleaded his case personally, he broke ice by requesting me +to accept a pair of doe-skin gauntlets more beautiful than ordinary. +In spite of my declining the gift, he asked "Will you marry with me?" +assuring me, at the same time, that I was his <I>saky hagen</I>, or "one +beloved." I would not have to travel far. He is one day from here if +there be wind, but two days with no wind. He likes the noise I make in +my throat when I laugh. The master explained to Prosper, "This is only +a way she has of gargling her throat beautifully," a wicked cynicism +which was lost on the bronze-faced tamer of horses in that gargling is, +to him, an unknown and hence an incomprehensible practice. The master +also advised Prosper to keep the gloves for, if I listened, he would +indubitably need them later. +</P> + +<P> +Prosper is a hardily-built man with admirable shoulders and a bearing +like Thunder Cloud, the American Indian who was the model for Mr. G. A. +Reid's picture entitled "The Coming of the White Man." Also, Prosper +is daringly ugly. When I tell him I am already married, he says, "You +need not go back. Your man can find many women by the great +Saskatchewan River." +</P> + +<P> +It may interest the curious to know that Prosper ultimately sold me the +gauntlets for my man, and put away the money with an imperturbable +serenity worthy the receiving-teller of a western bank. +</P> + +<P> +... The sports were inaugurated by the slaughter of an ox for the +benefit of the treaty Indians. It is foolish to shudder when we see +the throat of a bullock cut. When a bird dips its long bill into the +chalice of a flower it is doing precisely the same act. +</P> + +<P> +The heart of this bullock was fat, so that good fortune abides with the +tribe. A lean heart is always unlucky. Once Ba'tiste killed an animal +that had hairs on its heart, and Holy Mother! Holy Mother! that winter +he trapped a silver-fox. +</P> + +<P> +The white men played a game of baseball which would have given cause +for thought to those impersonal pawns known as professionals; it was so +very original. But, after all, baseball is only cricket gone +hysterical, and perhaps the game may be further evolved under the +aurora. Some one must take the onus of initiative. Originally the +game was very primitive and I have heard tell, or I may have read, that +it was really a baseball club which Samson used to kill the Philistines. +</P> + +<P> +The results of the horse races are not posted, a fact which tends to a +democratic spirit. If you want to see the start or the finish you must +bunch with the crowd at the post. This also enables you to learn how +wonderfully an excited Cree can vociferate: there is no other place in +the world where a more efficient instruction can be had. And when +words fail him, Sir Hotspur says: "Uh-huh!" and makes other sounds in +his teeth like a flame when it leaps through dry rushes. +</P> + +<P> +The mysteries of straight, place, and show are not probed here and no +Indian throws a race. The best horse always wins. The Cree jockey +rides bareback and beats his horse from the start. This, they tell me, +is necessary because there is no best strain in Indian ponies. They +are as native and unimproved as the horses of Diomedes that roamed the +hills of Arcadia. +</P> + +<P> +The tents, booths, and dining-rooms skirt the track, and so the squaws +can leave their cooking to engage in their own contests without any +unnecessary loss of time. These include a tug-o'-war, a horse race and +foot races. The men engage in canoe and tub races, boxing bouts, +swimming and smoking contests, bucking-broncho exhibits and other +physical tests for which they have a fondness and natural aptitude. +Gambling is in full swing and no one thinks it necessary to apologize. +Several men squat side by side on the ground and pass a jack-knife from +one to the other under a blanket which covers their knees. The gambler +has to guess in which hand the knife is to be found. It is the same +game as "Button! Button! Who has the button?" +</P> + +<P> +The drum-song, that rude rough song of the suitor, does not start till +after nightfall. As a general thing, the man sings it in a tent lying +on his back, his face flushed and his eyes suffused. "Hai! Hai!" he +cries with a blurred staccato that is without response, +"otato-otooto-oha-o." +</P> + +<P> +After awhile, he seems to become hypnotized by the recurrence of this +measured rhythm which is without melody and without gaiety. These +drum-songs are indubitably the survivals of earlier days when the +man-animal roamed through the land and made love-calls in the trees. +</P> + +<P> +The drum-man has one pronounced characteristic; you can never mistake +him for a Christian. On one of the drums, there was a sun-symbol +marked in blue, but this may have been an accidental ornamentation. Or +it may be the drum-suitor is a Christian who merely claims the +masculine prerogative of changing his principles with his +opportunities. You can never tell. +</P> + +<P> +But on the whole, the discordancy of the drum is no worse than that of +the fiddle which supplies the music for the dance. Why people say "fit +as a fiddle" I can never surmise, for a fiddle is always becoming unfit. +</P> + +<P> +One hears much complaint in our province over oak floors well waxed, +but here is a dancing floor that is laid while you wait. Cross-beams +are placed on the ground and over them are put planks of uneven +thickness. When in use, the floor seems almost as active as the feet +of the dancers. +</P> + +<P> +The crowd is made up of dusky belles from the tribes of the Athabasca, +Slave, and Mackenzie Rivers; many braves, and some few white men whom I +pretend not to recognize. I am like the man Herrick writes about, "One +of the crowd; not of the company." +</P> + +<P> +The dancing is of a primitive order not unlike the natural movement +which street children make to the strains of the hurdy-gurdy. +</P> + +<P> +In higher circles, it is known by the name of the turkey-trot. +Scientists classify it under the more dignified appellation of +"neuromuscular co-ordination." +</P> + +<P> +As compared with a ball, say at Government House, this one has some +marked peculiarities. There are no chaperones, no refreshments, many +sitting-out places, and it is wholly in the dark save for the light of +a tolerant and somewhat remote moon. +</P> + +<P> +A white woman who watches it is considered by the men of her own race +to be one of five things—stupid, innocent, mean, obstinate, or unduly +curious, whereas to be accurate she may only be a conscientious scribe. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap17"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XVII +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +A COUNTRY WOMAN AT THE CITY RACES +</H4> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Still do our jaded pulses bound<BR> +Remembering that eager race.—R. W. GILBERT.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +This favour would never have come to me if I had not found a two-eyed +peacock feather in the paddock. It isn't reasonable to suppose that a +simple, country-bred person from back Alberta-way could have such +story-book luck on her first wager. La-la-la! +</P> + +<P> +All the way down I kept praying, "Lead not Janey into temptation," +knowing right well I would slay any one who kept me out. I take off my +hat to myself. +</P> + +<P> +"Dear me!" says John. "One would think you cut your teeth on a bit +instead of a pen." Some people like the idea of betting: some don't. +</P> + +<P> +At this Woodbine race-course in Toronto, they no longer have turf +accountants. Their days were numbered when careless people started to +call them bookies. They have been succeeded by steel slot affairs +called pari-mutuel machines. The words pari and mutuel would seem to +be almost synonymous, one meaning equal, the other reciprocal. The +reciprocal arrangements are like this; the party of the first part gets +the money; the party of the second part, the experience. "And the +machine?" you ask. (I asked that too.) The machine, which is only an +impersonal way of saying the Jockey Club, gets as its commission five +per centum of all wagers, and I am told it makes as high as eight +thousand dollars the day. There are as many ways of fixing the races +as there are of making bannocks on the Mackenzie River, but you can't +fix the machine. It never gets tired of being good. This being the +case, people must study the science of betting just as politicians +study the ways of the electorate. +</P> + +<P> +A shrewd-spoken gentleman with ruddy features and fierce white +moustachioes to whom I was introduced in the paddock, told me some of +these rules he had learned. He said "My Good Lady, I can see you have +an honest face, although you come from Western Canada where the people +are exceedingly singular. I will therefore proceed to tell you in +confidence what I know concerning the canons of betting." +</P> + +<P> +"A tip, so far as I can make out"—and here he flicked a butterfly off +my shoulder—"is a secret told to the whole betting ring." +</P> + +<P> +"Unless you have money to lose you should bet small till you are using +money which you have won." +</P> + +<P> +He told me many other rules about gambling, with much eagerness, for he +seemed to conceive a liking for me, but it avails nothing that I tell +them to you, in that no man gives heed to another man's method of +plying the art, thinking his own a vastly greater superiority, in which +respect gamblers do closely approach to the fraternity of the pen known +as authors. +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="60%"> + +<P> +This Woodbine race-course is a fair tarrying place, and I enjoy its +beauty with luxurious wonder. Outside its high palings, there are +thickly peopled, fusty streets, for this is the very heart of the city. +Why any place should be called the heart of the city I cannot +conjecture, except that both the civic and human heart are places of +huge trafficking and, above all things, desperately wicked. +</P> + +<P> +The near foreground is a finely brushed lawn that, here and there, has +burst into flame-red flowers. In the centre of the ring where the +hunters take the hedges, two beautiful elms hold themselves proudly +erect as if to say, "Look at us, O woman of little wit! look at us; we +are finer creations than man, or even than horses." +</P> + +<P> +Off in the background, with nothing intervening save the elms, little +sailing yachts like white birds, rock and dip in the sapphire blue of +the bay. Strong-built motor-boats scud across the horizon in so +terrific a hurry one can hardly follow their wake for dust. (The +editor will kindly permit me to say "dust.") We watch them, from our +box, three women of us, with a field-glass which we use in turn for all +the world like the three hoary witches who had only one eye between +them. +</P> + +<P> +I like this landscape better than our prairie. The trouble with the +prairie is that you always seem to be in the middle of it. The garden +of Time and Chance, it has no parts or passions unless, indeed, its +spaces seem unfriendly. It has no mystery, no changeability, no +complexity.... But all this is digressing from the races and from the +beautifully dressed women who look like tall-stemmed flowers. I heard +a man in the next box compute that the feathers worn in the enclosure +had cost a hundred thousand dollars, but no matter what they cost they +were worth it—willow plumes, fish-spines, aigettes, birds-of-paradise, +ostrich mounts, ospreys, and other things I cannot name. Indeed, my +own hat has two bright scarlet wings which cause me no small +satisfaction, in spite of the fact that John says they are not so much +wings as a challenge to combat. Moreover, he says when I am better +civilized, I will know that feathers of any kind are an atavism and no +fit dress for Christian people. It is trying to have a near relative +with such views. The younger men of the enclosure affect Newmarket +coats, or Burberry's, and cloth spats, also field-glasses swung across +their shoulders. They express horse-language emphatically without a +word. The older men who have attained to the dignity of the Bench or +the Cabinet, run to silk hats and frock coats. +</P> + +<P> +The enclosure is occupied by the favoured few who have boxes and who +are designed by the Grand Stand as "the society bunch." I would like +to write about this distinction, and sometime I will, but just now the +three-year olds are cavorting down the great white-way, for the autumn +cup which has $2500.00 tucked away in its inside. It is on Star +Charter that I have my hard-earned western dollars—egg and butter +money, mind you—and I must pay strict attention to this race. I think +he'll win. The Lord never gave him those legs and that frictionless +gait for nothing. I'm sure of that. +</P> + +<P> +The horses do not mind their manners at the starting bar, but pick +objections, prance, and kick each other with the most admirable +precision. I have read that when the Otaheitans first saw a horse they +called it "a man-carrying pig." It is not possible to improve on the +definition. +</P> + +<P> +But, after awhile, the horses make a clean break from the bar and are +off in a spume of dust. Gallant-goers they are, and this is sure to be +a tight race. Their necks are strained like teal on the wing, and +almost you expect to hear a sharp shot and see one tumble. Indeed, +they might be birds in autumn flight, in that they run in a wedge and +seem to obey a collective consciousness. +</P> + +<P> +The jockeys ride high on the horses' shoulders and they ride for a +fall. The purple and blue jockey holds the lead and he's going some. +The enclosure says he is. +</P> + +<P> +But the blue and silver jockey is fighting him for every inch and he's +gaining. The enclosure says he is. +</P> + +<P> +The orange and black jockey is third. He's carrying my egg and butter +money. He'll win though, for the jockey who stays second or third must +get the advantage of the leading horses as a wind-shield. Presently he +will slip the bunch; he's sure to. The enclosure says he is. John +tells me to stop adjuring the jockey, that he will never hear me. +</P> + +<P> +They've only a little way to go now—only a little way—and the orange +and black is coming steadily to the front. Even John gets excited and +keeps saying, "Good l'il ol' cayuse," and things like that, which are +bad form down East. Steadily on—steadily past the blue and +silver—steadily upon the haunches of the red and blue—now on his +shoulder—now on his neck—and now a neck ahead. This was how the +orange and black won, but you should have been there to see it. +</P> + +<P> +And to think it all came from finding a two-eyed peacock feather in the +paddock! +</P> + +<P> +Between races, we visit the paddock, insinuating our way through the +crowd in order to get near the ring where the horses show their paces +to the racegoers who make believe they are judges of speed, condition +and stamina. As a matter of fact, the horses are all very much +alike—wiry, wispy things like lean greyhounds with rippling veins that +stand out in relief, muscles of rawhide, and bell nostrils. There is +little difference in their speed either—a second, two seconds, or +mayhap three—but these seconds are, in their results, so vastly +different to the turfmen that all other contrarieties become as +nothing. The jockeys who know the horses from their hoofs up, and who +ride with instinct, are perhaps the only men who can fairly hazard what +the results will be—or should be. +</P> + +<P> +They tell me that most of these jockeys die of consumption. This is +probably owing to the fact that they must rigidly train the flesh off +their bones. Napoleon said that Providence always favoured the +heaviest battalions. The dictum has no application to jockeys. Our +Western maxim that a cowboy is only as good as his nerves would be of +more general applicability. +</P> + +<P> +But while, in the horses themselves, there seems to be little of marked +individuality, think of what volumes could be written on their names. +Here we have Ringmaster, Gun Cotton, Froglegs, Song of the Rocks, +Tankard, Scarlet Pimpernel, Porcupine, Pons Asinorum and other names +which hold a lure. So exactly co-natural are they to our extended +acquaintanceship among the humans back in the Province of Alberta, that +our homesickness vanishes into the sunny blue. +</P> + +<P> +There were nine horses in the autumn steeplechase and Young Morpheus +would have beat handily had he not fallen on the last jump. The jockey +rocketed over his head and lay still, but Young Morpheus, being a +thoroughbred and no welcher, ran on and came slashing in to the finish. +That horse has a soul like John's and mine, only better than John's. +The prize was carried off by Highbridge, who seemed to be the +favourite, for the enclosure turned itself into a pandemonium. Men and +woman who before were separate entities, became merged into a mass of +frantic arms and white faces that with a pleading voice coaxed the +winner down the homestretch to victory. It is the steeplechase that +probes to the depths mankind's capacity for physical enjoyment. +</P> + +<P> +"But the jockey was thrown," you say, "and lay still?" Think you we +wear the willow because of it? Not so, Honourable Gentleman. We are +consoled by the well-turned and doubtless truthful reflection that— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Bright Lucifer into darkness hurled,<BR> +Was happier than angels quiet-eyed."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +I did not see any more of the races because I was summoned to the +Government House box and invited to tea with the occupants thereof. +They must have heard what an excellent dairywoman I am, and things like +that, but how they heard I cannot surmise unless John has been telling. +</P> + +<P> +"I'd like to live in your Province," said the Governor, "living is +mercilessly high there, but money keeps moving; money keeps moving, and +a fellow like me need never go to work without his breakfast." +</P> + +<P> +In the Directors' room, we refreshed ourselves with little sweet cakes +and tea from a delicious brew. And in this room, I talked with the +handsome, well-mannered women from Kentucky, Virginia, and Hamilton who +have brought thither their horses—about six hundred in all—for this +autumn meet. +</P> + +<P> +I have made up my mind that John shall not argue me into going home, +not if I have to fall ill from discomposure of spirit, and, as for +Toronto, ever hereafter it shall be to me a new city of Beucephala in +honour of its horses and because of the immutable game-loving +disposition of its people. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap18"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XVIII +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +IN NORTHERN GARDENS +</H4> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Away from the beaten tracks there are still by-paths where hyacinths +grow in the springtime.—ARTHUR EDWARD WAITE. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Far off in the Southland, it is in the habit of Spring to come lagging +over the land. She is a princess. You can tell it by her manner of +moving, and her fine lady ways. Often, she is greatly bored. +</P> + +<P> +Under the north star it is different. Spring is a wilding horsewoman, +sweet and graceless, pirouetting a-tiptoe and waving to us kisses. +</P> + +<P> +Hush! and hold you still, my merry Gentlemen. You may catch them if +you try, and they are not in the least sinful. +</P> + +<P> +Goldilocks, I call her. +</P> + +<P> +"A young mother," you say, "and no Columbine." +</P> + +<P> +Pray thee have it so, for when this season of seven sweet suns has +begun, she is all things to all men. +</P> + +<P> +What an ado there is when she calls to her flower-children and chides +them to arise and put on their dresses. +</P> + +<P> +Sleepy heads! Sleepy heads! +</P> + +<P> +The vi'lets peer out of their green bed and complain of the cold, and +as for the ferns, instead of expanding into fans of green, they curl +themselves into foolish fiddle heads and beg to finish their dream. +</P> + +<P> +The shy anemone, with flushed face, gets her up first that she may be +with her mother. She is Spring's favourite child, but mark you, the +maiden wears a ruff of fur about her neck, and snuggles into it, just +as the pussy-willow does into his coat of grey. +</P> + +<P> +Those flowers that have butter-pats to heads come on apace. Some there +are who call them dandelions but we shall call them children's gold. +</P> + +<P> +Ah! if flowers would only sing. +</P> + +<P> +How terribly long has been the winter with its tiresome monochrome of +white. Every vestige of colour has been bleached out of the earth like +one would bleach a tablecloth. +</P> + +<P> +By way of solace, our northern Indian paints his face and wears a +scarlet sash as, by the same token, you and I wear poster coats and +purple plumes. +</P> + +<P> +It was recorded a day ago that when our dogs run away from us they +always travel southward. There is no doubt in the world they are +seeking colour. +</P> + +<P> +Over the way from my study-window there is a glass-house where a man +who, aforetime, taught school now grows flowers. The transition is +surely a natural one. +</P> + +<P> +His is the last conservatory on this hemisphere—at least I've heard +tell it is. +</P> + +<P> +He lets me walk up and down its long blossom-bordered aisles whenever I +am so minded. Here, in his floral sanctuary, one may take deep +draughts from the warm subtly-scented air till, someway or other, it is +transmuted into the alembic of the soul. +</P> + +<P> +May no blight fall on his roses or his heart! May God love him and let +him live long! +</P> + +<P> +This man's roses are of ivory and pink, but a few are red as if they +might be the blood of some great wounded queen. +</P> + +<P> +Nearly all the roses are long-winged and heavy-headed. They could not +be otherwise when they come and go from the land where dreams are born. +Once, a poet told that the soul of a rose went into his blood. This +was how he came to write the <I>Idylls of the King</I>. +</P> + +<P> +One of the gardeners ties the red roses to stakes and he will not have +it that the habit is cruel. "You may have noticed, Lady"—and here he +tightly draws the cord—"that most folk are hung by their sweethearts." +I almost hate this man. +</P> + +<P> +Hath not a rose-tree organs, passions, senses? If you prick it does it +not bleed? Verily I say unto you that it hath and it does. +</P> + +<P> +It is near to April before the lilies are at flood-tide. You must +needs see them before Passion Week when the gardeners cut and send them +to a large hungry place called down the line, where, in prairie +churches of tin and pine and sod, the Eastertide worshippers consider +the lily and sing songs about death and life. +</P> + +<P> +Not an inch of space is lost in the long lines where, tall and lissome, +the stalks bend and curtsy to the passer-by. The glory of the lily is +short-lived, for always they are cut off in maturity. The message they +give is not one of prophecy and resurrection as the writers have ever +taught. You may hear the message if you are still enough. "There is +no second flowering time" they whisper. "Love while life doth last." +</P> + +<P> +But, after all, the lilies are white like the snow outside, so that I +esteem the big purple hyacinths better, and the bobbing daffodils. +</P> + +<P> +There is an osier chair in one room wherein I often sit and watch the +buyers flit from plant to plant. The women who come from the British +Isles choose primroses, while those of Ontario and the other provinces +to the south, prefer a lilac in bloom, marguerites, or +carnations—anything they knew and loved at home. +</P> + +<P> +The Fraus, Madames, and Senoritas from Europe (every one must have a +blossom for Easter, else where is luck to hail from?) are better +satisfied with heliotropes, azaleas, and claret-coloured cyclamens. +</P> + +<P> +Our erstwhile teacher places the Norway pines close under the palms; +the tree of shade and the tree of sun that sigh vainly for each other. +I like him for this. He knows that Titiana loved Bottom. He must know +it. +</P> + +<P> +Very few care for my favourite flower—the narcissus. I always buy it, +and a fern. There are folk who despise ferns because they are nothing +but leaves but I like them for their history. They are the survival of +the fittest; types which Nature, in her great printing-press, never +breaks up. They are the old-timers of the vegetable world. +</P> + +<P> +Also, I walk down the tomato avenue and take my pick—that is I do if I +have enough money, for, here, at the edge of the world, they are as +expensive as Jacob's mess of pottage. One does not dream of robbing +banks so much as stripping tomato-vines. +</P> + +<P> +Tomatoes do not ripen out of doors (but you must not tell the Board of +Trade I said so) unless on a sunny slope, or by reason of some other +special dispensation. +</P> + +<P> +Other vegetables thrive, and the cauliflowers attain a size and +perfection elsewhere undreamed of. +</P> + +<P> +Never were there such toothsome red radishes as are grown here in the +north, large, firm, and flavorous. They are not so big, though, as the +radishes the Jews used to raise long ago of which it was said a fox and +her cubs could burrow in the hollow of one. I have, however, seen a +pumpkin large enough for a fox-warren, but candour compels the +confession that the gardener fed it daily with milk by means of an +incision which he made in its stalk. +</P> + +<P> +Our strawberries are not the equal of those grown on the Pacific slope, +but are larger, sweeter and firmer than Ontario berries. +</P> + +<P> +We do not sit under our own fig-tree (nor, alas, our apple-tree), but +why should we sigh when each summer the sunflower springs up to a +height of twelve or fifteen feet? It is the palm-tree of the north, +only more beautiful. +</P> + +<P> +The Mormons on their exodus from Illinois to Salt Lake City sowed +sunflower seeds along the trail, and ever since it has been marked by +sunflowers. In the province of Saskatchewan, the Russian refugees +sometimes divide their fields by rows of poppies. In Manitoba, their +hedges are of sweet-peas; in British Columbia, of broom. +</P> + +<P> +After awhile, when all our real-estate has been sold, and all our +companies have been promoted, we of Alberta shall have time and +inclination to consider our provincial plant. +</P> + +<P> +Grant us then that it may be the sunflower! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap19"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XIX +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +COMMUNING WITH THE RUTHENIANS +</H4> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +I hear the tale of the divine life and the bloody death of the +beautiful God, the Christ.—WALT WHITMAN. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +This is my first visit to Mundare, on the Canadian Northern Railway, +and to the Ruthenian Church—the church with glittering domes, the +foundation stone of which was laid by the great Laurier himself. "Who +is this Sir Laurier?" I ask. "Ach! I cannot tell you. He a great man +is," says Michael Veranki, "his hair is like to the wild cotton in +August, and his face is beautiful, even like the face of the great +Archbishop Syptikyi, who is a soldier and a prince, and the like of +whom there never was. Believe me, Messus, he has seven feet high and +has seven tongues wherein to speak." +</P> + +<P> +"About this Laurier? Ya! Ya! almost I forget. He the stone of the +church placed in the corner, and we drew him in a wagon with six +bullocks. He the King's man is, and a smile in his eyes there comes, +quick, quick, like the wind comes on the wheat. Ya! Ya! we much like +this King's man." +</P> + +<P> +Nearly all the people are gone into the church and I follow. There are +no seats, so all of us stand, the sexes separated like the sheep from +the goats. +</P> + +<P> +One's eyes become riveted on the large globe of cut crystals that hangs +from the ceiling near the centre of the church, and the hard white +lights from it strike sharply on my eyeballs like dagger points. All +the people are making reverences and placing something on their +foreheads like oil, but it may be holy water. Know all men by these +presents that I, even I, am the poor ignorant wife of a Protestant +person, and understand not the meaning of these obeisances, nor of this +beautiful fête to which all the Austrian folk of the countryside have +come with not so much as one mouthful of bread to break their fast. +Neither shall one drop of liquid moisten their parched lips for these +three hours unless—Holy Mother and all the Blessed Saints, pray for +our presumption—unless indeed, it might fall to the lot of a woman to +take into her lips the sacred blood from the golden spoon which the +priest dips into the chalice, the holy chalice that is surmounted with +something dazzling like a star, so that no woman may even look thereon. +</P> + +<P> +Feeling all the while like wild oats amid the wheat, I take my stand by +a pillar close to the door and pretend not to stare. Ere long, a young +girl touches me and tells me she is inquested to bring me to the +sisters. I follow her through the church and into the vestry where a +little nun presses my hands and calls me by name. Once, she was my +escort through the Monastery at St. Albert, over by the Sturgeon River. +Of course I remember her. She is the china shepherdess in black who +says "Please" instead of "What?" and who comes from Mon'real. Also she +lisps, but what odds? Plutarch tells us that Alcibiades lisped and +that it gave a grace and persuasiveness to his discourse. +</P> + +<P> +She presents me to the other sisters, none of whom speak English, and +invites me out to the monastery to visit. All of the sisters look +middling healthy, not having the parchment-like pallor of the city nuns. +</P> + +<P> +The service, she explains, is the Finding of the Holy Cross. I must +not think it idolatry when they do veneration, indeed, I must not. +"Eet is what you call—Ah, Madame! I cannot find the word—eet is what +you call—" "A Symbol," I ask. "Oui, Oui, a symbol!" +</P> + +<P> +With many gesticulations and no small difficulty she tells me how the +Empress Helena, mother of the great Constantine, once had a heavenly +dream which enabled her to discover the very piece of ground wherein +the holy cross was hidden away. It lay under two temples where +heathens prayed to Jupiter and Venus instead of to Jehovah. She caused +these temples to be torn down so as not one stone was left, and +underneath were found three crosses. Being doubtful as to which was +the cross of the Lord Christ, the Empress had all three applied to the +body of a dying woman. The first two crosses had no effect (it was the +good Bishop Macarius, you must know, who helped her), but, at the touch +of the third, the dying woman rose up perfectly whole. +</P> + +<P> +This is a story worth lingering on, and the little nun would tell me +more about it, only the celebrant priest has come into the vestry and +talks with us before he goes to the basement to change his vestments. +</P> + +<P> +They are impressive garments which he wears, but one might imagine +their proving correspondingly oppressive. Kryzanowski is the wretched +name of him. He is a large, fair man, this priest, in the full force +of life, with an unmistakable air of distinction. On a snap judgment, +I should place to his credit the ability to deal with a supreme +situation. He is a priest of the Uniat Church, which church, so far as +I may understand, is a compromise between the Greek Orthodox and the +Roman Catholic, the compromise consisting of a prayer for the Pope +instead of for the Czar. +</P> + +<P> +In our White Alberta much antipathy exists between the Orthodox Greek +Church and the Uniats, and several years ago they had a lawsuit which +they took to the Privy Council in England, and which drove to insanity +one of our cleverest barristers. They are bonny fighters, these +Ruthenians from Galicia, and if they cannot "have the law" on one +another, they may always have the consolation of fisticuffs. And what, +pray, are muscles hard for and skulls thick, except to fight? Riddle +me that! +</P> + +<P> +Presently, when we shall have tied down and diverted their tremendous +fighting energy into what is usually described as civilization, we +shall, of a surety, find a human voltage here which will send these +Slavic peasants high up the scale where well-conceived and successful +endeavour is weighed and appraised. At present, ah, well! they are +young and positive and he is the best man who survives. +</P> + +<P> +The little sister brings me back into the church, where she places a +chair for me close beside the altar facing the congregation, an act and +fact which cause me not a little amazement and considerable +trepidation. Will the priest permit an unhallowed woman of lean and +meagre accomplishments—and she a Protestant—to sit so close to the +holy of holies? Will he? +</P> + +<P> +He does not even appear to see me and swings the censor close, close to +my head, over and over again, with the same free-handed gesture of +Millet's sower. He swings it out and about, hither and yon, till all +my garments smell of myrrh and aloes and cassia; until, like Solomon's +spouse, my hands dropped myrrh. +</P> + +<P> +Sometimes it is a rude Slavic peasant who swings the censer or lays the +spice on the live coals—a rough-necked man with red-brown hands and +face. He wears a caftan, or long cloak of skin, upon which red leather +is cunningly appliqued in pleasing designs. I doubt not he is from +Bukowina, or "the beech-woods," for the women of that province are +skilled craftswomen. He swings the censer with such deftness, that +were I not benumbed by the languourous odour of the smoke-thick air, I +would be wondering how this queer shock-headed acolyte with his bovine +stolidity came to acquire the revolver wrist in such a high state of +development. Surely it is well I am stupefied, for it might be +irreverent so to wonder. +</P> + +<P> +But for that matter, all this service belongs to the people and not to +any stilted crucifers or superior choristers smacking of professional +piety. As occasion may demand, an older woman comes forward and snuffs +a candle with her fingers and replaces it with a fresh one. The women +even carry the candles through the church when the ritual so requires +it. They do not appear to have any self-consciousness, but perform +their part gladly and naturally. This may arise from the fact that +they have been accustomed in Austria to taking part in religious dramas +such as The Nativity, which drama they once staged at Edmonton. I did +not see it, but Sister Josephat at the Ruthenian Monastery gave me a +picture of the <I>dramatis personæ</I> taken during a rehearsal. +</P> + +<P> +"See! See! Madame Lady. See! See!" said Sister Josephat. "Et ees +ver' fonny. <I>De tree wise men are womens</I>, womens I tell you. Yes! +the black one too! She is Alma Knapf." +</P> + +<P> +This drama was vastly appreciated, especially by the younger fry of the +community, who enjoyed seeing the devil carry a Jew off the scene with +a pitchfork and cast him into hell with certitude and great vigour. +The older folk considered this treatment unduly drastic and an +unwarranted loss of useful material. Here in the North, we do not +believe in killing Jews—no, nor even bank-managers—where we are not +infrequently pared to the quick to provide money for real-estate +payments or to margin up against the bad news the ticker-tape has +spelled out. Yes! it would be highly unreasonable to allow the +Ruthenian folk to kill off the Jews and bankers and it would make us +uncommonly sorry. +</P> + +<P> +... I like to watch these farmer-women carry the tall, white candles +under the dome. It seems like a vision picture or some sense memory +that has filtered down to me through the ages, but what the memory is I +cannot say. Indeed, once I read of a strange country where men used to +run races with lighted candles, and the victor was he whose flame was +found burning at the goal. +</P> + +<P> +I think the memory which troubles me must be of Jacob's rods which he +made into "white strakes." He performed his rite under the <I>libneh</I>, +or white poplar-tree, even as we perform them under the white poplars +of Alberta. +</P> + +<P> +And while the women march, they chant a weird harmony, the men's voices +coming in at intervals like pedal points. There is no organ, or any +tyrannous baton, but only, "They sang one to another," as the Jews did +at the building of their temple. +</P> + +<P> +I am strangely, inexpressibly moved by this tone-sweetness. Sometimes +it is massive, triumphal, and inspiring as though the singers carried +naked swords in their upraised hands; or again, it seems to be the +sullen angry diapason of distant thunder in the hills. +</P> + +<P> +But mostly they sing a pæan or lamentation of the cross, heavy with +unspeakable weariness and the ache of unshed tears. Surely this is the +strangest story ever told. It is as though they sing to a dead god in +a dead world. +</P> + +<P> +And, sometimes, sight and sound become blended into one, and the sound +is the sobbing urge of the pines ... the people as they rise and fall +to the floor are the trees swayed by the wind. The cross they are +lifting is wondrous heavy, so that it takes four strong fellows. It is +built of oak beams and the figure of the Nazarene is of bronze. As the +lights fall from the windows on the outstretched body, with its pierced +hands and thorn-stung brow, it seems as though the tragedy of Golgotha +is being re-enacted before my very eyes, here on this far-away edge of +the world. The thing is ghastly in its awful realism, so that I am +crushed and confounded. It falls like flakes of fire on my brain, till +my mind's ear catches again and again that most horrifying cry of the +ages, "My God! My God! why hast Thou forsaken me?" +</P> + +<P> +But I cannot tell you more of this story of the Lord Christ who was +crucified, except that in some way it has become a personal thing to +these worshippers, and, maybe, a joyful one. It must be joyful, for, +at last, they hang a garland of flowers over the upright beams of the +cross and from it draw long, long ribbons of scarlet and white and +blue; which the women carry to the ends of the church like floating +streams of light, and between which the men and children stand to sing +<I>Alleluia</I> and <I>Alleluia</I>. +</P> + +<P> +I know not why the priest stoops to the ground and touches it with +fingers or his lips. Sometime the little sister from Mon'real will +tell me. +</P> + +<P> +Henry Ryecroft, in his <I>Secret Papers</I>, recounts how he used to do this +same thing. "Amid things eternal," he says, "I touch the familiar and +kindly earth." It was in the silent solitude of the night when he +walked through the heart of the land he loved. +</P> + +<P> +I have always desired to see the mysterious sacrifice known as the +elevation of the host, but, now that I am an arm's stretch from the +altar, I do not look but cover my face with my hands. Only I see that +a dull red flames behind the man's ear when he takes the white wafer, +and the veins of his neck swell as if they hurt. +</P> + +<P> +But I look into the faces of the women and the men in the front line +who receive the sacred essence from the golden cup and golden spoon, +and almost I can hear what their eyes are saying. What odds about low +foreheads, thick lips, and necks brown like the brown earth when each +has the god within? The Ruthenians—or Galicians, if you like the name +better—may be a sullen folk of unstable and misanthropical temper; +they may be uncouth of manner, and uncleanly of morals, but I shall +always think of them, as on this day, when I saw the strange glamour on +their faces that cannot be described except that it came from a +marvellous song hidden in their hearts. +</P> + +<P> +There are no seats in the church, and while the sermon is being +preached the people stand—all except the mothers with babies, who sit +on the floor. These babies have pressed their mouths to the sacred +ikon the same as the older folk, and, doubtless, some gracious kindly +angel will guard them ever hereafter. Indeed, I hope so, and that she +will give unto them those things I most crave for myself. +</P> + +<P> +Father Kryzanowski delivers the sermon in the Ruthenian language. I am +glad, for I am tired of hearing I should be a different person. I +don't want to be, except to have hands of healing and a heart that is +always young. Yes! these are the things I most crave for myself. +</P> + +<P> +.... Good gentlefolk! will you be pleased to stay and eat brown bread +with us at the wagons, and cheese and hard-cooked eggs? We shall not +give you meat, for we would discourage the beef-trust, and, besides, +this is fast day.... But you shall eat your food off flaxen towels +which we spun and wove with our own hands. Yes! and we have wrought +northern flowers and prairie roses into them. +</P> + +<P> +And further, believe us, Sirs and Mesdames, we sent five towels like +unto these to Mary, the English Queen, that she might know that we are +now Canadians and no Ruthenians. +</P> + +<P> +And Michael Laskowicz shall take your picture, Lady, with his picture +box, and you may have Hanka's necklace like as if you belonged to us, +and Anna's head'kerchief which is always in this year's style.... and +we shall clap our hands and laugh and say, "There! There! she belongs +to us, this Mees Janey Canuck, now and without end." ... They are +engaging, these beechwood folk from Austria, and their loving kindness +is like honey to my mouth. +</P> + +<P> +If it were more genteel, I would like to speak them fair, and to write +books about them, but I have set my face against authorship. I will +not go into the writing business, for I do greatly prefer wealth and +honour, and to have my picture taken on a verandah with my arm around a +pillar as an exampler of a three years of successful life in Alberta +the Sunny. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap20"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XX +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE SHADOW OF THE SCAFFOLD +</H4> + +<P> +<I>It was my harassing duty to act as death-watch to the man who wrote +the appended diary. On the day before his execution he made no entry, +although he opened the book several times and once asked me to sharpen +his pencil. I was not present at his execution, but was informed that +he bore himself with dignity and calmness. The crime which he expiated +with his life was the murder of his wife who had left him to live with +another man. He had still one year to complete before obtaining his +degree as a medical practitioner. At his trial, he refused to take +refuge behind his wife's misdemeanour, nor would he permit his counsel +to urge this plea on his behalf</I>. +</P> + +<P> +<I>I have held this unique diary for over a year, not feeling at liberty +to give it to the public while in 'the service of the Mounted +Police</I>.—E. F. M. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +<I>There are yet six days till I die</I>. +</P> + +<P> +The words the judge said were "hanged by the neck till dead." Ever +since, they have haunted me like a song that fastens itself on one and +will not be forgotten. The words drag out their ghastly length to the +sound of the Fort bell as it rings the hours. They drawl to the tread +of the sentinel who walks back and forth outside my +cell—<I>hanged—by—the—neck—till—dead</I>. +</P> + +<P> +Does it take a man long to hang? I inquired of my guard, and although +we are not supposed to talk, he laughed nervously and said he had once +read of a doctor who cut down to a murderer's heart three minutes after +the drop fell. There was still enough force in the heart to ring an +electric bell. +</P> + +<P> +<I>Five days more</I>! +</P> + +<P> +They are a tireless breed, the red-police of Canada, and they have an +eye in the centre of their foreheads that never sleeps. I once heard +there was such an eye, but I forget about it. +</P> + +<P> +This boy who watches me is nearly my own age, and I can see he is sorry +for me. I will not whimper and wince, but will hedge myself about with +a fence of laughter and bravado. It is the last kindness I can do to +any one. +</P> + +<P> +I like him better than the priest who visits me. I look at the priest +with curious eyes, this man who in five days will wish me a pleasant +journey into eternity. He it is who will read aloud my burial service +while I yet live. They have no sense of propriety, these men. +</P> + +<P> +May a murderer talk of propriety? No! but he may think on it, and +write on it, and no one may contradict him. +</P> + +<P> +This ecclesiastic has never loved a woman and so has never hated one, +nor killed her in his hate. +</P> + +<P> +Her mouth was like a red wound, but it was evenly pale with her face +before I gave myself to the police. +</P> + +<P> +God! I did not mean to strike her down; I did not mean to, but I did. +Once, I read that no one was responsible for alienating a woman's +affections but her own husband. If this be true, I murdered her twice. +</P> + +<P> +I stooped to her as she lay at my feet and straightened her collar, +also I pinned back a strand of hair that had come loose. Margaret is +the best name of all. I like to say it often—Margaret. +</P> + +<P> +<I>There are yet four days</I>. +</P> + +<P> +It is not given to any living being, man or beast, to know the hour of +his death, else the monstrous horror would drive him mad. Yet, I know +it and am not mad. It must be that I cannot believe it; that nature +protects me with a density through which I may not penetrate, or that +there are yet four days—ninety-six hours! +</P> + +<P> +When I was at school, I kept a calendar on the wall and struck off the +days till Christmas or Easter, when I would be home again. Most boys +did. +</P> + +<P> +The guards in the hallways talk of horses and women and, sometimes, +they forget me and laugh aloud. I know they have forgotten me, for +when they remember their voices drop suddenly to a whisper. I heard +one of them tell of a half-Cree he shot through the heart at the time +of the Rebellion. There was, he said, no doubt of its being in the +heart, for the fellow drew up his right leg. +</P> + +<P> +The tragedy of my approaching death is its impossibility. How can one +realize his execution when the homely smell of hot wheaten bread sifts +into his cell? There is the odour, too, of horse-sweat on the guards +as they come into my cell. They are the Royal North-West Mounted +Police. +</P> + +<P> +I do not know why they are royal and I am criminal, for, after all, the +distinction between us is of slight consequence. They do by law what I +did contrary to law. The results are the same. On the whole I think +they are the worse: their killing by rule is so monstrously +premeditated. And yet, this side of the subject has never occurred to +me till now that I am the prisoner of the police. +</P> + +<P> +But why should I carp and gird at these fine fellows? They are only +the instruments of the state, that is to say of the citizens. I +myself, by taxation, have contributed to the expenses of the scaffold +whereon I shall be executed. +</P> + +<P> +The priest pleads with me that I may not die in my sin. He does not +understand, and I may not tell him, that Margaret died in hers, and +that I must do likewise if I would spend eternity with her. +</P> + +<P> +He carries the whole dogma of the Church in his face and shoulders, +this old priest, but he is a good man and sincere. His endeavour is to +help and comfort me, but his words are short-armed to relieve my agony. +Surely my soul has descended into hell. +</P> + +<P> +To-day, he spoke of my mother, but I would not have it. One need not +die a hundred deaths.... +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Oh! little did my mother think<BR> +The day she cradled me<BR> +O' the lands I was to travel in,<BR> +Or the death I was to dee."<BR> +</P> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="60%"> + +<P> +My dread is not from fear of the physical pain of hanging, for, after +all, the life of every man and every woman ends in a strangle. It is +that these men will lay their hands on me and bind me with a rope and +that I may not forbid them. The indignity of it is unbearable. The +prison stripes, the handcuffs, the black cap—these are from the +devil's wardrobe. +</P> + +<P> +It fills me with mute stupefaction, the mental picture I draw of myself +when I am swung out on a rope, a grisly limp nothing of humanity; I who +this minute am young and full of sap and sinew. I cannot endure that +men should look upon my countenance twisted into an inhuman grimace; on +my horribly bulging eyes, and on my tongue hanging out like the purple +petal of the wild flag. It is not decent so to mutilate a man. +</P> + +<P> +And when they have thus distorted my face, then will they blot out its +hideousness with quick-lime like one would rub an ugly picture off a +slate. +</P> + +<P> +This malign system of burying murderers in lime, and refusing the body +to friends, doubtless has its origin in the Roman custom whereby the +remains of the Christians were burned to ashes and cast into the river +so that not a vestige would remain. The Romans thought in this way +they would deprive their victims of all hope of the resurrection. +</P> + +<P> +The guard keeps a light burning at night that he may watch me the +better. It is his duty to deliver me alive to the executioner. If I +were so minded, I could sever the radial arteries in my wrists with my +teeth and he would not know. This is why I laugh out loud and will not +tell why I laugh. +</P> + +<P> +The wind blows bleak across the prairies and the brittle snow-flakes +that beat on the glass outside the iron-bars have a sound like the +whirr of swords. I wish the wind would blow always, for it lays a +salve on my soul. +</P> + +<P> +<I>On the third day</I>. +</P> + +<P> +My muscles ache for use in this two-by-nothing cell, and, now and then, +a close-shut but invisible fist hits me under the heart so that I feel +I must fall from numbness. It is stupid and super-brutal to refuse me +space wherein to walk. To-day, I went through some gymnastic exercises +and forgot long enough to hum an air that Margaret and I danced to at +the military-ball at Edmonton less than a year ago. I am not sure of +the words, but they concern "an old grey bonnet with a blue-ribbon on +it." +</P> + +<P> +My God! but I have been a bungler at living. I have wagered with life +and lost. I know it while I wait here to pay the reckoning and the +knowledge confounds me. +</P> + +<P> +I keep sifting this question over and over—why is it that men are +hanged by the neck till dead? +</P> + +<P> +I asked the priest and he quoted the verse about an eye for an eye and +a tooth for a tooth, yet it seems to me people sin more in the +observance of this law than they would in its abrogation. It used to +be said by the Jews there was a time to act for Jehovah by breaking His +commandments. +</P> + +<P> +There should come to me some severe punishment for the life I have +taken, but it should be remedial in character rather than revengeful. +Innately, I am not a criminal, and for thirty or forty years could be +made to serve my race with the labour of my body and the sweat of my +brain. It does not seem a good policy, nor economic, to kill a man in +order to kill the evil that is in him. +</P> + +<P> +<I>Two days</I>. +</P> + +<P> +This morning, a silent, fat-faced man with inimical eyes came in and +looked at me, as if appraising my weight. He dared not put his hands +on me for I have yet two days. +</P> + +<P> +I saw him once before, over two thousand miles from here, in a drug +store in Toronto. The chemist told me this was Radcliffe and that he +liked to play with children. He also said Radcliffe claimed to have +adopted the profession out of purely charitable motives, there having +been so many bunglings by amateur hangmen. +</P> + +<P> +It is quite true what some one wrote that in waiting for the +executioner to let him drop, society is revenged on the murderer. +</P> + +<P> +As I sit here writing, there comes sharply to me on the frosty air the +sound of hard hammering. There are two men working on my scaffold. I +can tell from the recurring beats of the metal on metal. +</P> + +<P> +It is appalling that the monstrous lesson these hammers are thudding +out in the barracks yard has found me too late. It must always be +late, for no man ever dreams that he will mount the scaffold. +</P> + +<P> +No! I will not whine. I will not be a coward and gag at the gall, +but, oh! I want to live so much. I want to live! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap21"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXI +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE BABOUSHKA +</H4> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +There is a woman and she was wise,<BR> +Wofully wise was she.—ROBERT SERVICE.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Now Judea was a Province too, only smaller than Canada, and it was +subject to Rome. In Judea, there was a town called Bethlehem, which +means a house of bread. It must have been that wheat was plentiful. +</P> + +<P> +But this Bethlehem was a small, small place, and the Romans cared not +so much as one finger's fillip that a strange white star waited there +for a little while to light up a birth-bed. +</P> + +<P> +I do not know if the star did wait, but it should have, for this was +the most momentous birth which history has recorded in that, for all +time, it changed the world's ideals. Its influence could only be +weighed with planets in the balances. The baby's name was to be +Dayspring, and Wonderful, and Emmanuel. +</P> + +<P> +... It is well the baby lay in a manger else a bullock might have +crushed him with its hoof... +</P> + +<P> +And having for its central symbols a mother and a baby, this cult of +the Christ can never perish. Its ethics may change; its authority may +wane; its history be impugned, but its symbols are eternal. +</P> + +<P> +Our idea of gift-giving at the Christ-mass-tide has grown up from the +offering made at the manger by the three wise men who came out from the +East, Casper, Melchior, and Balthasar. The myrrh they offered to a +mortal; the gold to a king, the frankincense to God. +</P> + +<P> +Whether to God, the king, or the child, all our gifts should first be +brought to the manger, which is only another way of saying that without +love they avail nothing. +</P> + +<P> +I know a story about these magi, and I will relate it to the children +of the North. It was told to me by Maryam, the ninth girl-child of +Michaelovitch, a Russo-Canadian, in the Province of Saskatchewan. It +is about three wise men and a foolish woman. The woman is called +Baboushka and her heart has become as water. Once, when she was +working in her home, the three wise men passed on their journey to find +the Christ-child and they gave her greeting. "Come with us, +grandmother," they said, "for we have seen His star in the East and we +go to worship Him." +</P> + +<P> +"Surely I will come," said the old woman, "but the oven is heated for +my bread and I must even now bake it. After awhile, I will follow and +find where this star leads." +</P> + +<P> +But she never saw the Christ-child because, when her bread was baked, +the star no longer shone in the sky. Ever since she has been +searching, but has never found Him. She it is who fills the children's +stockings on Christmas Eve, and decks the fir-tree on Christmas morn, +because she hopes to find in some poor child she has fed or clothed the +little Lord Jesus whom she neglected hundreds and hundreds of years +ago. Long before dawn on Christmas Day the children in Russia are +awakened by the cry, "Behold the Baboushka!" and they spring out of bed +on the instant hoping to see her vanish out of the window, but no child +has seen aught save only the gifts she has left behind. +</P> + +<P> +Maryam thinks—indeed, she tells it to the four winds—that the +Christ-child has left Russia and has come to Canada in a big ship with +a shipmaster. +</P> + +<P> +And so Maryam is full of employment, almost every day, knitting mittens +and long white scarves for babies and poor children. You never can +tell, He may be even here on the prairie, the Christ-child whom the +unwise old Baboushka disesteemed hundreds and hundreds of years ago. +You can never tell. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap22"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXII +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE HERO PRIESTS OF THE NORTH +</H4> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +This they all with a joyful mind<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Bear thro' life like a torch in flame,</SPAN><BR> +And falling, fling to the host behind,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">'Play up! Play up! and play the game!'—NEWBOLT.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"For long years," said a Toronto editor the other day, "this country +has produced few outstanding personalities except politicians." +</P> + +<P> +Here spoke the little Canadian. By this country he meant the provinces +to the south of the Great Lakes. Think of that! Think of that! +</P> + +<P> +Why, man dear, north of the lakes we have outstanding personalities to +burn—and we burn them. And, here and now, let me say that under the +northern lights, politicians must, perforce, take a third or even a +fourth estate, for always we have to reckon with the missionary priest, +the business man, and the real-estate agent, before we begin to +consider the politician. Even then, I am not so sure but the editor +and the railway boss take precedence of the politician. In this large, +airy land, politicians are truly but small fry from small +places—inconsequential ephemera, who age in a heart-beat and die. +</P> + +<P> +If I had realized at the start this was to be a chapter on the +outstanding personalities among the missionary priests, I would have +begun differently. I would have said that the Anglo-Saxon hungers for +heroes, but that the heroes were rare—that this was why the raw, +ragged wolf-land lying about the Hudson Bay and along the stretches of +the Mackenzie River was of deep and peculiar interest, in that it had +the distinction of producing crops of heroes and that the breed never +seemed to run out. +</P> + +<P> +I would have said that the story of the northern priest is the story of +a man with an ideal, or, if you will have it so, with a dream; that the +dream is one that disturbs his ease and leads him in perils often. +</P> + +<P> +I would have gone further and shown this boy o' dreams to be at the +same time a supreme realist and, without question, one of the highest +types of human excellence in the last half-century; that he has the +dauntless spirit of the soldier, the enthusiasm of the explorer, the +enterprise of the merchant, and the patriotism of the statesman, and +all for the sole object of helping humanity. In a word, that he is a +special soul and must not be judged as general. +</P> + +<P> +It is to be regretted I did not begin this way, but, to quote the Roman +governor who gave judgment concerning the Nazarene: "What I have +written, I have written." +</P> + +<P> +... Among the missionary priests of the North there is, to-day, no +greater outstanding personality than Bishop Stringer of the diocese of +the Mackenzie River. +</P> + +<P> +I used to know him years agone when he was Isaac Stringer, divinity +student, a lusty young fellow, lean and clean and strong of wind, who +could carry a ball down the field past all antagonists and send it +spinning through the goal. When I say he has grown stout since those +days, you must not make the deduction that he is under-worked and +overfed like other bishops of whom we have heard tell. On the contrary +part, north of 53° it is our profligate custom to starve all +dignitaries. Indeed, it was only last winter that Bishop Stringer, on +his way across the divide from the Mackenzie River to the Yukon, nearly +lost his life from starvation. He and his companion, Charles F. +Johnson, were lost in a mountain fog and missed the trail. Southern +folk who sit in offices and parlours do not grasp the full meaning of +this, and I cannot very well explain except to say that Dante had an +exceedingly fine insight when he made the Inferno foggy. +</P> + +<P> +For a week, in deep snow and deeper fog, they wandered in and out of +Fool's River, the irony of which could not fail to rub them sore. +Returning to the Fool's mouth, they spent three days making snow-shoes +and cutting up moccasins for webbing. From here they ascended the +height of land and crossed three divides before finding an east-flowing +river. But again the fog descended and now came the fight for life. +On and on they wandered, day after day, scarcely able to see a foot +ahead and more than once treading on the verge of a precipice. +</P> + +<P> +They had been living on a daily ration of a spoonful of flour and rice +and the half of a red squirrel each. But even this gave out, and the +sorely beset men tried eating moccasin leather, and ended on muckalucks +or messinke boots. For the benefit of the uninitiated, I would explain +that muckalucks are contrived out of raw sealskin. Bishop Stringer has +since told me that when he had divided the food, his companion assigned +the portions, and <I>vice versa</I>. This is one of the trail's lessons. +At last, after eleven days of blind stumbling, they came out at an +Indian camp on the Peel River. Twenty miles further down, at the +Hudson's Bay Fort, the factor weighed the much-emaciated men and found +that each had lost fifty pounds. +</P> + +<P> +In his letter to his wife, who was visiting in Kincardine, Ontario, the +Bishop says of his experiences: "The one thing that made us unhappy was +that you and the others might worry about us when we did not turn up. +But this feeling wore off when it meant a matter of life or death, and +day after day we wondered how long we would last—whether you would +ever hear from us. You can imagine we were much in prayer, and over +and over again reconsecrated ourselves to the Master's service." +</P> + +<P> +This Bishop of Mackenzie River is surely an outstanding personality, +and reminds me of what Robert Louis Stevenson said of the late John +Chalmers, a missionary of New Guinea: "You can't weary me of that +fellow," he asserted; "he is as big as a house and far bigger than any +church." +</P> + +<P> +Bishop Stringer's predecessor in the diocese was William Carpenter +Bompas, the Apostle of the North, the man who has been classified by +the Church Missionary Society as "indisputably the most +self-sacrificing bishop in the world." +</P> + +<P> +His diocese, too, was the largest in the world, consisting of one +million square miles. It had the same peculiarity as Bobbie Burns's +"cauld, cauld kirk"—-there were "in't but few." +</P> + +<P> +William Bompas went North in 1865 and stayed there forty years, coming +out only twice. On the first of these occasions he returned to England +to be elevated to the episcopate. +</P> + +<P> +The only medical training the Bishop had under gone was a short course +in the treatment of snowblindness, and this when he went to England for +his consecration. This is a form of blindness that causes great +suffering among the Indians, and the Bishop had himself been stricken +with it on several occasions. On one of these, stumbling painfully at +every step, he was led by an Eskimo boy for seventy-five miles. +Writing of his agonies, he says: "They are delights. The first +foot-prints on earth made by our risen Saviour were the nail-marks of +suffering, and for the spread of the gospel, too, am prepared to +suffer." +</P> + +<P> +Like Stringer, Bompas also endured frequent starvation, but seldom +spoke of it as a personal happening, but rather as applying to +others—a virtue most hard and difficult to be practised. Writing +about it to a friend in England, he said: "Horses were killed for food +and furs eaten at several of the posts. The Indians had to eat a good +many of their beaver skins." +</P> + +<P> +Another man who endured the privations of the pioneer in this district +is the present Bishop of Keewatin, Joseph Lofthouse. +</P> + +<P> +The most interesting, and certainly the most romantic story of his +career, is that of his marriage. His sweetheart, a young English girl, +was due to arrive on the yearly vessel of the Hudson's Bay Company. +Lofthouse travelled several hundred miles to meet her, but found she +had not come, being unavoidably detained in England. The following +summer he made the same journey, but this time as the vessel pulled up +the harbour, he was able to single out the lassie's face on the deck. +Yes, sir! if you had lived among Eskimos and Indians all these years, +you, too, would tremble and choke in the throat at the ship's rope hit +the mooring-post. +</P> + +<P> +But now the young couple found themselves in as trying a predicament as +the Israelites with the sea in front, Pharaoh's army behind, and +unscalable rocks on either side. In a word, there was no minister to +marry them. Things looked badly for them, and the lassie was thinking +of returning home, when it suddenly occurred to the captain that, on +the open sea, according to law, he was entitled to act as a magistrate. +It was not long till the good ship slipped her moorings and stood out +into the sweep of the Atlantic, where to a time-honoured form, the +minister and the girl plighted their troth, symbolized it by the gift +of a ring, and ratified it by the authority of the state, in the name +of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost. +</P> + +<P> +This is a good enough story to end with, but there are other +outstanding personalities I must mention. +</P> + +<P> +There is Bishop Holmes,[<A NAME="chap22fn1text"></A><A HREF="#chap22fn1">1</A>] who resides at Athabasca Landing, and who +has had many interesting experiences among the redskins. Like all true +northmen, the Bishop speaks in a quiet, low tone, admirably adapted to +the art of narrative. Once for weeks, he took charge of a Weetigo or +Weendigo Indian, in order to protect him from relatives who sought to +take his life. The man believed himself to be a cannibal, for in some +strange way the idea had been suggested to him. After a time, the +hallucination passed away, and the man returned to the camp. +</P> + +<P> +Until comparatively recent years, the untutored redmen believed that +people who were insane or in delirium were either obsessed or possessed +of an evil spirit, and that it was necessary to kill them in order to +prevent this spirit from entering into others. The plight of the +relatives in these cases was pitiable; they could not allow a violently +insane man or woman at large, and the killing was usually performed +with great grief. This custom has fallen into desuetude, for, since +the advent of the Mounted Police, the perpetrators are treated as +murderers and accordingly hanged. The most arduous duty of the police +is the bringing in of demented Indians or white prospectors from the +North. It is a task that has, in turn, driven a stalwart redcoat +insane. One's nerves are apt to snap when, for weeks, you sleep o' +nights in the snow roped to a maniac. +</P> + +<P> +And there was Rev. Henry Irwin, better known as Father Pat. He was a +railroad priest on the Canadian Pacific, and, because of his unselfish +work among them, became the idol of men. There are some misguided folk +who think of a priest as a feeble, microcephalous body with a black +coat, a shovel hat, and a superb ignorance of the ways of the world. +There are, we own, some priests like this, but Father Pat was not one +of them. Indeed, his dress and deportment were such as to often cause +scandal to good church folk who were not so conversant with his noble +deeds and self-abnegation as were the railroad navvies and gold-miners. +Father Pat had only been married a year when his wife and baby died, +and, not so long after, he was found almost frozen to death in a +snow-bank, from the results of which he died. Here was an elementary +man fighting the elements. The North stands at salute. +</P> + +<P> +Nor were the Roman Catholic missionaries less self-denying, or in any +way smaller men than their Protestant co-workers. There was Bishop +Breynat who froze his feet and amputated his toes with a penknife. +"Sirs, it's bitter beneath the Bear." +</P> + +<P> +In 1869-70, at St. Albert, the ecclesiastical head-quarters of the +Catholic Church in Alberta, Father Leduc, a complete Christian, nursed +the Indians who were sick with the small-pox until he contracted it +himself. Then the other priests in turn fell in line as nurses until +every man was a victim of the disease. +</P> + +<P> +It is a scene that reminds one of Sir Walter Scott's romance where the +clansman and his seven sons all fell for the chieftain, stepping forth +gladly into the gap and crying: "One more for Eachim." +</P> + +<P> +While the priests lay ill an Indian came for one of them to administer +the last rites of the Church to his mother. What was done? You never +could guess unless you lived in the North, so I may as well tell you. +A young priest rolled his blankets closer about, gave orders to his +attendants to carry him to the waiting sleigh, and, in this condition, +made the painful journey. Mattress and all, he was borne into the +sick-room, where he administered the viaticum to the dying woman. +</P> + +<P> +Father Lacombe, whose good grey head all men know, is the pioneer +missionary of Alberta. He is eighty-three years of age, and sixty-one +of these years have been spent in the service of the North. The story +of his life sounds like a new Acts of the Apostles. In the +science-ridden centuries to come, when these first white wanderers in +boreal regions will be almost mythical characters, tradition will love +to weave about them stories of romance and mystery—dramatic, +preternatural stories such as we frame to-day about SS. Patrick, +Augustine and Albanus. +</P> + +<P> +Perhaps the most interesting event in Lord Strathcona's visit last year +to Alberta was his meeting again with Père Lacombe. It was in the +Government House gardens at Edmonton, overlooking the Saskatchewan +River. All the guests fell back out of earshot while the aged men +clasped hands and talked over other days and of the boys who had long +since crossed the height of land to the ultimate sea. +</P> + +<P> +At the present time Père Lacombe is living at Midnapore, near Calgary, +in a home for poor old folk and children, the money to build which he +collected himself. +</P> + +<P> +... And there is the story of Father Goiffon who was frozen near +Emerson on the eve of All Saints' Day, 1860. It was told to me by +Father Lestanc,[<A NAME="chap22fn2text"></A><A HREF="#chap22fn2">2</A>] who, eighty years ago, was born at Brest in +Brittany. Father Lestanc has been fifty-five years in the West and +North, nineteen of which were spent at St. Boniface under Bishop Taché. +In spite of his extreme age, Lestanc has a hardy-moulded figure, and a +strong, clear voice. One cannot listen to him for long without being +impressed by his affectional force and broad reach of humanity. He is +not clear about things of yesterday, but take him back over the decades +and his memory rings true as a bell. +</P> + +<P> +Goiffon had been at St. Paul, Minneapolis, making the yearly purchases +for his mission. Among other things he bought a city-bred horse to +carry him home. Fifty years ago St. Paul was seventeen days' journey +from Emerson, on the border-line, and folk travelled in caravans. +</P> + +<P> +One day's journey from Emerson, Father Goiffon left the party that he +might push on the more rapidly and reach his mission post to say Mass +on All Saints' Day. To use a northern colloquialism, he travelled +light, carrying with him but one meal and no blanket. Neither had he +matches or an axe, for, bear in mind, he was only a young priest, and +he hoped to be in his shack by fall of night. +</P> + +<P> +Soon after noonday there blew up a blinding snow-storm that made +progress impossible. A usurping, all-invading sheet of snow settled +down over the plains and turned the air into a white darkness. The man +tied his horse to a willow shrub and lay down in the snow. The hours +passed painfully on, but the youth kept his head buried in his saddle +that his face might not freeze. When at last he looked up, he found +his horse dead by his side. I told you a bit ago, it was a city-bred +horse and no trailer. +</P> + +<P> +And now came the fight for life. The boy priest had no shelter but the +flaccid, unstrung body of his horse, already cold in death. I do not +know about the pain of the night, except that at the edge of day, one +foot and leg were frozen and the toes of the other, so that he could +not stand upright. I wonder if he heard the bell from his home in +France as he lay in the snow! They say men do. Something must have +been sounding in his ears, for he did not hear the caravan as it passed +him in the morning. +</P> + +<P> +At midday he cut a piece of flesh off the horse and ate it. +</P> + +<P> +"A crude diet, Mon Père," I remark. +</P> + +<P> +"Oui, oui," replies the old Breton. "What you Anglais call a +'sleepshod' dinnaire! What would you, Madame? One must browse where +he is tethered." +</P> + +<P> +The rescue party from Emerson met a man and boy hauling in the stricken +priest on a sledge. They had heard him sobbing in the snow. +</P> + +<P> +The Indians doctored him for six weeks until his limbs threatened to +drop off, and then sent a runner to St. Boniface to ask Father Lestanc +what they would do with him. This happened fifty years ago, but Father +Lestanc must walk to the window and look out into the garden for a +while before he can trust his voice. +</P> + +<P> +For men and dogs it was a round run of one hundred and forty miles from +St. Boniface to Emerson, but in twenty-four hours Goiffon lay in Bishop +Taché's palace at St. Boniface, on the banks of the Red River. Dr. +Bunn, the physician at the Hudson's Bay post across at Fort Garry, +awaited his arrival and amputated the already putrefied members. The +next morning Goiffon was found to be bleeding to death; the stitches +would not hold and the veins were open. Nothing could be done but to +calmly await the end. +</P> + +<P> +Father Lestanc broke the news to the household, whereupon the sorrowing +but withal practical sister in charge of the kitchen placed a caldron +of buffalo tallow on the stove, for, explains my narrator, "a priest's +wake requires many, many candles." +</P> + +<P> +The little serving-maids under the sister, doubtless whispering over +the sad happenings upstairs, forgot to watch the pot, so that it +"swelled much, Madame," over the red-hot stove till all the house was +on fire. +</P> + +<P> +Do not scold the girls, but wait till I tell you. Such a thing was +never heard of. It was really Le Bon Dieu who permitted the house and +cathedral to burn. There is no doubt of it, for, when the priest +carried the dying youth out and laid him on the snow, the frost +congealed the blood so that his veins ceased to empty themselves. +</P> + +<P> +This was fifty years ago, and last summer, Father Goiffon came up from +Petit Canada, near St. Paul, to attend a cathedral service at Winnipeg, +on the site of Old Fort Garry. +</P> + +<P> +"Oui, Madame, oui, I comprehend when you say <I>similia similibus +curcantur</I>. Literally, eet ees a frost kills, a frost cures. Eet ees +a well thing the body ees so adaptive." +</P> + +<P> +... And once Bishop Grandin was lost in the snow. It was in 1863, near +Fort Resolution on Great Slave Lake. +</P> + +<P> +With one Indian boy he was crossing the lake on the ice, following in +the wake of a party of Hudson's Bay Company men. The Bishop's dogs +were tired and fell behind. When a storm blew up he lost the trail. +The thermometer was at forty degrees below zero, and the storm was what +Father Lestanc calls a "poudrerie"—that is to say, a storm where the +snow blows up like fine powder. This does not sound unpleasant, but as +an actuality it is, in the extreme North, a sinister snow that bites +your face like driven needles. +</P> + +<P> +The Bishop had no guide but the wind, and when a storm rises the wind +veers. He gave the dogs their head, but even their homing instinct +failed them in the storm and night, so that they crouched on the ice +and howled in unison with the little Indian boy. +</P> + +<P> +At dawn the boy said he smelled smoke, for he was an Indian, and smoke +travels far in the clear, winnowed air of the North. +</P> + +<P> +On looking to the west they sighted land, and after a painful journey +met a dog-train coming toward them with men—the boy's father and +uncle. The priest was celebrating a Mass for the repose of the +Bishop's soul when he arrived, for "Les sauvages," says my informant, +"had declared the Bishop would be frozen to the middle of hees heart. +Ah, leetle Madam! Whom Le Bon Dieu guards are well guarded." +</P> + +<P> +I did not know about this Father Lestanc before. I thought he was +merely an old Oblate Brother passing from the sixth to the seventh +stage of man's little day. Now I know him for one of the outstanding +personalities of the North, and, as such, would do him honour, even I +who am of the world, worldly. I know things about him that happened +years and years ago when this was no man's land. I know how once he +nursed and buried a young man whose companions had abandoned him to die +at Rat Creek, near Portage la Prairie. +</P> + +<P> +The man had gone into the Indian camps against the wishes of his +fellow-teamsters who were travelling from Fort Garry to Fort Charlton. +But he was a gamester, and he went. This was how he contracted +small-pox, and the reason his companions were forced to leave him to +fight death for himself with a little supply of pemmican and some +bannocks as his sole backers. You may not have noticed that the life +of a gamester and the race-horse are short ones in the north-west, but +it is, nevertheless, indubitably true, and this case was no exception +to the rule. His name? I do not know. One forgets names in the +oblivious West. +</P> + +<P> +Father Lestanc rolled the loathsome body in a blanket and decently +buried it, for the buffalo hunters had learned that in cases of +small-pox the healthiest thing a traveller can do is to mind his own +special business. +</P> + +<P> +"Did any one else catch the disease?" I ask. +</P> + +<P> +"Non, non, no one else." +</P> + +<P> +The old man muses a little, for he is growing tired, and this was fifty +years ago. Suddenly memory floods in on him and he shows distress: +"Pardon, Madam, pardon! I took eet. Oui, I took eet." +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +<A NAME="chap22fn1"></A> +[<A HREF="#chap22fn1text">1</A>] Since deceased. +</P> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +<A NAME="chap22fn2"></A> +[<A HREF="#chap22fn2text">2</A>] Since deceased. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap23"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXIII +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +COAL-MINING IN ALBERTA +</H4> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Till dazzled by the drowsy glare,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I shut my eyes to heat and light;</SPAN><BR> +And saw, in sudden night,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Crouched in the dripping dark,</SPAN><BR> +With steaming shoulders stark<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The man who hews the coal to feed my fire.</SPAN><BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 4em">—WILFRED WILSON GIBSON.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Solon once told Croesus that whoever had the iron would possess all the +gold, but here Solon was taking coal for granted. Iron-mines are of +comparatively little value unless coal-mines are within easy access. I +think of this as I view the underground workings of a coal-mine, +to-day, and of how our Royal Land of Canada has both minerals in +immeasurable quantities. In this Province of Alberta alone, there is +so much coal to burn that it will take a million years. Looking at +this sheer face of coal twenty feet in height, I must perforce recall +Oliver Wendell Holmes's remark that he was not at all nervous about a +certain comet which threatened to destroy the earth, for there was so +much coal in the world he couldn't bring himself to believe it had been +made for nothing. +</P> + +<P> +In time past, it was said hereabout that coal-mining did not pay; that +the profit of the industry lay in its higher mathematics, by which was +meant the formation of companies and the disposal of bonds and stocks. +The primary work of The Coal Barons, it was further declared, consisted +in laying up treasures on earth for themselves, leaving the +shareholders to find reward in heaven. The "suckers" who purchased +stock were said to have gone through the comparative degrees of mine, +miner, minus. They were "the bitten." +</P> + +<P> +From the uppermost appearance of things, these remarks would seem to be +warranted, particularly as the true westerner has always something to +sell and has even been known to lie about it, but a closer and more +careful study of affairs shows that, in this grim game, the mine-owners +received neither the honours nor the tricks, that is, unless you are +disposed to count the chicane as one. Most cases, in their futile +efforts to bolster up the exchequer of the company, the barons have +sacrificed their private fortunes, so that their titles may, with +entire propriety be spelled barrens. It was one of these men who +feelingly remarked: "When a man's affairs in this province go rocky, +you may safely reckon on coal being the rock." +</P> + +<P> +But now that the seven lean years of coal are over and the fat ones are +well begun, now that coal as a revenue producer is only second to +Mother Wheat, we can with calmer and more unbiassed judgment consider +the causes which have hitherto been responsible for its "outrageous +fortune." +</P> + +<P> +Perhaps the commonest cause of failure has been the lack of adequate +capital. The President's chair in a coal company is no place for empty +pockets. To successfully operate his mine he requires money at any +price. The initial outlay is large, the carrying expenses heavy, the +unexpected demands many. Hitherto, this capital has not been readily +forthcoming. Investors have preferred to buy town lots rather than +industrial stocks. In older and more settled communities the opposite +condition prevails. On the other hand, coal on the cars is cash. The +mine operator takes his bill-of-lading to the bank and draws up to +two-thirds of its face value. This enables him to meet his fortnightly +pay-bill and general mining expenses, but, for two or three years, +until sufficient rooms have been made in the workings of the mine, he +cannot expect it to do more. +</P> + +<P> +In the meanwhile, there is development work to be done and development +work is expensive. The entries or hallways off which the rooms open +are costly to drive and they must be beamed with great timbers held in +place by tree trunks. Initial surveys have to be made, and expert +superintendence paid for. It is for such work the President requires +ready money and free money. He cannot possibly make his working +expenses to cover those of development in that the same managing staff +is required to handle a small output as a large one. The same is +applicable to the engines and hoisting machinery. +</P> + +<P> +The second cause which has hitherto hindered successful operations has +been lack of railway facilities and lack of a steady market. Emerson +has defined commerce as taking things from where they are plentiful to +where they are needed. Coal, we have shown, is plentiful; and that it +is needed in the Canadian North-West we need hardly remark, but that it +could not be carried needs explanation. For several years our railways +were lamentably short of equipment, so that the mines had frequently to +close down for days, or even weeks, their bunkers being entirely +inadequate for storage purposes. This meant a severe loss to the mines +in that their men and machinery stood idle and that lucrative contracts +had to be cancelled. +</P> + +<P> +Probably no industry has suffered so keenly from car shortage as that +of coal-mining. The only people who have received windfalls from this +regretable state of affairs were the dishonest yard-masters who, +unknown to the railway officials, did a secret but withal brisk +business with the rival coal companies that bid for cars. It took a +goodly slice off the profits of each car of coal to grease the large +palm of the yard-master. And who in this pushful, practical age has +ever heard of a car spotter in the railway yards buying a ton of coal? +The plethora of his coal-bin is more to the credit of his wits than his +morals. My mind is fully established in this thing; as a grafter he is +the perfected article. +</P> + +<P> +It may, however, be said in excuse for the car shortage, that the +demand for coal cars synchronized with that of wheat, the rush for both +being in the autumn and early winter. At first, the pioneer coal +dealers in the villages and towns throughout the west, had neither the +buildings wherein to store fuel nor the money to permit of their +purchasing it, so that orders were seldom given until cold weather had +actually set in. +</P> + +<P> +While this condition of affairs still leaves something to be desired, +the dealers have had several salutary lessons and are, as a generality, +becoming much more forehanded. The population of the west has also +increased so vastly during these latter years, that the demand on the +dealers, and accordingly on the mines, has gradually become steadier +till, at last, the industry rests upon the well-settled foundation of a +regular demand, a regular supply, and a dependable railway service, in +other words, it fulfils the three conditions laid down in Emerson's +definition of commerce. +</P> + +<P> +A third difficulty which confronted mine operators, was the securing of +experienced miners. The supply was distinctly inadequate, so that +green hands had to be engaged—homesteaders who wanted to earn money +during the winter, newly-arrived immigrants who took the first job +which came to hand; and farm labourers who came west to take off the +harvest and decided to stay in the country. +</P> + +<P> +These men, while they came under the union scale of wages, were unable +to do little else for the first winter than spoil their shots of +dynamite, cave in the roofs, and blow out the timbers. The mine +operator, however, rarely became disheartened so long as the green man +didn't blow off his own head for, in this case, the operator would be +called upon by the courts to pay staggering damages to the miner's +heirs under the compulsion of an extraordinary statute known as the +Labourer's Compensation Act. +</P> + +<P> +But now, in these days of grace, owing to the investment of British and +foreign capital, the unskilled man has been superseded by electric +drillers and cutters—in a word, modern methods are being used in our +mines with the result that we have fewer accidents and losses. +</P> + +<P> +This application of machinery to the industry has also brought about a +maximum of output with a minimum of expenditure. The development work +can be done with more speed and less expense, so that the old +disabilities under which western operators had to labour will soon be +cancelled out of memory. +</P> + +<P> +While the application of machinery to mining must indubitably minimize +the probability of strikes, the operators must be prepared to reckon +with these until the end of time, in that throwing down their tools +appears to be the chief occupation of miners. It is hard to account +for this irresponsible vagary unless it be that they receive twice as +much pay as other workmen. Or it may be that they make a fetish of the +union, in which respect they do resemble certain stupid people in the +southern seas who have a worm to their god and are wont to sacrifice +oxen to it. +</P> + +<P> +Now, miners on strike are persons of no very marked refinement, neither +are they given to logic. What Tennyson says of the Light Brigade is +finely applicable here—"Theirs not to reason why." +</P> + +<P> +When you meet real strikers nothing counts. You may do everything +which instinct, invention or despair can suggest, except descending to +vulgar invective, yet without the slightest tangible result. No matter +how soothly their employer may speak to them, they are suspicious of +him or her. The intervention must always come from a third party. +These men are the latter-day exponents of the old rule laid down by +Dean Swift for the better direction of servants: "Quarrel with each +other as much as you please, only always bear in mind that you have a +common enemy which is your Master and Lady." +</P> + +<P> +To find yourself facing a square of irate strikers is to feel yourself +very thin, very colourless, and amazingly inexperienced. It is to +wonder at the rudeness of their speech, the largeness of their mouths, +and to speculate in a Christianly way as to just what screw is loose in +their mental make-up. I know this to be the way of it, for once we had +a strike in a mine which I, with a strutting but misguided assurance, +imagined to be the property of our family. Owing to a former +superintendent having entered into an agreement with the union, I +learned we were holding the mine co-operatively, and that I could not +dismiss the men either individually or collectively. +</P> + +<P> +The trouble happened in this wise: the president being absent for +several months, it fell to me, as vice-president, to hold the reins. +By reason of the facts that the seam of coal was pinching thin; that +the miners were receiving one-third more than any others in the +locality, and that we were producing on a falling market, we found we +were losing nearly one hundred dollars a day. The superintendent +invited the miners to discuss the matter without prejudice. They did +not disallow the correctness of his contention but refused to consider +a reduction of their wages. They were content to stand by their side +of the agreement and would see to it that the company did the same. +</P> + +<P> +And here I showed a lack of discretion in allowing this matter to be +discussed, for, while failing to deduce that it was highly preposterous +to kill the goose who laid the golden egg, they still had the +penetration to see that in closing down the mine because of lack of +orders, my primary object was to nullify the agreement. Nothing could +express their unmeasured contempt of the vice-president, and they left +me under no misapprehension as to their opinion of me. They accused me +of playing them, and being guilty of the offence, I was naturally +offended at the accusation. Still, I declined to be led into further +discussion, or to recriminate in kind, so that ultimately I came to +feel strong as one does who is intentionally weak before her enemy. +There was nothing for it. The miners had to walk out, all except the +engineers who pumped the water from the sump. Now, the night engineer +had a face so wicked that he might all his life have been stoking +furnaces in the underworld, and he it was who permitted the men to +enter the shaft and put a stick in the valve of the pulsometer so that +the mine became flooded and several entries caved in. +</P> + +<P> +I was quite as angry as my temperament allowed, and it would have given +me much satisfaction to have killed them, for, after all, this is a +most effective method of getting rid of your enemies. It was, +nevertheless, no small satisfaction when the superintendent, a +tight-built muscular Englishman, gave the engineer a touch or two that +reminded the onlooker of a piston-rod in action. If might and right +are not the same thing, they ought to be. Two weeks later, the works +were re-opened with other workmen on a new wage scale. On arriving at +the mine the following day, I found our former employees were picketing +it. They had a crow to pluck with me, I could see that. The very air +was portentous. Those workmen were like the horses of Phoebus Apollo +in that their breasts were full of fire and they breathed it forth from +their nostrils and mouths. But while the men were abusive and +loud-voiced, they were never insulting, for even Satan finds it hard to +forge a weapon against a smile and an unwavering courtesy. And, after +all, what can strikers do with a vice-president who is a woman? It +seemed like taking an unfair advantage of them. It was only when we +met the miner's wives that I learned my exceeding limitations; that the +power fell out of my elbow and the stiffening out of my collar-bone. +</P> + +<P> +When I say "we" I mean William and myself. Now, William was my driver, +and he spent fourteen years in the British cavalry. He had served in +Egypt and South Africa; he had fought his way through a screaming death +at Omdurman and yes, I will say it—William was "a nob" and handsome as +a circus horse. His deference as he lifted me down off the high seat, +his manifest concern for my comfort, and his superb arrogance as he +bade the women "Give over there!" were too much, for even these raging +furies to reckon with. His coolness under a withering fire of +invective restored me to normal and enabled me to stand pat. +</P> + +<P> +To shorten the story, we had to engage three successive gangs before we +won out. By that time the strikers had become divided, some having +accepted work in other mines, while the remainder became discouraged +and gradually gave up the picket. +</P> + +<P> +I have dwelt at some length on this matter of strikes because, as yet, +no actual operator has expressed his view point or his feeling under +the ordeal, whereas the strikers have made the street corners vibrant +concerning the villainies of their employers whom they designate as +Capital. In dismissing this phase of mining, I would say a strike is +to be avoided at almost any cost, for, apart from its factor as a +somewhat strenuous builder of character, it is a victory which costs +the operator too dearly both in the expenditure of nerves and of money. +</P> + +<P> +... Before being led into the discussion of finances and strikes, I had +started to tell you about an Albertan mine and its workings. The theme +is worth picking up again. Before you go down, it is well to have a +look around the machinery-room where the engines pump up the water and +pump down the air. You will also be interested in the great spool or +drum which unwinds the long steel cables by which the cage is lowered +or hoisted in the shaft. One man stands beside it and controls it with +a lever. The man behind the lever needs to be equally as steady and +effective a worker as the man behind the gun, for it is by this cage +the men enter and leave the mine, although they may, if so disposed, +ascend or descend by the escapement or ladder-shaft beside it. +</P> + +<P> +It is the strict duty of the foreman to examine this drum, these +cables, and the cage every day, and to record his findings in a book +which he is required to keep in compliance with the laws regulating +coal-mines. This man must also carefully test for gas. The +maintenance of the air-circuit is a matter of much concernment to the +operators, for on it depends not only the health and security of the +men but the safety of the mine itself. Carbon monoxide, which is white +damp, is more dreaded by the miners than any other gas because it is +difficult to detect, having no odour, taste or colour. +</P> + +<P> +The Bureau of Mines in the United States have recently discovered that +canary birds are extremely susceptible to it and, after being exposed +for three minutes to air containing one-sixth of the one per cent, of +the gas, show marked distress. In eight minutes, they fall off their +perches. As a result, many American miners are now using canaries to +watch out for gas while they are at work. +</P> + +<P> +Black damp, or carbon dioxide, may be detected by its peculiar odour. +It is heavier than air and tends to suffocate fire. After an explosion +has taken place these two gases become mixed and form what is known as +after damp, a mixture which surely destroys all life remaining in the +mine. +</P> + +<P> +From familiarity with danger, miners become disdainful of it and +careless to a degree that is well-nigh incredible. They will hold +dynamite caps in their mouths for convenience, a risk which pales into +nothingness the ancient simile of the weaned child who plays on the den +of the cockatrice. He is a poor man of low-funk spirit who does not +believe himself quick enough to cross a cage after the signal to ascend +has been given. To run this venture is, to them, a matter of no +moment. I have seen more than one miner caught and crushed through a +slight miscalculation in this respect, but these accidents are so +quickly forgotten that they do not act as deterrents to any noticeable +extent. In truth, there seems little reason to doubt that most of the +sudden catastrophes which result in the loss of many valuable lives, +are the result of some insane risk taken by one man. If these risks +were not among those things which the Deity is said to "wink at," all +miners would have been killed long ago. +</P> + +<P> +If you feel inclined, you might stop awhile and look at the +skeleton-like tipple of the mine, by which I mean the wooden framework +above it; at the automatic self-dumping skips and at the rocking +screens which sort the coal into the kinds known as lump, egg, and nut; +but the tempestuous torrent of coal from the hopper bottoms of the cars +would drown our talk and assault our eardrums, so, on the whole, it is +just as well to take these things for granted. +</P> + +<P> +One's first descent into a mine is an experience rather than a +pleasure. To leave the sharp intensity of the sunlight and to be +suddenly dropped into a horrible pit, is to feel oneself rolled into a +tight little ball, with every nerve as hard as a nail. You hope, you +pray, that the long, lithe cables which hold the cage are stronger than +they look. You wonder if you will come out feet foremost in Australia, +and if it will hurt very much. After a second or third experience, the +sensation is one of swift adventuring, but few people care to inure +themselves to this frame of spirit. Arrived at the shaft bottom, you +are made aware with the aid of your cap lamp, of huge square timbers +around you and of a "sump" or well, underneath. It is into this sump +that all the entries of the mine are drained. +</P> + +<P> +Without realizing it, you will have lowered your voice, for the +darkness and stillness oppress you as though you were bearing a weight +on your shoulders. The air is lifeless and leaden. This is assuredly +The City of Dreadful Night. You feel as if you were the last survivor +in a dead world. But presently, a strong hand will take yours in his +and lead you through the Stygian darkness till your eyes become +habituated to the gloom, when you will become aware of two tracks +stretching away in the channel which has been hollowed out of the coal. +Then you will be warned to step aside and keep close to the wall while +a stocky-car holding probably three tons is, with a vast grinding of +wheels, whirled by you to the cage, there to be hoisted to the tipple. +</P> + +<P> +Your guide will explain that you are in the main entry or tunnel of the +mine, and that there are other entries at right angles. These with the +rooms which open off them, are surveyed by engineers with great +exactness and according to certain regulations laid down in the mining +statutes. +</P> + +<P> +Here and there in the blackness, thin tongues of flame move about like +fireflies. These are the lamps in the miners' caps. You have also a +fire-fly in your bonnet, but, of course, it is only visible to the +onlookers. These lamps are like little coffee-pots and are filled +either with carbide or seal oil. In the more modern mines which are +lighted by electricity, lamps are not required so much, although no man +ventures into the mine without one. Faith is not nearly so estimable a +virtue as sight, no matter what the theologians may say. It was a +miner poet (you must not spell it a minor poet) who wrote the lines— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"God, if you had but the moon<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Stuck in your cap for a lamp,</SPAN><BR> +Even you'd tire of it soon<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Down in the dark and the damp.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Nothing but blackness above<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And nothing moves but the cars—</SPAN><BR> +God, in return for our love,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Fling us a handful of stars."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +These lamps are the footlights the miners hold up to Old King Coal as +they pierce his sides with their electric drills, and wrench open his +wounds with their ripping charges of dynamite. They call this shooting +the coal, so it is just as well to keep your peculiar fantasies to +yourself. +</P> + +<P> +In a coal-mine one loses his sense of direction, for there is no heaven +above, no earth beneath—nothing but silence and black impenetrableness. +</P> + +<P> +And yet, when you are alone in a mine, you may hear a sound like the +sighing of great trees. This is probably the utterance of your own +blood to which you are giving audience as when you put your ear to a +conch-shell; or it may be the surging sigh of the enormous primitive +ferns, sigillarias and lepidodendrons who lay down in these strata as +though for an eternal rest. In the counting-house of the years, vast +cycles have come and gone till, now in these impertinent days of +dynamite and electricity, uncouth, ungentle men have broken their rest +forever. The complaint of the trees is not without judgment. The +thing seems ill-done and almost, of myself, I can hear their tragical +murmurings. +</P> + +<P> +The temperature in the coal-mine does not vary with the seasons, and +the men believe it healthier to work in this underworld than to be +subject to the changes of climate above. They have also told me that +there is no echo in a coal stratum. I do not know if this be true, +but, of a surety, one's voice does not carry far in the dead air, and +even the shots of dynamite seem to be muffled and indistinct. +Nevertheless, it is my opinion—an irrational one, no doubt—that men +who dig in mines should have music rather than men who eat in cafés. +We need to recast our ideas about these things. +</P> + +<P> +It makes no difference how you have quarrelled with these miners in a +strike; it makes no difference that once you felt like murdering them +in bulk, it is impossible to follow them day after day through the +working of a coal-mine without seeing something heroic in their crude +bent figures. You may not be able to understand the language they +speak, for many of them are foreign born, but in time you come to talk +to them through the smile, the touch on the arm, or the clap of the +hands, which signals are, after all, the universal language of the +world. Most of these men are kindly disposed and, when left free from +the machinations of the lawyer, are capable of self-sacrifice for their +employer, and even of affection. In every gang of men, whether in +railway construction, lumber camp, or coal-mine, there is always an +unamiable workman of ferocious egoism who is known as the camp lawyer. +The legal fraternity will probably resent this misuse of their name, +and properly so, for this fellow is froward in manner and has the same +loving heart as a tiger. He it is who stirs up all the internal +strifes and keeps them at boiling point. It is an art in which he +greatly excels. In olden days, they called a man of his ilk a gallows +knave, and the epithet was selected with care. Foremen are, nowadays, +beginning to pay less attention to the communion of saints in their +camps and vastly more to the communion of sinners. It is a foreman's +particular business to spot the lawyers early in the game and to deal +with them as the occasion warrants. +</P> + +<P> +There are many things to be observed down in these black entrails of +the earth, but, before we leave, we will look at the stables. They are +lighted by electricity. It is the work of the horses to haul the cars +to the main entry where they are switched on to the electric cable. It +is commonly believed that horses who live in mines become blind. This +is not true. What they lose is their sense of colour, for in the dark +all things are hueless. These horses are fat-fleshed and healthy, and +are so tame they can almost be mesmerized into talking to you. They +seem highly interested in the story I tell them of how once the +Frenchmen put twelve thousand dead men and their horses down three +coal-pits at Jemappes, and things like that. They appreciate carrots, +sugar-lumps and apples, which have been steadily purloined from the +cook's pantry at the bunk-house, in a way that is positively human. It +would be unkind to enter the mine without carrying a treat for the +horses, but now, having done so, let me bid all of you on the day-shift +a very good fortune, and a safe return to God's blessed sunshine. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap24"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXIV +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE PLAYGROUNDS OF THE WEST +</H4> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Come, my love, and let us wander<BR> +Cross the hills and over yonder.—CY WARMAN.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Banff, in the Rocky Mountains, has been so often called the playgrounds +of the West, that the words have become trite and fail to carry their +true significance. This fact is inevitably borne in on the Canadian +who visits the place, and he wonders to himself why he has failed to +understand it before. +</P> + +<P> +Assuredly this is my experience as I ride around Tunnel Mountain this +beautiful August day. The road is seven miles long, and from its +winding ascent, one may look across the hills and down the wide valley +where the green waters of the Bow River foam into white over the rocks. +This is the full-robed, full-voiced choir of the mountain temple, but I +do not know what it sings. +</P> + +<P> +The Valley of the Bow River with its amphitheatre of hills is the +wonder picture of the Rockies, combining, as it does, all that is most +beautiful in are and nature. [Transcriber's note: because of the +oddness of the grammar of this sentence, it may be that one or more +words are missing.] +</P> + +<P> +Across it, on Tunnel Mountain, is the splendid hostelry of the Canadian +Pacific Railway; warm sulphur springs that bubble up out of the earth, +and a cave of waters which is an extinct geyser, but might be the +matrix of the hills themselves. +</P> + +<P> +Geologists say that the eastern ranges of the Rocky Mountains are of +the Eocene Age, and that the western ridges are Pliocene, and eons +younger. But these revelations of science are almost as overwhelming +as our ignorance. They tell of the immensity of time but do not sound +it. It is not possible to level them to our mental capacity. +</P> + +<P> +A wealthy Sheik who once lived in the Land of Uz told us how God +challenged him to answer certain questions about the mountains. +</P> + +<P> +"Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth?" +</P> + +<P> +"Who hath stretched the line upon it?" +</P> + +<P> +"Who hath divided a watercourse for the overflowing of the waters?" +</P> + +<P> +But Job could not answer so much as one question, and he said, "Behold +I am vile; what shall I answer Thee? I will lay my hand upon my mouth." +</P> + +<P> +This Job, it would appear, was no ordinary sort of man, and one who was +very wise. +</P> + +<P> +And ever since, mankind has puzzled itself with these riddles, even as +you and I are puzzled. Sometimes we do not so much as believe in the +great Lord, who is thought to have made this world, and we say, "Aha!" +and other scornful words that are wicked exceedingly. But, up in the +hills, we comprehend God without so much as an effort. He is natural +here. These scenes of sublimity break in on our life's dead level and +show us depth within ourselves unsounded before. Impulses which have +been informulate, and aspirations which the years have strangled are +brought to life and sentience. "Blessed be the hills," say I, and you +must reply, "Amen and Amen." +</P> + +<P> +This road twists upward easily, but, in one place, they have made it +into stone stairways, with each tread many feet wide so that the horses +can find firm footing. This stairway looks to be a hundred feet in +height. All the horses must go one way round the mountain, and not +turn backwards, for there is no room to pass on the trail. Every +little while, you stop to look at the savage rock forms which surround +you, or at their colours. It was no stinting brush that laid them on. +Opal and wine-red, purple and ochre, splash the rocks with living hues +of wonderful beauty. It is a pity we have not more lavish words for +these transfiguration scenes of Nature. It is foolish to try and +explain them with our worn-out ones. Every traveller realizes this. +For my part, in the mountains, I always feel like that Eton boy of +fourteen, who was at the Battle of Waterloo. His first letter home was +to this effect: "Dear Mamma: Cousin Tom and I are all right. I never +saw anything like it in my life." +</P> + +<P> +There are few birds hereabout. I have only seen a robin and a hawk. +The hawk hovered above as if undecided what to do and then fell as if +he had been dropped from a plummet. This bird has an instinct for the +straight line that might shame even a Dominion land surveyor. This and +the fact that the hawk has been known to eat mosquitoes, are his only +claims to our attention or respect. All the world knows him for a +predaceous bird, and that his heart is a fierce furnace. +</P> + +<P> +A nice-seeming man who is working on the road tells me there are many +kinds of animals in the Banff Park, but that they are all preserved. +In the corral there are eighty buffaloes. The corral consists of two +thousand acres. The white-tailed deer are so tame they come up to the +village. There are wolverines, too, and these animals are of so +covetous a nature they will steal even a frying pan. The Indians call +them <I>carcajous</I>, which means "the gluttons." +</P> + +<P> +This man says he was formerly a fur-pup, by which expression he means a +trapper. He left the trap-line because his partner was always +objecting to bacon for dinner. Huh! Huh! to hear him complain, one +might almost think the Lord grew bacon for consumption at breakfast +only. +</P> + +<P> +Riding up the hill through the green trees, I feel as if I were in the +opening paragraph of a story, and an half expecting at each bend of the +road to meet a knight in armour with a retinue of servants. As he +fails to appear I talk to Swallow, my mare, and she twitches her ears +as though she understands. Indeed, there is little doubt but that she +does. +</P> + +<P> +"Let us stay awhile here," say I, "and look at this gay young squirrel. +He is enlarging his burrow as if he intended finishing it in five +minutes. He is no hireling squirrel. What say you, Swallow?" +</P> + +<P> +If a mare can laugh, this one does, but maybe it is only her way of +coughing. +</P> + +<P> +"And I have an idea, Swallow, that she is inside with four or five baby +squirrels, who think the world is lined with fur and that life consists +in drawing nutriment from a warm breast. This must be the way of it." +</P> + +<P> +"Step along, my pretty one, and may it happen we shall find the Knight +round the next turn. Do you notice how the green trees grow like a +mane on the hills?" +</P> + +<P> +Swallow thinks differently. It is her opinion that the dark +needle-like pines stand erect in the same way as the fur on a grizzly's +back. I know this, else why does she shy violently as we make the turn? +</P> + +<P> +"You are wrong, my pretty one," say I. "These pine-trees are very +religious and much too dignified to attack you and me. Besides, the +needles of the pines drive devils away, and if you carry a sprig of +spruce with you in the woods, no ill-luck will ever come to you. +Théophile Trembly, who is a woodsman and a ranger, told me this. +</P> + +<P> +"Do not linger, Sweet-o'-my-Heart; the world is young and you and I may +ride forever. +</P> + +<P> +"These are juniper-bushes, any one can see. Maybe if I were to lie +under one, like the Tishbite did, an angel might touch me. And maybe I +should also find 'a cake baken with coals', and a cruse of water. I +would tell you, Swallow, how it tasted in my mouth, for the Tishbite +forgot this thing. And I would mention where the angel got the coals. +They must have been the 'coals of juniper' of which King David wrote, +for these are, to this very day, the best charcoals in all the world. +Where the divine visitant found the match to kindle the coals... +</P> + +<P> +"Ah, well! I'll ask the Padre about this, but like as not he'll say, +"An irrevelant and irreverent question, M'Dear!" although it is neither +one nor the other, for it argues well for humanity that an angel, who +is generally portrayed as a rather offish being, should know where to +find a match and how to use it. A lot could be said on this very +point. It pleasures me not a little that an angel from the skies built +a fire out of doors and cooked cakes on it. This surely means that +when the angels take recreation they play at being men and that they +have a kindly feeling for us. It might be that there are more of them +around about than we have any idea, neighbourly-like angel of sap and +sinew, who occasionally bear a hand in our work and who loaf around of +evenings by the campfire. If an angel can cook on an out-door fire, he +must know how to hang a blanket to the windward side, and an angel who +knows this is no nidnoddy fellow, I can tell you. +</P> + +<P> +"If you were listening more attentively, Swallow, and if I were not +afraid of the Padre finding out, I would push this idea further and say +that, when the angel was through with his meal, he would in all +likelihood be humanely tired and would fall asleep on a heaped up +mattress of fir needles and dried juniper leaves. These, as is their +wont, would whisper immemorial secrets to him, so that he might come in +time to be a little more tolerant of our failings and to wonder if it +were altogether fair that the soul of a man should be damned for his +body's needs. He might even think the same about a woman's soul. It +cannot fail to vastly affect an angel's opinions when, instead of +looking down from the sky, he lies on a bed of leaves and looks up at +it. The whole colour and texture of his ideas must be altered. I +believe he would come to feel that religious truths should vary to suit +the needs of humanity, as those needs change, and that religion should +serve men rather than men religion. +</P> + +<P> +"A young god-man said something about this one day in a wheatfield, but +he was reproved by his wincing hearers whose descendants are with us to +this very day." +</P> + +<P> +This conversation has become too philosophical for Swallow, whose ears +are sweetly holden and who shows her wish to change my thought by +single footing whenever we come to a level stretch. Doubtless, she +hopes to draw my attention to her easy and right pleasant gait. If I +owned her we might become great cronies. +</P> + +<P> +On the top of the mountain to which we have come, the leaves on the +deciduous trees seem smaller and about the size of rabbits' ears. On +my way hither, I passed bluebells, ferns, heather, roses, wild cotton, +and painter's brush, the plant which combines colour with heat. From +several thousand feet below comes up to me the bellow of the train's +engine, that makes long hollow echoes among the peaks. A peculiarity +of the north is that the sounds seem only to emphasize the silence and +loneliness. This engine makes an ill-noise, but without the railway, +these mountains must have remained unseen to all except a hard-muscled +and adventurous few. For this reason, we must feel something of the +gratitude of the Chief of the Blackfeet Indians, who, in 1885, because +of the friendly spirit of his tribe towards the builders, was given a +pass ticket over the Canadian Pacific Railway by the President thereof. +The ticket was given him in a carved frame. The letter in which he +acknowledged the courtesy read like this: "I salute you, O Chief, O +great One! I am pleased with railway key opening road free to me. The +chains and rich covering of your name writing; its wonderful power to +open the road show the greatness of your chieftainship. I have done. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.8em">his</SPAN><BR> +"Crow X Foot,"<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2.5em">mark.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Standing on this hill and looking off into the sky, I and my horse seem +poised in mid air. It wouldn't be so hard to fly. Hitherto, I have +been following pleasure as something to be caught, and, of a sudden, I +have ridden into it. Don't you know me? I am Columbine pirouetting on +the white horse of the North. +</P> + +<P> +Don't you know this is summer time on the hills where Nature has wealth +to spill like a mad-woman and spills it? On this mountain-top, there +is a wandering wind soft as a child's caress. I must make the best of +it and of the fierce radiance of the sunshine, for, sooner than we +bargain for, the Lord in his derision may send a cutting blizzard and +it will be cold, so cold. +</P> + +<P> +As I ride homeward down the trail, I lift up my voice and hallo to the +sun for joy. You may call this mountain madness if you care to. Don't +you know that it matters not a finger's fillip what any one says about +a climber's mood or manner once she has reached the heights? Barbed +arrows fall off in this rarefied air, and this, I take it, is the great +reward of the climb. +</P> + +<P> +There are other compensations on the heights. You may shut your eyes +and have a vision of the land that lies beneath you ... let us say a +vision of Mother Canada and her nine daughters, and of the part they +are destined to play in history. You may open your eyes again to +ponder how they will grapple with the problems of race assimilation; of +arbitration and war; of morals and politics; and of labour and capital. +You will conclude that nothing unfair can exist long in this land of +wide spaces, and that Canada is sure to think and act greatly. And +right here is a good place to repeat her prayer which it rests with +each of us to answer— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Bring me men to match my mountains;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Bring me men to match my plains;</SPAN><BR> +Men with empires in their purpose<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And new eras in their brains."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +When you are come down off the mountains there are other things to be +seen at Banff, like the golf-links, the aviary, and the museums, but +you will enjoy the water pastimes best, that is, if you are a Canadian +or an American. The European will be shocked to see the sexes bathing +together at this famous spa, for in Europe, it is their wish to bathe +privately even in the ocean. +</P> + +<P> +The outdoor swimming pool is a sulphur water, and comes up from the hot +underworld. The pool is set in a splendid quadrangular court of grey +stone, open to the sky, but shielded to windward with glass. +Red-lipped flowers drip over its pillars, adding vastly to the charm of +the scene. The pool is flanked on the hotel side by retiring-rooms +which are as luxurious and sleep inviting as those of ancient Rome or +Pompeii. Overhead, the guests may look down into the green waters and +watch the bathers spring from the diving-boards or cavort about like +young dolphins, tritons, or lightsome naiads. No matter how phlegmatic +you may be, you will wish to tarry here indefinitely and to rest from +your labours, for a voluptuous languor slides into your veins till even +the mountains round about seem illusory and unreal. Here it is +"Paradise enow." With this alchemy of water and sun and these electric +currents of earth and sky, you could hardly expect aught but healing +and enchantment. +</P> + +<P> +But the attendants will not let you stay too long in the water, for it +is not wise to accumulate any more sulphur on your person than is +necessary to strike a light, for, owing to our proximity to the +magnetic pole, most of us are already dynamos. +</P> + +<P> +At the fall of day, a storm rises in the hills. These seem to come +close together and whisper, and the sound is like the whirr of swords. +</P> + +<P> +Many people who are wise talk about storm spirits, so there must be +such ... poor distracted beings who wring their hands and moan in black +discord. It may be they are the souls of murdered folk, and those who +have been executed, and they cry curses on all who live and love and +laugh. You must be afraid of them if you are like me. My windows look +down on the Valley of the Bow and out upon a riot of hills. There is +nothing more beautiful in the girth of the Seven Seas, but, to-night, +this scene is awesome and full of strangeness. The black clouds are +laced with streaks of lightning, or it may be that the spirits thrust +out red tongues in derision. +</P> + +<P> +Lord, how it blows! and I am afraid of this thunder and the shouting of +the storm. The wind grapples with the trees as though they were living +creatures and it makes no difference that they crouch and cry for +mercy. It is Bendan, the Pine Wrestler, who is out there, and when +angry he can pluck up a young tree with his little finger or break it +with a push of his shoulder. But he does not do this often; he only +wrestles to make them strong. +</P> + +<P> +It is better for a woman to go down to the great stone dining-hall with +its yellow floor, where there is music, and dancing, and love-making. +It is a pretty play even to the onlooker. Or in the big central +rotunda, which is the heart of this hostelry in the hills, she will +find "there is always fine weather," and "the good fellows" are from +all over the world and have strange stories to tell Canadian folk who +stay in the North. In the cavernous fireplace, spruce logs burn redly, +and by their light you may decipher the words on the mantelpiece: "The +world is my school; travel our teacher; Nature our book, and God our +friend." Overhead, in the fourth gallery, a deep-voiced singer is +taking us into captivity. Listen, then, for it is only in music that +critics are taken captive: literature has no such thraldom. It is +about a perfect day that the singer sings, and this is what she says— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"And this is the end of a perfect day,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Near the end of a journey too;</SPAN><BR> +But it leaves a thought that is big and strong,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">With a wish that is kind and true.</SPAN><BR> +For Memory has painted this perfect day<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">With colours that never fade,</SPAN><BR> +And we find at the end of a perfect day<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The soul of a friend we've made."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap25"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXV +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +THE OVERLAND TRAIL OF '98 +</H4> + +<P CLASS="intro"> +Out of the North there rang a cry of Gold!—TOM McINNES. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Only this spring, a widow near Edmonton sold her quarter-section to a +real-estate syndicate for eighty thousand dollars. She was one of the +women who "stayed at home with the stuff" while her husband fared forth +in search of gold at the time of the Klondike stampede in 1897-8. He +died on the trail, and ever since the woman has ploughed the lone +furrow both literally and metaphorically. +</P> + +<P> +The handsome reward of her industry and pertinacity calls to mind that +fable of Æsop's where the young men found that the hidden treasure +their father had described to them was in the yield the soil had given +after they had industriously digged it over. +</P> + +<P> +We were talking about this the other night, and the humour and +tragedies of the gold stampede, over the last bottle of +champagne—-positively the last—that remained of the most prolonged +and celebrated spree that ever took place in the North. The vintage +was a <I>Koch Fils</I> of 1892 and, therefore (to save your mental +arithmetic), I may add, twenty-one years old. It was brought in by the +Helpman Expedition, familiarly known to the local wiseacres of the day +as "The Helpless Proposition." +</P> + +<P> +Did it taste well? +</P> + +<P> +I do not know. +</P> + +<P> +I like lemonade with maraschino cherries better than champagne, but the +party were agreed that it was excellent drinking. One said it had a +pulse; another, that European grapes sucked in more sun than those +grown in America; "The stuff that makes the world go round," remarked a +third. Assuredly it looks well, thought I, and the bubbles caper like +they were alive. +</P> + +<P> +Under the balm and stimulus of the champagne, the men (all of them +old-timers) were not indisposed to talk concerning the party who +brought it into the country and of the things that befell them. Also, +they tell about the other parties who attempted to reach the +gold-diggings by the overland route from Edmonton. These were +heart-breaking tales, with, here and there, a golden thread of humour +showing up in the black fabric of despoliation and defeat. +</P> + +<P> +The thirty members of the Helpman Party came from Great Britain. They +were unfortunate from the start. They arrived at Edmonton on Christmas +Eve, one of them, Captain Alleyn, being ill with pneumonia, from which +disease he died a couple of days later. He was the artist of the +party, and correspondent of Reuter's News Agency. +</P> + +<P> +His was the first military funeral held in the North, so that it was an +event around which much interest centred. +</P> + +<P> +The expedition was under the command of Colonel Helpman and Lord +Avonmore of Gortmerron House, County Tyrone, known to the local folk by +the unkind name of "Lord 'Ave-one-more." He died last year in Ireland. +"A truly remarkable man, my dear," said an old lady of our lemonade +group, "and always he talked of smashing niggers." +</P> + +<P> +All provisions and supplies for the gold crusade were brought from +England, except the horses, and the duty thereon amounted to several +thousand dollars. In truth, they were provisioned under War Office +approval, for, said they, "We are English gentlemen and must travel as +English gentlemen." Baled hay and hay-choppers, baths, beds, tents, +sanitary conveniences, and other impedimenta were imported by the +train-load. +</P> + +<P> +These Canadian men will have it, moreover, that the Britishers brought +in snowshoes for their horses, which gear they were wont to designate +as "bloomin' tennis racquets." I might have believed this +extraordinary statement had I not guessed that my narrator gleaned his +idea from the <I>Voyages and Explorations of Samuel de Champlain</I>, for +these imperturbable northmen never so much as blink an eye when adding +the inevitable pinch of spice to a story. +</P> + +<P> +It is quite true though that the party did bring enormous supplies of +"arrested" foods, egg powders, Westphalian hams, almost unlimited +quantities of tinned ptarmigan, woodcock, plum-pudding, and other +toothsome delicacies well calculated to pique the most jaded and +club-debauched palate. Unfortunately, on being opened, nearly all +these delicate edibles were found to be spoiled, so that the travellers +were forced to exist on such crude diet as pig's face, rice, and beans. +</P> + +<P> +But the liquors still remained. Allah be praised!—barrels and cases +of it; yes! even kegs and demi-johns—brandy, burgundy, benedictine, +claret, champagne, and canary—these and other brands which I forget, +for my interest was attracted from the list to the wistful faces of +these historians who think with love and longing on those rare old, +fair old golden days that are gone beyond recall. +</P> + +<P> +On their arrival at Edmonton, the commanders of the expedition were +informed that a prohibition law was in force in the Yukon and that, in +consequence, no spirituous liquors could be carried across its borders. +This being the case, there was nothing for it but to drink the liquors +in Edmonton. They had no licence to sell it, and to pour it upon the +unappreciative prairie would be manifestly absurd—even wicked. This +is why I was correct in saying that our vintage of the night was the +last bottle of the most prolonged and celebrated spree that ever took +place in the North. In truth, it was an Homeric carousal. +</P> + +<P> +The spree lasted for six weeks, and fights with their legal sequences +were frequent. To use the most generally approved northern expression +of the day, "They just fit and fit," so that more than once the good +Archdeacon of Alberta had to pour oil and balm into the broken bones +and brittle nerves of the combatants. Indeed, he went so far as to +have them nursed in his own home. He is a hale-hearted, fine-fibred +gentleman, our Archdeacon. +</P> + +<P> +It is hardly fair, however, to lay the entire spree to the credit of +the stampeders. The population of Edmonton, in the late nineties, +consisted of fifteen hundred people, and all the male portion of it +used their utmost endeavours to prevent any good liquor going to waste. +The gentry of the community were invited to partake, but the hewers of +wood and drawers of water who had been engaged to exercise the +pack-horses by walking them up and down, these, and the disorderly +arrant idlers who hung on the borders of the camp, helped themselves. +Their motto was the same as Lord Nelson's—"Touch and take." Indeed, +the speedy manner in which they relieved the expedition of any +encumbering wealth was truly most astonishing. They have a theory in +the North that everything belongs by right to the man who has the +greatest need. Now, the need of the North is a very big pocket and +there are holes in it. +</P> + +<P> +Ultimately, the party got away. They took the Swan Hill route that +leads to the Old Assiniboine Crossing, but spring had already set in so +that the trails were deep with water, and the muskegs were bottomless +pits. +</P> + +<P> +The leader of the expedition (by which they meant the foreman as +distinct from the director) was Mr. Matthew Evanston O'Brien, an Irish +solicitor and erstwhile Chief of Police in Australia. It is also said +he was an English secret-service man. He died in April of this year at +Wetaskawin, Alberta, where he was practising law. +</P> + +<P> +The breeds and other packers who accompanied the party became insolent +and purposely lost their loads. One man smashed the camp stove and +dropped it into a river; others lost tents; while some found hay and +oats as hard to hold as quicksilver. Being badly sheltered and +underfed, nearly all of their hundred horses died, so that long +afterwards teamsters coming to the south picked up wagon loads of +harness besides other useful gear. In a word, like the man who tried +all the rheumatism cures, the members of the Helpman Expedition were +"done good." +</P> + +<P> +Some of the party got as far as Fort Simpson on the Mackenzie River, +but in the end every man, greatly chastened in spirit, turned back to +Edmonton, where some of them were stranded for several months before +money came to take them on to England. +</P> + +<P> +Do not laugh at their misfortune. It is not seemly so to do, for, in +all this wildly-warring world, there are few more bitter cups than the +failure of a big financial coup in the which you have invested your own +(and alas!) other people's money. +</P> + +<P> +Besides, few of the scores of parties who started fared any better, +while many faced worse. Some of them, like the Moody Expedition, +returned because they could not make over two or three miles a day, +they having to fell the impeding timber. At this rate of travel, the +journey would have occupied five years. +</P> + +<P> +Other crusaders returned because they had no food or money, a condition +that scarcely makes for progress or health. +</P> + +<P> +Still others came back because they had fallen out by the way, for the +trail has the satanic peculiarity of developing all that is surly, +selfish, or yellow in human nature. People who are tired, ill, and +hungry lift the curtain of their character and forget to let it fall, +so that the result is disillusionment to all concerned. Not a few men +who started in on pronouncedly amicable terms, eating from the same +plate both actually and figuratively, came out brimful with umbrage, +hatred and pique. Murder on the trail may be almost a natural impulse. +</P> + +<P> +But all the derelicts who returned had one well-defined peculiarity +(albeit a negative one), they came in quietly by the back trails—they +who had gone forth full-fed and wanton as young gophers. The North had +rolled out their individuality like one might roll out dough. They +were "the bitten;" gaunt-eyed starvelings; tatterdemalions who might +have posed for Rip Van Winkle or The Ancient Mariner. The North is a +goodly country and attracts goodly men, yet, even here, one may lose +both his sense and his competence. +</P> + +<P> +"Did no one succeed?" I ask. +</P> + +<P> +"Oh yes!" replies a jocund old gentleman who has lived here these +thirty years. "One man got through by hook or crook—chiefly crook. +He was a real-estate agent and insurance broker." +</P> + +<P> +Further questions elicit the fact that this broker was not so much a +stampeder as an absconder. He was short in his returns to the +insurance company and took this means of avoiding arrest. At least, so +it was rumoured. He left Edmonton in the late winter with no money, no +food—nothing but a small hand-satchel containing collars and blank +premium forms. All the way along he insured the trailers on the +straight life, endowment, or accident policies, or for sick benefits. +They were far enough on the trail to realize that there was a distinct +possibility of their requiring one, if not all these premiums, so our +broker found fat pickings. Resides, each trailer had begun to think +lovingly and longingly of his family at home, and of what a comforting +compensation a ten-thousand dollar policy might be to them in the event +of his death. Indeed, it seemed almost like swindling the company to +take out a policy on this journey. But what would you? Here was their +properly certified agent with the requisite papers to boot. One must +take what the gods send. +</P> + +<P> +At Athabasca Landing, our broker man stole a boat and made his way down +the river. He fed at each camp he encountered; related how he had +become separated from his party, and how he was hurrying forward to +rejoin them. Under the circumstances, it was only natural that his +hosts should supply him with enough food for a day or two. Besides, it +would never do to let him die of starvation and he carrying their good +money and insurance policies in his satchel—the little black +hand-satchel wherein he kept his collars. +</P> + +<P> +He reached Dawson early in the rush, but we do not know how it fared +with him there—-whether he crushed his money from stones or bones—for +it was probable he took a new name, and, needless to say, he did not +return via the overland route to Edmonton. +</P> + +<P> +Two others who reached the northern Eldorado were Jim Kenealey and Jack +Russell. It took them two years to get in. Russell struck pay-dirt in +the Cape Nome District, but Kenealey, after abandoning several claims, +came out penniless. He died recently at the Cameron House, Strathcona, +of which hotel he was proprietor. Kenealey, who came from Peterboro', +Ontario, in the early eighties, was a clever sleight-of-hand artist and +one time had an encounter with an Indian, it being natural and entirely +reasonable that the Indian should demand the fifty cents that Kenealey +claimed to have taken from his ear. +</P> + +<P> +"But there were others who reached the gold zone," explains a lawyer +who was, in those days, a cub-reporter, type-setter, and I know not +what besides. "I have forgotten their names, but you may find them in +the files of <I>The Bulletin</I>." +</P> + +<P> +One of these parties comprised four men, Martin McNeeley from Sault +Ste. Marie, Michigan, George Baalam, W. Schreeves and W. J. Graham. +</P> + +<P> +Schreeves and Baalam reached Dawson safely; Graham was drowned on the +way, and McNeeley, who injured his foot, was left behind by the others +somewhere near the Devil's Portage. +</P> + +<P> +Some months afterwards, Mr. E. T. Cole of Pelican Rapids, Minnesota, +with his party, stumbled upon a small tent in which they found a +terribly decomposed body. It was McNeeley's. By his side there was a +knife, a compass, a rifle, twenty-five rounds of cartridges, twenty +pounds of flour, some meat, matches and wood. The following excerpts +are from his diary— +</P> + +<P> +"December 28, 1897—My partners deserted me and tried to cripple me +further by taking my grub. +</P> + +<P> +"January 5, 1898—Walked eight miles on my awful foot and am crippled +on an Island alone. The pain of my foot is terrible." +</P> + +<P> +The files reveal another tragedy in which two men from Brantford, +Ontario, were the principals—the Strathdees. +</P> + +<P> +Mr. A. C. Strathdee was one of the early stampeders. He went north +with sixteen pack-horses. His only companion was his son, aged +twenty-two, W. Harvey Strathdee, a member of the Dufferin Rifles. They +camped one night beside the Taylor Trail that leads to Nelson. In the +morning, while cooking breakfast, Harvey sighted a moose and, +straightway, started in pursuit. At noon he had not returned and his +father, becoming anxious, tried to follow the trail, but +unsuccessfully. At night, the now frantic man lit a fire and shot off +his rifle in the hope that Harvey might see or hear them. He did this +for eight terrible days and eight more terrible nights, till he +realized that further delay would endanger his own life. In these +eight days, half of his horses died from lack of food, the man being +afraid to shift camp in case Harvey might find his way back. +</P> + +<P> +Further on, he met James and John Fair of Elkhorn, Manitoba, who +returned with him to spend yet eight other days in unavailing search. +At Dunvegan, Mr. Strathdee engaged a white man, an Indian, and a +dog-train to go in and make quest till spring. Then he came back to +Edmonton, where he exacted promises from the journalists to forward to +him at Brantford any report that might come in from the trails +regarding the lost youth. +</P> + +<P> +For a long time nothing came but, one day, some Indians brought in word +how on their way north nearly a year before, they fell on the fresh +trail of a lost white man and had followed it up. They knew he was +white for he wore boots, and that he was lost because of his uncertain, +round-about course. They found his body on a mountain between two +logs. His arms were outspread and his cartridge belt and rifle lay by +his side. The trees around had been burned, and the Indians were of +the opinion that he had set them on fire to try and attract his +father's attention. +</P> + +<P> +That the public of Canada and the United States had little idea of the +hardships to be endured on the overland trail was evidenced by the fact +that a number of women attempted to take it. Some of them wore +ordinary clothes with plumes in their hats, but the more knowing ones +were attired in jaeger skirts and jerseys, also they wore jaeger caps +that covered the face except for the nose and mouth. In their belts +they carried six-shooters. +</P> + +<P> +Letters were received here asking if the writers could get through to +the Klondyke on bicycles; if there were good boarding-houses on the +way, and if the Indians were troublesome. +</P> + +<P> +For the instruction of the stampeders, the Honourable the Minister of +the Interior, then Mr. Frank Oliver, issued a special number of <I>The +Bulletin</I>, which was the farthest north newspaper, mapping out the +route and the distances between the points. +</P> + +<P> +By the shortest and best travelled trails, the entire distance from +Edmonton to the Klondyke was 2,728 miles. This route was via the +Athabasca, Great Slave, Mackenzie and Peel Rivers. From thence it +crossed to Summit, La Pierre House, and down the Porcupine River to its +junction with the Yukon River. From this point to Dawson was the +home-run. +</P> + +<P> +There are said to be sixty-eight roads to heaven, but this road to +Dawson is not one of them. +</P> + +<P> +Each man had six pack-ponies to carry in his supplies, which consisted +of 900 lb. of food and 150 lb. of clothing and hardware, making in all, +1,050 lb. The ponies cost from twenty-five to thirty dollars, and it +was conservatively estimated that the supplies cost $250.00. +</P> + +<P> +The food was calculated on the basis of the Mounted Police rations and +was supposed to last a year, being doled out at the following ration +per man, per day: flour 1-¼ lb., beef 1-½ lb., bacon 1 lb., potatoes 1 +lb., apples 3 oz., beans 4 oz., coffee or tea ½ oz., salt ½ oz., butter +2 oz., sugar 3 oz. +</P> + +<P> +With praiseworthy discretion, many of the Old-Timers opened up depots +to supply the parties with outfits, but, on the whole, there was no +over-charging or money-grabbing such as one might have expected. On +the contrary, the prices that prevailed were from 25 to 75 per centum +less than those of to-day. Flour was $2.50 per hundredweight; bacon 11 +cents per pound, evaporated apples 8 cents, rolled-oats 3 cents, +raisins 10 cents, and black tea from 25 to 40 cents. Pack-saddle +blankets cost $2.00 a pair, and large grey blankets $3.25. Long arctic +socks cost from 50 cents to $1.00, sweaters from $1.00 to $1.50, and +cardigan jackets from $1.00 to $2.00. +</P> + +<P> +Many kinds of costumes were affected. Some men were clad in fur from +head to feet; others wore khaki, or sheepskin coats; and in one party +every man had a coonskin coat. +</P> + +<P> +Nothing, however, caused so much excitement in the burgh as the various +modes of conveyance that were planned and built by the gold-seekers. +</P> + +<P> +"Texas" Smith started alone on the longish trail with all his +provisions packed in three barrels. These were equipped as rollers or +wheels with a platform on top for sleeping purposes. He calculated +that on the rivers the barrels would act as floaters and so could be +comfortably navigated. +</P> + +<P> +Texas travelled nearly nine miles before the hoops came off. He was +able to retrace his steps to town by the beans the barrels shed on the +road. They took his photograph, and that of his conveyance, before he +started but, on his return, good-naturedly refrained, for it was +distinctly noticeable that Texas had the air of having eaten the canary. +</P> + +<P> +Breneau Fabian, a Belgian, invented a boat which, being intended for +all elements, was constructed from galvanized iron. He called it +Noah's Ark. It was built in two parts with a hinge in the middle. +When open, it could be used on the river, for it had a keel; or on the +snow, for it had runners. If he cared to, he could close up his boat +by means of the hinge—that is, it would turn over, one part on top of +the other, in which shape it was a caravan with wheels attached. His +yoke of oxen were to be killed at Athabasca Landing and salted down as +food for the journey. +</P> + +<P> +For the information of the curiously inclined, I might say that until +recently, Fabian's Ark served as a float at all civic processions such +as Labour Day and the Queen's Jubilee, but it has had its day and its +scrap heap. +</P> + +<P> +Another man, whose name I could not learn, built an ice-boat on the +Saskatchewan River. He had figured out that he could reach the +placer-diggings by means of sails, thus acquiring a distinct monetary +advantage over the folk and fellows who had horses, in that sails would +not require to be fed with hay and oats. +</P> + +<P> +Be it said to the credit of the folk and fellows that they cherished no +grudge in their hearts, for, the sails refusing to act, they loaned him +fourteen teams wherewith to haul his ice-boat on to the bank. +</P> + +<P> +Considering the length and nature of the trail, perhaps the most +bird-witted scheme of reaching the Klondike was that evolved by the "I +Will" Steam-Sleigh Company of Chicago. They ought to have known better. +</P> + +<P> +They built a train of four cabooses or cars, the motive power of which +was steam. A marine boiler and engine were imported from the United +States, upon which they paid $500.00 custom toll. Also, they imported +a revolving drum equipped with teeth, similar to those used on the +log-roads in the big timber-limits, and sprocket-wheels, band-chains, +and other things no mortal woman could be expected to remember. All +the cars were on steel-runners. The one behind the engine contained +fuel; the second was the living car, while the third held supplies. +</P> + +<P> +Everything was packed and loaded ready for the hour of starting before +the builders had tested the machine. All Edmonton was assembled to see +the sight, while scores of Indians squatted around and stared like +gargoyles. The workmen, with an air of high concern, twisted a bolt +here, or a belt there; oiled a hub, or did one of the hundred things a +mechanic does to an engine and boiler when he would have you believe he +is earning his pay. +</P> + +<P> +It was a proud moment when one of the builders stepped forward and +touched his hat to a blue-uniformed official—a moment, too, that was +fraught with serious issues, for the blue-uniform said, "<I>Let her go</I>!" +All Edmonton ceased to breathe and the Indians looked almost pale. +</P> + +<P> +There was a vast creaking; a shudder as if the caverns of the deep were +opened; the wheels turned—and turned—and turned, and with each turn +buried the machine deeper into the earth, there to remain till the day +that Kenneth Macleod bought the marine boiler and engine for his +sawmill. They say he bought it for a song, but no one ever heard the +song. Ah! but those were right royal days for the Old-Timers, the like +of which can never be. +</P> + +<P> +I nearly forgot about the three cabooses. These stampeders who did not +die of scurvy, hardship, starvation, or accident, and who returned via +Edmonton, used the cabooses for shelter while they wrote home for money. +</P> + +<P> +It was a long time before they were free of occupants. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap26"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XXVI +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +A SONG OF THIS LAND +</H4> + +<P> +Out of the North comes tumult, say they who are poets, and clangorous +challenge to battle. +</P> + +<P> +True, O Poets! And out of the North come men of robust mood who will +keep our nation's honour, for this is a country where courage and truth +are inborn; a land which sways the souls of its citizens unto high +endeavour. From this country where, of old, dwelt the bow-bearers who +were eaters of strong meat, will come high-hearted men of loyal temper, +for this is the world's House of Youth. This shall be its nurse of +heroes. +</P> + +<P> +Money-flingers and careless, are these Northmen, says another, and +wasters of wealth. +</P> + +<P> +True, O Sir Time Lock, but when the gods would be thrifty they give +their money away. The Gods are master-spenders and have learned the +wide wisdom of being foolish. Do you follow me aright? +</P> + +<P> +And this is the wisdom of our Northmen who have well tamed Dame Fortune +and have set their sure brand upon her. +</P> + +<P> +But, if money sticks not in their purses, and if they haggle not over +coins, yet are these men businessful with a purpose for large +enterprise. In these latitudes, we have deep-counselled companies of +traders who, while they love the sweet power of money, have ever +bartered fairly, and know that 'mine' and 'thine' are different words +which rhyme well in all reckonings. I have sure grounds for knowing +this, and am minded to say, "Hail! and all hail!" +</P> + +<P> +The North is a numbed and haggard land of and snow, say many voices. +In its vast voids lives a dark spirit which lures men on and tricks +them so that they come, in time, to love that which punishes them. And +if by some fair hap they are led into other and softer climes, then do +they fret and fever for the wolf-lands of the Yukon or the Mackenzie, +as though some secret and unforbidden magic had entered their blood +forever. +</P> + +<P> +I will not speak contrariwise to these men, for it is meet that I +should speak fairly. The love of the North, like the fiery kiss of +genius, is a sorrowful gift, and none can say whether it is greater in +joy or pain. She is an exacting mistress, this white-bodied, +rude-muscled North, and, of times, she breaks and hurts a man till he +drags his brokenness away to die. Yet, is she beautiful and +passionately human; full of vigour and drunken with life, and her house +stretches from the dawn to dayfall. +</P> + +<P> +And why should men complain of the stabbing cold and of the +unrestricted range of the young winds? Why do they wish to regulate +God's snow and rain? What could be more hateful to men than +unfaltering sunshine and ever-flowering fields? +</P> + +<P> +In the winter of the fortressed North, animals turn white as do the +birds and the very earth itself. All were pallid and colourless but +for the yellow belt of the setting sun and the black-green tree shadows +that fall toward the pole. The rivers cease their singing; the birds +are silent, and all is stilled to the bounds of the world save only the +sonorous wind which is the breath of Claeg, the Bound One, who is the +earth. Here, the north-east wind is Lord Paramount, and the Crees and +Chipewyans have long known that Death comes from his direction. +</P> + +<P> +Listen! I made an error, to say that all is stilled, for, of occasion, +there is the mewl of the lynx; the yap of the timber wolf as he gives +tongue in pursuit of <I>ah-pe-shee moos-oos</I>, the jumping deer; the +howling infamy of the huskies seeking their meat from God; the raucous +roar of the hulking moose blind with rage of love. +</P> + +<P> +Listen! I made an error to speak of an all-whiteness, for, where the +Aurora pins her colours to the sky, it is like unto an angry opal. +This is Beauty Absolute. Her swinging swords of flame none have +measured: who shall tell the measure of this land? +</P> + +<P> +But listen! It is not beyond our understanding that men should feel +the urge of this Northland and its strange enticement. Some there are +who speak of it as the lure of the North; the fret of spring, or the +call of red gods. Surely we may understand aright if we do but watch +the birds flock hither of spring-time, and how the fish fight up +against the streams though it be to suffer and to die. These cannot +resist the drag of the magnetic pole, any more than you and I who have +souls and are feeling folk! +</P> + +<P> +But it is not always frigid here, for we have springtide and the season +of seven sweet suns. "Good morrow!" shouts the tired Winter in the +time of melting snows. "Good morrow!" shouts back the nimble Spring as +he throws a mist of green over the young aspens. "Come fly with me and +touch the sun," pleads the eagle to his sweetheart. "Come with me and +be my love," woos Kiya, boatman of the Athabasca; "already the young +birds are in their nests and soon they will fly away. Soon will the +time of mating be past." +</P> + +<P> +Aye! but the summer winds are honey-mouthed. +</P> + +<P> +Aye! but the skies are star-enchanted, and there are fair stories I +might tell about yellow grain fields and of red lilies like blown +flame, but none save those who are prairie rangers would understand +aright. +</P> + +<P> +Besides, there are woolly-mouthed men and chattering daws who say +secretly that we of the North are boasters, and that we tell ill tales. +</P> + +<P> +But though we are impeached, yet will we say that our song is tinged +with no lie. We are young men, and sowers of grain, and it is pleasant +to glorify the largess of our harvest. +</P> + +<P> +We are boasters, they tell, and full-mouthed, but why should we keep +hidden and unshared the all-golden treasures of our fields? We will +not hide this thing in our hearts, but, with fair speech, will sing it +in a million-voiced canticle of praise. There is no need that we sing +restrainedly of our goodly dower, or in measured words, for we are no +servile race of hirelings, but free men and proclaimers of this land. +Because we are witnesses that the talent of our country is folded in +the fecund earth, we will speak aloud to our neighbouring Saxons of +friendly mind, and to the brotherhood of the soil throughout the +universe. We will speak with them concerning our gold, and vineyards, +and fine flour; of our forests, and fisheries, and apple orchards, till +their veins stir as with the tang of old wine. These folk have need to +know that in the North prosperity groweth widely; that here the +unbelievable is achieved. This is the true fairy-land where swineherds +and barbers, and much labouring men are raised to riches and power. +Here is a dining-hall whose friendly feast is spread for all. Here +every man may come and eat of our cakes and melons, of our honey and +fat things. +</P> + +<P> +The North has no need of an interpreter: it has need of heralds. Then +ho! for our fierce and beautiful country; our strong and fertile +country. +</P> + +<P> +We will send these tidings Europeward and the far-delivered message +shall not fall to the ground. It is a blithe young tune we shall sing, +with a resonant chorus of "Canada, O Canada." +</P> + +<P> +Fitting is it that we should sing to the Isles of Britain, for from +them is the birth of this breed and theirs is the royal stamp we bear +upon our fighting arm. We are the wide-ruling seed of the Saxons and +ever shall we answer to the rally of the race. All hands around! We +will pledge the homeland of Britain! +</P> + +<P> +And who will sing this song of the North? Sit you here till we talk of +this thing. I pray you prompt my pen as it forgets. +</P> + +<P> +They have come hither to sing it from Ottawa, which is the Place of +Councils, and the sovereign city in this fair house of Canada. +</P> + +<P> +Hither have they come from the tobacco plantations of Essex; the yellow +cornfields of Lambton; the luscious peach groves of Kent, and the +vineyards of Welland. These are lusty fellows and of fine fibre. +</P> + +<P> +Here are men of consideration from the thick-leaved apple orchards of +Nova Scotia and from the dairy steadings of Oxford. Have you never +heard concerning the round towers of Oxford which are stacks of grain, +and of the herds of black bulls which feed fatly on her meadowlands? +Then it is small knowledge you have of this Dominion and the bright +fortunes of its people. +</P> + +<P> +Others have joined our chorus who are from mailëd Quebec, which is the +eye of Canada; from Montreal, whose traffickers are among the +honourable of the earth, and from Niagara, where, with subtle cunning, +men have bridled Neptune, the Lord of Waters, and have made his trident +into one of fire. +</P> + +<P> +These courtly and free-handed fellows have hailed from Toronto. +Beautiful Toronto! The city of work and play. I like well its stately +homes and its women with honey-throated voices. And, here where I +write at Edmonton under the aurora, these men of the Southern Provinces +have assembled with our lads of the North and West who are +leather-fleshed and hard-sinewed, but withal, comely. This is Edmonton +on the Saskatchewan, which the bow-bearers call by another name, +meaning the great river of the plains. This is the stranger-thronged +city of the North; the city that has merited a cheer. It is here our +glorious Lady of Alberta has placed her throne whereunto all her sons +come up that they may pay her tribute of honour. +</P> + +<P> +To this place come the farmer-folk from the wheatlands of the queenly +Peace, and the priests and trappers from the Athabasca, which the +bow-bearers call by another name, meaning the great river of the woods. +And hither come the traders and road builders from the pass between the +cleft mountains where, of old, dwelt Jasper of the yellow head; these, +and the horse-taming men from young Calgary. We who love games and the +glory of them, stand at salute. +</P> + +<P> +These are the men from Winnipeg, the Mother City of the North. Honour +upon honour be to her! +</P> + +<P> +Right pleasant is it to present the likely-looking lads of Regina and +of the deep soiled plains of Saskatchewan. On the plains, the +straight-blowing wind is scented from the grassed headlands dappled +with flowers. On the plains, dwell strong, glad men in the joy of +their youth. On the plains there lives some common mother of the +common weal, who is the ancestress of our kings to be. +</P> + +<P> +These others whom I have held back until now that your attention might +not falter, are the dauntless, high-adventuring men who crossed the +mountains to where the land lieth soft to the sea. These are the men +of the new appointed city of Prince Rupert; the men of the fortunate, +fair-built city of Victoria, and those of sure-seated Vancouver. May +they build strongly and well. It is seemly that the forefront of our +royal House of Canada should be of far-shining splendour. +</P> + +<P> +We have high delight in this Province of British Columbia; in its +unshorn hills that are furrowed with rifts of roses, in its +fair-watered fruitlands, and in the rice and silk ships that come +reeling down its bays. This is a new-peopled land of fostered folk +and, of times, men's hearts fail them lest these stranger-guests march +not in step with the genius of the race. We who are your sister +provinces, O Columbia by the Sea, stretch forth our hands to you and +pray you as sentinels to keep our portals straitly, but, +notwithstanding, that you be wise in love to all things living.... +And, now, to the hither side of the mountains have come these western +men of erect spirit to sing with us the song of the North and of Canada. +</P> + +<P> +I wish my pen might tell you of our song, but this were a hard task, +for while our voices are tuned to one chord our themes are manifold. +Whatsoever things a man may desire, these may he find in his Mother +Canada. Some men sing of her ample skies and the incorruptible glory +of them; of her changing climes, limitless fields, and law-loving +spirit. Others have pleasant cause of song in the rivers that give +water to the people; in far-strung wires and clear highways to the sea; +and in her great institutions of beneficence which conserve the moral +energies of the citizens. +</P> + +<P> +Some, in voice which sounds like supplication, sing that a sense of +safety may be preserved in our homes, and that sweet tranquility may be +the lot of our aged folk. +</P> + +<P> +Others would have it that our ballot-strips fall from clean hands, and +that no man thinks only of his own Province but of the well-being and +good health of all. +</P> + +<P> +May our children, O Canada! have strong bodies and souls above the +lusts of gain, urges one, and let the women of our Dominion be skilled +in mother-craft, but with their house windows open to the intellectual +breezes of the world.... And I, of myself, am stirred to do tribute of +praise. I am thy child, O Canada, dear Mother! How shall I have +wisdom to order my words aright? O my lips sing this song! Sweet, my +pen, tell this tale, for the fullness of my heart has made heavy my +hand. +</P> + +<P> +I will make a crown of maple leaves for you, and will twist them with +flowers of the lily. See! I bring you native flowers; mint and roses +and clover blooms. I bring you golden-rod and marigolds, and berries +that are red. Take these from my hands, Good Mother! My heart is awed +and I cannot speak aright. +</P> + +<P> +Listen! All of us who sing to you have joined hands—Northmen and +Southerners and men of the coast-line. It is our wish to tell your +glory aloud that all may hear. It is wiser still to leave a part +untold that the world may the better know it. +</P> + +<P> +Hail to thee, O Canada, and hail to the flag! We who are thy children +salute thee! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<P CLASS="finis"> +THE END +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H6 ALIGN="center"> +T. H. BEST PRINTING CO. LIMITED, TORONTO +</H6> + +<BR><BR><BR><BR> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Seeds of Pine, by Janey Canuck + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SEEDS OF PINE *** + +***** This file should be named 32409-h.htm or 32409-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/2/4/0/32409/ + +Produced by Al Haines + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +https://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at https://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +https://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at https://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit https://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including including checks, online payments and credit card +donations. To donate, please visit: https://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + + +</pre> + +</BODY> + +</HTML> + diff --git a/32409.txt b/32409.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..15d578a --- /dev/null +++ b/32409.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8383 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Seeds of Pine, by Janey Canuck + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Seeds of Pine + +Author: Janey Canuck + +Release Date: May 18, 2010 [EBook #32409] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SEEDS OF PINE *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + + + + + +SEEDS OF PINE + + +_By_ + +JANEY CANUCK + + +Author of + +"Open Trails", etc. + + + + "_A handful of pine-seeds will cover mountains + with the green majesty of the forest, and I, too, + will set my face to the wind and throw my + handful of seed on high._" + --_Fiona Macleod_ + + + + +TORONTO + +THE MUSSON BOOK COMPANY LIMITED + + + + +Copyright, Canada, 1922 + +THE MUSSON BOOK COMPANY, LTD. + +PUBLISHERS + +TORONTO + + + + + _Affectionately dedicated to + my four brothers;_ + + _Thomas R. Ferguson, K.C. + Gowan Ferguson, M.D. + Harcourt Ferguson, K.C. + Honourable Mr. Justice W. N. Ferguson_ + + + + +CONTENTS + + +Chapter + + I WESTWARD WITH THE GRAND TRUNK PACIFIC + II A FRONTIER POST + III TO THE BUILDERS + IV BEHIND THE HILLS + V THE END OF STEEL + VI BITTER WATERS + VII MOTORING TO ATHABASCA LANDING + VIII COUNTRY DELIGHTS + IX AT THE LANDING + X ON THE ATHABASCA RIVER + XI SOME NORTHERN PIONEERS + XII AT THE PARTING OF THE RIVERS + XIII ON THE PORTAGE + XIV ON THE LESSER SLAVE RIVER + XV THE BISHOP OF THE ARCTIC + XVI NORTHERN VISTAS + XVII A COUNTRY WOMAN AT THE CITY RACES + XVIII IN NORTHERN GARDENS + XIX COMMUNING WITH THE RUTHENIANS + XX THE SHADOW OF THE SCAFFOLD + XXI THE BABOUSHKA + XXII THE HERO PRIESTS OF THE NORTH + XXIII COAL-MINING IN ALBERTA + XXIV THE PLAYGROUNDS OF THE WEST + XXV THE OVERLAND TRAIL OF '98 + XXVI A SONG OF THIS LAND + + + + +SEEDS OF PINE + + +CHAPTER I + +WESTWARD WITH THE GRAND TRUNK PACIFIC + +"'What went ye out into the wilderness to see?' They answered thus, +'So that we might not see the city.'"--SIR WILLIAM BUTLER. + + +The new steel trail the railway men are laying from Edmonton leads away +and away, I cannot say whither. For these many days I have had an +anxious desire to follow it and the glories thereof. I am tired of +this town and of the electrical devices that appear and re-appear in +the darkness like eyes that open and shut--wicked eyes that burn their +commercial message into my very soul. I am sick of these saucy, +swaggering streets and of sundry of the townspeople. Come you with me +and let us travel down the ways through the heart of the summer! We +shall have breeze and sun in our eyes, and breeze and sun in our +hearts. If you like not the prospect, pray, come no further, for we be +contrary the one to the other and no way-fellows. + +As we climb on the train this morning, it seems as though our quest for +quiet is to be cheated by the wallowing wave of humanity that threatens +to submerge us. Who are these close-nudged folk and whither away? + +She who runs may read them for hard-headed, white-handed men in search +of "prospects"; brown-throated homesteaders; real-estate agents out for +talking points and for snap fortunes; mining engineers with dunnage +bags--young fellows all in the full force of life--these, and "the +gang," who are ill-looking men and rather dirty. The gang fare forth +to work on the railway grades. They are always ganging--that is +going--for the words are strictly synonymous. The gang going to the +city meet the gang coming out. And so in everything they are +retroactive, and fight much, and swear, to give weight to their +differences of opinion. In one thing only is the gang agreed, no navvy +has yet been found who disputed the axiom that the Boss is a yellow +canine. + +There is a sprinkling of women, too, and we talk to each other in the +friendly manner of the country. A couple of them are half-breed girls, +with drooping feathers and skirts that have a hiss. Surely their men +are industrious Indians. Both are cinched into their clothes like a +cayuse into its pack-saddle. Both have skin the colour of brown coffee +into which milk has been poured, and always they are fussing with their +pinned-on curls. "The judicious Hooker" once watched some women doing +this, and he said they were "a-dilling and burling their hair." No one +may ever hope to strike out a more apt expression. The younger of the +girls has an indiscreet mouth and desirous eyes. I should not be +surprised, if one of these times our little brown woman found these to +be a mortgage on her soul somewhat difficult of discharge. And the +usury, little woman, it troubles me, the usury! + +The farmer's wife who shares my seat came to this province ten years +ago from the United States. Her husband made entry for a homestead and +she built the house, outbuildings, and fences on it, and bought the +implements with money she had saved from school-teaching. The first +year, their crop was frozen; the second, it was hailed out; and the +third, a spark from the threshing-machine burned their wheat stacks. +Their horses died and they had to incur debt for others. All this +time, the woman supported the household with the returns from her +poultry yard and dairy. These last years have been fat ones, thus +enabling them to save sufficient money to send two of their sons to the +business college in Town. The eldest girl is walking with the young +man on the adjoining farm and a wedding is brewing. + +To my thinking, this homely, ill-accoutred woman is something like a +heroine, and it is a pity the end of her troubles is not yet. Her +husband, who appears to be a flabby-spirited fellow, has always wanted +to, and has finally decided that he will sell the farm and go to the +town to keep a boarding-house. She is opposed to the move and has been +in the town endeavouring to protect her interests in the property, but +finds she is unable so to do. Because of this she has decided to buy +the farm from him and has the agreement ready for his signature. I am +astounded by her hardihood. She has the soul of a warrior. If the +recalcitrant spouse refuses to sell--no, I won't tell what she intends +doing, for I am willing to wager you, even to the half of my kingdom, +that he sells. + +The woman is proud, I can see, and accordingly careful to enlarge on +her man's good qualities, but it takes no acuteness to read through her +assurances that he is a pessimist and one who always draws tails in the +toss of life. + +The readers who have come with me thus far may here swing off key, but, +People Dear, you would be wrong; she is not chastising him; she is +mothering him. It is a remarkable trait in the make-up of a good woman +that she can, in critical junctures, not only be her own mother but may +also act in this capacity to the husband of her children. It is this +same office the Holy Ghost performs in the Trinity. + +The newsy is giving the last call to breakfast. He is a full-lifed +young man, with a cock-o'-my-walk air. I would not be surprised if he +were hatched out of the egg of a pouter-pigeon. He serves meals as far +as Edson, from whence we will be transferred to a construction train +and trust to manna being rained down from heaven. His tables are +crowded with guests, and we sit close like kernels on an ear of corn. +For breakfast, there is tea; there is coffee; there are pork chops, and +other fat foods which are made palatable by the sprightly addition of +sour pickles. Indeed, you may credit me, this breakfast is not one to +be sniffed at. I drink pannikins of tea that is very strong and green, +and fearlessly ask for more. If there is a happier woman in the North +than myself, I have never heard of her. I quite agree with you; our +pouter-pigeon serves the public far more effectually than do the +cabineteers, or even the bishops. + +We are yet in the wheat belt and the wheat is at flood-tide. When I +see a large stand of grain that is breast-high I say, "Well done, Good +Fellows!" and "Haste to the in-gathering!" The field hears my +salutation to the sowers and bows a million heads to me. And it says, +_shibboleth! shibboleth!_ (If you would pick up the talk of the fields +you must be still and listen.) + +The Hebrews, with ears a-tilt, caught this whisper, and so their word +for an ear of wheat was "shibboleth." It was this word the Ephraimites +lisped and so betrayed themselves to Jephthah. The difference was only +one of an aspirate. What they said was sibboleth. + +Now, while one can tell the sound of ripe wheat, no word is exactly +descriptive of the odour thereof. When I am not tired my pen almost +catches it. The odour is an intangible something between dryness and +colour, and the sign that expresses it can only be revealed. + +It is the mental habit of people to think of wheat as only so many +bushels of inert matter that is bought and sold on margins by half-mad +men, whereas, in all the world, wheat is the thing most richly alive. +It won't die, not for thousands of years. We would put jars of wheat +in the corner-stones of our state buildings, even as the Egyptians +buried it in tombs of rock. It is the only food we could pass down the +centuries to posterity, and apart from its scientific value, there is +little doubt posterity would appreciate the gift infinitely more than +those stupid name-lists of still stupider people. The grain should be +of the highest grade, with the name of the grower and the exact +location of his farm added thereto. + +Yes! let us tuck away these northern wheat grains till England becomes +a republic; the United States a kingdom; and until the yellow peril has +turned white. Let us lay them safely aside for that day when labour +and capital have become one, or till a still later epoch when instead +of sex in soul, there shall be soul in sex. Then take them out, +Posterity, and crush them into a sacramental wafer that all the world +may eat of it as a loving pledge from the twentieth century. + +If you think this too long to wait, perhaps you will recall that while +the seven sleepers slept, Caesar was superseded by Christ. Now, the +time they slept was for the lives of three men. + +In handling wheat, you have doubtless noticed that it is not only alive +but possesses a markedly developed will-power. It is ever resisting +conquest. They tell me that in the part of the exchange called the +pit, you cannot beat back wheat. Some men have succeeded for a while, +but always it has rolled in and smothered its erstwhile victors. Try +to hold a handful and the task is well-nigh impossible. It slides +through your fingers and causes your palm to open involuntarily. It +wearies a man to hold wheat tightly for long. Oats may be held and +other cereals, but not wheat. Its tendency is to fall to the ground +and reproduce. Thus, it is age-old but still eternally young. It is +the true Isis and no one has lifted its veil. I tell you men, there is +something uncanny and almost wicked about a thing that refuses to die, +and it so small as a grain of wheat. + +As a whole, this country is not beautiful, but now and then, there come +striking pictures. Here are pleasing lakelets a-flush with ducks; tall +cotton-woods which I name the maidens because of their fluffy +hair--these, and lush meadows, over which range regiments of asters, +sunflowers, and yarrow. It is a magic lantern fantasia with an +occasional muskeg to represent the waits between views. On the muskegs +the trees are so thin and straight they fairly scratch your eyes. + +Oh! but it is hot this day, and every leaf seems a green tongue thrust +out with thirst. The sun is making amends for his insulting reticence +of last winter. The Indians call him Great Grandfather Sun, but why, I +do not know. + +The houses of the homesteaders are built of poplar lumber, +weather-stained and ugly. Others are of logs chinsed with mud and +moss. All are small and favourable neither for hospitality nor +reproduction. Some day, when a large acreage is under crop, pretty +bungalows with brave red paint, will edit the scene as in the older and +more settled districts of the north. + +At every station, land seekers get out and disappear into the trees as +if the country ate them up, and, indeed, I am not so sure but it does. + +A baby gets off too--a new baby that has come from the city hospital is +being brought home. You would fancy a baby was a miracle the way the +men look at it and ask questions. Her name is Annette. She was born +on duck-day. Her father works in a saw-mill. We crowd to the window +to watch him meet Annette, for we would see the gladness on his face. +He is an admirably strong man, with the hard sinews of a wolf. He has +surely gone through the mill to some effect. I think he likes Annette, +but he looks most at the small mother and he has the mate tone in his +voice. + +The women ask me concerning my husband, and I say, "Oh yes! I have a +husband up here, somewhere--a big, fair man--I wonder if you have seen +him." + +They are discreetly silent, but I can see they are hoping I'll catch +him. This is not a case of duplicity on my part but rather of +kindness. It is one's stoutest duty to convey colour and snippets of +gossip of women, who, for the long winter months to come, are to remain +in these wilds. You must understand that gossip is not wicked up +North. Besides, this word actually means a sponsor at baptism--an +office recognized by all the world as one of unimpeachable +respectability. + +At Wabamun there is a great sweep of forest, but, a year ago, a great +fire raged here and large patches of burnt trees assault the eyes. +Hitherto, the homesteaders have had a two-handed harvest, one from +their lovely lake and the other from the land, but, nowadays, their +richest harvest comes from the summer tourists, who are building up a +popular resort at this point. Summer girls are trespassing on the +berry-patches, once the sole preserve of Indian maidens, and Ole +Larsen's fishing grounds are full open to sailing yachts and electric +launches. Such fish as Ole could catch, and such fish as his Frau +could cook! Always, I bowed my head over my plate and said the Indian +grace, "Spirit, partake." Ole can tell where the fish are to be found +in certain seasons by the movements of the birds. The fish feed on +flies and rise to the surface for them, whereupon a t gull or duck will +fall with plummet-like pounce. White-fish bite in the autumn. +"Yumping yiminy, dey yust do." + +The remains of the railway construction camps have almost disappeared, +and only the bleached bones of horses mark out the long trail of the +grading gangs. + +Here are the grades I descended a couple of years ago while prospecting +over this ground. What slopes these are to put a horse down. They are +like those described at St. Helena, upon which you might break your +heart going up or your neck coming down, with the additional risk of +being arrested as a trespasser. On this place where we once ranged for +coal-rights, the real-estate agents have sub-divided the surface into +desirable building lots, that sell from three to five hundred dollars +the lot. + +One day, this lake shore will be a hive of industry, for deep in her +loins Mother Earth had hutched her riches of coal and fire-clay, and, +mayhap, more minerals that are precious. Once, in drilling here, our +men came upon black sand with a showing of gold, but it petered out, +after a couple of inches. It was with great difficulty they were +persuaded to go on with the drilling instead of going to town to file +on claims. + +Already there are several towns along this lakefront--that is to say, +towns consisting of three or four tents or houses. In the earlier days +of the North each settlement was commenced with a fort, now it is begun +with a railway station. The next building to be erected is the station +agent's house, which is quickly followed by a restaurant, and a general +store with a post-office. This is the axis from which the homesteaders +radiate into the surrounding country, and, presto! before you know it, +there is a bank, an implement shop, a church, a hotel, and the other +conveniences of modern civilization including mortgages. + +Already you may see trails like long black welts across the +land--trails that appear to fare forth without any preconceived plan +and to hold a lure in their far reaches for happy-go-idlers like you +and me. There is no telling what we might find on them a goodish way +off. The only straight trails made in this North land are made by the +engineers, and as you look down the lines you may readily see that they +lead into the sky. I like greatly the unthanked, unknown engineers who +beat out these paths for the people who are to come after. No trumpets +herald their coming, or announce the leagues they have herded behind, +but I tell you these fellows are a commonwealth of kings, and we may as +well stop here for a moment and stand at salute. + +And after the engineers came the builders with their sinews of steel to +bind the trail. It is this steel strength that makes the land to bud +and blossom. It is creative. Well and truly has a builder said that +the land without population is a wilderness, and the population without +land is a mob. Yes! it is a steel idol we worship in this country and +not one of gold, and we do refuse to grind it to powder and drink +thereof, no matter what any Moses or Aaron may say. + +This last hour I have been in mind-to-mind talk with a young Englishman +who does not think much of Canada. He speaks of our dismal +respectability, our tombstone virtues, and our provincial +small-mindedness. We call our gardens yards, and have no manners to +speak of. Indeed, nothing but a major operation could remedy our +boorishness. + +Now, all he says is quite true _but I don't believe it_; besides, his +English-sure way of summing us up is irritating to my sense of +patriotism. + +In some places up here he has had to sleep in puppy's parlours, which +means with his clothes on. This must have been uncomfortable in that +he still wears leather puttees which are the true hall-mark of men from +the British Isles. He talked about our cold winters and how unbearable +they were, just as if the cold were not the sepia the North shoots +forth to protect herself from joyous loafers. I did not say this, for +one cannot be polite and patriotic at the same time, and it is well to +be polite ... only I remarked that one of these cold days we will shut +off the Gulf Stream instead of sending it out to heat up England. + +I have no doubt he has private means, for he has travelled widely and +is a well-educated man. He came here to have a go at homesteading. +"Have you succeeded?" I ask. He does not reply except to ejaculate, +"Farming--my hat!" whereupon we both laugh, he at the Canadians and I +at the English. + +The average youth from England finds it trying to be stripped of +precedent, and there is nothing approximating Canadian homestead life +in London. We too often forget this and so fail to make allowances for +his prejudices and lack of adaptability. Our government mounts him and +puts his foot in the saddle, but he must set the pace himself. One can +hardly expect the government to do more, but yet, it seems a pity so +much excellent material is annually lost to the Dominion because we +have not the time or means to work it up. It will take some years to +manipulate the crude European immigrants into the mental and physical +trim of this Britisher and to inculcate them with equally high +political standards. We do not recognize this, or maintain an easy +passivity to it, until at some election crises our hearts fail us for +fear because of the preponderance of the foreign vote in educational +and moral matters. + +And the Englishman and I speak of subjects of grave import, and of how +it is not seemly that we trade too freely with foreign peoples +(especially with the States of the American Union), neither is it loyal +to our most Christian King, George V. "Wealth at the expense of +loyalty is not a thing to be desired," says the Englishman, "and +Colonials do well to preserve the integrity of the Empire," to which +dictum I make no reply, not being able to gainsay him. I could wish +though that he tell me how we are to avoid so doing. + +This dear lad would go into literary work if we read anything in Canada +besides statistics, sporting news, and crop forecasts. In the +contemplation of our sordid practicability, he is lost in astonishment. +"No, madam, I shall not do it, and I shall tell you my reason," says +he. "If you write with a sense of life or colour along will come some +weighty, grim fellows whose business it is to write stock +quotations--leaden creatures, believe me--and they will distinctly +sniff and sneeze out the word 'impressionistic,' by which they mean +fanciful. Sons of bats! If once they tried to frame an impression in +black and white they might have some proper comprehension of the word. +Any uncouth man can state facts, but it is the telling what the facts +stand for that hurts. A coarse man cannot take impressions except from +a closed fist, which impression he would probably describe as a 'dint +in the pro-file.' Such an one hears no farther than his ears, +although, in not a few cases, this might be no inconsiderable distance." + +"No, I will not become the local _litterateur_," continues the lad, "to +be received by the community with a mingling of pride and sarcasm. I +tell you what I will do: it is better to be a real-estate broker, in +that all conditions tend to what you Colonials call 'a dead sure +thing.' It is the only business in which a man reaps where he does not +sow. I will surely be a real-estate man. This I will be." + +We are come to Edson now--the terminus of the passenger route--but I am +going to describe it in another chapter, for it would be ungrateful to +bulk it with other events because of the sense of adventure I enjoyed +from my visit thereto. + + + + +CHAPTER II + +A FRONTIER POST. + +The new world which is the old.--TENNYSON. + + +Have I told you about Edson and its prospects? No! ah, well, never +mind, I shall do so by and by, when I have talked to the citizens. + +While biding my time for a seat at the lunch-counter, I will walk up +and down the station platform. Every minute men are arriving to await +the out-going train to the city. They come and come, apparently from +nowhere, till there are quite a hundred of them. Of course, they +really come from up the street (I should have said from the streets, +for there are two, or, perhaps, three streets), having recently arrived +from the grading camps somewhere up in the mountains. We are going +there to-morrow, or maybe the next day, and then we shall see the +habitat of these battling, brown-throated fellows who nose the stream +of flesh-pots and feed on hunks of brawn. + +The men philander about, or sit on the platform planks, and loll lazily +against the sun-warmed wall. They count their money, smoke, and talk, +but on the whole they are quiet. Also they stare at me like they were +gargoyles and whisper the one to the other. This is not because of +rudeness--not at all! Even the white armoured Sir Galahad would find +it difficult to be knightly in the circumstances. For months they have +done naught save stake out and measure up, shovel gravel, dig ditches, +set transits, sweat and swear, for a railway, you may have heard, is +built with heavier implements than batons, pens, or golfsticks. No +woman has come near them except certain will-o'-the wisps whom the +Mounted Police did straightway turn back to town. Their lives have +been filled full of contest, hardship, and loneliness, so that every +mother's son desires, above all else, that some woman (she may be +either saint or sinner) put her hands upon him and tell him he is a +truly fine fellow and worthy to be greatly loved. This is why they +will give her all their money and not because they are of the earth +very earthy. + +Do you waggle your head at me! Do you? Then I care not a straw. It +only means you do not comprehend the ways of men at our frontier posts. + +Some men are here preparing to take the wagon trail to Grand Prairie in +the Peace River District. This trail, they tell me, is one hundred and +fifty miles long, and may be traversed in six days, a journey which +from other points formerly took as many weeks. Hitherto, it has seemed +the faraway edge of the world, a place for none save the adventurous +blooded and sturdy, but in this day it seems to lie at our very door, +for, in the North, one hundred and fifty miles is merely a stone's +cast. In the spring, fifteen thousand homesteads will be thrown open +for entry, so that presently it will seem that all creation is trekking +this way. + +And why not? It requires no fore-vision to know that the land has a +future above anxiety. Up this trail there is a new world to be +possessed, an unequalled empire, in which men may go hither and yon as +they please. It gives my feet a staccato movement to think of it. +Some city folk there are who might fear the trail, but this were +foolish. It is good to ride on a long trail and laugh out loud for +sheer joy. On the trail, the ear of Society is closed and there are +smoked goggles on her eyes. + +I have been talking to a stripling from Nova Scotia, who has been here +these four months. When first he came, there were but three girls in +the village; now, there are eighteen. As a result of this increased +immigration, the weekly dance is better attended and is more amicable. + +Besides his outfit, this Nova Scotian is taking in a year's provision +to his homestead, and so has been working to secure a sufficiency of +money. He hopes to get a steading that will one day become a town +site. This is the dream of every northern farmer: it is the gold at +the foot of the rainbow. Perhaps, my Boy o' Dreams may find it. Who +can say? Providence keeps a closer eye on farmers than we imagine. As +yet, the boy has not persuaded any girl to accompany him to Grand +Prairie. I would go myself only (I had the reason a minute ago but it +has escaped me); what was it? Oh yes! I remember now, I am already +married. The Land of Cockaigne could not have been situate in the +North, for in that most blessed land every Jack has his Jill and found +no difficulty in keeping her. No! it was never in this latitude. + +I went to two hotels before I could find a room. I should have +registered at once instead of loitering at the station. In the first +hotel they could eat me, but to sleep me was out of the question. In +the second, a stout well-looking German--or, as I prefer to call him, a +coming Canadian--took possession of me, remarking in one breath, but +with an air of great punctilio, "You would in my house put up? Der +conductor-man he so told me you to me might come. This my wife is. +You should become to each other known. She a bed for you will +get--water!--towels!--whatsoever Madam she may desire." + +"Urbanity" is the one word that fits the German, my host. His Frau, +who is of the pure Teutonic type, has a heart of great goodness, with +emotions that lie close under the exterior. + +All might have been well with me at this hotel, but, unfortunately, in +descending the closed-in stairway, I stepped on a sleeping cat and +plunged headforemost to the bottom.... "Der drouble mit you," says my +host, "a crick in der back is." The cat's "drouble" seems to be +paralysis. + +Some one has said that reserve is a sign of great things behind. Sweet +Christians! this is entirely true; I realized it to the full while +holding back the tears and assuring the assembled household I was not +even jarred. I am proud of the way I behaved, and sorry my own folk +were not there to see. Now, they will never believe it. + +One of the maids brought me brandy which I did not drink, but after +awhile, my hostess fed it to me in what she called canards. You dip a +lump of sugar into the cognac and transfer the lump to your mouth--that +is all. You could never believe how nice they taste, or how curative +they are for "crick" in the back. + +Before long I am able to limp down the street and call on the doctor. +I used to know him in days when we both lived farther south. But any +way, a previous acquaintanceship would have made no difference. We do +not need introductions at a frontier post like this, for there is an +undercurrent of good fellowship which understands that the stranger who +talks to you is not necessarily a scalawag, with subtle designs on your +purse or your person. Any one who fails to grasp this plainly obvious +fact is either a newcomer or a solemn humbug. + +This doctor has charge of the hospital car that lies in the station +yard, and most of his time is spent travelling from camp to camp down +the line of construction. I saw the car to-day, or rather I nosed it, +for the smell of iodoform came siftingly through like dry cold. It is +owned and operated by the railway company for the benefit of their +employees. At certain stations along the line, the company have placed +cottage hospitals where emergency cases are treated. Those who have +fevers or require major operations, are usually taken to the city. + +Long ago, when the earlier railroads were being constructed it was not +possible to supply such life-saving appurtenances, so that nothing +remained for the wretched fellows but to drag themselves away and die +like hurt dogs. There is a current aberration that the golden age was +"once upon a time," but, in my opinion, it is here and now, or at least +it will be when every municipality has instituted classes to teach +policemen the difference between drunkenness and a fit. I will say a +prayer about this some of these days. One must be business-like. + +As he builds up and smokes a cigarette, the doctor tells me that the +navvies and teamsters have a singularly critical taste in the matter of +medicine. They do not like tablets or medicine with an innocent +flavour. Unless it be distinctly pungent, they feel cheated. + +"Do you accede to their demand?" ask I. + +"I do, Good Lady," says he. "It is modesty that prevents my describing +to you the excellency of my flavours" (and here he assumed a truly +sagacious air): "my medicines have 'nip' to them and a body that is +really desirable. They are indescribable, but most they approach the +little girl's definition of salt--'that which makes potatoes taste bad +when you do not eat it with.' + +"I see, Dear Lady, you are still of inquisitive mind," says this Man of +Medicine. "Yes! I can see that and I dare say you will put me in a +book, so I shall not rise to your questions--not I! Let us prefer to +talk of how we shall invest our money when we sell our lots, and things +like that." + +"Real-estate is a valuable asset in this place," continues he, "if you +buy it 'near in' on the original town site, but three miles out of the +subdivisions, it is equal in value to a pop-corn prize. And yet who +can say? Who knows? In these new places, the bread we cast on the +sub-divisions has a way of returning to us in meat and pie and cake. +It is often the height of wisdom to be foolish. That singularly +unattractive person on the doorstep across the way--the shrunken, +hollow-stomached one--has made much money in buying and selling." + +"Do you believe me?" he asks with some trace of heat; "then pray heaven +speak!" For I have fallen into silence. But I will not speak--not one +word--but only smile in an enigmatical way, for the stop I am pulling +out is one of intended indifference. It is about the navvies and +teamsters I would talk and not of hollow-stomached men who gather much +money. + +The doctor rolls up two cigarettes and offers me one. + +"You will smoke?" asks he. + +"No!" says I, "not till I am sixty." + +"Let me see your palm and your nails. Humph! Lady, you had better +start now as a mere matter of expediency. Why not try this one? +Where's the use of a mouth and an index finger if you do not smoke?" + +Now, I cannot say why I do not smoke, except that there are so many +reasons why I should, and so I return to our first topic and ask, "Does +your medicine make the men well again?" + +"No, no, decidedly no!" he replies--"they allow me to hold no such +illusion. The talismans they carry, work the cure--a bear's tooth, a +lucky penny, or the image of a calendar saint. A snake's rattle is a +panacea for anything but a broken heart. Time was when men only choked +on grape seeds as did the old poet chap, Anacreon, but in these days, +the navvies get appendicitis from them. It would be offensive to +suggest other causes, in spite of the fact that most of them never +taste grapes. No! it would not be right for me to put my patients in +the wrong and shockingly poor policy." + +"Have you much trouble with drunkenness?" I query. + +"Not a great deal!" he makes answer, "for the Mounted Police have a +disconcerting habit of probing into bales of hay and of finding false +floors in wagons. They have fifty-fox power, these police fellows, +although I have heard tell that a gallon or more of whisky has been +within roping distance of them and escaped. A bottle that gets by them +is worth ten dollars, but the navvies declare whatever it costs it is +worth it. But, dear me, there are other liquids for inordinate and +uncritical thirsts, such as----" + +"Your medicine?" I suggest, whereupon our conversation abruptly ends, +for he will be no longer beset by me; and he will not give me a bottle +of liniment for "crick" in the back; no, not if I die in Edson, without +even a graveyard started wherein to bury me. He supposes Providence +knows his business, but how ever woman came to be made is a mystery far +beyond his wit's end. + +Huh! Huh! I am tingling to scratch this man's eyes out, but I only +call him a brown pirate. + +Do you think I care so much as a snap of the fingers for the medicine +of this spiteful doctor of the countryside? Not a bit of it! One of +the navvies will give me a talisman if I cannot find the cordial tree +for which I search. It grows in the North, and the fruit gives life to +strong people and faintness to the weak. It was Theophile Tremblay who +told me about it. He lives always in the woods. Once, he found the +tree but he was afraid to eat of it, for how could he know whether he +was strong or weak? He has heard tell that, in the tree, there is a +wood's-woman and that sometimes she laughs aloud, but he thinks it may +be a soul or something like that. + + * * * * * + +The only drawback to happiness is the peculiar impermanence of its +character. Happiness is a large, comely person, but, withal, as +elusive as the smallest sprite. Such hours of pain as I spent last +night on this wretched sagging bed--I who was so happy only +yesterday--with nothing to look at save a little lamp with a flame like +a bleary red eye. Truth to tell, it was the eye that looked at me. It +stared till I became hypnotized, when by the blessing of God, I fell +asleep. + +This morning, I am consumed between a desire to get up and one to lie +still. In all such crises of the will, it is better to follow the line +of least resistance, and so I lie in bed. My hostess brings me an +amazingly pungent liniment which she calls "Herr the Doctor's +medisome." It came last night, but Daisy, who is a waitress, neglected +to deliver it. Perhaps the sarcastic advice which the doctor set down +for me under the word "Poison," may have frightened Daisy. + +"She a lump is, that Daisy!" says the Frau. "Believe me, Madam, for I +know. I tell her a thing to do and she doing it keeps on, till I to +stop tell her. Then I to her explain that she is not for ever to stop, +nor for ever on to go, and all the time, about everything, I have her +so to tell." + +The Frau pours on the liniment with generous measure and rubs me till I +prickle with it, and feel for all the world like a wet newspaper caught +in a wire fence. She rubs me with a used-to-things way until I beg her +to desist. I should not be surprised if Herr the Doctor took this +means of venting his spitefulness on me. + +The Frau tells me she had a vision once. I wish to experience a +vision, or a miracle, but nothing comes to me save presentments which +have their terrible plain origin on the basis of cause and effect. Her +vision was about heaven. She saw heaven quite distinctly and the +streets were really made of gold. There were no children there, but +only men and women, so that there must be a special Paradise for boys +and girls. The Frau believes heaven will be a failure because there is +no division of the sexes provided for. How, she would like to know, +could a woman enjoy heaven with men there all the time looking at +everything she does. It would be an impossible situation. + +After awhile, Daisy brings me a meal. There is a tremendous finality +about the way she sets down a tray. Daisy, in spite of her name, is +not so much a housemaid as what they used to call a stout serving +wench. She is courtly neither in figure nor manners. Her hair is +puffed out over her ears and drawn down low, till her head looks like +the husk of a hazel nut. But what odds? Daisy is splendidly plebeian +and really of more value to the community than a writing person who +falls downstairs. She cannot see for the life of her how I happened to +come out here, and so I am apologetic and find it necessary to explain. +She asks permission to try on my hat and tells me she has ordered a new +one from Edmonton. It is to have three "ostridge" feathers. + +To assure me that the cat I stepped upon is not dead, she descends to +the kitchen and returns with it. The cat seems all right except that +it sags in the middle, but Daisy says this is because it has just been +fed. I am glad I did not kill it, in that I always associate a cat +with Diana Bubastis, the Egyptian goddess who presided over childbirth, +and who was represented with a feline head. Indeed, Bubastis is said +to have transformed herself into a cat when the gods fled from Egypt--a +play of gods and women and cats that has continued even to this very +day. + +After dinner, I am able to go down to the sidewalk where I fribble away +the hours agreeably enough. It is a sun-shot afternoon, but the air is +cool to one's skin, and grateful after the scorching heat of yesterday. + +Some civil engineers who came in on the train with me are playing +baseball on the road. These are no aesthetic feeblings, these merry +gentlemen, but a sturdy breed, upstanding and handsome, with skin like +the colour of well-seasoned saddles and a smell of burnt poplar in +their hair. I think the rough clothes they wear throw their good looks +into relief. Or it may be that the people _are_ better looking in the +North and have better physiques. It must be so, for the South has in +all ages drawn upon the northern blood for rejuvenation just as, in +these days, they need hard wheat to tone up their softer varieties. + +I write of them as merry gentlemen because this fornight agone I had +been watching them make ducks and drakes of their savings. When they +come to Town, which they do once or twice a year, they cannot be +accused of nearness. Each mother's son holds to the amended maxim of +this country, "Hard come, easy go." "Jack ashore," I called one the +other day. "Possibly so! Possibly," answered the delicious boy, "but +I prefer to think of myself as March--in like a lion and out like a +lamb." + +The whole Town is a foraging pasture for the engineers on vacation. +They buy everything they do not need, from gramaphone records and +swearing parrots to Gibbon's _Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire_. +They yell into the telephones as if it were a lung tester, and it makes +their hearts dance like daffodils to hire taxicabs for the day, boxes +at the theatre, and to give suppers and dances to all and sundry of +their acquaintances. Neither are they laggards in love. They are +vastly appreciative of the girls, and I am told go sweethearting with a +directness there is no possibility of misunderstanding. It is well the +girls do not take them too seriously, for they are roving bachelors +all, and would seem to be as faithful as the poet who vows his love for +Kate, and Margaret and Betty and Sweet Marie. + +Yet, once in a blue moon, an engineer and a girl make decision "to be +man and wife together," and to live in a shack on the Residency, much +to the annoyance of the townsmen, who dislike the engineers, being +inordinately jealous of them. + +The game of baseball which the engineers carry forward on the highway +is strenuous rather than scientific. Things that are considered +important in the league matches have no significance here. As I watch +the pitch and toss of the ball, it occurs to me that this game has +filtered down the ages from the primeval woods where orang-outangs +threw nuts from tree to tree. They pitch them that the young lady +'rangs might admire their cleverness and good form. You may credit me +this was the way of it. + +A Chinaman and some Indians are also watching the game. The Indians +think it fine fun, and fetch and carry the lost balls like spaniels +retrieving sticks. I like the Indian men for several reasons, but +chiefly because they are shrewd riders; have a sovereign indifference +to appearance, and never quarrel over theology. + +The game of ball was not completed, the interest of the players being +diverted by a blindly vindictive fight between a staghound and a +bulldog. I did not see the conclusion of the fight, but the honours +lay with the bulldog. "For you must know, Dear Lady," explains one of +the engineers, "that all things considered, the grip on the throat is +an eminently practical one." + + + + +CHAPTER III + +TO THE BUILDERS + + To the builders of the highway, that skirt the canyon's brink, + To the men that bind the roadbed fast, + To the high, the low, the first and last, + I raise my glass and drink!--EVELYN GUNNE. + + +As yet, there is no passenger service from Edson to the End of Steel. +Several day coaches are run, but they are chiefly for the use of the +engineers and workmen. This is how I happen to be the only woman +aboard pulling out for the mountains across this newly-made trail. + +Do not misunderstand me; it is the railroad that is new. The trail +that runs by its side was an old one when Columbus discovered America, +and beaten deep with feet, and also it is a long trail, for it leads +through to the Pacific Ocean. For centuries, it was the only mark of +human interference in this waste that is world-old. It is a trail of +lean hunger and bleeding feet, one that has ever been prodigal of +promise, but wary of accomplishment. Surely this is so, for once over +it stumbled and swore those half-mad men known as the Caribou +Stampeders--these, and other unwept, unhonoured fellows who fared into +the wilderness for what reasons even the wise Lord knoweth not. If the +bones of the red and white folk who have travelled this long, long +street were stood upright, I doubt not they would make a fence of +pickets for us all the way. + +I have no sooner thought this thing than it happens there is a dry +stirring and, in an eye-wink of time, the dead men have taken on flesh +and colour. They must have been keenly near. Grim, plainish fellows +are they, not unlike the gang around me, but rougher-clad and more +hairy. They are powerful and full-lifed men, I can see that, and the +rough-necked one with the trail stride and mop of curly hair is +Alexander MacKenzie, a Scotchman from Inverness, but late of Messrs. +Gregory & Co.'s counting-house. He is "down North" endeavouring to +open out a trade with the Indians, obtaining a foothold they doubtless +call it; his masters, the Nor'-West Fur Company--for monopolists are +always sensitive to terms. His is a continental errand (mark this +well), for he is the first white man to cross the Rockies, and to tell +us what lies over and beyond the hills where the sun goes down. Honour +to Alexander MacKenzie, Esq., of Inverness, say I! Some day, when +Messrs. the Publishers give me fuller royalties, I shall surely build a +cairn to him on the height of land e'er it falls away to the Western +Sea. + +This man lived more than a century ago, and yet, as his figure fades +back into nothingness, we see this other figure close by. It is David +Thompson, the Welshman, who has recently discovered a river, and has +called it by his own name. Also, he has captured the Astoria +fur-trade, and has established a trading post, which future generations +will know as Kamloops. + +And here is Sir George Simpson, Resident Governor of the Hudson's Bay +Company. He likes to travel with pipers who go before him, piping as +he enters a fort in order that Lo, the Red Man, may be properly +impressed. + +The ugly person with the harshly aggressive features is Sir James +Douglas. He looks as fully open to convincement as a stone pavement. +This spalpeen near by is none other than young Lieutenant Butler of +Ireland. He is gathering material for a volume he proposes to call +_The Great Lone Land_. I like the way he carries his head. Who runs +may read him for a fighter with a fighter's build. + +But on they go, and on, this long procession of pioneers, till we can +only call out their names as they file by--Dr. Hector, Daniel Harmon, +Viscount Milton, Alexander Henry, Dr. Cheadle, and other lean, +laborious fellows, long since passed into the shadows. Dead men do +tell tales. You may hear if you care to listen. + +And what a strange thing has come to pass in these latter months! The +tenuous, twisting trail--that very old trail--has been superseded by a +clean white road that is like to a long bowstring. Its impotent, +creeping life has given way before the gallant onslaught of pick and +spade, chain and transit, and before monstrous lifting machines which +have other names, but which are really leviathans. + +Hitherto, it may be said of this land what was once said of Rome, that +the memory sees more than the eye. This is no longer true. Before we +realize it, Baedeker will be setting down a star opposite the name of a +fashionable hotel in the Athabaska Valley, and the whole of this +morning world, from end to end, will be spotted with a black canker of +towns. Right glad am I to go through it this day with a construction +party, and for my own satisfaction to mentally tie together the threads +of the Past and Present. And who knows but in a century from now some +curious boy in one of these towns may find this record in an attic +rubbish-heap, and may rejoice with me over the knotted threads. (I +love you, boy! you must know this.) + +My fellows of the Way, who are young engineers, tell me the peculiarity +of each cut and grade and the difficulties they encountered. They do +not speak of stations but of "Mile 48" or "Mile 60," by which they mean +48 miles from Wolf Creek. The railway, when completed, will measure +3,556 miles. They talked of other matters mathematical, much to my +bewilderment, but from which I, for myself, ultimately deducted that +while the genie who built Aladdin's palace in a night was the champion +contractor of fairy-tale countries, he is not to be mentioned in the +same breath as these master-men who blaze out this metal highway +towards the sea. + +Each engineer lives on a residency which is twelve miles long, and it +is his duty to supervise the work of grading in his division. This +duty occupies about eighteen months, when he is moved on to another +residency. + +The men placed in a residency camp are an engineer, an instrument man, +a rod man, two chain men and a cook. Over these camps, there are +placed the chief engineer at Winnipeg; the divisional engineer at the +End of Steel; and assistant divisional engineers, who may locate at +different points from fifty or sixty miles apart. + +The grading itself is built by contractors, and sub-contractors, down +to station men, who with the aid of spades, picks and wheelbarrows, +built a hundred feet. All these are paid by the yard and according to +the nature of the soil or rock. The station men work from five in the +morning until nine or ten at night, and make from five to ten dollars a +day each. The blasters are known by the uneuphemistic title of +"rock-hogs." + +The first engineers who scouted had a hard time in their unsplendid +isolation, but now that the rails are catching up, life on the +residencies is more pleasant than one might imagine. The shack is +fairly warm and comfortable and the Powers that Be supply to the men an +abundance of the best food procurable, with a reasonable portion of +dainties. The Powers doubtless recognize the distant advisability of +keeping the engineers and their assistants in health and temper, for +after all, nothing is so expensive as sickness. Still, the men are by +no means petted. It is true that one engineer has a pair of sheets, +but these are the talk, and possibly the envy, of all the residence's +on the line. When visitors come to his residency they sleep between +the sheets, while their chivalric host betakes himself to the long desk +that is built for map work. + +Each residency has a gramophone, and some of them have small +menageries, including pet bears. In the summer, after hours, the men +have outdoor games such as baseball and tennis. They have been able on +several occasions to secure a sufficiently large attendance of women to +have a dance. It may happen that the engineer is married and that his +wife has girl-visitors, which party may be augmented by a visiting +contingency from the residency twelve miles further down the grade, or +some such fortunate happening as this. It is a heyday, I can tell you, +when this happens. + +They do not quarrel in the residencies as missionaries do at their +posts, although a man sometimes gets moody. All through the winter +they talk over everything they did when last in town, and what every +one else did. Between times, they can watch the married engineers and +declare how much better the bachelors are situated. Purple grapes were +ever sour. They told me about other things, but I forget them; +besides, they are secrets. + +One of the engineers gathers me some flowers at a wayside station, +concerning which the others, with full-throated laughter, propounded +riddles. + +"When did he ast-er?" "How much did the rose raise?" "Who gave Susan +her black eye?" These, and other problems of peculiar interest to +young bloods, the solution of which we shall never know till flowers +learn to speak plainer. + +The riddle, "Why does the willow weep?" elicits a discussion on music, +and on the sound of the wind in the pines. One man says he has read +somewhere that violin makers construct their instruments out of the +north sides of trees. He does not know if this be true, but I think it +must be, for the urging of the north wind in the trees and the soft +calling of the violin, are one and the same. They both allure to a +land where no one lives. You must have observed this yourself. + +One rueful rascal with no civic conscience, and an overweening +appreciation of his sex, gives it as his opinion that this is an +ill-reasoned theory. He declares the sound to be a screeching +crescendo that has its origin in an implacable quarrel between the wind +and the pines. The wind is a suffragette, a woman of determined +grievance, who would be better of bit and bridle and possibly of gag. +She makes the pine a butt for her insult and ridicule and a target +against which she lashes the hail and drives her shrewish snow. When +not grappling his throat with her plaguing, pestilent fingers, it is +only because she is recoiling to strike again. She calls this "a spell +o' weather." + +It is a bitter monologue this leather-fleshed, lathy-framed fellow +gives me, and I takes it as a body blow, but I answer not a word, for I +have heard it said, or perhaps I have read it, that the meek will own +the earth; besides--you can try it yourself--nothing so puzzles the +understanding of mortal man as a woman who refuses to go on defence. +Her silence fills him with a gnawing uneasiness similar to that one +feels when he has swallowed a tack. + +And yet I would like to tell him he has overstated his case; to point +out that the trees are cross-grained to the wind; that their green +spectacles prevent their seeing things in proper perspective, and that +they are deep-rooted in obsolete prejudices. Sir Pine cannot escape +being an intractable old person, seeing that woman's suffrage was not +the rule seventy-five years ago, or more, when he was born. Yes! I +should have liked to say this, but it is almost as equal satisfaction +to score a verbal chicane. + +I think, perhaps, the men felt my silence more than I intended, for +they argue the anti-suffragist out of countenance, although I have no +doubt they secretly and sincerely agree with him. To change the +subject, one of them brings me a caged squirrel he is taking to his +residency. Punch is a well-groomed squirrel and has an immoderate +tongue. His owner says that in the mountains these red squirrels +collect and dry mushrooms. They group them on a rock, or fix them in +the forks of young trees, ultimately banking them in hollow logs. He +is trying to tame Punch, but then we have all heard of the American who +tried to tame an oyster. + +Punchinello is as active as pop-corn in a pan. He is a squirrel with a +job, and not nearly so light-minded as he looks. His job is to go +round and round on a wheel but never to make progress, for the wheel is +so swung that it revolves with him. I am appalled by the absolute +inutility of it. What a life! What a life! Wearing out a wheel and +himself at one and the same time. "Let him go when you get to the +woods," say I, "it will be kinder. You have heard of those Eastern +folk, who, when they wish to praise Allah, buy birds and set them free." + +"No! I have not heard," he replies; "tell me about them." + +"There is no more to the story, that is all." + +"But I don't see the application when a fellow does not want to render +praises. I invested part of my savings at the races and the tenor of +my success was markedly uneven. I bought town lots, hoping to sell +before the second payment--'Stung'--Yes! it's as good a word as any. +The father of my best girl has cursed me to the tenth generation." + +"For what?" + +"Oh! for a newspaper item which concerned me. I will allow it would +have been just as well had it not appeared, but there it was! There it +was! No! I cannot see any special reason why I should set the +squirrel free. Besides" (and here he speaks softly and with a kindly +persuasiveness, as if he had butter in his mouth), "this Punchinello is +a sweet-toothed fellow, and the cook will feed him daintily; he has no +store set by for the winter; no drey, no mate; he is not properly +furred for exposure, and he would not know how to protect himself +against the hawks and stoats. Surely, you would not have him go free? +I tell you the thing would be cruelty itself, and I will not do it." + +You see, he does not know this matter is a personal one with me, I mean +the wheel that goes round and never gets anywhere. If he did it would +probably make no difference, for the peculiarity about his arguments +are their sincerity and wisdom. I always did suspect that Providence +was a large serene young man with a strain of steel in him. + +At Bickerdike, all the engineers I knew got out. Some are stationed +here; some await orders, but most of them go down the branch line that +is under construction from this point. Bickerdike is largely a tent +town, although, as yet, it is the metropolis of the Grade. I heard one +man on the train tell another it was "one of these here high-society +places where folks dance on a plank floor and don't call off the +figures." I promise to visit at Bickerdike on my return trip with some +friends I have not seen for years. No matter where you come from, it +would be almost impossible to drop off at any of these little frontier +posts without meeting some one you knew elsewhere, so representative is +the population of this Northern country. + +At each post the same question is asked the newly-arrived passenger. +"Well, what's the news along the road?" To-day the news concerns a +wash-out near the End of Steel, and doubts are expressed as to the +possibility of our getting through. + +At Marlboro, the people are talking of their cement industry, and at +the next station lumber is the topic. They are making the lumber out +of spruce. The small logs have been converted into railway ties. Some +of them are crossed. If ever you have "taken out" ties you know what +this means. As you likely haven't, I'll tell you. The railroad +contractor, when he rejects a tie, crosses the end of it with a blue or +red pencil. Once an acquaintance of mine, by name Jerry Dalton, took +out a cut of ties in the Province of Saskatchewan. One day Jerry--an +accurate man rather than a placid one--was stamping about somewhat more +rampageous than a baited bull. + +"What is the matter now, Man Jerry!" I asked; "you are always having a +big sorrow." + +"Sorrow ith it?" lisped Jerry at the top of his tall voice. "Look at +them d---- ties (begging your pardon, ma'am). Look at them ties! Does +that turkey-faced, muddle-headed idjit of a contractor think I'm +running a Catholic themetery? Crosses ith it? It's crosses he's after +giving Jerry! Troth! an' it's a crown I'll be puttin' on him." ... + +And so as I look at this pile of crossed logs by the wayside, I am +wondering who is the rascal responsible for the Catholic themetery. + +These mills belong to a Northern timber chief whose large holdings have +made them turbulent. They have called him a timber-wolf, and other +names that are smart rather than polite. As a matter of fact, any man +who pays the government dues and converts the trees into lumber for the +use of the settlers, deserves all the emoluments that can possibly +accrue. On account of floods and fires, lumbering is a precarious +industry, and the majority of operators fail thereat or carry a +nerve-grinding overdraft at the bank. + +And did you ever stand on the heights and watch a rising, ripping flood +bear out your booms and incidentally the year's logs? If you have, my +good little man, you'll be sensible to something closely approximating +a tender regard for the timber-wolves. This play of lamb and wolf is +frequently disastrous to the wolf. + +I would like to rest off here to see the whip-saw bite into the logs; +to watch the long white boards as they fall from the carriage, and to +drink in their refreshing odour, for the whole essence of the North is +concentrated in the odour of the spruce. + +Big Eddy takes its name from the whirlpool formed by the confluence of +the McLeod River and the Sun Dance Creek. The creek is an impetuous, +capering stream that leaps to the McLeod as a little laughing girl +would throw herself into the arms of her father. This is the fairest +tarrying place I have seen this way, and fit for a ball-room of the +dryads. Down in the valley beside the great bridge, the divisional +engineer has built him a wide house of logs, with hospitable porches +and chimneys that suggest generous fireplaces. I covet his right, +title and ownership thereto. They say this engineer is seventy-eight +years old, but I don't believe it. + +"Beyond all doubt he is," says one of the train officials; "believe me, +he has eaten up his teeth at the work of building roads, and he has a +heart of great goodness." + +"A strong man, is he?" I ask. + +"Why, I cannot say, only that he sticks to his work and takes the trail +with the best of them. The men say he is 'sun-ripened,' which I am +convinced means something praiseworthy, for every man is his friend." + +The Canadian Northern Railway Company is running a line immediately +parallel to this of the Grand Trunk Pacific, and as I look out of my +window I can see the men at work on the rival road. They are the +primal ploughers of the land, these railway fellows, and can cut a +valley out of a hill, like it were the rip of a brutal blade. To my +thinking, this is an enterprise of high heart and bravery..... And +yet, as I watch them at work, heaping up a grade, they seem small to +me, and paltry, like dirty boys intent on nothing more serious than +mud-pies. In some places, they build through marshy dunes that are +coppery-brown and tawny-red. Walking in these places is like walking +upstairs all the way, or like treading in deep straw, forms of exercise +most certainly concomitant with heart disease and a hackney gait. +Westward they go and Westward, these uncouth moving pictures of the +landscape, that change well-nigh as quick as those on a canvas, but +always it is a picture of a grade, a new cut, a gridiron of ties, and +long, long trails of steel. I tell you, these trails are the +heartstrings of the North. + +But you must not think that the only builders are the men. The horses, +mules and oxen help. Some folk there are who mislike the oxen, but +these are foolishly prejudiced and ill-informed. The ox, it is true, +has a tiresome straddling gait, and his brain is small in comparison +with the bulk of his head, but contrariwise he retains a stolid +reliability that keeps him at his job. Once inspanned, he has no +desire to kick over the traces or to explore foreign parts; he doesn't +bite his trace-mate, or engage in any of those little playful jinks so +strangely peculiar to northern horses and northern men, not he ... the +ox is a good sort, and one who strictly attends to business. He is an +animal that walks in the light. There are northern men who will +doubtless resent these remarks, so I may as well explain that my +comparisons have been prompted by the conduct of "the gang" which +offends my sense of decency. + +The "happy low lie down" all over the car in various stages of +intoxication. How hideous they are with their unshaven faces, open +mouths and yellow teeth! Abroad they are silly; at home they are +heart-scalds. As they sprawl over the floor like huge primeval toads, +I am consumed by a desire to kick them with my boots. Drunkenness is a +disgusting, unfleshed sin. + +And yet, these prostrate fellows are hardly more offensive than those +still able to sit up and debate about nothing. As controversialists +they remind me of the characters in _Alice through the Looking-Glass_, +who want "to deny something and don't know what it is." When any +over-wise babbler feels himself worsted in an argument, he says to his +opponent, "You are a liar." While fairly popular, this argument can +hardly be considered a logical one. It can be claimed, however, to +cover the whole ground, and to be a masterpiece of brevity. + +One fellow, who reeled through the car in a molluscous invertebrate +condition, stopped by my seat to tell me he was my friend for life. He +was old enough to have known better, and I was glad when a glorious, +tall stranger collared the fellow and hurtled him down the aisle like a +hockey-player would hurtle the puck. + +Soon afterwards the train's agent, a civil-spoken young man, came into +the car and took me into his caboose. I knew something fortunate would +happen on this journey.... And to think it came just as my nomad +spirit had failed me, and I was utterly crumpled with weariness and +hunger. + +I would here desire to reiterate my belief that Providence is a large, +serene young man, with a strain of steel in him. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +BEHIND THE HILLS. + + "Behind the hills, that's where the fairies are, + Behind the hills, that's where the sun goes down." + + +I fell asleep in the cupola of the caboose and dreamed that my head was +a rubber band holding too many notes, and that it was going to snap any +second. "Hit's the bloomin' haltitude in your 'ead, Ma'am," explained +a Cockney later, and I expect he was right, for we have made an ascent +of over one thousand feet since leaving Edmonton. + +When I awake the train is standing stock-still. Here is the trouble! +the heavy rains have been playing havoc with the newly-made grades that +have hardly been shaken down to stay, and progress is necessarily slow +till the proper ballast has been laid on. Outside, on the grade, the +fireman is swearing with remarkable precision. His language is not +exactly that described by the Prayer-book as "comfortable words," but +then, a man who fires up with slack coal when the thermometer is +sometimes thirty degrees below zero naturally becomes proficient in the +use of secular expletives. + +I open my window above him and say very distinctly, "Wicked man! swear +not by the Lord Christ." Then I lean back so that he may not see me. +It must have surprised him to hear such a reproof in this no-woman's +land. Out he goes and looks up and around, and up again, but I keep +well hidden. That writer who conceived the horror of _The Wandering +Voice_ was no nid-noddy fellow, I can tell you. + +As I was thinking this very thing, a voice close behind said to me, +"Wicked woman! play not the oracles," and almost I fell out of the +cupola with fright. It was the glorious tall stranger, and he was +laughing mightily. I almost hated him. Indeed, I quite hated till I +saw the joke and laughed too. + +He had been reading in the opposite bunk and, incidentally, watching so +that I might not roll out, for it is a high climb to the cupola bunk, +and there are no sides to it. He says that he is an engineer and that +the boys who left the train at Bickerdike gave him instructions to see +that I got through all right. Did I say mean things awhile ago about +certain northern men? Did I? Well then, I am a spiteful jade and my +tongue should be split. + +He has yellow fruit for me, and cherries, but hands them out carefully, +for the smell of steam from the stove shows that dinner is deliciously +imminent. The cook is turning cakes on a pan with a spat like the +sound of clog-dancers on the stage. He turns them with a grace and +intelligence which I may never hope to equal. I have an idea his elbow +and wrist work on ball-bearings. + +The glorious tall stranger whose name is _not_ Burney (but it will do +as well as any other) tells me he was reared down by the Miramichi +River. He went back East to see his mother last Christmas, but it took +her some days to get used to the grown man who had left home a lad. I +can see this thing in my mind's eye. His mother is very clever and has +a beautiful face. He need not have told me this. It is true of every +man's mother "back home." + +Burney was among the first men who scouted for the railway to the West +and helped run the try-lines. Falling into the pose of the +raconteur--one very natural to the northman--he tells me tragic things, +and some that are both tragic and humorous. + +One of these was about a Mounted Policeman who was sent out from his +post to bring in a murderer. It was terribly cold weather, the mercury +almost falling out of the tube. Now, the wanted murderer is the +wariest game in the world, and to take him in those mountains one needs +boldness and caution in the right proportions--that is to say +ninety-nine per cent. of the former, and one per cent. of the latter. +The policeman who was sent out was only a stripling, but there was no +yellow in him save the streak on his trouser-legs. The round journey +was one hundred and twenty miles, but, alone and unaided, he brought in +his man, not even waiting to sleep. Almost immediately on a fresh +mount, he again started out from the post, but this time to bring in +the corpse. The second hundred and twenty miles were terribly long and +arduous ones, and the cold cut like a blade. By shutting your eyes you +can see and feel this thing: the two frost-covered horses plodding +through the bleak and sterile mountains that are grim as eternity--no +sound save the cry of starveling wolves, or the white whine of the +sleepless wind, these and the sharp-drawn breath of the men. No! we +must be mistaken. Only one man breathes, the other seems strangely +still, and his lips are tight shut. There is something peculiarly +defective in his stony eyes and stony face. If you look closer you can +see he is roped close to the horse, and that he doesn't give to the +lope.... God of men and beasts! that is a dead man that rides through +the snow, and he rides to confront his slayer.... And when the two +reached the police post, the live dare-doing man was found to be +terribly exhausted from hunger, lack of sleep, and the long, long ride, +so that his brittle nerves were like to snap in two. This was how they +came to give him the stimulants which in some way (it is not for a +tattling civilian to say the way) had not entirely worn off when he was +summoned to give evidence at the inquest. + +The auditory consisted of engineers, and chainmen from the residencies +who resented this grim sitting with a murderer, a judge and accuser, +and the white, stark man on the table, whom presently they would put to +bed with a spade. They were sitting austerely upright with grave faces +as became the occasion, when it came upon them suddenly that the police +stripling was intoxicated. It is true he faced the judge with an +uncompromising attitude and stood erect, and "at attention" as if a +perpendicular rod braced his body from his crown to his heels, but when +the judge's glance wandered for the fraction of a moment, the stripling +would wink prodigiously at the engineers, and in an unholy manner that +threw them into suppressed convulsions. The thing was grievously +grotesque. It was as though a stone altar-saint had suddenly awaked +and had put his fingers to his nose in a way that was sinister. Comedy +with her wry face was peeping through a tragic mask. It is a way of +hers. + +It was not until the judge observed the policeman constantly dropping +his papers and picking them up in a stiff unjointed way, that the +reason of the court's commotion became apparent to him. + +"What is the rest of the story?" you ask. I do not know. I am a +reviewer of books and never go so far as the end. + +Sirs and Mesdames, but it is an athletic feat climbing out of the +cupola of a caboose. I stepped on the shoulder of Burney, who is +admirably strong, and then down to a chair. The brakesmen enter the +cupola off the roof and have a way of sliding to the floor backward. +It looks easy, and if I were alone, I would surely try it. + +There were four of us for dinner, and we had pork and beans, beefsteak, +potato-cakes, rolls, peaches and coffee. The butter was tinned, but +withal toothsome, and so was the milk. The butter is shipped here from +Nova Scotia, and is supplied to all the camps on the road. I help the +cook clear away the dishes, but he thinks me rather unhandy, for I +upset both the sugar and salt. He comes from Kilmarnock in Scotland, +and is a nice lad, I can see that. He has a thicket of hair that +stands erect from his head like a growth of young spruce, and he always +looks as if he had just heard some good idea. His latest idea, he +confides, is a job with the purveyors who contract for the supplies for +all the grading camps on the line. + +Hitherto, I have always looked upon a caboose as something commonplace, +but now, I know it may be truly a Castle of Indolence. I have a sweet +tooth for this kind of life, and have no objection to continuing it for +a month. Journalists, and important people with stamped passes, go on +private cars, but the advantage of mediocrity is that you can travel in +a caboose and need not view the scenery as a commercial commodity. +When I can think of what to say, I will write a story called "The +Romance of a Railway Van." Its setting will be in the hills. The +heroine will be a southern girl of probably twenty summers (with a +corresponding number of winters). She shall be no fine die-away lady, +but middling strong and built to go out in all weather. Each move of +the romance will be made by invisible kelpies, ogres and dryads, who +will say "Ha! Ha!" and "Ho! Ho!" and who will clap their hands when +the wicked flourish, or valour wins against the odds. But I never +could think this story out, so I pass it on to you. + +At the McLeod River the grades begin to spy into the mountains. These +mountains have all the bewilderment of an elusive dream, and in the +thin northern air seem nearer than they really are. There is a +come-hither look about them. It is well, at first, to thus see from a +distance, for to stand against a mountain is to lose one's sense of +proportion and symmetry. + +At Prairie Creek the road runs high up on a ridge to the south of the +Athabaska Valley, so that it looks like a ribbon of steel basted on to +the hills. The Athabaska River is wide and swift here, and has what +the Japanese call the language of line. The Cree Indians call it the +_Mistahay Shakow Seepee_, meaning thereby the great river of the woods. +A semi-spectral mist rises off its waters, as if it were an incense to +the mighty spirit, Manitou. + +It would be well if I, one of the first of the tourists who, world +without end, will travel through these hills, could tell how they +impress me, but I am crushed into a wordless incompetency. I cannot +speak the language of this land nor interpret its spirit. These hills +of White Alberta have something to say, but they will not say it. It +must be true what the essayist wrote, that you cannot domesticate +mountains. + +There appears to be no life here, nor any form of sentience, but when +it is dark, the grizzly bear, the lynx, the moose, and other +night-things, will move out for purposes of life or death. + +Alexander Mackenzie, who entered these defiles one hundred and +twenty-five years ago, wrote down that the Atnah Indians believed all +this land was made by a mighty bird whose eyes were fire, the noise of +his wings thunder, and the glances of his eyes lightning. This bird +created all things from the earth except the Chipewyans, who were made +from dogs. Now the Chipewyans and the Atnahs were not on borrowing +terms. + +These were the times when the Indians were as plentiful in the +Athabaska Valley as dandelions in a meadow, and they told this +Mackenzie of Inverness how, in the good old days, their ancestors lived +till their throats were worn out with eating and their feet with +walking. + +The Athabaska Valley is enclosed by a circle of the hills, the two most +prominent of these being Roche Perdrix, or Folding Mountain, and Roche +Miette. The latter peak takes its name from the French word _roche_, +meaning "rock," and _miette_ which is the Cree for sheep, this because +of the mountain-sheep which make it their home. It is 8,000 feet high +(I give you the height because it is not legal to go down the line +without so doing). Somewhere, near here, at Fiddle Creek, at a height +of 1,200 feet above the railway, there are wonderful hot springs +concerning which Burney talks learnedly. I pretend to understand all +about sulphuric anhydride, and carbon dioxide, and 127 degrees +Fahrenheit, but do not really know if there are things which should be +remembered or forgotten. + +Other of the peaks which enclose the Valley are Roche Ronde, Roche +Jacques, Bullrush and Roche Suette. Off to the west, the range of +hills silhouetted against the sky is known as the Fiddle Back Range. +These are crowned with snow, but as the sky changes, take to themselves +its moods--coral-red, opal, stone-blue and a mellow, purple glow, which +blend and shift like the weird fantasy of the auroral lights. + +It is an idea of mine that these hills are the lair of the running +winds which for past eons have swept in bitter streaks across the +prairies, winnowing them like a thresher would winnow grain. +Seven-leagued boots have they and no man has tracked them down. How +could a man when they fling dust in his eyes? They are the bitter +scouts of the North who fight as they go. I have no doubt their home +is hereabout. It might be found if we had time to stay, but this would +take too long, for you must surely understand these winds are +non-resident to a degree that is nothing short of scandalous. + +At this point, we ought in all propriety to talk about Brule Lake, +which is not a lake at all, but an enlargement of the river. We should +nudge each other and remark that this is Jasper Park; that it consists +of 5,450 square miles, and that it is held in perpetuity for the +nation. I should ask, "Why do they call it Jasper Park?" and you, my +fine fellow-farer, should tell me how old Jasper Hawes was one of "the +gentlemen adventurers" of the Hudson's Bay Company, and doubtless a +purposeful man and clever. "But why do they call this defile 'the +Yellow Head Pass?'" I should further query, whereupon you ought to +reply, "I perceive you are an untaught person else you had heard how +this Jasper Hawes had hair the colour of September wheat in the sheaf, +so that the Indians called him 'Tete Jaune' or 'Yellow Head,' much +after our mischievous manner of turning about on the street to look +after a lady who is flaxen." + +Yes! we should say all this, and more, but it might sound like the +private car "write-up," so we had better not. Besides, our engine has +come to a sit-still and will not go a step farther. The gossip we +heard at Bickerdike about the wash-out has been verified. The +officials in the private car are in no very graceful temper over this +landslide, and some of the men on the firing-line who dug and blasted +and built the grade, are going to have their hearts cut out because of +it. + +The trouble is that these vastly particular officials conceive of the +mountain into whose body they have slashed as a dead thing--dead as +pickled pork--whereas it is splendidly alive. Because of the malapert +efforts of the builders, the mountain has shaken its monstrous sides +with laughter till the tears ran adown its face and washed out their +puny sticks and stones. One might hint this to the officials, but one +is scared to. They belong to the unamiable sex and are showing an +anger highly disproportioned to the cause. Indeed, I saw a very +special official put the hot end of his cigar in his mouth. Sometime +to-night, a few flat cars will come from the End of Steel to convey the +gang thither. The gang will climb up one side of the wash-out and down +the other, and I will too, if the train's agent will let me, but from +his hard-baked, non-committal manner, I glean he is predetermined to +take me back to Edson in the caboose. + +The men have lighted a fire in the hills, and this fire seems to be the +kernel of the land. Strange elemental figures appear and disappear in +the darkness as though they were performing unnamed, unholy rites. +They seem human but, perhaps, they are spirits, for I have some +splendid clues that these mountains are the haunted house of the world. + +Here, there are eyes that watch you all the time, but they are hidden; +and if you have a listening ear you may hear voices that call. The +gods come close in the hills. They go whispering about in the night +and calling your name. + +Foolish folk there are who say that the world is old, and that all its +songs are sung. There is a new song that can never be told, else I +would tell it to you. Only it may be heard. + + * * * * * + +A man whose face is covered by the dark is spinning a yarn about an +engineer lad on this grade who truly loved an Indian girl. This is +what he says-- + +"She died a week ago, and the lad was with her. It is a beautiful +story, but I know another like hers. It is about a butterfly that had +specks of gold on its wings." + +I did not see the gang climb down the crevasse and up the other side, +but I heard the low lorn echo from the train roll up along the crags +and die away in the snows. The train's agent said I could go to the +End of Steel if I insisted, but I was not to insist. This is why I am +travelling back to Edson. Only I am disappointed much, but he says I +may come again soon, when no one shall disallow me. It would have been +all right for me to go with the gang, and I could have taken care of +myself: any woman could who has been years and years "in society." + +The agent and the Scotch boy have made a bed for me on a wide bench +with my blankets and cushions. If little private, the bed looks wholly +comfortable. + +"You'll be after loosenin' your collar," says the young person from +Kilmarnock as he fluffs up another cushion, "an' ye 'ull be takin' off +baith your shoes an' your stockin's. I'll be keepin' the daftie loons +out o' the car till ye get a bit o' sleep." + +For the benefit of the nervous readers I may add he does not say, +"ye'll be layin' off your bloose," but these are such nice lads I could +do so with absolute propriety. + +And they turn the lamp low and shade it with paper while I am asking my +prayer. And I pray, "Spirits of the Mountains and Rivers, be not angry +with me for talking in the hills. Gods of the North, strong Gods who +watch over little children and us older ones, let me sleep in quietness +this night, and at last bring me home in safety where all the lights be +white ones." + +And I press my lips to the palm of my heart-hand to say "Amen," and to +let the gods know I love them. To let them know I love them! + + + + +CHAPTER V + +THE END OF STEEL. + + I love the hills and the hills love me + As mates love one another.--MACCATHMHAOIL. + + +It is over a year since, in the last chapter, I was turned back from +the End of Steel because of a wash-out on construction, and now I am +come back, but this time, through the kindness of the Grand Trunk +Pacific Railway, on a through service, electric-lighted, +fast-scheduled, no-fare excursion. And on this occasion, I am not the +only woman on the train but merely one among a hundred, for this, you +must know, is the triennial excursion of the women journalists and +authors of Canada. The men present may be counted on one hand. The +engineers who travelled with me last time have gone on further to new +outposts. + +"What are they doing?" you ask. I'll tell you. + + "They are busy building railways on + The map's deserted spot, + Or staking out an empire in + The land that God forgot." + + +Doers of deeds are these men and the world has salted them with curious +and stern experiences. To my way of thinking, Dinny Hogan, boss +contractor, with his blue eyes that are the blue of steel, is a bigger +man than the First Lord of the Admiralty and his work is of more +permanent value to the Empire. It was only the other day that Dinny +made an arch of "coyotes"--that is to say, of round holes--in one of +the mountains, and into them he packed fifty carloads of gunpowder. +The reader may find it difficult to follow this idea, but no doubt he +could if he saw where Dinny removed the mountain in one shot. This +would seem to be a kind of big game shooting which has all others +vanquished into nothingness. This is a wonderful trail through the +mountains--the pass called the Yellowhead--a level ribbon of land along +which the steels are laid for most of the way. But in some places, a +road has been blasted out just to show how the mountains can be beaten. +These lords of earth and sky, when called upon, must bow their +unwilling necks to the yoke of steel. And no proper-spirited person +can stand in this pass without feeling the challenge of the hills and +without an immutable desire to conquer them. This I take it is the +spirit of the buccaneer. + +The highest mountain in these Rockies is Robson, called +_Yu-hai-has-kun_ by the Indians, meaning thereby a high, winding road. +The Alpine Club of Canada intend, one of these times, to erect a chalet +at Mount Robson so that they may attempt to scale it often. Three men +succeeded in making the ascent this very summer. They were roped +together for thirty hours, and when they had come down again, their +faces were seen to be cut and greatly marred. These men spoke fine and +glorious things concerning the hilltop, and of how they looked down +upon five hundred other peaks, but, in strait and narrow minds like +ours, these climbs may be accounted only as strange follies. I have +talked to Clausen Otto about these things, for he has been a guide +hereabout these ten years or more, and is a notable man of affairs. He +said I was only a terribly lame dog in front of a terribly high stile, +and then, fearing that his comment was truthful rather than polite, +Otto proceeded to salve my feelings by explaining how the desire to +climb glaciers was an ill-regulated one, and that what the Bible said +about sucking honey out of a rock was "plumb foolishness." + +Once, he was climbing with a hunter of goats when a bear came swiftly +over the glacier-clad peak of the mountain. They were greatly puzzled +to know why the bear had climbed so high, and why it dashed across the +summit. Surely there was something remarkable on the other side of the +peak. After climbing several hours they made the ascent and looked +over. "What do you think we saw?" asked Otto. + +"Give it up," said I. + +"I wish we had too," said Otto; "there was nothing on the far side but +another glacier." + +Perhaps, the literary critics will help me decide if Otto meant this +for the parable of the climber or whether he was only singularly adept +in the art of suggestion. + +You do not see Mount Robson till you have passed by. Our train stops +to let us look aright, but cloud curtains obscure the turrets of this +great temple of stone. Like a sorrowful Caryatid it stands erect under +the burden of the sky. But, after awhile, the veil is rent asunder and +a tingling flood of light spills itself on the snow in blurs of garnet +and blue and gold which scintillate and blend like the colours of a +shell: Of a surety, the North has the alchemy that transmutes base +metals into gold. + +What else may one see at Robson in this dream of summer Canada? Come +near till I whisper! You may see white horses--and roan--and chariots +of fire, but not every one can. This is one of the mountain's secrets. + +And if you listen you may hear what the hills talk about, but you must +listen. One mountain who is not so solemn as you might imagine wishes +to deny that he is of the earth, earthy. + +"Bosh!" he said, and "Stuff! Any one who hasn't moss on his eyes can +see I am of the rocks, rocky!" + +"Mark me and be astonished!" boasts a stupendous fellow near by whose +face is furrowed by snow-slides. "I am a western mountain. Beat me if +you can!" + +"I used to be a fish plantation," remarks a chalky-looking individual. +"It was in the cretaceous period and I lay underneath the sea." + +"Lobster plantation?" queries the western one. + +"No, you froward ignoramus," replies the fossiliferous fellow, "I +consist of Inoceramus problematicus, Faseiolaria buccinoides, and other +aristocratic mollusks of the which you have never even heard." + +... Overhead, an aweless eagle, rising wing above wing says to his +sweetheart, "It is my opinion God made these mountains for no other +reason than that you and I might build our nest in them....." + +There is, in this region, a body of water called Maligne Lake, and +Jules DuBois, a trapper, whose son is married to 'Toinette, the niece +of the second cousin of Pierre, whose mother-in-law was the third wife +of Black Moccasin, the chieftain, once told me that this lake is +dreaded by the Indians because there are no fish in it. This is why it +is called "maligne." It frets Jules at the heart to go near it, for he +has heard how the fish have been frightened away by a dead man who +lives there. This man can see without eyes and his face is like a +fungus with white teeth. When he laughs there is a noise in his throat +like the crackle of tamarack twigs, freshly lighted. + +Because of the glaciers on these hills and the warmth of the summer in +the valleys, this atmosphere seems like that of an eternal spring. +Just to breathe it is a delight. Here the air strokes you into +quietness till you forget the tearing hurry of life; the fretting +uneasiness that rasps, and the hurt that comes of the fight. This is a +sating of one's desire for the spiritual. And should you wish for a +token you may stay awhile and drink of the water that cascades over the +rocks. This is living water. This is the good wine of the hills. You +may drink it in remembrance. + +I am very sorry I must die some day and miss these wilding joys and the +odour of the trees and flowers, but it is my comfortable hope that when +I return to Claeg, the Round One, who is called the earth, I shall be +evolved into a pine-tree and grow happily in this mountain pass. Then +will other people come to, even as I come to these trees, and say, +"Good morning, my friend! I have been lonely for you." + +The pines are our fellow-creatures and more closely related to us than +anything that has roots in the earth. They speak to our inmost being. +A group of pines will restore sanity to the disdistracted and sorrowful +mind, for they are cordial trees, and in quietness and confidence is +their strength. The pines are never tremulous or trivial, neither do +they fade or die. Other trees are green for awhile, but these all the +while. + +... Pippa, the little maid who sang for the world's hurt, came out of +the woods, as likewise the Nazarene who died for it. + +Upland growths are the pines as befitteth the gods of the arboreal +world. They are northern trees, "the chief things of the ancient +mountains, the precious things of the lasting hills." Their history is +writ far back in the black strata of the carboniferous age, and that +they will be the last trees to disappear off the earth, who can +gainsay? As for me I shall not be persuaded otherwise though a man +rise from the dead to tell me. + +And now we have come to Jasper, where we have two hours to rest off and +talk to the men of a construction camp who have struck work for the day +in order to see the train come in. Of course, it does not take all +their day for this, but there were the preliminary toilet preparations +to make and the walk in and out. Such newly shaven chins; such freshly +brushed clothes; such irreproachable boots! Who could have expected it! + +Like the ascetics who of old-time went into the wilderness and found +themselves dreaming of scarlet lips and white arms, so these fine +fellows are ever fancying a comely woman gliding across their trail; a +distressed damsel who needs to be fed and carried for long, long +distances and sheltered in a low-built house of logs that is +well-warmed and well-provisioned, with no other bachelor nearer than a +hundred miles. + +The bachelors will doubtless deny this sweet dalliance with a vehement +fervour, but it has the matter of fact virtue of being true, and is no +whimsey of mine. A year ago it was, in a prize competition, I was +called upon to read over a hundred short stories, or more properly +speaking, human nature studies. An amazingly large proportion of these +came from northern camps, and in nearly every case the afore-mentioned +situation was the theme. The variation from this concerned a young +Englishman of education who is notified that he has inherited wealth at +home but prefers to stay with his woodland wife--a beautiful Indian +girl--rather than return to the granitic conventions of the old world, +and to the busy idleness that goes by the name of society. + +And why deny that their hearts are a-brim with dreams, for these are +beautiful reveries and worthy the most chivalrous of knights. Since it +was given me to look into the recesses of their minds I have liked them +better than ever and am many times heartily glad. Any woman who is a +gentleman would. + +And here Opportunity has spilled a whole trainload of women before +them--old and young, wise and otherwise. It would be tempting the +patience of Providence if they didn't meet the train, these bachelors +who would gladly lose a rib. + +"Such a waste of excellent material," says a poetess who looks over the +bachelors with an appraising eye. "How big they are! Someway or +other, they make me think of steel girders." + +"Ragingly handsome, I call them," says a petite miss who edits a page +on a big eastern daily. "Do you think it possible, Lady Jane, that +they--could--have--holes--in--their--socks?" + +"Not only possible, My Dear, but highly probable," I reply. + +"What odds?" asks Cy Warman, the poet. "It is recorded that President +Taft was noticed to have a hole in his sock when he took off his boots +in a Tokyo tea-room." + +"I am persuaded," remarks an historian who has been listening, "that it +is the duty of the Prime Minister of Canada to import wives for the +bachelors who live on the frontiers. He has most excellent precedent +in the case of Talon, the Intendant, who in 1670, because of the +disparity of the sexes in this country, imported one hundred and +sixty-five young women. Moreover, Talon specified that in sending out +these girls from France, the King should see that they had good looks +and were strong and healthy." + +"My fellow-women!" interrupts a society reporter, who is an incarnation +of frankness, "lend me your ears; I won't need your money. I intend +coming here to live. No longer will I remain a martyr to good form. I +am weary to death of musicales and other entertainments of an +objectionable character. I intend to quit the 'best circles,' the +'local coteries,' and the '_haut noblesse_ in favour of a man with a +bungalow at Jasper, and for these delectable mountains with the glories +thereof. Now, what do you say to that?" + +"Taken," replies a distinctly masculine voice in the rear--a voice that +might come from a steel girder--whereupon the rest of us discreetly +retire to allow for the arrangement of preliminaries. Love is born +through effrontery more often than we think. + +When we have achieved the sights of Jasper we entrain for Tete Jaune +Cache, a beautiful moping place on the Fraser River. All the way along +we pass through the fastnesses of the hills, places of glamour and +mystery, and perhaps of fear. Here our eyes are pleasured with an +illusive perspective or an uncertain silhouette; a fantastic rock-form +cut out by the cruel chisels of the ice; a precipitous gorge up which +the adventurous trees have stormed in darkened files; a welt of green +where the moss has healed the hurt of the avalanche; a snow-born river +with its white-toothed angry waters, a splash of ice called a +glacier--a steady, long-living splash obedient only to the sun. + +The artists with us talk of values, vistas, truth of space, +chiaroscuro, mellowness of effect, and transparence of air. Perhaps +they are right, but it seems to me that when Nature stretched her stone +canvas in the Rockies she did not trouble with the trivialities of +pleasing prettiness or technical nicety. She brushed in her colours +with a boldness of mass and outline, with an energy and expression that +stagger. There is no ambiguity about them. She used primary colours +and never hesitated. Royal purple, the orange light of fire, and the +sickening red in which Tintoretto has painted the wounds of his +martyrs, she here emphasized by the "cold virgin snow" on the peaks. + +For uncounted centuries, silence has brooded over the beauty of these +imperturbable hills and over their unpathed, desolate places which only +the eyes of the gods have seen. It is well with me this day that I +journey through them, for here, as in Eden, the terrestrial and +celestial may be one. It is well, too, that in passing I may shut my +eyes and mentally sing the song of the land as it came hot from the +heart of a poet in his home at the foot of these hills-- + + "Oh, could ye see, and could ye see + The great gold skies so clear, + The rivers that race the pine shade dark, + The mountainous snows that take no mark, + Sunlit and high on the Rockies stark + So far they seem as near. + + But could ye know, and forever know + The word of the young Northwest; + A word she breathes to the true and bold, + A word misknown to the false and cold, + A word that never was broken or sold, + But the one who knows is best." + + +At Tete Jaune Cache, they are preparing to "strike camp" and move on to +Mile 149. This has been the supply station for all the outposts, which +means more than you may think, for the Railway Company furnishes an +amazingly generous and varied bill-of-fare to its employees. + +Don't ask me what you can get here, for I won't tell lest the urban +epicures whose jaded palates need tickling should start out in a body +for this lodge at Tete Jaune. + +And the leading man in the kitchen has the most substantial merit and +can roast a sirloin of beef or bake a cake of prodigious bigness for +the men's supper just as he can cunningly and designedly contrive a +pimento bisque, an omelette espanol, or shrimps a la creole for the +boss and his company. I'll not tell another word about the fare, but, +believe me it is "with such cookery a monkey might eat his own father." + +Te' Jaune, as it is familiarly called in the North, is situated on the +Fraser River. Because of the snow melting on the mountains, the Fraser +is swollen as if the waters surged from underneath. While we wait, +swart, husky-looking men are putting off to Fort George in primitive +craft built of squared logs. These boats are called scows. They are +carried along by the current which is from six to eight miles an hour, +and are guided by means of a paddle with a vast yellow blade. + +As the men pass on and wave their hands to us, a fret falls on me to go +with them along this river-road to its very end, and if you are of my +kin you would want it too. We would live sturdily; we would be sopped +in sunshine, and God would give us joy. + +At Te' Jaune there are many tongues spoken, for the workmen hail from +all over the universe. Of late, we have heard much about these +foreigners and of "those nations which we, so full-mouthed, call +barbarous." Certain Canadians are enwrathed and utterly discomfited +because of them. It is their desire to tidy up the country by sending +the "alien offscourings" to where they belong. They tell us that our +manners will become corrupted and our institutions imperilled by them. + +This fear of strangers is not peculiar to our country and age. +Strangers have, in all lands, been looked upon as enemies to the +commonwealth, and consequently to be avoided or extinguished. +According to Flavius Josephus, when Moses came to die he said, "Oh you +Israelites and fellow-soldiers.... I would advise you to preserve +these laws to leave none of your enemies alive when you have conquered +them, but to look upon it as for your advantage to destroy them all, +lest if you permit them to live, you taste of their manners and thereby +corrupt your own proper institutions. I do farther exhort you to +overthrow their altars and their groves and whatsoever temples they +have among them, and burn all such, their nation and their very memory +with fire; for by this means alone the safety of your own happy +constitution can be secured to you." + +The Jewish constitution was not worth the price asked; neither is ours. +This should be far from the spirit of Canada--"the manless land that is +crying out for the landless man." Canada is the child of the nations +and our husky provinces have need of these husky peoples. Not only +must we open wide our doors and bid them a good welcome, but having +entered, it must be our endeavour to weld them into a seemly and +coherent whole. + +This is a task which is half accomplished e'er it is begun, for the +Russian, the Italian, the Scandinavian and all our immigrants are eager +to be like the Canadians, to speak our language, to wear our clothes, +and to think, talk and walk like us. Their differentiation is a burden +to them and they desire to drop it as quickly as possible. + +These Coming Canadians from Europe are of a fine advantage to this +country where thousands of miles of roads and railways are to be built, +in that they perform the more onerous tasks of digging and drainage +which the Canadian, British, and American turns from as menial and +unworthy. It would be a wide mistake for us to turn back from our +sea-ports these unlearned and common peoples who seek entrance--as +foolish as the farmer who would fear a large yield of wheat lest he +could not thresh it, or a banker who dreaded an inrush of gold lest he +could not count it. + +It was Michael Gowda, a Ruthenian living at Edmonton, who expressed for +his people their feelings of loyalty towards the land of their adoption +in a poem entitled "O Free and Fresh-home Canada"-- + + "And are you not, O Canada, our own? + Nay, we are still but holders of thy soil,-- + We have not earned by sacrifice and groan + The right to boast the country where we toil. + + But, Canada, our hearts are thine till death, + Our children shall be free to call thee theirs, + Their own dear land where, gladly drawing breath, + Their parents found safe homes, and left strong heirs. + + Of homes, and native freedom, and the heart + To live and strive and die, if need be, + In standing manfully by honour's part + To guard the country that has made us free." + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +BITTER WATERS + +I + +They could not drink of the waters of Marah, for they were +bitter.--_The Pentateuch_. + + +"Tweet, my little plover! Thy lips are like unto the bleeding +strawberry." + +Wasi, the father, smiled indulgently on this child-play, cooing +chatter, and sweet-flavoured words of his girl-wife as she fondled +their wonder-eyed baby. + +And in truth, it was a round dimpled baby--a cunning, cuddling papoose +that looked for all the world like a live bronze. Wasi did well to +smile. + +The older Braves had sneered at Wasi, "the Yellow Pine," for had he +not, they asked, breathed the breath of his squaw till his heart was +even as faint and soft as a squaw's heart. But Wasi of the swart face +heeded not their gibes for he loved Ermi with the flaming love known +only to men of hot heart and greedy senses. + +"Lazy one, to sleep till sun is high," merrily chided Ermi. "Little +Ninon has been awake since the dawn raised the meadow-larks." + +Wasi rose hastily, for he would take the trail early to the sun-dance, +and it was four suns' journey to the North. + +Once, Ermi had gone when she was ten spring-tides old, but the +cruelties of the scene with its shrill jubilations, had bitten +themselves into her memory. Her brother had been one of the candidates +for the coveted title of "Brave," and she had seen the wooden skewers +thrust through the muscles of his chest by which he was suspended to a +tree and from which he only freed himself by tearing away the flesh. +Since then, she had been to the mission school at St. Albert, and the +nuns had taught her that the body was holy, "a temple," they called it, +and that the sun-dance was sinful exceedingly. + +Father Lament at the cathedral had christened her Agatha, for she had +come to them in February on the day of the virgin-martyr of Sicily. +But Wasi was a Pagan, and called her Ermi. + +Ermi busied herself laying out Wasi's beaded moccasins, his bow of +cherry-wood with its leathern thong, and his arrows of Albertan +willows, that were winged with eagle feathers and tipped with iron. + +All the while she sang a quaint song about love. + +"Why singest thou thus!" asked Wasi. "'Tis the foolish song of the +hunters from the south-land." + +But Ermi laughed as she sang-- + + "'Twas odour fled + As soon as shed, + 'Twas morning's winged dream; + 'Twas a light that ne'er can shine again + On life's dull stream." + + +Then, as Wasi held his pony, Ermi kissed her brave and rested her +slight little body against him with love speaking in every line of its +limp abandon. + + +II + +Outside, the smouldering sun sank earthward in a drapery of blood-red. +In the tepee, the fierce dryness of the hot winds breathed on the baby +that lay dying by the open door. + +The Indian women feared the measles more than any other plague, and so +Ermi had been alone all the days, save only for the medicine-man who +had come to her thrice. He would drive out the evil spirits who had +caused the sickness, but Ermi only shook her head and held little Ninon +the closer. Once, she had seen him sear the flesh of Cheneka with a +burning piece of touchwood, and he had sucked the blood from the breast +of Kon. Besides, Ermi was a Christian and worshipped always at the +shrine of the great white virgin. + +The hours passed, horrible hours, and still in her loneliness and +parching anxiety she cried for the life of her baby, cried the prayers +of impotence to omnipotence. Already the baby-face was old and tired, +but the mother crooned and rocked her all through the night till, at +dawn, the wearied eyelids drooped over the darkened eyes for the last +time. The dove had found no rest for the sole of her foot. + +Ermi knew where there lay a great stone in the coulee off by the river +bank. She would carry her baby thence and bury it under the stone, +safe from the grovelling of wolves. + +Then she washed the tiny form and combed the tangles from the soft +hair, looping it back from the face with a band of scarlet. "After +all," she mused, "life has no beauty so wonderful as death." + +And because it was the tribal belief that if a corpse were carried +through a door, the next person following would shortly die, Ermi put +Ninon through the window, for Wasi would come home soon and the dread +fate might fall on him. + +Gathering the little clod of flesh in her arms and pressing it closely, +the dry-eyed mother set out on her journey across the wide-lying +plains. On and on she walked, trudge, trudge, trudge, under a brazen +sky that looked down pitiless and tearless. + +"Oh! If Wasi were here," she thought. "He would carry the spade and I +would hold little Ninon only. If Wasi were here!" + +The ground reflected heat to her weary soul and body, and the weight of +the world seemed to crush her frail being. + +"Oh, Mother of God! Sweet Mother of God!" she moaned. "How the sun +burns, and I am very tired." + +But the women of the Braves are in pain and weariness often, so Ermi +staggered on till she reached the coulee, with its boulder that had +been carried hither by the river when it overflowed its banks at the +last springtide. + +Laying her burden in the shadow of the rock, Ermi hollowed out an +earthen cradle for the baby. She lined it with green, too, just as +they had done at school when any one died, and then passionately +kissing Ninon, she wrapped a bit of blanket about her, for the living +would have the dead sleep soft and warm. + +Ermi tried to think a prayer, but she had forgotten them all since the +nights when Ninon was sick. She could not think of even one. She only +noticed that the white butterflies swam lazily to and fro like floating +blossoms, and that the sunflowers were wondrously beautiful as they +punctuated the rank, shaggy grass with gold. Lissome lilies swayed +gently in the hot breeze and made blotches on the earth like spilled +wine. + +At midday, the lilt of a lark stabbed the air, and the sound roused +Ermi, for she rose sharply to her feet and sang with hoarse voice and +stiff lips-- + + "'Twas odour fled + As soon as shed; + 'Twas morning's winged dream; + 'Twas a light that ne'er can shine again + On life's dull stream." + +The startled gophers darted into their cover and waited. When they +looked again, the mother had packed the little form in clay, had rolled +to the stone and lay face down wards on the earth. It was early dawn +when she rose from her vigil. + + +III + +As Ermi neared the house, she saw that Wasi had returned, and with +bursting heart she ran to tell him of their sorrow. His face grew sad +and stern as he listened, but again, it lit up as he took her by the +hand and led her to see Asa, the woman he had brought as a wife to his +hut. Asa, who would be to her as a sister, one whom she would love in +the place of Ninon, the child. + +There are half-hours that dilate to years, and Ermi seemed to have +suddenly grown cold. It was as though the vampire vixen who haunts the +muskeg swamp had suddenly sapped her youth. Ermi spoke nought, only +she laughed like Kayosk, the sea-gull, as he flies across Lac Wabamun, +a loud laugh and bitter, like the taste of sleugh salt in summer. + +She knew the unwritten laws of their tribe permitted polygamy, but she +knew not that, even in his best love, a man's heart is never entirely +absorbed, that no Wasi ever belongs wholly to any Ermi, knew not that +this is the tree of woman's crucifixion. + +And Wasi endeavoured to comfort her, but she was only silent and +motionless. He told her of the great sun-dance, and of the feastings, +and of how the sisters of the youths had cut little pieces of flesh +from them, but the youths cried not, for they were no weak women. + +Then Ermi moved around gently and prepared food for Asa, who wore a +wreath of yellow blossoms wherewith Wasi had crowned her. + +Sometimes, as she moved to and fro, she stopped as in a dream to look +at the glowing and beautiful body of her rival. The woman was lithe as +a sapling, her cheeks were like wild red roses, and her mouth was like +to a bow and arrow when it is set. Asa's hair was blue-black, but her +skin was almost white, for her father had been a pale face, one of the +Company's men at Fort Edmonton. + +But Ermi neither spoke nor complained, even when she read in Wasi's +eyes strange depths of passion as he looked on the lovely stranger. A +few days agone, she would have torn this woman to pieces, but there was +no rage in her heart now. The world had hardened around her, and she +could not cut through. + +And so four moons filled and waned, and darkness and sun passed +unheeded to the stricken Ermi, for the light had gone out of her life, +and from the heavens too. + +The women who loved her, and even Asa, tried to break her apathy, but +guessed not that her wound was past all surgery--that her life was a +bitter marah into which no tree of healing could fall. + +Some said the sun had kissed her when she carried little Ninon to the +coulee, and others said it was the touch of God, for the world has +always a name for a broken heart. + +Once the wife of Tusda told her that Ninon was better off and not +needing her in the least, but this only made Ermi's heart the more dull +and leaden. Wazakoo thought that Ninon might have grown into such a +wicked woman as the bold Asa, but the words were an insult to the +innocent eyes, the little unsullied feet, the lips pure as thought of +God, which the mother's eyes called up. + +"Very soon, you will go also," added Taopi, but it bewildered Ermi the +more to know that the little piece of ground on which she stood was +crumbling too. + +Another moon waned and yet she served the household. In her brain the +fire still burned on. Without, on the plains, the wind made a black +discord like the sobbing cry of a starved wolf, and, sometimes, it was +most like the whine of a whip-thong. Manitou walked about the earth +and the leaves faded and fell from the trees. Manitou blew with his +breath, and the river became like flint. At the wave of his arms the +animals hid away in the ground and the birds forsook their nests in the +wild rice and flew far off to the south-land. + +But all the days the baby called to Ermi, and often it wailed. One day +the voice wooed her unto the snow, out into the sheeted storm that +turned the air into a white darkness. Streaks of bitter wind screamed +across the prairie. The snow cut her face with stinging lash and the +cowering cold cut into her very bones. But still, without ceasing, the +baby called to her. Now and then, she almost clasped it, and her soul +swooned, but something intangible, impalpable ever waved her back. + +And then Ermi understood that the night was closing in and that she had +come a long, long way. She would go back to Wasi, for she had +forgotten about the other woman. The fire would be low, he would need +her and she must find him, however weary the trail. + +But even as she resolved, the woman sank limply to where one finds +dreams and soft reveries and where church bells toll the vesper hour. +Her hands clasped her rosary, but she did not pray. She only maundered +softly the foolish song of the hunters from the southland-- + + "'Twas odour fled + As soon as shed; + 'Twas morning's winged dream; + 'Twas a light----" + + +Once at school, she could not solve a problem and so she broke the +slate. She remembered it quite well; it was a question in the rule of +three. "How foolish!" she mused, and Ermi smiled as she remembered. + + * * * * * + +The morning dawned brightly in the coulee where a stone covered a +little grave. There was nothing to be seen, nor anything to suggest +that it was here Ermi had lain down to dreams. The snow had hidden her +well in its white bosom, but somewhere, somehow, Ermi, the Indian +woman, was working out the pitiful problem of life on another slate. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +MOTORING TO ATHABASCA LANDING + + "I'll tell the tale of a northern trail, + And so help me God, it's true." + + +I dreamed three times that I was taking this trip, and here it has come +to pass. + +Our party consists of an editor from Vancouver; an editor from +Edmonton; a Member of Parliament, a chauffeur, and myself. I feel +guiltily feminine. + +The road is one hundred miles long and connects Edmonton with the +North. Over it are hauled all the supplies for the settlements and +trading posts clear down to the Arctic. Once arrived at Athabasca +Landing, the supplies are loaded on to scows or, in the winter, to +sleighs, and from thence carried to their destination. I secretly call +this the Trail of Sighs, for to the freighter it is a long and weary +way, especially in these later days when editors, M.P.'s and graceless +witty bodies whirl past him at forty miles the hour in motors that are +quite mad. Some day a teamster will kill a chauffeur for sheer spite. +Even now the fuse is fizzing round the magazine, or whatever you call +the gasoline receptacle under the seat. + +It would be hard to declare how long this trail has been used, but I +would say for a century at least. From Edmonton for a few miles out, +it is called the Fort Trail because--allowing for a slight +divergence--it goes to Fort Saskatchewan, the head-quarters of the +Mounted Police in this district. From thence, it is called the Landing +Trail. + +But soon this whole country will be shod with steel, for, even now, you +may see navvies building grades as you pass along the trail, and next +week the first railway to the Landing will be opened for traffic. I +tell you, these railways are creating a new heavens and a new earth +however much the freighters may object. It is true, the trail will +lose in interest once the lumbering stage coaches and heavily laden +"tote" wagons have disappeared. When there are no long whips that +crack like pistol shots; no night encampments around blazing fires, and +no browsing cattle with tinkling bells, much of its picturesqueness +will have been surrendered to the implacable cause of civilization. + +From this time forth, the men who travel the trail will work for a +wage. They will forget the feel of frozen bread in the teeth; the hard +earth underneath them and the rough blanket against their chins. Yes! +and they will also forget the fine elemental thrill that comes from +hitting a running moose at long range, or a slithering wolf that lurks +privily in a covert of kinikinnic. The pity of it! + +No longer will our trail know the tired huskies, and still more tired +runners, who each year, come February, make this homestretch to the old +fur-market. The enormous bundles of fur that each spring sell for a +million dollars to the bidders from Vienna, St. Petersburg, London and +Chicago, will, for the future, figure as only so many untanned hides, +as per bill of lading, instead of precious peltry or--supposing you to +have sight and insight--"the lives o' men." + +Our first stopping place is Battenberg, by the Sturgeon River. The +place is not named for the lace as you might conjecture, but in honour +of the son-in-law of her late Majesty, Queen Victoria. It is here the +rural telephone wire comes to an end but if you are inclined to be +finicky, it is not well to telephone. I tried it and had a +conversation with Central in the which she expressed her opinion of me. +I cannot complain that it was not informing. + +The motor in which we travel has a record, not for speed, but as having +made the farthest north trip on its own power. Last winter, Jack Kydd, +our chauffeur, took it down the Athabasca River, on the ice, as far as +the Pelican Rapids--that is to say, 225 miles north of Edmonton. "The +make of the car?" you ask. I would tell you straight off and, later +on, would endeavour to collect a bonus from the manufacturers were it +not for the uncompromising prejudice of the publishers and their +editors. Men are like that. + +But I was telling you about Jack Kydd! His talent as a chauffeur is +one that trails no feathers and he is a fine, likely looking lad. This +day, I saw him pull the remains of a stump out of the road without +breaking the axle. Such a performance should be rated as a religious +act like the planting of the pipal tree in India. + +All the way along, our road is contested by farmers' dogs who surge out +from the shacks in a vain endeavour to regulate our speed. The dog is +an incurable motophobe who says everything profane about motors that +can be said. + +Here is a morose young bull contesting the high way with us, refusing +to budge an inch, and facing the motor with a menace. He is a +grim-visaged brute and built for battle like an ironclad. His +challenge to combat is a very dagger stroke of sound. Although the +M.P. wagers fifty dollars on the motor, we do not try conclusions, but +discreetly take to the side of the road at an angle that is truly +appalling. + +Even the calves are not afraid of the car and make their perilous bed +in the middle of the road, thus causing us to reduce our pace to a +legal one. Indeed, the only animals frightened of it are the horses. +Its huge black snout and great goggle-eyes must make it seem to them +like some monstrous, unthinkable brute. And, all considered, the +horses are the wisest of the animals---wiser even than men--for the +yellow peril--is as nothing to the black one. + +Still, we are having a mighty good time. When the road is clear, the +car spreads her wings and flies. Her gentle pliancy seems incompatible +with her hurtling force. Each moment, she accumulates momentum so that +we feel a sensation of tremendous power without pity. For the nonce, +we are potential murderers and pigmy men had better have a care how +they lounge across our paths. This mad car doesn't know a hill when +she comes to it and even sings a long-metre song on the ascent. She +might fairly be considered to have conquered gravitation. On! On! +with bird-like swoop she goes, fairly skimming the ground and taking +the corners just as if she knew what was there. + +You can never believe how stretched out the world is till you motor +this way north and see the long ribbons of road that unfold at every +turn, the silver illimitable distances that suggest both a mystery and +an invitation. I love these open trails, and to be of the earth earthy +is not so wicked after all. + +Gur--r--r--umph! Our 50 H.P. had dwindled to less than one-pony power +and we haven't a leg to stand on. I will never say we burst a tyre: we +cast a shoe. + +"It is neither, Madam," said the Vancouver editor who was helping to +prise up the wheel. "It is a valvular disease. Our viary accident is +the result of a vicious valve that, of its own volition, has put a veto +on our volacious voyage." + +"Avant!" retorts the editor from Edmonton. "I will vouch that the +accident to the vitals of our vehicle was a voidable one and arose from +violent vibrations and vulgar velocity." + +"Your verbose verdicts will never make the vamp or fill the vacuum," +says the more practical M.P. "Bring me the vade-mecum this instant, +you vacillating vagabonds." + +I cannot think of any assonant words so I am content with fining each +man a "V" or "vifty" days. I told you I was guiltily feminine. + +Sitting at the side of a road, waiting for a plaster to dry on a valve, +is about as exciting an occupation as knitting. Men should see to it +that women learn to smoke if only that the women may take breakdowns +more placidly. I can understand smoking becoming a means of grace. +Besides, the sun is very hot this day and burns my face and neck to a +vivid scarlet. Each man in the party produces a talcum tin for my +alleviation. "Sunny _Alberta_!" snorts the British Columbian, "_Sunny_ +Alberta! a place of sun, believe me, for people who would prefer shade." + +This newly acquired habit of the modern man in carrying a talcum tin is +one that, hitherto, has escaped print. I here set it down for your +consideration. + +While we are at work, three handsome boys drive up and stop to talk +with us. I take their photograph while they pose for me on a stump. +They are real-estate fans, so that their heads are full of +"propositions," their pockets full of maps. They have imagination, +unflagging industry, facility of expression, and love of +country--qualities which are sure to bring them to the front in their +gainful pursuit. + +The illustrious financiers who come yearly to this province to deliver +much kind advice and sage instruction, warn us to beware of these boys +whom they are pleased to call "wildcatters," just as if we were the +first to spend our money on the evidence of things hoped for, the +substance of things not seen. The trouble which follows from +over-investment in real-estate futures is attributable, not so much to +the wildcatters, as to the unknown author of the multiplication table. +Multiplying is our favourite occupation in Alberta even as it is in +some other provinces I know of. Up here, every one who has a tongue +talks about his "turn-over"; his "c'mission"; his "stake." Those who +haven't tongues are the listeners. And it is a good thing to have a +stake in this North-West Canada--very good. I have never yet met a +person who regretted having one, but there are many regret they have +not. I could tell you more about the real-estate situation only Jane +Austen says if a woman knows anything she should strive superlatively +to conceal it. + +Fifty miles from Edmonton, we cross the Arctic watershed, so that from +this point it is strictly proper to say down North, although the fall +is only two feet to the mile. It is at this height of land that we +look around and mentally spy out the country. We talk about the +incomparable wheat fields of Grande Prairie; the water-powers of the +Peace River; the oil-fields at Fort McMurray; the natural gas at +Pelican Rapids; the timber berths and asphaltum of the Athabasca; of +the coal, salt, fisheries, furs, and minerals spread all over and under +this new and unrivalled Northland. And all this riches lies at our +very feet--_ours for the taking_. "Hungry and I feed them," says the +North. "Naked and I clothe them; thirsty and I give them----" + +"No, it doesn't," says our chauffeur. "You can't get anything to drink +beyond the Landing. The North is strictly a prohibition country." + +"Dear me!" whines a person in the back seat, "and we are dreadfully out +of tea." + +At five o'clock, we stop at Eggie's for supper. Eggie broke land here +fourteen years ago, and ever since has kept a stopping place for +travellers. There is no need of his transporting eggs, butter, meat, +grain, and vegetables to market, for the market comes to him. He makes +hay when the sun shines, and also in the dark. As a result, he has +accumulated sixty thousand dollars in money and gear. So far as I +know, there is no eating-house with a record in any way comparable. + +Eggie Jr. is a telegraph operator. His instrument is back of the cook +stove over against a window. When he is away from home his young +sister works the code. She picked it up while tending the stove. You +can never tell what is up the sleeve of these pioneering women. I told +her she was the sixth wise virgin. "The other five?" she queried with +a glint of laughter in her eyes. There are other folk having supper at +Eggie's. The man with the long slouchy stride is a land surveyor. +They grow on every bush here. + +That crisp-mannered youth with the honey-coloured hair is going down +north to cap a gas well. In what better task can a youth engage than +to conserve power, heat, and light for humanity? Dear young man! + +Their driver quotes Cicero, and swears in Cree. He is a living example +of what whisky can do for a Bachelor of Arts who entirely devotes +himself to it. + +By six o'clock we are again on the road, and passing through a rolling +park-like country dotted with clumps of cottonwood, birch, poplar, and +spruce. Sometimes, we pass lush meadow upon which graze full-fleshed +cattle and comfortably rotund sheep. On one farm, a man is burning +dead brushwood. There is no keener pleasure than, here and there, to +thrust a core of fire into long grass or brushwood, and to watch the +red tongues of flame as they greedily lap it up. As yet, no farmer has +written about it, but this is only because farmers are afraid of +literary critics. It is a pity the workers are so frequently +inarticulate, thus leaving their joys and sorrows to be imperfectly +sensed by onlookers. But, Hear, Oh Men! and rejoice with me for at +this game I am not a mere onlooker, having once burnt over twenty-eight +acres. In making these fires, there is a kind of madness that takes +possession of you so that you pay no heed to the shrivelling of your +shoes; to the scalding cinders on your hands; or the inky blackness of +your face and clothes. Indeed, it would not be surprising to +ultimately learn that the direful task assigned to Lucifer is not +wholly without its compensations. + +At long intervals, we pass fat little shacks that spread over the land +instead of stretching up. At one of these, we stop to get cold water +in the engine. + +"Any news moving?" asks the bachelor who is overlord to the shack. + +He does not wait for an answer, but proceeds to inform us that the +prime knowledge a man needs for homesteading is the art of cooking in a +frying pan. + +His homestead is a ranch; not a rawnch. The difference, he explains, +is that the former pays sometimes; the latter never. + +He very kindly invites me to see his swineyard, the special pride of +which is a heavy thoroughbred called "Artful Belle" ... O la! la! la! + +As he upholsters his pipe with a stuffing of cut-plug, her master would +have me observe that Belle's face is "dished" and that her eyes are +free from wrinkles of surrounding fat. Indeed Belle is no waddling, +commonplace sow; no mere animated lard keg, for she has been bred to +the purple with great care. + +"A bacon hog?" I ask. + +"Yes, madam," he replies, "but in order that her bacon may be of the +desired streakiness I feed and starve her alternately." + +It makes a vast difference to a sow whether her ears stand up or lie +down. Belle's ears are 'pliable' and 'silky.' Her hair doesn't comb +straight either, but tends to swirls and cowlicks which are +proof-positive of her blue blood in the same way that a cold nose is in +a woman. + +I made a grave error, too, in speaking of Belle as red. Every swine +husbandman knows the technical word for her particular colour is +"mahogany." She has already farrowed two litters of six, the members +of which inherit their mother's fatal beauty. He tells me other things +but I forget them, except that pigs can see the wind, and that they are +older than history. + +We take a photograph of this bachelor homesteader and promise to print +it in a city paper under the caption, 'Wife Wanted.' In the North, we +call a bachelor, 'an anxious one.' + +The last miles of our journey are heavy going because of the hills and +stones, and our motor makes a lugubrious noise internally that is +wholly at variance with her velvet wheels, well lubricated machinery, +and the comfortable roundness of the corner seats, as if a plump and +smiling matron had suddenly started to swear. + +We reach Athabasca Landing at half-past ten while daylight still +lingers. Our complexions are somewhat impaired, but the man who +settles the bill for the steaks and coffee says there is nothing wrong +with our appetites. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +COUNTRY DELIGHTS + +Sometimes, I go a-fishing and shooting, and even then I carry a +note-book, that if I lose game, I may at least bring home my pleasant +thoughts!--PLINY. + + +I am fishing for graylings, but so far have caught none, my case being +similar to that of one Chang Chi-Ho, who in the eighth century, "spent +his time angling but used no bait, his object not being to catch fish." + +And truth to tell, I have not even the grace of an object, unless it be +to talk to the men folk who are lading the big flat scows called +"Sturgeon-Heads," for the trip down the river. + +By these right pleasant waters of the Athabasca, you are no longer +guided by duty but throw a rein on the senses. You do things because +you want to do them, and not because you ought to. This is owing to +the fact that the time-table loses its thrall north of 55 deg. I intend +stopping here a long while. + +It is a sun-steeped day, and the river looks like a bed of sequins. +The sun, although it is strong in Alberta, doesn't seem to ripen people +like it does farther south. I can see this from the way people give me +greeting and from how they tell me all that is in their hearts. + +Antoine hears that far off in that place called Montreal they dig worms +out of the clay for bait, and that these worms have neither shells nor +fur. This must be "wan beeg lie," for how could the worms keep from +freezing? It is not according to reason. These white men with trails +in the middle of their hair say these things so that the Crees, who are +very shrewd rivermen, will go to live in Montreal. + +I heartily concur with Antoine. I have been to Montreal myself and +have never seen so much as the sign of an earth-worm. They tell queer +yarns, those Eastern fellows who come from down North to write books +and buy land, but Antoine and I won't be fooled by them. Indeed, we +won't. + +Antoine caught a pike the other day without a line, but he lost it +again. It was the biggest fish he ever caught, but this is only +natural, and is no new thing, for ever since the first slippery fish +slithered through the hands of primeval man, it has always been the +biggest one that got away. Where these biggest fish foregather +ultimately has always been a mystery to me. Some day, we shall +discover a piscatorial paradise with millions of them in it. + +Antoine presents me to Captain Shot, an Indian who has been on this +river for forty-eight years. The Captain is seventy-three, and his +name is really Fausennent. He is called "Shot" because he was the +first man to shoot the rapids of the Athabasca. I say that Antoine +"presents me" but I say it advisedly, for the North levels people, by +which is meant the primitive north where they live with nature. In +this environment, the man who builds boats and supplies food or fuel, +is the superior of the man or woman who writes, or pronounces theories. +I may be able to hoodwink the people up south as to my importance in +our community, but it is different here. And this is as it should be. + +Captain Shot is engaged in building a boat for the Honourable the +Hudson's Bay Company, and there is even a smoking-room in it. But, +Blessed Mother! it is no trouble to build a boat now--none at all, for +presently the railway will be completed and the boilers and metal +fixings will come in over it, but in the old days--that is to say up +till now--it was different. When the Northern Navigation Co. brought +in the boilers for their boats, they hauled them a hundred miles over +the trail from Edmonton, and it took seventy-two horses on each boiler. + +"Didn't the government help any?" I ask. + +Oh yes! the late government at Ottawa tried to help transportation by +sending in fifty reindeer; but the Captain has heard tell that some men +swore terrible oaths at the government, and set their dogs about eating +up the deer, for these men hold a kind of an idea it is railways the +country hereabouts needs, but he is not quite sure as to the rights of +the story. + +There are four hundred men employed here at the Landing in building +scows and transhipping. Only a few of the scows are brought back, for +they have to be tracked up by power of man. For this reason, a new +flotilla is built each year. + +Captain Shot has many estimable sons, all of whom are rivermen and +shipbuilders. They could hardly be expected to disgrace their name by +becoming mere farmers or teamsters after the unwisdom of the white +man's way. Ho! Ho! the idea of any one wishing to become a farmer. + +But I was telling you about the scows. Unless you sat here catching +fish, you could never believe how much stuff can be packed into a scow. +As I watch the men at work, I think of Mark Twain's ambitious blue-jay +who tried to fill a house with acorns. Still the men do not seem +lacking in confidence, and keep wading backward and forward through the +water with sacks of flour, slabs of bacon, chests of tea, crates of +hardware, tins of stuff, and treasures in boxes that can only be +guessed at. I am hoping the biggest box contains dolls, ribbons, +work-bags, picture books, peppermint bull's eyes, and things like that, +for a mission school Christmas-tree somewhere down near the Arctic. I +am almost praying that it does. + +The smaller boxes are called permits, and each contain six bottles of +whisky. These are for the pioneering gentlemen at the different posts +who are delicate, and who honestly desire to get strong. + +Each permit is signed by a doctor so that the liquor must be considered +strictly as medicine. Irritating people who fail to understand that +there are only two licensed hotels between Edmonton and the North Pole, +sneer about there being a thousand delicate men on the rivers; but, for +my part, I am inclined to stand by the doctors, although I have always +held the clinical thermometer to be the only thing about the medical +profession with an integrity beyond question. + +If any one should glean from reading these lines that all there is to +loading a scow is to load it, he or she is a much misled person. The +last bale is hardly stowed away till two of the men have disappeared. +No one saw them go, least of all the Boss, but any one can see they are +not here now. The Boss is a creature of steel who seems to forget +there is much to be done in the last hour or two before a boatman +leaves the Landing for the stretched out journey beyond. Various +purchases are to be made; people are to be seen; drinks are to be had +against a long, long thirst, to mention nothing of new vows to Marie, +Babette, and Josephine. + +After awhile, the voyageurs are all rounded up with the exception of +Luke. The best the Boss can say for Luke is that he has been given a +Christian name. Jake is sent to fetch him. Luke turns up, but Scotty +must find Jake. Luke isn't drunk either--not he. It's the scow that's +drunk. Who said Luke was "fuller'n a goat," I'd like to know. +Ultimately, the Boss starts off to get Scotty and Jake. He gets them, +and he sits them down in a highly decisive manner, only to find that +Bill, and Jean Baptiste, and One-eyed Pete have gone up town for a +dunnage bag they left at the Grand Union Hotel.... The Boss looks +eight feet tall when he is angry, but, otherwise, to the unseeing eye, +he is only a young factor, or maybe an independent trader, intent on +his work like scores of other ordinary, unaccounted workmen. +Contrawise, the eye of imagination may see in him an adventuring +gentleman launching a craft that is to traverse for hundreds of miles +through many and diverse waterways, carrying with it a veritable cargo +of blessings to the far and lonely outposts of the North which, as yet, +are little else than names. + +The rivermen push off from shore with their oars till, in the centre of +the stream, the current catches them and carries them along. This is +their only method of locomotion, to float and float with the stream. +They have a steering-pole in the scow similar to that which may be seen +in pictures of old Roman galleys, and when, because of darkness, the +voyageurs wish to stay their course, they make to shore by its aid, +even as the Romans did more than two thousand years ago. To make the +simile complete, I stand on the bank and repeat the invocation of the +Roman poet: "Oh ship that conveyest Virgil to Greece, duly deliver up +the precious life entrusted to thy care."... + +If I hadn't jerked the crown of an old hat out of the river under the +impression that it was a fish, Justine would not have laughed out loud +and I would not have had an excuse to get acquainted with her. She has +been sitting nearby this half-hour. Her name isn't really Justine and +I forget what it is. She is the prettiest breed-girl in the country +and, by the same token, the frailest. "Believe me, Madam," explained +an old officer of the Mounted Police, the other day, "those eyes were +never given her for the good of her soul. She is a little +worth-nothing person like all the other breed-girls." + +This man despises breed-women and he has made a sufficiently intimate +study of them to form an opinion. He wishes they were all dead. "For +an absolute truth, Madam, listen to me. For years, these women have +paddled their canoes up this river with kegs of contraband liquor +a-swing from ropes beneath and none of the force ever suspected. They +were so monstrously civil, they would even give us 'a lift' if we +desired it. I was highly surprised when we found them out, and so +disgusted with myself that, for a time, I thought of becoming a +type-setter. By Jove! you know; a fellow doesn't expect to find a keg +outside a canoe. Now does he?" + +But I am not one of those who believe there are good women and bad +women. Some are elemental and others are not; that is the only +difference. I will maintain this to the very day my tongue wears out. + +Justine's white father must have had a head and shoulders of the most +perfect classical type. As she sits on the beach with a light shawl +drawn down over her head, this girl resembles greatly the Madonna of +Bouguereau. I tell her this, and we talk for a long while. She thinks +my suggestion that she marry a riverman, or a trapper, and have quite a +large family, a wholly foolish suggestion. It causes her to think +little of both my discernment and my knowledge of men. Rivermen, she +would have me understand, hardly ever come home, and when they do, only +to get drunk and beat their wives. A white man won't marry a breed +girl, nowadays, and if he should give her his heart, he expects it to +be returned sometime. Still, Justine considers his transient +affections to be preferable to those of the breed's, in that a white +man seldom strikes his girl. Justine gives me a short lesson in Cree, +and, among other words, I learn that _saky hagen_ is the equivalent of +"one I love," and that _nichimoos_ means "sweetheart." The former is +usually applied to a child, the latter to an adult. + +When I ask Justine to tell me a story about the North, she complies +because she has been educated in a mission school and speaks English +well. And then she is not in the least afraid of me since I showed so +lamentable a lack of insight about marriage. Now listen to the story. + +Once a mallard who was sick of love asked a blackbird to marry him. +"Marry me," he said, "and I will give you fish to eat and wild rice. +And when the sun is hot, I will hide you in the rushes and keep you +under my wings." + +And so they lived together as man and wife and the blackbird bore her +husband three sons, but soon he tired of her and made believe he was +dead so that she went away and left him in peace. + +And then the mallard went in search of another wife.... It was a story +I craved of Justine, and lo! she has told me a parable. + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +AT THE LANDING. + + A city founded is no city built + Till faith becomes prolific by the fathering tale + Of good report and all-availing effort.--J. M. HARPER. + + The sweet of life is something small, + A resting by a wayside wall + With God's good sunshine over all.--R. W. GILBERT. + + +This is the rainy season at Athabasca Landing, so that the streets are +very muddy. Long ago, it was like this in Edmonton, my continuing +city, but when we were come to a very considerable puddle our escorts +carried us. This is why big, fine-looking men were in high demand. + +But, this day, by some strange providence, the glut of rain has abated +and the clemency of the sky fills me with an importunate inclination to +gad about and use my eyes. There are no moments to be lost, to-morrow +it is sure to be raining again. Never was land more golden; never one +more grey. + +Here at the Landing, it makes no difference where one goes in search of +diversion, for it is to be found in all directions and every foot of +the way. This morning I preferably take to the hill back of the town, +for the water has drained off it to the river and the footing is good. + +The hill is held by the Honourable the Hudson's Bay Company, who have +owned it time out of mind. It hurts the Company to sell land, for they +are the true lineal descendants of that classical tree which groaned +with torture when a limb was dissevered from its trunk. This being the +case, they may be expected to hold the hill until the municipality +taxes it away from them. + +Ignorant people like the wheat-sellers of Winnipeg, speak of this +settlement as a new place, a mushroomic upstart of yesterday, whereas +it was an old post before Winnipeg was thought of. North of the +Landing, there are thirty thousand people who depend on the local +rivermen to bring down their year's supplies, so that this is a place +of no small concernment and it has seven streets, you might say. As +yet, its houses and public buildings do not run to paint or useless +ornamentations, and there is a stolid practicability about its front +doors. + +But about the hill: Terry, who is in "the Mounted," tells me it is a +walk of three cigarettes to the top of it, but two if you step lively. +This Terry has a bold and busy fancy, and if he cared to write, he +would, like Xenophon, be "an author of wonderful consequence." Once, +he tried to set down a story, but it was like trying to make a fire +with a wet match. + +Aha! Terry, Aha! you have said it exactly--defined it to a +hair's-breadth--the plight of the authors who would rise up on wings as +eagles but only they faint and are weary. A wet match! What greater +or more invincible deterrent could exist to the kindling of a fire? If +Terry's manners were less adroit and his hair less curly, I could +almost love him. I am half-purposed to anyway. + +And now that we are on matters literary I wish to announce that some +day, when my thoughts have come to issue, I intend writing an article +on the evil taste of pen-handles. There are several million dollars in +store for the man who will manufacture handles that are toothsome--say +of licorice, cinnamon, or sassafras wood, or of some composition +agreeable to the palate. The connection between the tongue and the pen +is a much closer one than generally recognized. + +We might even have pleasantly medicated pen-handles guaranteed to +stimulate our addled heads, or--Heigh, my hearts of the fourth +estate!--to fill us with an irresistible desire to work when there is +music and laughter downstairs, or a horse and sunshine out of doors. +The invention of such a pen could not fail to be imparted as +righteousness.... The roses are in full blast, and all the way along I +walk the earth in a fine rapture. On the hill-top, there is a spread +of blue hyacinths like a torn veil that has been thrown to the earth. +Here, in bewildering array, grow wild parsnips, feverfew, painter's +brush, mint-flowers, and lilies that flame riotously across the sheens +and greens of the open ways. I love the crimson glories of these +lilies; they seem to bring grist to life. Indeed, there is no question +but they do. + +The poplars and cottonwoods are hanging out long tassels of woolly +silver. It is a pity these do not pledge fruit like the tassels of the +Indian corn. Mayhap, some day, a scientist will cause the black poplar +to produce something for the sustenance of the North. Even the honey +which the bees store in its cavities becomes bitter and acrid to the +taste. Or it may happen we shall discover a cordial substance which +will transmute the tassels of the poplar into something else--say into +mulberries. Long ago, the English orchardists believed such things to +be possible, for, in the fourteenth century, one wrote down that "a +peach-tree shall bring forth pomegranates if it be sprinkled with +goat's milk three days when it beginneth to flower." + +It is good to be here this day enjoying the pleasant amity of the earth +and sky. One may draw physical and spiritual renovation from both. It +is very good to feel on one's face the soft-handed wind that is seldom +still. This is the kindly unrestricted breeze which brings gifts to +the North and West. It blesses the grain by swaying it to and fro, for +the word "bless" means literally to fructify. On some such day as this +I will come back here from the dead. + +On this hill, the Hudson's Bay Company, the world's oldest trust, have +erected their storehouse and factor's residence. These are log +buildings, austerely square and ugly in the extreme. In the factor's +garden is an old sundial which adds the needed touch of romance to the +place; also, it connotes a fine leisureliness. + +The erstwhile typical regime of a Hudson's Bay fort is a phase of +existence which shortly will be sponged off human memory. It has never +been as fully explained to me as I could desire, but as nearly as I can +make out, the staff of a well-manned post consisted of the factor and +chief factor, the trader and chief trader, an accountant, a postmaster, +two or more clerks, a cooper, a carpenter, a blacksmith, and labourers, +the work of the last mentioned being to haul water, cut wood, and +secure meat. There were also as many cooks as required. Food was +sometimes scarce, so that the men were required to lick their platters +clean. Contrariwise, they drank not a little of heady beverages which +they are said to have "carried well." + +The Indian's idea of a house is a different one to the trader's. It is +not a place to be lived in, but exists merely as a shield from the +weather. Accompanied by Goodfellow, a frowsy, stump-tailed dog from +the hotel, I visited the Indian houses hereabout. Goodfellow came with +me, not as a protector, but because he wouldn't be driven back. He is +a reprobate cur, forever spoiling for a fight; a natural born feudist +who lives in a state of violent excitement. Terry says he is "no +bloomin' lap-dog," but a four-legged incarnation of the devil himself. +Sometime soon, this dog's day will be over, for he is surely going to +die of lead poisoning. + +All the way to the Indians, with a stupid malignity, and in defiance of +the plainest laws of fence, Goodfellow gave chase to every cat and +rabbit and bit every cow. It is not open for me to say what I thought +of him, except that his conduct was solidly wrong. It was, +accordingly, of high gratification to the rancour I hid in my heart +when the Indians' huskies made short shrift of him. Like Humpty +Dumpty, it will be hard to put him together again. They are no dealers +in sophistries, these wide-mouthed wolf-dogs, with their wicked teeth, +and would fight against the stars in their courses. + +When the women have beaten them off and learn I am not offended +concerning Goodfellow's drubbing, they are pleasant to me. A thin, +pock-marked squaw invites me into a shack or, more properly speaking, +into a baby-warren which fairly bristles with a flock of semi-wild +children, for, as yet, the squaws have not deliberately ceased from +having children. + +What I said awhile ago about the Indian's house applies equally to his +children's wearing apparel. It shelters rather than ornaments. Their +clothes seem to have no visible supports, but are held to their small +fat bodies by some inexplicable attraction. One may see the same +phenomenon on the apostolic figures on stained glass windows. + +A chocolate-coloured baby with blackberry eyes is propped against the +wall in a moss bag, and looks for all the world like a cocoon that +might any moment push off its sheath and take to wings. + +An unsavoury mess of entrails is stewing in a black pot and filling the +house with an unpleasant odour. I try not to show my repugnance lest +my hostesses consider the white woman to be proud-stomached with no +proper appetite for lowly faring. I tell them as I take down the +blanket from the door--not untruthfully you understand, but as a small +matter of immediate expediency--how it is light one desires rather than +fresh air, and that it is hard to see aright when one has been walking +in the sunlight. + +This Hudson's Bay blanket is, next to _uskik_, the kettle, the one +indispensable thing in an Indian household. It serves as a door, a +coat, a carpet, a bed, and for other things which it boots not to +mention. It is, therefore, well to be explanatory when one removes it +from its place, just as it is wise to apologize when one pokes an +Englishman's fire of coals. + +Mrs. Lo tells me the old woman who is making moccasins is _Naka_, which +word, she explains for my better understanding, is the Cree for "My +Mother." Naka is a very old woman and "can no English say." Neither +can she be considered as typical of Whistler's mother. + +There are amusing things to be done in this shack. For instance, you +may by signs and smiles make Naka, my mother, to understand how you +greatly desire to sew upon the moccasins she holds, and Naka may, in +the amiability of her disposition, accede to your importunity. + +As thread, deer sinew is not so easily manipulated as you might +imagine; indeed, I should say it is distinctly uncontrollable. The +audience, in spite of its manifest efforts at politeness, is +nevertheless widely diverted. Who would have thought a white woman +could be so droll in the woods, and so very stupid? + +Huh! Huh! she may be so stupid that even old Naka, who is a proper +woman with her needle, has to scrub the air with her arms and show her +yellow gums in laughter. + +Their always wakeful curiosity leads the maidens to enquire as to what +might be inside a white woman's hand-bag, and that they may +sufficiently know about this matter, the white woman empties it upon +her knees. Immediately, the articles are passed around for appraisal +and approval. Bank cheques! ... _Oui_! _Oui_! The men who work on +the boats get these. The girls know how it is talking [Transcriber's +note: taking?] paper to get money. + +My penknife, pencil, note-book, purse, and handkerchief are duly +examined and quietly commented upon, but a package of tablets packed in +a silver paper, and small tube of cold cream, cause no small flutter in +our circle. When I am through demonstrating their use, every one's +breath is laden with the odour of mint, and their hands with that of +roses. Um--m--m--mh! + +The women feel my arms, try on my bracelet and rings, and ask me to +take off my hat that they may see my hair, which, alas! is devoid of +all waywardness and coquetry. I can see they are disappointed in this +and think me what Artemus Ward calls "a he-looking female." + +In one shack to which the girls accompany me, an emaciated, coughing +boy is bed-ridden and near to death. Lili Abi has him in her arms, and +he may not go free. + +Who this Lili Abi, or Lilith, is does not certainly appear, but, +according to the Rabbis who wrote of old time, she is the first wife of +Adam and queen of the succubi. Some there are who declare this to be +an ill-framed story, and a conceit of the fancy, but others hold it as +a creed that she lives by sucking the blood of children till they fade +away and die. It is from Lili Abi that we get our word lullaby. The +malific lullaby she sings has come nigh to breaking the heart of +humanity, but, one day, it shall happen that a sure and strong-handed +scientist will get a strangle hold on Lili Abi and pierce her to death +with his slender but omnipotent needle. + +Amil, who is the lad's father, says, "I am mooch scare' 'bout leetle +boy, for sure. I ees pray all tam to de holy mother. Mabbe he ees get +well... la bonne chance ... mabbe non! Leetle boy sing all de tam when +he ees well." + +Amil has never been to the south, or over the mountains, but he has +heard much about these countries. He has been told how, in the United +States, they do not believe in the pope and get married many times. He +has also heard that the Yankees mean to conquer Canada and pull down +the tricolor. + +Michele Daubeny, who once went across the mountains to where the +fish-eaters are, told him that the ocean never freezes. But this +Michele has a tongue which is not straight, also he has been known to +steal fur out of the traps, so that Amil does not know what to believe. + +"I have mak rip'ly," says Amil, "dat mabbe by'me by, I ees tak de trail +dem queeck an' see _kickekume_, de great sea water, to myse'f." + +And when I leave the shacks and go back towards the village, I fall in +with some swart broodlings, who are shooting with arrows. At first, +they will have none of me until I make the mortifying confession and +concession that I cannot shoot and desire greatly to be taught. After +this, nothing could exceed their pedagogic enthusiasm. Apollo, prince +of archers, could do no better. + +In the pale face, the hunting instinct, while never entirely lost, is +still greatly modified. In the red man it is a passion. Watch this +little lean-bellied Indian as he stalks his game. The bird rises and +settles again a few yards away. The boy trails it up closer and closer +with a feline softness of tread, a queer slurring movement that belongs +only to animals of prey, and then, standing taut and tense as a +finely-bred setter making game, he concentrates the whole energy of his +body on one piercing point and sends his arrow home. + +The bow-and-arrow stage through which these Indian lads are passing +corresponds in the white boy to that inevitable condition of +development known as gun fever. In our city, at a highly immoral +price, we dress up in khaki the boys of the lower classes, give them +guns, and call them scouts. I like the Indian way better. Of course, +there is this to be said for our method, that it instils a martial +spirit into the youngsters so that when they are grown larger we shall +have no lack of soldiers. This is a statement so obvious and axiomatic +that it hardly needs writing down. + +Well, so be it! How else are our bonds to be protected? And may not +the lower classes be relied upon to constantly produce batches of boys +to step into the ranks? Yes! I believe in Boys' Brigades and in war. +I have some bonds myself. + +In the village, several homesteaders who are trending northward to the +Peace River country, have drawn up to the hotel. Their wagons are +piled high with farm implements and household stuff which they +purchased at Edmonton. + +All of these people are topful of enthusiasm, being of wise and gallant +mind. Indeed, the whole country seems surcharged with it and even the +poplars clap their hands. The settlers will tell you the only knocker +here is Opportunity. There is always a mirage in the pioneer's sky +which, God be praised, he manages to haul down bit by bit and pin to +the solid earth. "The pins!" you ask. Ah yes! I may as well tell +you; they are surveyors' stakes and tamarack fence-poles. + +I have some little talk with a woman who is resting on the balcony +while her horses are being fed. She comes from the United States and, +until her marriage three months ago, practised her profession as a +trained nurse. Her husband is going to make entry for a homestead, and +when, in three years, he has "proven up," they will open a store in one +of the villages. By that time, the railway will have reached their +district. Here is a woman of varied interests and many pursuits; one +with more than an arm up her sleeve. I am doubly sure of her +practicability now that she has told me of the stuff she has packed in +the corners of the wagon, and in the narrow spaces between the +household utensils. She has seeds for her kitchen garden, also sweet +peas, mignonette, sunflowers, hollyhocks, and pansies. The firebox of +her stove contains a hand sewing-machine, while the oven is the +receptacle for a guitar, some music a surgical case, a box of +medicines, a small looking-glass, two metal candlesticks, a roll of +coloured pictures for her walls, a few thin paper classics, stationery, +fishing-tackle, and a well-stored work-bag. The matches she carries in +a case with a close top, while the groceries are packed in tin bread +boxes which will serve the same end in her new home. Besides their +cooking utensils, toilet articles, clothing, blankets, and tent, this +couple carry a rifle, a shot-gun, ammunition, and other small but +useful things like a map, a compass, and an almanac. The wagon has a +canvas top. + +One man who is also heading for the far north tells me he has sold +everything from painkiller to mining stock. Of late, he has been +selling real-estate, but the bottom has dropped out of this business. +For the future, he intends raising potatoes on the land instead of +prices. He has "cleaned up" eight thousand dollars in real-estate, but +he wishes me to understand he made this honestly by taking options on +property and selling before the options came due. + +With remarkable precision of language, he explains how the slump in +real-estate is chiefly due to those large, didactic gentlemen of slow +conscience and insulting superior manner who come here by the trainload +and tell the North she is still a flapper, and that it is unbecoming of +her to do up her hair and lengthen her skirts, after which cheap and +unsolicited advice, they take themselves and their pestiferous money +homewards. + +Their opinions are quoted from the Atlantic to the Pacific, which I +must know takes in Spruceville, till the bankers are seized with the +complaint known as cold feet--pest take them!--and "get orders from +headquarters" to close up all outstanding accounts. These banker +fellows, my informant says, lose their beauty sleep, but as far as he +can see, lose nothing else. A business man may be potentially rich and +yet be put into bankruptcy by a corporation, the spoils going to the +corporation, or its manager. There should be a law against elderly +wide-jawed financiers who prophesy hard times because, with them, the +wish is father to the thought. There is nothing in all the world they +desire so much in order that they may, by their phenomenal rates of +interest, pillage the country to their heart's satisfaction. So +gainful is their pursuit, my friend will not be at all surprised if, at +the last day, it is found that these tongue-lolling financiers have a +lien on heaven; indeed, he believes this to be inevitable. Owing to +the fact that we are unaccustomed to it, the process of thinking is a +somewhat painful one to us of Alberta, but it is wonderful what flashes +of illumination come to us sometimes. + +To-day, the first train of cars has entered this place. It belongs to +the Canadian Northern Railway Company. For many years Edmonton was +known as the last house in the world. This, of course, was not +literally true, and it would be hard to state where or which is the +ultimate hearth-stone in this very good land of Canada, but assuredly +Edmonton was the last post-office and, until this year, the End of +Steel. To-day, this road is born. When will it die? We fall into a +way of thinking it is here for eternity, but railways vanish like +everything else. Even the great Appian Way, which lasted for over two +thousand years, has, in these last centuries, become little more than a +name. + +To build even one of our railways, a hundred forests are sacrificed, +and, in the uncanny gloom of the dead country which lies in the heart +of the earth, thousands of bowed, grim workers toil, Vulcan-like, for +the iron to make its spikes and nails. + +The railroad seems like a huge centipede with rails for the body, ties +for the limbs and smoke for the breath. The men who stand by her side +are the waiters who feed her with coal and slake her thirst with water. +Sometimes, when she is weary of the freightage these men lay upon her, +she rises and crushes it to atoms. Men call this happening "a broken +rail" or "an open switch," but we know better. + +Or we may think of the railroad as a streak of light through desolate +places telling the pioneer to be strong and of good courage with the +hope of better days. + +Or, again, it is a belt which binds the lustrous provinces of the East +and West into the eager land of Canada. What odds that the belt, +partaking of its environment, is rocky here or sandy there, so long as +it be really a belt? + +No one can truly say when this road will die. It may be--if one may +hazard so saucy a suggestion--that the airships will kill her by taking +her traffic in men and merchandise. And maybe the great-grandchildren +of the "Coming Canadians" who arrived this year from Scandinavia or +Austria, will plough long furrows on her right-of-way and haul off her +bridge timbers for firewood. Guesswork all! + +I might have gone on musing about this railway until now, and computing +what its advent means to the North, the country which has hitherto been +the land of the dog and the canoe, had not a commanding voice bade me +come and "drape" myself with the crowd beside the first train in order +to have my picture taken. + +"I won't go! not a toe," said I, but I went, for no woman who is even +fairly normal can successfully resist having her photograph taken. She +always hopes it will turn out better than the last one, and I hoped so +too. + + + + +CHAPTER X + +ON THE ATHABASCA RIVER + +I am but mad north-northwest: when the wind is southerly, I know a hawk +from a handsaw.--_Hamlet_. + + +All the world is a deluge of rain when we leave Athabasca Landing, and +we wait at the hotel till the last minute, hoping the storm may abate +in order that we may reach our steamer without losing too much starch. +But the horn is making the asthmatic lamentations, meaning thereby that +everybody should be aboard, so we say good-bye to all at the hotel; +promise to be good; to take care of ourselves; and to come back soon. +I say "we" because it is journalistic etiquette to be impersonal, but +actually there is only myself, the other passengers having gone down to +the river over an hour ago. + +It is a troublous jaunt which I make, for a streak of wind turns my +umbrella into a cornucopia; the fat drops of rain splash into my eyes; +I take the wrong turn, get mired and lose my rubber shoes. When the +river is reached, I find the descent to the steamer is buttered with +mud and so steep that sliding is the only method of locomotion possible. + +A vastly tall man stands on the gangway at the foot of the hill; holds +out a pair of arms that must measure ten feet from tip to tip and says, +"Come on, lady." The lady comes, but with such impact that we nearly +go through to the opposite side of the steamer. Our final resting +place is on a banana crate, which, in all conscience, is yielding +enough, the fruit proving to be over-ripe. The passengers are +distinctly amused, but the freight master is in no gallant temper over +it and disapproves of the whole affair. I could tell you what he said +to the vastly tall man, but you would have to come very close to hear +me. + +After supper, which consists of beef with stuffing, macaroni with +cheese, pork with beans, white fish, stewed tomatoes, escalloped corn, +boiled potatoes, walnut pickles, catsup, soda biscuits, pumpkin-pie, +apple-pie, currant buns, cocoanut cake, cheese, coffee, stewed figs, +tooth-picks and other things which I cannot remember, I crawl to the +deck to find out where Grouard is, and how we are to get there. + +Although thither bound, my knowledge of its location is shamefully +vague. Here is what I learn. We sail north and west on the Athabasca +River till we come to Mirror Landing, at the confluence of the +Athabasca and Lesser Slave River, at which point we leave the steamer +and make a portage of fourteen miles to Soto Landing. This portage is +to avoid the government dams which have been built to make the Lesser +Slave River navigable. At Soto Landing we embark on the _Midnight +Sun_, another steamer of the Northern Navigation Company, and travel on +till we enter Lesser Slave Lake, down which we journey to its extreme +western end, where Grouard sits on a hill overlooking a bit of the lake +called Buffalo Bay. Without mishaps, we ought to reach Grouard in four +or five days, but no one will cut off our heads if we loiter a bit on +the way. + +There are about thirty male passengers on board and seven women. This +half-hour I have been talking to a plausible prolix villain whom it +would be easy to like greatly. He is going to make three million +dollars from his oil-wells on the Mackenzie River. He says so himself. +He has been down north for several years and walks like one who has +been used to the spring of a snowshoe beneath his foot. His clothes +have the odour of the forest--that is to say of leaf mould, poplar +smoke and spruce resin. He went to England two years ago to persuade +Grandfather Bull to invest in oil and asphaltum, but was not as +successful as he could desire. "I figure," he says, "it will take +another century to convince Grandfather, and by that time the fourth +generation of America 'Coal-oil Johnnies' will have squandered the +dividends on actresses and aeroplanes. Pouf! these Americans have no +idea the world belongs to the Lord." + +It was well I agreed with him so civilly, for he said, "If you wish to +invest in some oil-stocks, Madam--and no doubt you will after what I +have told you--I will see to it that you get in on the ground-floor and +no questions asked." + +Now I did not like to inquire of him what is meant by the ground-floor, +lest he should think me the veriest ignoramus, but I am persuaded it +means something most excellent, for I have frequently heard promoters +mention it to people like me, who have not much money to buy with. + +This man originally hailed from New Zealand, but he tells me that +country is no good; it is too far from Fort McMurray. At Fort McMurray +life is one round of pleasurable anticipation and all the day seems +morning. Who can tell at what moment a gusher may shoot into the +clouds and blot out the sun itself? Then it's gorged with gold we +should all be--those of us on the ground-floor--and are millionaires, +with hundreds of universities and public libraries to give away. What +would be the use of having oil and hiding it under bushels of rocks, +we'd like to know. + +At this point the purser explains that the steep ascent to our right is +called Bald Hill. It can be seen from a long distance, and is one of +the features of the landscape from which, in the winter, the freighters +measure distances--a kind of millarium or central milestone. Surely +this is a country of vast horizons, both mentally and visually. + +About every twelve miles we pass a stopping place where the winter +freighters and their teams are fed. These houses and stables are built +of logs and are sheltered by the forest. I prefer to say they have a +roof-tree, the words seeming to suggest a good deal more. In spite of +their splendid isolation, these stopping places do an excellent +business and, while warm and well-provisioned, are still somewhat in +the rough. The purser says this roughness is not worth regarding, for +while here is the country a fellow roughs it, in the city he "gets it +rough." + +"And that reminds me, ladies, of my errand to you," he continues; "you +are probably aware there are only sixteen bunks on this boat and eight +mattresses. You, of course, will use your own blankets and pillows, +but I perceive you have not secured mattresses. It would be +wonderfully easy if you were to carry off one, or even two, from the +priests' state-rooms, for at this very minute the priests say prayers +on the lower deck." + +"And believe me," he concludes in a highly chivalrous manner, "you two +ladies have an unquestionable right to the mattresses, so that I shall +consider your act to be one of perfect propriety." + +Thus encouraged by the pursuer I proceeded with my room-mate to seize +our "unquestionable rights," but, approaching the priests' door, my +heart failed me, and our undertaking seemed a plain and undeniable +demonstration of wickedness like the robbing of a child's bank. They +are such quiet, well-deserving men, these eight black-smocked Brothers +who are going North to the jubilee of the great Bishop Grouard, the +like of whom there never was. Also, they are very polite, and the one +who is an astronomer and comes from Italy, picked out the tenderest cut +of beef for me at supper. + +"Pray don't be silly," snorted my room-mate, "the rules of their Order +say distinctly they shall deny themselves and not sleep softly. +Besides, when men take terrible vows that they will never get married, +it is a woman's stoutest duty to steal their mattress whenever the +opportunity serves." + +She also told me with rapid brevity some names which Clement of +Alexandria, a Father of the Church, applied to women in the early days +of the Christian era. She had read about them in a history...... + +In the falling of the night, at the mauve hour, our ship having been +made fast, we go ashore and talk with the Indians who are camped here +in a wigwam. One of the passengers, who has lived among the Crees for +many years, tells me I express myself with redundancy in that the +literal meaning of wigwam is camping-ground. She says the Indians have +many grotesque folk tales, which are told by the men. Each story has a +moral which they desire their wives to consider from an educative +standpoint. Once there was a man whose _utim_ (that is to say his dog) +used to turn into an _iskwao_, or woman, when it became dark. She had +yellow hair and her arms were white and soft like the breast feathers +of a young bird. This happened long ago, before the Indians were +baptized and when people were not so pious as they are now. Any man +can do the same thing to this day if he happens to know the magic +formula. + +There is also a tale about a woman of the woods whom we, in our +scientific conceit, call the echo. Once when her man was away for many +moons on the great _sepe_, or river, the woman took another husband, so +that when her man came back she flouted him and slapped his face. That +night the moon changed her into a voice, and now she calls for her +husband to come and love her, but he only mocks at her. + +This habit of the husbands in telling tales with palpable deductions +attached would seem to be common to other races than the Indians, for +the Romans, likewise, had a story about the echo. It appears that +Jupiter confided to Madam Echo the history of his amours, and when she +told his secrets among her friends she was deprived of speech and could +only repeat the questions which were asked of her. The Cree story is +the better one. It has a fine human motive which the other lacks, and +also it drops, a much-needed tribute on the worn altar of domesticity. + +When a fire is lighted with birch bark and tamarack knots, we sit +beside it and are more merry than you could believe. + +The sweetheart of Jacques dances for us to the well-cadenced rhythm of +a Tea Song. I cannot spell her Indian name, but it means "Fat of the +Flowers," by which term they express our word "nectar." The cree is a +droll language. + + "Ha! He! ne matatow, + Ha! He! ne saghehow." + +she chants and rechants as the fitful flames make sharp high-lights on +her dark skin, causing her to appear as the flying figure of a bronze +Daphne, and, in truth, the boughs of the trees lend likeness to my +fancy, for as she dances into them, they seem to absorb her, even as +the laurel absorbed the Grecian nymph of old time. + +Translated literally, the words of the Tea Song read thus-- + + "Ha! He! I love him, + Ha! He! I miss him." + + +This is a supremely cunning song, in that it utters in six words (if we +exclude the interjections) the summary of all the love songs which have +ever been written--"I love him: I miss him." I am glad it was framed +in the unsophisticated North. + +And Fat of the Flowers sings another song which is addressed to her +lover. She is lonely for him, our interpreter explains, but drinks her +tears in silence. Sometimes his presence comes to her in the hour of +twilight, and she kneels to it as the poplar kneels to the wind. When +he returns to the camp fire she will give to him a blanket made out of +the claw skins of the lynx, and a white and scarlet belt from the young +quills of the porcupine. + +I can see that her honeyed words are agreeable to Jacques and give him +fullness of pleasure, for there is a tell-tale joy in his face that +refuses to be hid. + +Jacques, who is a riverman, was educated at a mission school on the +Mackenzie, and he tells me that Fat of the Flowers is nearly as +"magneloquent" and clever as a man. He is almost sure there is a +little white bird that sings in her heart. + +After a time, our dusky friends steal away one by one to their rest, or +two by two. The ship lolls lazily on the bank and there is no sound +save the whimper of the fire and the deep breathing of some over-tired +sleeper, but once a sleeper laughed aloud. + +I step carefully between the recumbent forms on the deck lest I hurt +them or disturb their quietude. I am sorry now that I stole the +mattresses. Surely I am a bitter sinner and unlovely of heart. + +In the morning, when I told the Brothers how I had privily taken the +mattresses because I disapproved of their vows concerning marriage, and +because of the unseemly remarks Clement of Alexandria had applied to +women in the early days of the Christian era, they laughed again and +again with much hilarity. Indeed, one of the Brothers said he +applauded my moderation and marvelled that I was good enough to leave +their blankets and pillows. Another gave it as his opinion that +Clement's pleasantry was a shabby-minded one and needlessly sarcastic, +the result of an ill-governed disposition. But this Brother, like the +others, took full care to evade the question I had raised as to +celibacy.... + +What Clement of Alexandria said was that women, like Egyptian temples, +were beautiful without, but when you entered and withdrew the veil, +there was nothing behind it but a cat or a crocodile. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + +SOME NORTHERN PIONEERS + + Through these shores amid the shadows, with the apparitions pressing, + Pioneers! O Pioneers!--WHITMAN. + + +In the morning, soon after sunup, we continue our joyous journey on the +Athabasca, but the birds are out and about before us. An occasional +duck rises off the water sharply with a whir of wet wings, but +generally they are self-complacent and play at last across the road +with the ship, just as if they sought trouble and despised it. The +young ducklings, who have only taken to water these few days agone, +form themselves into tiny rafts and one might almost expect to see a +fairy step aboard them. The fish jump out of the water, praying to be +caught. They look like strips of silver ribbon. Mr. Patrick O'Kelly, +who is also watching their come and go, declares this to be a sign of +rain. "When birds fly low, lady, and when fish swim near the surface, +it is well to bring in the clothes off the line." He also says that +the plover's cry indicates rain, even as does its name--the _pluvoir_, +or rain-bird. + +There are few birds to be seen, except an occasional hawk, who seems to +have no other object than to curvet about and display his clipper-built +wings for our admiration. Sometimes he soars into the skies in order +to exercise a keen vision that covers half the province, or, again, he +appears to hang in the air with an invisible string, so perfect is his +poise. It is foolish to call hawks ravening birds and to impute evil +motives to them. We only do this because they like chickens and other +gallinaceous fowl whose end we should prefer to be pot-pie. This is +not a reprobate taste on the hawk's part, for, of course, he has never +read the game-laws, nor the Book of Leviticus, and cannot be expected +to know that certain flesh, in certain localities, in certain seasons, +is the particular appurtenance of the _genus homo_. In truth, we are +so uninstructed in these laws ourselves that the government must, +perforce, keep game-wardens and the churches must keep preachers to +educate us more fully. + +The Athabasca River, Mr. O'Kelly calculates, is about eight hundred +feet wide and about twelve feet deep. Its current is about five or six +miles an hour. The less said about its colour the better. At +Athabasca Landing they use the water as a top-dressing for the land. + +I get on well with Mr. O'Kelly because he does not mind answering +questions, and I am rather stupid and do not understand irony, a fact +now published for the first time. + +Mr. Patrick O'Kelly started on "his own" thirty years ago in Manitoba. +His name isn't really O'Kelly, but in this country a name is neither +here nor there. He homesteaded one hundred and sixty statute acres, +but to be a farmer one had to possess a capacity for waiting and he +didn't possess it. After this, he became a prospector. Now, in +prospecting, a man does not have to wait: his money is always +discernible to the eye of faith. Mr. O'Kelly still holds his on this +unnegotiable, spiritualistic plane. In the meanwhile he is boss of a +big lumber camp over Prince Albert way. He used to be a captain on +this river, but he doesn't captain any more. Some of these days he +intends to take a wander back home. He hears that northern folk are +foreigners in the South. This last remark is made with a rising +inflection as if an answer were expected. + +Who would have thought such a pathetic fear to be lurking under so +confident and so square-shouldered an exterior? I can see now why Mr. +O'Kelly finds it hard to get away. Without letting him know that his +secret is suspected, I try to explain how it is the northerners who +have changed. We pioneers talk of going home but we really never go +back--that is the person who went away. This may be equally true of +all migrants who go into a far country, whether it be Abraham who went +into Ur of Chaldea, or Reginald of Oxford who goes into Saskatchewan. + +There are several scribes on board, and one of them, "a editor in human +form," gives us greeting and joins our company. He is a thin, straight +young fellow with a likeable face, but his hair is shockingly awry. + +"So you are an editor," says Mr. O'Kelly. "Your unpeaceable tribe has +committed much damage in this country." + +"What do you mean by calling us a tribe? I conceive that you are an +old fool and perhaps a liberal in politics. Although I am an editor, +and by no means proud, I consider myself to be much better than you." + +"Young person! you mean you are no worse," answers Mr. O'Kelly, "but, +in faith, I meant no offence and I am not a liberal." + +Being thus reassured, the editor proceeds to discuss his difficulties +with us. He has been treated with great unfairness in one of the +northern towns. They gave him a fine mouthful of promises when he went +there, but they gave him nothing else. They failed to pay their +subscriptions and their advertisements, so that he had to leave the +place naked and ashamed. Some day, he is going to write a story in an +American magazine and describe this town as a real-estate office in a +muskeg. It will be marrow to his bones, and he will let the magazine +have the story for nothing. + +Or, worse still, he will tell the truth about all the leading citizens; +he will set it down without equivocation or shadow of turning. + +"But you wouldn't do this latter," I argue; "only a man with ink for +blood could do so terrible a thing." + +"On the contrary, lady," snaps he, "I shall take blood for ink, that is +what I will do." + +"But," said I, "you must expect to be beat a few times in your life, +little man, if you live such a life as a man ought to live, let you be +as strong and healthy as you may." This was quite a clever answer, and +I wish Charles Kingsley had not said it first, then it would have been +original with me. + +This young editor talks with so much vigor and so many gesticulations +one might think he was acting a picture for a biograph machine. It is +a pity his political heroes do not avail themselves of his services. +As a fighter, the dear lad would have a fine genius if properly +incited; also, he has a marvellous vocabulary of flaming adjectives. + +There is an Indian woman on the ship who is married to a white man, who +seems most kind to her. The northern woman who interpreted the Toa +Song for me, says this man believes the world well lost for love, his +heart being very full and his head very empty. You will observe that +this northern woman is a philosopher, probably owing to the fact that +she has had little to read and plenty of time to think. She was born +in this country over fifty years ago but was educated in the South. At +the age of sixteen, she married a Factor of the Hudson's Bay Company, +and is now his widow. This year agone she has been in Europe, but has +returned once more to her native North with its hidden wilds and yet +unhappened things. I tell you that some secret presage lies upon this +land, and one who has sensed it must come back again and again to its +intangible allurement. It may be the strong, austere spirit of the +land that holds one; or the vast voids of the sky, with their blue and +gold, and blue and silver. Or it may be that Tornarsuk, the great +devil of the Arctic, who rides on the wind, steals from their breasts +the midget souls of humans so that they belong to him and must follow +whither he wills. It is not for me to know the reason, or to tell it +to you, for I am southron born and cannot construe aright. + +Time was when this woman only tasted flour once a year. It was in New +Year's Day, when her mother baked cakes for the gentlemen who came to +pay their respects to her--the doctor, the missionary, the clerks at +the post, or the visitors from other posts. On the first of these +occasions her mother, with an ill-grounded confidence, passed the plate +of cakes to the earliest visitors so that there were no cakes left for +the callers who came afterwards. + +When flour became more plentiful, it was her mother's custom to have +cakes every Sunday evening. A cake was baked for each member of the +family and one for the plate. No one dreamed of taking the last cake. +It would have been accounted a gross breach of etiquette to have done +so, and one not to be thought of. + +"But what became of it?" I ask; "who ate it ultimately? Surely some +one knew?" + +Apparently no one did, for I am answered by a lift of one shoulder, +suggestive of ignorance and possibly indifference--a little defensive +shrug which precludes further intrusion into the subject. It is unkind +of her to leave me with this worrying problem, for there are fifty-two +cakes a year to be disposed of, and I may never hope to dispose of them +alone. + +The Indian woman who has the white husband gives me bon-bons from a box +she purchased in Edmonton last week. Nothing so makes for confidence +in women as to eat sweets together. Authors write much about breaking +bread and the sacredness of salt, but, in actual life, nothing cements +friendship like chocolate drops. This is why the woman opens her heart +to me and says she desires to write a book--a great book about the +white people of whom she knows many things. I have no doubt she does, +and that if she put down all that is in her heart without one glance at +the gallery and without trimming her language to the rules of syntax, +her book would be the literary sensation of the year. + +She wants to know if ever I wrote a book. Now, once I did, but it was +a simple book, so that wise people did not care so much as one finger's +fillip for it, but, sometime, I am going to put all their counsel +together and compose a really great one. It will not be disjointed, +but will flow along without a break in the smooth, natural way people +talk when they are alone with their families. It shall concern psychic +phenomena, yearnings, root-causes, the untrammelled life, strange +decadencies, and things like that. It shall be paradoxical, +epigrammatic, erudite, even vitriolic. I will pierce the self-conceit +of these Canadians and tell them they have need to mend their manners; +that they are primitive beasts--even _Diprotodons_. + +Now the _Diprotodon_ was a kind of ferocious kangaroo, carnivorous and +predaceous, which lived in the Tertiary Period and had a skull three +feet in length. Those who are not of this species, I shall designate +as fanatics who cling to worn-out shibboleths over which they snarl +like pestilent dogs; or prigs who affect neurotic cults that are +exceedingly false and not native to this country. I will be superior +and insufferably arrogant so that they may be vastly annoyed with me +and rage like the Psalmist's "heathen." I shall not be kindly to any, +nor say them fair words, no matter how much I may desire to, nor how +much it hurts me to tell lies. + +Then will the wise people take their pens in hand to say that "This +writer is possessed of the discriminating sense to an extraordinary +degree. She has vision, luminosity, verve, technique, and artistic +self-restraint--these, and other palpable qualities which bid us hope, +in spite of all which has been said to the contrary, that the time is +not so hopelessly remote when Canada may lay some small claim to having +a literature of her own." + +Oh Me! Oh Me! This is what they will say, and I will laugh in my +throat and in my sleeves. I win not care the point of one pencil what +they say, so long as they refrain from using the adjective breezy. +When a northern woman goes visiting and the wise people wish to be +kind, they all apply this word to her. When the dubious visitor looks +into the dictionary for the exact meaning of breeze, she finds it +stands for either an uproar or a gentle gale. People have been +murdered for less obvious errors, so that all wise people will please +to be forewarned. + +If you were to ask here what the Indian woman wished to write in a book +about the white people, I would not be able to tell you, for, at this +juncture, we all forgot to talk and crowded to the prow of the vessel +to see a moose that swam boldly ahead of us in the river. He kept far +enough away to be out of range, so that no one shot him. I use the +word shot in deference to the untaught urban folk into whose hands this +book may pass. What the men really desired was to "trump" him. + +We did not see him take to the bank, for we took to the bank ourselves +in order to load wood for the engine. He is a worthy gentleman, the +moose, and should be well esteemed. Dropped in a thicket, hunted by +wolves, unprotected save by his sharp hoof, which, however, will rip +anything softer than a steel plate, he ranges the forests till his +antlers are full-branched, and then, at the age of three, without +costing the Province or the Indian a cent, he tips the scales at a +thousand pounds of meat. + +We are invited to the tent of Mrs. Jack Fish, who receives us seated. +This is not owing to any lack of hospitality on her part, but because +she is very old and quite blind. The Oblate Brothers say she is over a +hundred years old, and truly she might pass for the honourable +great-grandmother of all Canada. Her son, with whom she lives, minds a +wood-pile on the Athabasca, but in the winter he has a house of logs at +Tomato Creek to which he retires. All Indians live in tents from +preference, and not from the sordid reason assigned them by the +would-be poet who declares that "Itchie, Mitchie lives in a tent," for +"He can't afford to pay the rent." There are no rented houses in this +country, and no man has ever heard of a landlord. Every person holds +his house, or his several houses, in fee simple. In Great Britain, +these residences would be designated as "shooting boxes." + +Neither would it be a sign of mental superiority on the part of the +traveller to consider Jack Knife's job a menial one. Banking +situations or provincial politics may have an importance in the fence +country, but in boreal regions the prime test of intelligence is a +knowledge of how to handle a boat or an axe. + +Madam, our hostess, informs the Factor's widow that she keeps quite +well except for an evil and tormenting spirit in her chest. She +desires to know who are in our company, and when she learns that the +_Okimow_, or Great Chief of the Peace River Country, is one of us, she +asks for tobacco. Ah! the Chief at Fort Edmonton would be generous to +her, but he is dead now and there is no tobacco to soothe her pain. +When she was young, her people fought with the Blackfeet tribe in the +Bear Hills, and many of the Crees were scalped. She fled through the +forests to Fort Edmonton, carrying her two children on her back, but +there was much rain and almost she was drowned crossing the rivers. +That was many, many nesting-moons ago, and now she is old and her pipe +is empty of tobacco. + +"Is the kind lady going down the river to find a man?" + +No! the kind lady has white hair and her man is dead. + +"May be it is the _Okimow_?" + +No! the _Okimow_ has a wife in the South with brown hair. + +Ah well! Ah well! but it was different when she was young. Then every +woman's skin was full of oil and there were many braves who loved her. + +After she has been led into the open, and has had her picture taken +with us, the great _Okimow_ takes her back to her blankets and fills +her lap with a heap of pungent tobacco. It will be many moons before +our honourable great-grandmother requires a fresh supply. "An old +straggler," that is what I call her, after the beggar-woman who asked +Sir Walter Scott for alms. + +The religion of the gentle Nazarene has cut the fighting sinews of the +Indians. This was why the Christianized Hurons were brushed off the +earth by the tigerish and unapproachable Iroquois. The Hurons became +soft, and being soft, they became a prey. In some inexplicable way, we +Anglo-Saxons have managed to keep our bumps of veneration and +combativeness well partitioned or estranged and so keep mastery of the +changeling tribes who permit them to commingle. This is why the +Indians are a dying race in a new country. This is why our honourable +great-grandmother whimpers for tobacco instead of hurling us over the +bank and throwing her camp-fire on the top of us. I could almost find +it in my heart to wish that she had. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + +AT THE PARTING OF THE RIVERS + + "Think o' the stories round the camp, the yarns along the track + O' Lesser Slave an' Herschel's Isle an' Flynn at Fond du Lac; + Of fur and gun, an' ranch, an' run, an' moose an' caribou, + An' bulldogs eatin' us to death! + Good-bye--Good-luck to you!" + + +Mirror Landing, where we leave the boat to make the portage to Soto +Landing, is on the Lesser Slave River, at its confluence with the +Athabasca. Its name has been well chosen, for the Lesser Slave River +is a clear stream, and shows a kindly portrait to all who look therein. +A telegraph office, an official residence, a stable, and storage sheds +are the only buildings. What is to be done with the portaging party, +whom we have met here and who go back to Athabasca Landing on our boat, +is beyond a mere woman to say. Both parties must spend the night here; +there is only one bunk to every twenty persons, and those who hold +possession utterly refuse to sleep outside with the mosquitoes and +bulldog flies. Once I read a story in the Talmud which I considered +wholly fabulous. It was about a mosquito saving the life of David when +Saul hunted him upon the mountains. I no longer doubt this story, my +incredulity having vanished this day with my courage. A mosquito is +big enough to do anything. + +A member of the Royal North-West Mounted Police, truly a most +formidable appearing man, insisted on searching our luggage for +contraband liquor. I was sorely displeased, and could have dealt him a +clout with all my might, for the froward manner in which he turned out +my things to the public view. He might have known if I carried a +flask, it would be in my coat pocket. His only find was an unbroached +bottle of elderberry wine which a rancher's wife was bringing home for +her dinner-party next Christmas. Be it said to the youth's credit that +upon the circumstances being explained to him he returned the wine to +her. He had no authority for so doing, but assuredly he had the +countenance of a great example Yahveh of the Jews having aforetime +"winked at" certain breaches of the law which He considered to be the +better kept in their non-observance. + +The liquor taken by the police is either given to the hospital at +Grouard or poured on the ground as a libation to Bacchus and his +woodland troup. It is very foolish to ask the officer in command if +his men ever drink themselves, for he will say, "Pooh! Pooh!" and use +other argumentative exclamations that will fright you out of your wits. +You would almost think the subject was loaded, and it takes a soft look +and a wondrously soft answer to turn away his wrath. + +Early in the evening I was invited to browse at the official residence, +and I had a good time; that is to say, I found it distinctly +entertaining. "I would say that you are very welcome," remarked my +hostess as she held out both her hands, "were it not that it seems an +understanding of the fact. I have read your _Sowing Seeds in Danny_, +and feel that I know you extremely well." + +It was fortunate I did not tell her she had confused me with Mrs. +McClung, for she gave me eggs to eat that were most cunningly scrambled +with cheese; also many hot rolls sopped in butter, and yellow honey in +its comb. + +This is a ramblesome bungalow and very comfortable. Musical +instruments, couches, big cushions, book-shelves and pictures take on a +peculiar attractiveness when they are the only ones in a hundred miles +or more. + +After supper we read _Phil-o-rum Juneau_, by William Henry Drummond, +and discussed its relation to the French Canadian legend, _La +Chasse-Gallerie_. Of all our Canadian legends, I like it the best, and +it may happen that you will too. It tells how on each New Year's Night +the spirits of the woodsmen and rivermen are carried in phantom canoes +from these lonely northlands back to the old homesteads in the south, +where, unseen and undisturbed, they mingle with their friends. The +father embraces his children; the lover his maiden, the husband his +wife, and once more the son lays his head on his mother's lap. All of +the voyageurs join the feast, the song, and the dance, so that no man +is lonely in those hours, neither is he weary or sad. It is a better +thing, I make believe, than even the communion of saints. But just +before the dawn comes, the wraith men find themselves back on the +Athabasca, the Mackenzie and the Slave, and no one speaks of where he +has been, or of what he experienced, for all this he must keep hidden +in his heart. + +When, over a century ago, the legend first sprang to life, there were +none save men to travel like this, but now, of times, a woman may +travel too. I know this for a certainty in that each New Year's Night +I go myself. In my dug-out canoe--delved from wishful thoughts and +things like that--I take my hurried way across prodigious seas of ice +where never living foot has fallen; adown ill-noted trails through +silver trees; by hidden caverns that are the lairs of the running +winds; over dark forests of pine and across uncounted leagues of white +prairies which light up the darkness, till I come to the warmer +southland, where youths and maidens make wreaths of greenery, and where +mellow-voiced bells ring out the dying year. + +And when those who are my own people feel their hearts to be of a +sudden rifled of love; that some one has brushed their cheek, or that a +head is resting on their shoulder, then do they know the exile has come +back, for I have told them it will be thus. + +And you, O my readers of the Seven Seas, now that we are friends and +know each other closely, will you of New Year's Night be keenly +watchful too. + +It was here that our conversation wheeled off from the consideration of +this legend to the northern postman. In the final summary he must be +classed among those peerless fellows who, because of their courage and +incredible endurance, have won for Canada this myriad-acred but +hitherto waste heritage. No man here who puts his hand to the mail +bags must ever look back; he must have the quality of keeping on +against the odds. He is the modern young Lord Lochinvar, who stays not +for brake and stops not for stone. Often his route is stretched out to +hundreds of miles, and there is no corner grocery where he may thaw out +his extremities while mumbling driftless things about the weather and +the government. + +Presently the railways will have taken over his perilous profession, +and he will exist only as a memory of pioneer days. For this reason I +took great heed while my host talked concerning him and of the +qualities which go into making a successful postie under the aurora. +He must be agile, light of weight, abstemious, trustworthy, tireless, +thewed and sinewed like a lynx, and, above all, he must have +wire-strung nerves. In a word, his profession requires a strong will +in a sound body. + +"Does it ever happen that the mail is not delivered?" I asked. + +My host hesitated, and made three rings of smoke while he considered +the answer, as though he would be sure-footed as to his facts. + +"Sometimes it is not delivered, Madam," said he; "there may be an +untoward happening, in which event its delivery depends upon the +recovery of the carrier's body." + +When he made another three rings of smoke he proceeded with the story. +"Yes! the mail-carrier in this country is a special person and must not +be judged as general. He deserves a much better reward than he gets. +To my thinking, it is a vast pity poetic justice so frequently fails. +It may be that some day you will write a story about us Northmen, and +if you do, be sure you set down how Destiny so often blue-pencils our +lives in the wrong places. We will read your book down here, all of +us, just to see if you have been true to us instead of laying up for +yourself royalties on earth." + +"And where do you bury a postman who dies with his mail-bags?" I +further pursued. + +"Holy Patriarch!" he ejaculated. "You don't think he is carried back +to Athabasca Landing? His body is cached in a tree and the police are +notified. When they give their permission, and when the ground is +thawed out in the spring, we bury him just where he died. It may, +however, interest you to know that the letters 'O.H.M.S.' are cut on +his tombstone." + +"'O.H.M.S.'" I repeated. "Don't you mean 'I.H.S.,' _Iesous Hominum +Salvator_, the same as we write over our altars and on our baptismal +fonts?" + +"No!" he replied, "I mean 'O.H.M.S.'; the same as they stamp on +government letters which are franked '_On His Majesty's Service_.' You +see the work of delivering the mails down this way, while extremely +arduous, must never for a moment be considered as menial. The carrier +is a servant to none save His Imperial Majesty, George the Fifth, of +England." + +They are all gamblers, these Northmen: they play for love, for money or +for the mere pleasure of the play, and Boys of our Heart, like the +mail-couriers and the striplings of the Mounted Police, gamble with the +elements for life itself. + +"Ah, well!" remarked my host, as he put away his pipe for the night, +"these fellows know the rules and dangers of the game when they 'sit +in,' and while twenty-six of the cards are black, it is just as well to +bear in mind that there are an equal number of reds." + +On my return to the ship at midnight, I found that some one had seized +and was occupying my state-room on the nine-tenths of the law idea. +She seemed to be a woman turbulent in spirit, and, accordingly I left +her in possession: also, I left her door open to the mosquitoes, who +are evil whelps and more tutored in crime than you could believe. + +The purser, a very agreeable and well-behaved man, gave up his office +to me, but I did not rest well, in that a whirligig of jubilant +mosquitoes was occupying it conjunctively. Being full-blooded and +sometimes inclined to be rather mean, I endeavoured to accept this +retributory plague as a chastening which might prove beneficial to both +body and soul. + +In the morning all the reckonings of the trip were settled at a desk +beside my bunk, the men moving around with the prehensile tread of the +villain who goes round a corner in the moving-picture films. I +pretended they had not awakened me, and breathed with much regularity, +but all the while I was stealthily peeping. They would not have +understood if I had made objections to their entering, for here, at the +edge of things, all men are gentlemen, or are supposed to be. +Conventionality would be actual boorishness, and a woman must try and +earn for herself the title of a good scout, it being the highest +encomium the North can pass upon her. + +Before leaving the ship for the portage, we backed into the Athabasca, +and, after travelling two or three miles, unloaded a vast deal of +freight at a little tent town on the bank. Here and there, through +this country, you come upon these white encampments, which mean that +the iron furrows of the railway are steadily pushing the frontier +farther and farther north. This was the first load of freight to be +brought down the Athabasca for the building of the Grand Trunk Pacific +Railway. It was only rough hardware truck, but, withal, amiable to my +eyes, standing, as it did, for the end of a long rubber between fur and +wheat. You would like the looks of the young engineers who took charge +of the stuff. They were no muffish sick-a-bed fellows, but brown with +wind and sun, hardy-moulded and masterful. One of them has written +something about life on the right-of-way, which he intends sending me +to touch up a bit for a paper. It augurs well for a country when its +workers love it and want to write about it. + +And even so, My Canada, should I forget thee, may my pen fingers become +sapless and like to poplar twigs that are blasted by fire. And may it +happen in like manner to any of thy breed who are drawn away from love +of thee. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. + +ON THE PORTAGE + + We sing the open road, good friends, + But here's a health to you.--WILLIAM GRIFFITH. + + +As one watches the efforts of the wagoners to store away the valises +and rolls of blankets without ejecting the passengers, one remembers +that Caesar's word for baggage was impedimenta. But Prosper, our +wagoner, is the best packer on the trail, also he can sing, "I've got +rings on my fingers." + +"It is strange there are so many dingy half-breeds in the world," says +the person by my side who objects to her blankets being tied on behind. +"To my thinking there is no colour to compare with white. 'Ishmaels,' +I call these breeds." + +Prosper's bearing under her choleric criticism is so superbly apathetic +that I like him swiftly and completely. Any one can see that he is a +man of substantial qualities and not to be excited by fidgety women. + +It is fourteen rough miles from Mirror Landing to Soto Landing, along a +black trail that lifts and dips through the tall ranks of the poplars +and pines. The scenery offers no great varieties except those of light +and shade, vista and perspective. + +Whenever we pass through a thick-knit stand of pines, the people in the +wagons are instinctively reticent and subdued, but, upon emerging into +open space where there are only birches to throw a shimmering wayward +shadow, 'tis observable that every one laughs or sings. It was _La +Marseillaise_ the eight Oblate Brothers sang, and once they broke into +a French ballad the theme of which was-- + + "Mary, I love you, + Will you marry me?" + + +The team on our wagon is a badly mated one. The off beast trots like a +sheep and has a way of hanging her head as if some one had told her a +story too shocking to contemplate: while Lisette, the nigh mare, +although strong as a steel cable, picks objections to every foot of the +way either with a kick or an idiotic sidelong prance. Now and then +Prosper, who knows the whole truth about Lisette, and who looks more +religious than he really is, advises her as to her forbears and +predicts as to her posterity, but, like Job's wild ass, this +whimsical-minded trailer "scorneth the multitude of the city and +regardeth not the crying of the driver." + +"She's a female voter, she is," says an Englishman, who has been back +home on a visit, "and it's a tidy bit of walloping she needs." + +The London suffragettes would have been pleased with our opinion of +their countryman and that we were able to express it in the exact +words. After a full and unreserved apology from the frightened +traveller, we, in turn, retracted the indecorous charge that he was a +ridiculous pinhead, and a man of low understanding, whereupon peace +once more reigned in our wagon. It is astonishing what pernicious +consequences may follow from the kicking of a wayward-minded mare on +the trail. Most of the frontier tragedies are attributable to this +very thing. + +Anderson's stopping-place which we are passing used to be the only +house between Grouard and Athabasca Landing, and accordingly is a +notable landmark. Anderson is still unmarried. It is forced upon the +notice of a traveller in these North-Western Provinces that every +bachelor has little spruce-trees around his house. The bachelor thinks +we don't suspect his reason, but we know it is because he hopes, some +day, they may come in handy for Christmas-trees. + +We stay for a little while at the house of Ernst and Minna, who came +from Europe more than six years ago. It is a sheer joy to know Minna, +who is a little round-bodied woman, firm-fleshed and wholesome as an +autumn apple. She has been at Athabasca Landing once. She hears there +are trains there now. It may be that Madam saw them. + +Minna had planned a trip to the Landing this summer but it happened she +did not go after all. Ah, well! there is the money saved and she is +sure to see the Landing again. Minna was going to the hospital of the +good sisters to lie in with her fifth baby and Ernst was to stay here +with the children. You may believe it too, that Ernst is no +butter-fingers with children and a most cunning baker of bread. Minna +says that down this way every man can bake bread--and does bake bread. + +The little house by the trail would, of course, miss its mother for a +while, but the garden seeds were in; the children's clothes were mended +to the last stitch, and a parcel of baby's fixings was on its way to +her from Edmonton. Now it happened there was too much important +freight from the boat to carry this parcel and so it was left behind +till the next trip. It was nearly too late and Minna was greatly +perplexed, for surely she was going to see the Landing and how could +she go without the baby's clothing. + +But, at last, the parcel came, and the wagoner who delivered it was to +call the next day on his return trip and take Minna with him over the +portage to the boat. He came, and with him were several passengers. +It was unfortunate there was no woman among them, for Minna had no +neighbours; Ernst had gone down the trail, and her hour was upon her. + +"Mother, she iss sick," explained her little son, "and no one iss in to +come. I am by the door to stand till Father he comes back." It was +nearly an hour before the distressful travellers were able to find +Ernst, but no man ventured past the young sentinel. + +The little daughter was half-an-hour old when Ernst was deposited on +his door-step, but Minna had cared for the child herself. It was too +bad the mother had fallen from the loft and hurt herself, for now, she +cannot go to the hospital and she wanted to see the Landing. Ah, well! +there is the money saved and that is something. It takes much money +for five children. + +"How old is the baby girl?" I ask, as I take my turn in kissing the +mite's forehead, and in wishing that she may be a good little scout +like Minna. + +"She was one week last Tuesday. No! two weeks last Tuesday. Ah! +Madam, I cannot surely say. Ernst I will ask him how old is the baby." + + * * * * * + +Once on the journey we passed a speckled owl in a pine-tree, but she +did not answer to our "Oo-hoo!" neither did she so much as open an eye. +She looks rich unto millions, and thoroughly proof against all appeals. +She is what Cowper called the University of Oxford, "a rich old vixen." +I intend affecting this pose myself when I find the gold at the foot of +the rainbow, in order that I may be extremely insolent to the bankers +and to other offensive collectors. + +Prosper says he often shoots owls who lodge in the fir-trees, and that +he gets two dollars bounty from the government from each one. He does +not know it is accounted a sin to him who kills a bird that has +sheltered in a fir-tree, or an animal that has crouched thereunder, for +this is the tree of the Christ-Child, and a House of Refuge in the +forest to the denizens thereof. To those men or women who love the +fir, its bitter taste on their tongues may be more holy than bread or +wine, and may convey to them an inly grace. + +Also it is wrong to cast away the Christmas-tree, or the ropes of +greenery which have been used for the celebration of Christmastide. +These should be burned upon the hearth as a sweet savour, and the +fire-master should say, "Peace be to this household and to all the +household of Canada." + +The resin of conifers is a more agreeable and a more seemly offering to +Our Lady of the Snow than aloes, or myrrh or spices, so that it behoves +us, her children, to look anew to our censing pots. + +Since leaving Athabasca Landing, we have passed through enough +uncultivated land to solve all the problems of Great Britain which +arise out of unemployed workmen, and out of slum conditions with their +attendant evils. + +As its stupendous acreage, enormous fertility, and its lifeless voids +are daily thrust upon me, I am filled with amazement. Surely no land +was ever so little appreciated by its owners. If there were an ocean +between it and our more populous provinces to the south, one might the +better understand the reasons. This waste heritage can only be +accounted for on the grounds of a lack of interest, and because people +are indolent and like to live softly. Only two members of the Alberta +legislature have ever visited this country, and these two belong here. +It does not need a new Moses to stand and say, "This is a goodly land"; +it needs a new and more drastic Joshua, to take them by the ear and +lead them in. The time is coming when the crops from this land will, +each year, outstrip in value all the gold money in the world, and it +will not be so long either. I intend to buy as much of it myself as I +can afford, and if I can persuade the Christians of my own town to lend +me the money instead of building churches, I shall buy more than I can +afford. I have read much about this country, but I find it better to +come here and tread out the grapes for myself. + +While I have been taking stock mentally of these things, we have +arrived at Soto Landing, on the Lesser Slave River, and already the +Indian women have come out of their tents to watch our movements. +These people are called squatters hereabout, but I prefer to call them +nesters. They sow not, neither do they gather into barns. They don't +care to do either. + +They view us women with a quiet appraising look, but not understanding +"their dark, ambigious, fantasticall, propheticall, gibrish," I cannot +learn their conclusions. The Factor's widow, who is still with us, +heard one of the Indian men describe her hat as a pot, whereupon she +remarked to him in excellent Cree that her pot lacked a handle. If I +were to set down how the other Indians enjoyed this stabbing surprise, +and how they were contorted with laughter by reason of their fellow's +confusion, you would hardly believe me, so I shall not set it down. + +One Indian woman wears a dress that has in it the many shocking colours +of a Berlin-wool mat. She is pleased when we stroke it with our hands, +and I can see she is as proud of it as I am of my dimity bed-gown with +the pink rosebuds on it. + +Dinner is ready on the boat and our appetites are too sharp-set to +permit of delay. We eat and eat just as if eating were our chief and +ever-lasting happiness, and as if life itself lay in a fleshpot. + +This is a larger and better equipped boat than those on the Athabasca +because it is meant for the lake traffic. We do not leave Soto Landing +till three hours past the scheduled time, for Mr. J. K. Cornwall, the +Member of Parliament for the Peace River Constituency, affectionately +known hereabouts as "Jim," has chosen to make the portage afoot. + +This country, from Athabasca Landing to the Peace River, is commonly +described as "Jim's Country," and if you travel it over you will +understand the reason. + +Who supports the stopping-places on the river? Jim's freighters. + +Who cuts the wood on the bank? Jim's Indians. + +Who hauls the passengers, the freight, and the mail-bags over the +portage? Jim's wagoners. + +Who owns the ships on the Athabasca and the Slave? Why, Jim himself. + +How Jim can look his pay-sheet in the eye every fortnight and keep +laughing, is, to my thinking, the miracle of the North. But then it +must be borne in mind that I have never seen Jim's ledger-book, and, as +yet, no one else has except his accountants and bankers. + +The dream of Jim's life has been to lay bare the wealth of the North, +for the good of the North, and every day he is making his dream come +true. + +But I was telling you about Soto Landing. The freight shed here is in +charge of a bachelor whose wardrobe is drying audaciously on the trees. +He says he ties his clothes together with a rope and lets the current +of the river wash them, but I think this statement is what Montaigne +would describe as "A shameless and solemne lie." + +He asks me how long I have been out from Ireland and I tell him three +years. "What was the charge!" he pursues. + +"Stealing the crown jewels," I reply. + +"Oh!" says he, "it's the same time since I left the sod. It was for +killing a landlord." + +Now as this man came from New Brunswick, and as I came from Ontario, it +may readily be seen that we have both become Albertans. + +"Are you not ashamed to deceive a woman like me, and an ignoramus who +is travelling north to gain instruction?" I ask of him. + +"Woman! You're no woman. I mean you're no ignoramus--and, although +you question us, I perceive you know more about the north than all of +us. But seeing you wish to be further instructed, come with me to the +freight shed that I may show you how the wholesale houses pack their +goods. Believe me, Lady, I cut to the root of the matter when I say +the only downright packers in this north country are the Hudson's Bay +Company. You can plainly see this for yourself, and I hope you will +inform the Board of Trade about it when you go home. Here, you will +observe a set of scales, but the weights were insecurely attached and +have been lost. + +"This heap of refuse is the remains of a shipment of crockery that was +crated too lightly. Errant improvidence, I call it. Lady, the pitcher +is no longer broken at the fountain: it is our habit here to break it +on the portage. It is no exaggeration when I say I am worked like a +transcontinental railway system, hammering up boxes or shovelling out +damaged merchandise. + +"Cast your eye up at these chairs in the rafters, six dozen of them by +actual count, sent north by a furniture house last year but delivery +was refused by the purchaser." + +"They look like good chairs," say I, "what is the matter with them?" + +"Matter enough," he continues, "shipped as 'knocked-down' furniture, +four legs to each chair, all of them hind legs. This was a matter of +considerable vexation to the purchaser, who paid cash for the goods and +for their transportation." + +"But the furniture house will send the front legs," I argue. + +"Might as well try to get blood out of sawdust," says he. Now, +personally, I think this simile is an inconclusive one, for I have +known timbermen to sweat great drops of blood into sawdust, and there +is no reason why those drops could not be extracted. + +This freight master is a compelling man, and he says the shippers are +expert sinners and a parcel of ignorant and makeshift people. It may +be he is right: it is not for me to gainsay him, or to further +discompose his temper, when all the evidence is so plainly visible. + +After this discussion, I play with the other children who tumble about +on the hillside. They all talk Cree, and some of them who have been to +school talk French and English. + +One little girl, with the fine insouciance of eight years, says there +is no use praying _Le Bon Dieu_, for He doesn't understand Cree very +well. She has repeated her prayer over and over but she has never had +a soft-faced doll yet. + +Solemn little mother! Her prayer, at any rate, is reasonably specific, +and I can see how one of these days it is going to be answered. + +It is good to rest in the shade of the trees while these +copper-coloured babies jabber about me in soft Cree, and finger my hair +and clothes. Truly, I am very fortunate and have much fulness of +pleasure. I might be that same good girl whom an English playwright +describes as having never compromised herself, and yet the wickedest +child who ever was slapped could hardly have had a better time. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + +ON THE LESSER SLAVE RIVER + + Gitchie Manito, the Mighty, + Mitchie Manito, the bad; + In the breast of every Redman, + In the dust of every dead man, + There's a tiny heap of Gitchie-- + And a mighty mound of Mitchie-- + There's the good and there's the bad.--CY WARMAN. + + +From Soto Landing, the Lesser Slave River bends its course to the north +and west till it empties into Lesser Slave Lake at Sawridge. It is a +small river, being about a hundred and fifty feet wide and about thirty +deep. Owing to its sharp curving banks much care is required in its +navigation. Its banks are heavily wooded and as we pass down its quiet +reaches we seem to have sailed into a dreamful world, where just to +breathe is a delight. I account it sinful to talk in these +surroundings, but one may not hope to enjoy solitude for any +considerable time in a country where women-travellers are sufficiently +rare to arouse a raging curiosity in the breast of every male entity +who comes within reach of her. People like these northmen, who live +out of doors most of the year, are not easily bored. They are +interested in things; they are perennially young, and this, I take it, +is the secret of Pan. + +Now, the trouble about having a man near is that he is always picking +up your things and so making you nervous. I prefer to wait till ready +to move before regaining my handkerchief, my back-comb, my hand satchel +and my scarf. This is why I pretend not to notice the iron-built +person with strong white teeth who has seated himself nearby and who is +watching a chance to restore something. He is what the Irish call +"bold-like." I know what he is thinking about and understand his +motive perfectly. He wants to know if I have ever been north before. +He is the thirteenth man so to wonder. I am, however, severely +purposed not to tell him. + +There is a belief, common in the cities, that no questions are asked in +the bush; that people may travel for days together without divulging +ends. Here is a good place to spend an arrow on this widely droll +deception. An uninquisitive man is as hard to find here as an +unsociable cockerel. Goodness Divine! the chief use of a stranger in +the woods is to keep the denizens of it from dying from _ennui_ and +lack of news. They would consider it the essence of uncordiality not +to show an interest in the affairs of a stranger, especially as the +stranger might possibly have succeeded in smuggling a flash +[Transcriber's note: flask?] or two past the police on the prohibition +line. + +This bush-ranger catches me off my guard when a bulldog fly takes a +piece out of my ear. It is his opportunity to produce a vial of +collodion for the wound. As he pulls out the cork and finds a match to +dip in the mixture, he tells me that the bulldog fly is no sweet angel +and equal to ten thousand times its weight in prize-fighters--a +statement which I do not think it fit to disbelieve. The collodion +having eased the hurt this impudent gentleman draws up his chair and +talks with an immense volubility concerning the species, genera, and +habits of these flies till one might take him for a professor of +entomology. + +The long winter nights in this province enable the denizens of it to +become well posted in any subject which they may elect to pursue. This +was how the late Bishop Bompas, who lived here for over half a century, +became the first authority in the world on Syriac, so that the +_savants_ of Europe were wont to refer their mooted points to this +lonely old prelate for decision, waiting a year, or often longer, for +the answer which was carried by Indians for hundreds of miles down the +out trail to Edmonton. My new friend declares that, like Montaigne, +the bulldog fly has only one virtue and that this one got in by stealth. + +"Yes?" say I, with a rising reflection which delicately hints at an +answer. + +He does not seem to hear me, this cold-chilled, care-hardened +northerner, and goes on stuffing his pipe with exit-plug and searching +through pocket after pocket for a match as if my remark were of no +concernment. He is trying to pretend he has known me for a long time, +and that I was the one who took the initiative in this +acquaintanceship. This is why I became dumb, and why he repeats his +statement. Still I am wordless, whereupon he vouchsafes, with an +exasperating drawl, that the fly's one virtue lies in the fact that it +prefers picturesque food which is very eatable. + +Our parliament should legislate against the cunning arts of these +designing northerners, against which no town-bred woman may hope to set +up an adequate defence, however perfect may be her poise, or fertile +and calculating her brain. + +This person tells me that all a man needs to succeed in the North-West +Provinces is to keep his head hard and his pores open--a recipe, no +doubt, equally applicable in the more southerly regions, and one which +I am supposed to deduct he, himself, has proven with very happy success. + +He has been south getting people to come to the Peace River Country, +the new and unpossessed empire where there are twenty-two hours of +daylight and which will, one day, be belted by a string of cities and +gridironed by a score of railways. It is good to listen to this fellow +talk, for, in his calculations lineal or intellectual, he can measure +nothing less than a mile. He is typical of the great and splendid body +of Canadian and English pioneers who have absolutely no truck with +pessimism. These men and women are opening up this empire and they are +under no misapprehensions concerning it. They are people with a +vision, which vision they are willing to endorse with the best years of +their lives. + +_Kitemakis_, the poor one, who intends writing the book about the white +folk, has drawn near to us and is listening to our talk. We invite her +to join us and, after awhile, she tells us curious legends of the north +in which fear does many times more prevail than love; these, and old +superstitions which catch your fancy sharply and fresh the dusty +dryness of your spirit. + +Although they are in no great credit with historians, it is an odd idea +of mine that the only true history of a country is to be found in its +fairy tales. These seem to be the crystallization of the country's +psychology. On the trail, on the river, in the woods, you may glean +from the Redmen and their mate-women tales that are well veined with +the fine gold of poetry, but which, as a general thing, are +inconclusive and do not serve aright the ends of justice. As you +search into the untaught minds of these Indian folk and pull on their +mental muscle, you must perforce recall the amazing sensation of the +gentleman who took the hand of a little ragged girl in his and felt +that she wanted a thumb. + +Or again, in your Anglo-Saxon superiority you may feel like that +Merodach, the King of Uruk, of whom a philosopher tells us. This +Merodach wished to make his enemies his footstool, so as he sat at +meat, he kept a hundred kings beneath his table with their thumbs cut +off that they might be living witnesses to his power and leniency. + +And when Merodach observed how painfully the kings fed themselves with +the crumbs that fell to them, he praised God for having given thumbs to +man. "It is by the absence of thumbs," he said, "that we are enabled +to discern their use." + +Listen now to this tale of the North: Once there was a smiling woman in +this land and wherever she went she brought warmth with her and light, +so that even the ice melted in the rivers. Her eyes were blue like the +flowers and her skin was white like the milk of a young mother. As she +passed through the land the fish swam out of their caves, the birds +rested on their nests, and even the dead women who were in the clay +stirred themselves when she passed over, for once they had known lovers +and had carried men children. She was vastly kind, this woman, and was +known even to the dear God and the Holy Virgin in the country of the +beautiful heaven. + +Now, there was also in this river land an evil man of impetuous +appetite who was part bear, and had seven tongues, and his arms had +claws instead of hands. And it befell that when he saw the woman and +heard her voice that was sweet like the singing voice of an arrow when +it leaves the bow, he yearned to her with a vehement love and wooed her +with cunning words and with dram songs that she might come to him and +be his mate-woman. + +"So strong am I," he said, "that my blow can break any skull. My skin +is flushed, and my flesh is warm with thoughts of you. My bed is of +soft skins and I will feed you with yellow marrow from white bones. I +am _Mistikwan_, the Head, and I have strength and skill to feed the +mouth of my woman. I am _Askinekew_, the Young Man." + +But the woman flouted him, for he was hateful with his hands of hair +and his seven tongues; besides she knew, this woman, that there were +matters of scandal against him and that the people of the Crees said +_weyesekao_, "He is a flesh-eater," and hid themselves in the trees as +he passed by. + +And because she thus flouted him, the dew stood out on his face like +the juice on the fir-tree, for he loved her most exceedingly. + +But as he drew near and grasped her in his strong arms that could not +be unloosed, the woman's heart became weak as the poplar smoke when it +turns into air. + +And thus he holds her for nine months, this _Askinekew_, the Young Man +who is strong and very mischievous, till she bears him a son, when it +happens that for three months he falls asleep so that the woman goes +free to bring heat and light to the river-land and meat and fish to the +kettles. + +Thus does Kitemakis, "the poor one," tell me the story of winter and +summer and of the birth of the year. + +And Kitemakis, who has "the young lamb's heart among the full-grown +flocks," advises me to hold no converse with left-handed people, for it +is well known in these parts that such have communion with the devils. + +I am bewared too, that if I have a bad dream, that is to say, if I +dream of small-pox, or of white people, I must cut a lock from over my +ear and burn it in the fire. + +Also, Madam is instructed to throw away the wishbone of any bird she +may eat in order that it may grow again and be food for other folk. + +And Kitemakis tells me further that when Amisk, the beaver, dies his +soul lives on. In the happy hunting grounds the beaver was a carpenter +who, through some distemper of the mind, kept working while the moose +were on the runway so that he frightened them away. This caused the +chief hunter to become very angry and he said to the beaver, "Thou +shalt built always, and men shall break down thy work and take thy pelt +for covering. Also, thou shalt eat wood forever." + +I cannot hear any more of these stories for my attention is drawn to a +man who has come close to the ship in a small row-boat. The engine has +stopped and a permit is handed to him over the side of the vessel. The +man looks like a Scotchman, seems like an Irishman, but in reality is a +German, an erstwhile soldier, who makes his livelihood in curing and +smoking fish. He is indulging in a surly and wrong-headed paroxysm +because Elise, his wife, is not on the boat. Elise went to the city to +have her teeth filled and still lingers in the south. A certain rude +fellow with a brass-throated laugh is suggesting of the +soldier-fisherman that Elise may be appreciative of the change of +society and that he is foolish to look for her under two months. +"Better enjoy your permit before Elise gets home; that's my advice," +enjoins the tormentor. + +"About the viskey, not one tam I care," replies the irascible husband, +"it's ma vife I vant. Ma vife she in Edmonton stays"--a praiseworthy +choice on his part which, to our way of thinking, minifies the +oft-urged but yet unproven claim that "A woman's only a woman, but a +good cigar's a smoke." + +As the man pushes off, Baldy, a pucker-faced fellow whose real name is +Nathaniel, assures me that this German is considered "sorta queer" +hereabouts, and that it is nothing short of flat irreverence for a man +to speak so lightly about his permit in a land of such inordinate +thirsts. + +This matter of leaving home for the treatment of sore molars has +suddenly become an important one in the north. Hitherto, the traders +of the Hudson's Bay Company and the missionaries did not need to go to +the city on business, or to see their mother-in-law; their errand was +teeth. But this summer, the Company seems to have waxed over-wise, for +the Inspector of Posts is bringing a dentist. It was only yesterday +that a woman who [Transcriber's note: line possibly missing here] women +alike consider this to be an ill courtesy and hold to the hope that the +dentist may be drowned at Athabasca Landing. The woman who tells me of +it believes when one gives nine-tenths of her time to the Company, the +church, and the household it is not wicked to take one-tenth for +herself. Indeed, there are times when she honestly desires to be +wicked and to take several-tenths for herself. The whole arrangement +she stigmatizes as a graceless one and a blot on the Company's +escutcheon. + +Still, there are drawbacks in being so far from a dentist. It was only +yesterday that a woman who was using the river as her wash-pot, dropped +her new set of teeth overboard. She had not been out for five years +and made the trip with her husband and her two youngest sons at the +cost of much time and money. However amusing the incident might be to +thoughtless onlookers, at the bottom it was almost tragic, and she, at +least, is hoping that the H. B. Co. dentist will meet no dire or +untimely fate before reaching Grouard. This is a healthful-bodied, +healthful-minded woman with a temperament that adjusts itself to life. +She is proud of the fact that she is educating her five sons at home; +that she cooks for the ten men engaged in her husband's saw-mill, and +that she has twelve hundred cabbages in her garden. I am glad she +wears a hoop of diamonds on her finger and that her fur wrap would cost +a fortune in Paris. It means that her husband is no stingy, +unappreciative curmudgeon and that all is well with her. + +Sawridge is at the mouth of the Lesser Slave River where it enters into +the lake of the same name. At present, it consists of a Hudson's Bay +Company post and a telegraph office. Some day, by reason of its +location, it will be a good-sized town. Farther on are the Swan Hills +and the Swan River. This is the river referred to by Lever in _Charles +O'Malley_. The young gentleman whose affairs were in an ill posture +had his choice, you may remember, between going to "Hell or Swan +River." This was a libel on the place and an impudent falsity, for, if +you omit the mosquitoes with their unhandsome manners, one might call +it the trail to Paradise. Besides, if life cut too hard the young +gentleman might have taken his last trail here. It would not have been +a bad death either--a wide sky, a wide sea, and a sudden dip into +immortality--or oblivion. + +On the lower deck, the Indians who travel to Grouard for the Golden +Jubilee of the great Bishop Grouard are whiling away the time by +playing poker. The cards which they use weigh twice as much as when +purchased, but why worry in a land where microbes are unheard of and so +have no pernicious consequence. These Indians have the air of +unambitious men; they have not cared to come into the big Canadian job. +They appear to do little else than eat, sleep, and gamble. But, god of +civilization, what else is there to do except make love, and men cannot +make love to preposterous women who work always. These fellows have, +however, one saving quality, having never formed themselves into +unions. Now that even the farmers have gone over to the enemy, the +Redmen would appear to be our last hope. + +A doctor on the boat who knows all about the Indians, tells me of their +misfortunes, peccadilloes, their thin transitory pleasures and their +love and practise of idleness. But this is not strange, for gossip is +so common in the north that every one knows "the carryings-on" of every +one else from the Arctic circle clear up to the Landing. Indeed, I +have heard tell that these northerners know what you are up to before +you have done it. + +The Indians, the doctor would have me notice, are beginning to chew gum +and hence their teeth and gums are deteriorating. + +The mildewed fellow who is dealing the cards is pestiferous with +disease. His birth was a biological tragedy. The doctor thinks he +could best serve his tribe by dying without delay. + +Andre, the man who has just won the jackpot, is not the prototype of +the expression "Honest Indian." He is a bad Indian, a most bad Indian. + +"His profession?" I ask. + +"Oh, Andre is my camp-cook," is the reply, "and when he washes himself +he uses quite a cupful of water." By way of amends, Andre affects a +stupendous scarf-pin, a watch-chain, and two rings. Ah well! to quote +Mr. Artemus Ward, "The best of us has our weaknesses, and if a man has +jewelry let him show it." Besides, it is entirely thinkable that even +a man like Andre might have to dress for those whose discernment goes +no deeper than clothes and ornamentation. + +The difference between an Indian and a half-breed lies in the fact that +the Indian is in treaty with the government and lives on a reservation. +The breed is free to come and go, but his blood is just as pure as the +Indian's so far as its redness is concerned. + +In most cases, the children look to their mother as the head of the +family. The doctor says this is quite fitting. Take the case of Marie +there--Yes! the little girl with the precise plaits--she is the +daughter of old Henrietta and a Mounted Policeman. Jacqueline, her +sister who in-toes so queerly, is the result of old Henrietta's fancy +for a fur trader. It can be readily seen how several masculine heads +to the family would complicate matters and that it is wholly desirable +the girls should look to their mother for their lineage. In the north, +as yet, it has not been necessary to cover vices with cloaks. + +The Indian women have fallen on better days since the government passed +a law prohibiting the Indian from selling his cattle without a permit +from the agency, and making it illegal for a white man to purchase. +Previously, the Indian gambled away his animals, leaving his squaw and +papooses to suffer from starvation. + +"The old effigy" asleep in the sun is, I am informed, a chief of +distinction. Like Froissart's Knights, the hereditary chieftain may be +blind, crippled and infirm. His body fordone with age is by them +considered to be full of the spirit of wisdom. He is the giver of law +and keeper of traditions. The Indians have no dead-line in their +tribal codes, it being held in suspension north of 55 deg. with the league +rules and the game laws, a fact which leads to the deduction that what +the world has gained by civilization is fairly balanced by what it has +lost. + +While we have been getting acquainted with the Indians, our ship has +carried us into the finest duck grounds in the world, the teal and +mallard rising from the rice beds in almost incredible numbers. It +seems impossible that their numbers should ever be noticeably depleted, +nor are they likely to be, until Grouard, which we have now reached, +has become the splendid metropolis its people have planned and which, +no doubt, their efforts will one day materialize. + +"We believe," says my medical friend, "that any one who says Grouard +isn't going to be a large city hasn't got things properly sized-up. I +hope you won't go south again, my interesting child," he further +continues; "it would seem like being cut off in the flower of your +days. While sometimes shadowed here, the days are never dull, and if +no one loves you in this burgh, believe me, it will be entirely your +own fault." + + + + +CHAPTER XV + +THE BISHOP OF THE ARCTIC. + + The trail hath no languorous longing; + It leads to no Lotus land; + On its way dead Hopes come thronging + To take you by the hand; + He who treads the trail undaunted, thereafter shall command. + --KATE SIMPSON HAYES. + + +Half a century ago Bishop Tache wrote a letter to France, in which he +asked for some missionaries. In response to this appeal a certain +young Grouard was sent to Fort Garry. When Bishop Tache looked over +the slender stripling he said: "I asked for a man; they sent me a boy." +But a year later he wrote again: "Please send me more boys." This was +fifty years ago, and from that day to this the northern world has had +but one opinion of Grouard--he makes good. He is a worker who sticks +to his text. To-day, he is the head of the Catholic missions in the +far north, and his diocese, until lately, included the very Yukon. + +He is seventy-seven years old (but we don't believe it), with a leonine +head, an unrazored face and a chest like a draught horse; an erect man +who commands the instant attention of whatever company he enters. +Assuredly, he is the type of the sound mind in the sound body. It is +not to be wondered that his attractive personality made him the +cynosure of all eyes, and that his name was on every tongue when, +several years ago, he went to England, there to attend a great +conference of his Church. + +Bishop Grouard is alert in manner and has a kindly consideration for +the poorest person. Attend you, sirs and madams, to observe the Old +World courtesy in its highest perfection, you must see it in the person +of a French gentleman who holds a position of honor in the far, far +north, it is an absolutely truthful courtesy, that has its roots in a +big warm heart, so that it becomes the very bone and fibre of the man. +By way of placating our more southerly dignitaries in what may seem an +invidious comparison, it may be urged that Bishop Grouard's urbanity +has never suffered such cross-currents as the municipal watering cart, +speed-limit fines, or the bill collectors, for, as yet, these +well-conceived but ill-approved institutions are entirely unknown in +the strangely blissful regions north of 55 deg. + +It is for the fiftieth anniversary of Bishop Grouard's consecration as +a priest that all of us have gathered from Edmonton to Hudson's Hope to +celebrate. We are assembled at Grouard on Lesser Slave Lake, the +missionary post that was built here forty-nine years ago and named +after the hero of this day. Our assembly is what smart society +reporters would describe as "mixed," and the word would be correctly +used; nevertheless, the interest and colour of this occasion are in no +inconsiderable measure due to this very fact. Besides, ours is a +goodly fellowship. + +Here we have Father Orcolan from Rome, who has written books on +astronomy; Jake Gaudette, who was born in the Arctic Circle; Indian +Chiefs from near and far, with their wives and children; big Jim +Cornwall, the Cecil Rhodes of the north; Bishop Joussard, the +coadjutor, a short man with a hard-bitten sun-scorched face; factors +and traders from outlying posts (believe me, right merry gentlemen); +Judge Noel and his legal company, who have been dispensing justice in +the regions beyond; lean-hipped, muscular trappers who toe-in from +walking on the trails; equally lean-hipped river men who toe-out from +keeping their balance on a log; children from the mission schools; +black-robed nuns, doctors, government officials, and stalwart ranchers +in homespun and leather--even bankers. This short gentleman, who looks +as if he had just heard a good idea, is George Fraser, wit and +journalist. The tall man in khaki with the positive shoulders is Fred +Lawrence, pioneer and trader, likewise Fellow of the Royal Geographical +Society; these and other interesting folk, the pictures of whom even my +newly cut quill stops short at delineating. In truth, they are all +here--the world and his wife--excepting only white girls. "It would +seem too much like a special miracle," explains an Irish rancher, "to +find half a dozen colleens set down here in Grouard--something like +finding posies in the snow of December." + +And the good Bishop Grouard is overcome because he doesn't deserve the +homage of these people. "Truly, madame, I did not think to receive all +this honour. I am only an old voyageur, a poor old fellow who gets +near the end of the river." + +"Does the paddle grow heavy, monseigneur?" I ask, "or is it that the +journey is long?" + +"Non, non, madame; it is the thought of home at the end, and the loved +ones." + +"But surely, monseigneur, the end is yet a long way off. Your eyes are +not dimmed, neither is your natural force abated. And did we not this +very day hear you speak to the tribes in six tongues?" + +"Six was it?" queries the bishop. "Six! Ah, well! they seem to come +to me easily. I feel like the man who had only to open his mouth to +have roast ducklings fly therein." + +Now this old northman has a close grip on twelve languages--it was +Father Fahler who gave me the list--so that his modesty is truly +disconcerting in an age wherein vanity seems to vary inversely with +talent. He is a master in the use of Greek, Latin, French, English, +Cree, Eskimo, Rabbitskin, Chippewaian, Beaver, Slavis, Dog Rib, and +Loucheux. + +Bishop Grouard is an exegete and printer of no mean order, having +translated the service book of the Catholic Church into seven languages +and printed them himself. I do not know if the printing press he +brought into these northern fastnesses was the very first, but if not, +it was assuredly the second, for there is only one other. + +What these books have meant to the tribes it is not for mere +terrestrial folk to say, but if the Catholic doctrine of supererogatory +works be a reasonable and true one, of a surety it is a splendid +balance that is laid up to the good bishop's account. In the more +southerly provinces, where people like books, it is an easy matter for +messieurs the publishers to roll out scores of editions to the greedy +public, but up here in the north publishing a book becomes both a joke +and a tragedy. In the first place, people do not care for books; in +the second, the people do not know the alphabet. + +This was how Bishop Grouard came to build schools for the children. He +had to teach the Indians to read. If you care to you may go to the +school across the bishop's driveway and see the children. There are +hundreds of them, or even more, but if you wait awhile we will go +together, for they are giving a play to-night, and at this moment are +rehearsing their parts. It was Sister Egbert and Sister Ignatius who +wrote the play; the theme, I have heard, is an incident in the life of +the bishop. + +But it takes a long time to learn reading; besides, there are many +distractions. And then the older folk whose eyes are smoke-dimmed by +the tepee fires may never hope to con the letters. It were ill +reasoning to suppose so. For these people who are less literate the +kind bishop painted pictures of angels on the walls and on the ceiling +of the church, and he made one of the Crucifixion, over the altar, a +glowing canvas instinct with living reality. The onlooker may truly +say of this what Ruskin said of Raphael's "Transfiguration": "It goes +directly to the heart. It seems almost to call you by name." + +If you have lived long in the north you will have been wondering this +while back how our workaday ecclesiastic got his materials into +Grouard. How came his printing press, his type, his canvass, and his +paints? Where did this man get the furniture for his schools, his +hospitals, his church? Where did he get the boards for all these +buildings? + +The boards, curious person, were cut at his own saw-mill, from which +boards he fashioned the furniture with his hands. "But how," you +persist, "did he bring the machinery for his sawmill?" + +That was easy; he brought it here in a steamboat. Any one could tell +you that. + +"But where did he get the steamboat?" + +Oh! he built the boat himself--the first steamboat on the Lesser Slave +Lake. In it, if he cared, he could carry his printing press and his +canvases also. + +It will not be surprising if the historians of the future appraise +Bishop Grouard's combination of wisdom and action as something keenly +akin to genius. Indeed, they are almost sure to. + +I cannot tell you what the anniversary services meant--it cannot be +expected of any one who is versed in the Thirty-nine Articles of the +English Church instead of the Rosary of the Blessed Virgin--but I came +away from them with languorous impressions of golden robes, silver +censers, and wavering lights, the odour of lilies and lilacs that +wilted in the heat; a suspended cross with an agonized Christ, wan and +attenuated; of purple and scarlet cloths, of dark-haired young priests, +husky and brown-skinned. There were other things like a shepherd's +crook, and smoke of incense, but, most of all, there was a music that +mothered you and stayed with you. In some way or other these old +plaintive songs of Egypt seem fitted to the boreal regions, but why I +cannot explain. + +In the city we must perforce set a stage for a drama, but here Nature +has made a setting for us high on a hill overlooking a wide meadow that +slopes to the bay. You have read something like this in classic myths, +or maybe it was in Shakespeare, but it doesn't greatly matter; the play +is the thing. For myself, I made believe that is the slope of +Parnassus--for the Pythian hero was also a promoter of colonization, a +founder of cities, a healer of the sick, an institutor of games, a +patron of arts. + +It is on this outdoor stage in its June-tide glory that we banquet; +that we sing; that we play our parts. And it is here that Keenosew the +Fish, chief of the Crees, with rapid rush of speech and voice of +military sharpness, presents the homage of his tribe. In like manner +do also the other representatives of other northerly tribes. Each +chief wears a Treaty medal as a pledge from her Gracious Majesty, Queen +Victoria. + +It is here also that a fair-faced woman of our company expresses the +reverence of her sisters of the diocese for Monseigneur the Bishop, +and, as a token of the same, presents to him a plate heaped high with +coins of gold. + +And from this hill it is that we ride through the newly cut road, a +thousand men and women of us in stately procession, but withal gaily +caparisoned. Observe, if you will, our ribbons and fringes of gold; +the little flags in our bridles; our lynx-skin saddle clothes, and the +wreaths of purple vetch that hang from the pommels. Look well at our +black soutanes, scarlet coats, grey homespuns, and yellow moose hides, +for we are proud this day and wear our finest feathers. It is not well +to be disturbed by the untamable naughtiness of our horses, for the +northern trailer, you must have heard, has no stomach for glitter of +trappings, neither does he like the feel of neighbours. As we ramble +down a white aisle of birch and poplar, the feet of our horses tread +out for us the odour of leaf mould, which odour is the panacea of the +world. + +We do not ride with any preconceived plans, or because of any +propaganda. Neither are we knights who sally forth to right wrongs, +albeit we have the truest knights of all with us--he who has snow on +his head but fire in his heart; he who has taught these tribes by +doing..... + +This day we ride without review or forecast. We ride because we are +glad. All we ask of life is room to rove adown this long white pathway +in this young world. It is the best that life can give--room to ride. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + +NORTHERN VISTAS + + My name is Ojib-Charlie, + I like to sing and dance.--CY WARMAN. + + +The reader will excuse my chronicling the Jubilee before telling about +Grouard. I have no excuse other than caprice, nor any precedent other +than the fact that Chinese authors write their stories backward. To +resume then: + +You will remember the medical doctor on the boat was telling me how, +one day, Grouard would be a large city. I wish to go further and +declare it one now in spite of its small population, that is if you +will accept with me the definition laid down by an ancient Jewish +writer who defined a large city as a place in which "there are ten +leisure men; if less than so, lo! it is a village." + +No one seems to be working unless it be the Indians who are training +their horses for the sports that are to take place the day after +to-morrow, which sports will last for a week. This might be the +leisurely land of the hyperboreans where there is everlasting spring +and the inhabitants never toil or grow old-- + + "A land in the sun-light deep + Where golden gardens glow, + Where the winds of the north, becalmed in sleep, + Their conch-shells never blow." + +The first men we meet are the civil-engineers. Nearly every one +surveys here, and even the wild geese run lines along the sky. These +engineers are pleasant-spoken men of proper spirit, who have been +hammered into hardihood by work and weather. Nearly all of them invite +you to eat in their camps: "Come over to my stamping-grounds," says a +youth who looks like a walking pine-tree. There is no doubt in the +world he is lonely for his women-folk whom we happen to know "down +home," for when we accept he smiles and says "Heaven bless you +endlessly!" He gave us a good supper, too, of hot and savoury food, +and the coffee, though served in cups of unbelievable thickness, was +undeniably nectar. + +Afterwards, we walk into the village to get acquainted with the people +thereof, and to secure lodgings. Over the doors of some of the shops +there are signboards written in Cree, that is to say in syllabic +symbols which look like the footprints of a huge bird. + +We are accosted by a gentleman of the Bible Society who wishes to sell +us copies of the New Testament, which book, he says, is lightly +esteemed in the North. He asks me if I belong to my Creator, but I +dissemble in that I have never been able to say God created me without +distinct reservations. There are certain ugly and reproachful traits +in my make up which it seems sacrilegious to attribute to the Deity. +This colporteur has a keen, clean mind--any one can see that--and I +like him for his childlike straightness of soul. + +He is carrying copies of the gospels in the different Indian languages, +but, so far, has sold but few. Doubtless the Indians think with that +Mendizabel, the Prime Minister of Spain, who once said to George +Borrow, "My good sir, it is not Bibles we want but rather guns and +gunpowder." + +The knowledge one picks up on a walk down the street is varied in +character and throws a light on village life several hundred miles from +a railway. + +There are three churches here, also a pool-room and a moving picture +show. It costs fifty cents to see the latter. + +When a trapper is not working he is whittling. This is a bad year for +the trappers: two summers came together. + +Eggs are a dollar a dozen and four loaves of bread may be had for the +same price. Beef sells for twenty-five cents a pound and butter for +sixty-five. + +There is an outcropping of coal on a mountainside twelve miles away. A +sample of the coal has been sent to Edmonton for analysis. + +The main cafe is built of logs and a notice in English advises the +wayfarer to "Stick to our pies. Never mind the looks of the house," it +further enjoins. "It's the oysters we eat, not the shell." + +The village boasts of a brass-band with twenty instruments. Although +instructed by wire to meet us at the boat to-day, they failed to +assemble, the members of the company having quarrelled over the +selections to be played. + +Lots on main street sell as high as two thousand dollars each. + +A gentleman in tweed suit with capacious pockets and tan leggings which +he has brought with him across the Atlantic, has decided to stand for +the legislature at the next election. "The electors will say," he +assures us, "that I have been drunk. They will say that I have been in +jail, but I shall reply with repartee. You see I've always been +deucedly clever at repartee." + +The Mounted Police Barracks, the Indian Agency, the Hudson's Bay Post +and the Catholic Mission are on the hill above the village. The Church +of England Mission lies out and beyond, on a further hill. The bankers +ride out to the further hill to play tennis with the pretty English +girls who teach in the school. + +When an elderly jocose Irishman so far forgets himself as to say +"darlint" to a breed-girl, he must not be surprised if she draws a wry +face and calls him _muchemina_; that is to say, "bad berries." + +I might write a book on the news to be picked up on this main street, +if a tide of sleep did not threaten to submerge me. In this dry +crystalline atmosphere, one must sleep an hour or two sometimes, +however unwilling the spirit or unique and alluring the things present. + +My room at the lodging-house is the best the place affords in that it +has a cotton curtain for a door, and as yet doors are only used in the +outside walls of the houses. The curtain is not, however, of much +account in that the green lumber of the walls has warped to such narrow +dimensions that the occupier of the adjoining room would have to shut +his or her eyes to keep from seeing you. On the contrary part, you +must of necessity go to bed in the dark unless you wish to fall a +victim to the crafts and assaults of the mosquitoes who are attracted +by the lamp. In a fortnight or so, they will have completely +disappeared, but, in the meanwhile, if you would escape their nasty +niggling ways you must neglect your hair, teeth, and sun-scalded nose. +A real-estate agent was telling me to-day how the mosquitoes often +disappeared in a night, and, to illustrate this fact, related a story +of a Tipperary Orator, who said, "My fellow-countrymen, the round +towers of Ireland have so completely disappeared that it is doubtful if +they have ever existed." + +.... A wagon is leaving this morning for St. Bernard's Mission on the +hill, and by some felicity I am invited to go with it. Bill, who is +the driver, received a bullet wound in a Mexican rebellion; had his leg +broken by a fall from "a terrible mean cayuse"; lost an eye and part of +his nose in a mine explosion, and says, by these same tokens, he will +live to be a hundred unless he loses his head to the government. Bill +was married once down Oregon, way, but his wife divorced him. His wife +was very short-sighted, but, contrawise, her tongue was long. Besides, +she was appallingly like her mother. + +This trail to St. Bernard's, passing as it does through a trail of +lanky poplars and birch in green lacy gowns, is a right pleasant one, +and fills you with the great joy of growing things. + +And also it is very pleasant this morning to shut your eyes that you +may the better inhale the fine brew of the conifers, the reek of the +wild roses, the pungent wafture of the mint from the meadows, and above +all, the subtle incense of the warm spawning soil. This is to have a +happiness as large as your wishes. This is to think thoughts that are +very secret and only half-way wise. + +At St. Bernard's the nuns take me to see their finely manicured garden +with its rows of cabbages, leeks, turnips, radishes and its many herbs +such as parsley, mint and sage. Their potatoes are coming on well and +so are the posy beds. This sweet-breathed garden is tilled by +voluntary labour and held in common, but it must be remembered the +nun's occupation does not afford her any special opportunities for +knowledge of the world at large and its shrewder ways. + +I can easily discern that the pride of this garden are the cabbages, +probably because more care has gone into their culture. Indeed, this +vegetable seems to be peculiarly favoured by all gardeners of all +classes, for even the haughty Diocletian, when asked to resume his +crown, said to the ambassadors, "If you would come and see the cabbages +I have planted, you would never again mention to me the name of +empire." In this garden-plot the sisters have erected a pedestal upon +which stands a fair shining woman, even she who is the mother to their +Lord and wonderful God. + +In order that her labour may become an offering to her tutelary spirit, +every woman should have a statue in her garden embodying her highest +ideal, whether it be of Isis, Mrs. Eddy, or Diana, the "Goddess +excellently bright." Such a statue would tend also to keep her +religion a divine intimacy rather than a creed or an institutional +observance. + +Sister Marie-des-Anges shows me the hospital, and pleasures me with a +delicious cordial which is made out of wild berries and which tastes +better than champagne. + +Those who have an eye for esoteric apartments with etchings and +faint-coloured prints on toned-down walls, would not be impressed with +the wards and offices of this hospital where all the furniture is +home-made. It is, however, cleverly contrived and has the prestige of +being literally the original "mission furniture"--no one can gainsay +it. In this connection, give me leave to transcribe here a passage +which I have met with in the book of Thoreau, the naturalist. "Why +should not our furniture be as simple as the Arab's or the Indian's?" +he asks. "When I think of the benefactors of the race whom we have +apotheosized as messengers from heaven, bearers of divine gifts to man, +I do not see in my mind any retinue at their heels, any car-load of +fashionable furniture." + +I know not the answer of this question unless it be that we of Canada +need practice in the excellencies of those graces which have respect to +personal simplicity and disrespect to communal opinion. I have a mind +to make a trial of this. + +It was in this hospital that "Twelve-Foot" Davis (now in heaven) gave +his instructions to his partner, Jim Cornwall, to take his body on a +sled to the Peace River and bury it on the height of land. + +People in the cities are too busily absorbed in the transactions of +peers and politicians to know northern philanthropists like +"Twelve-Foot" Davis, the first man to introduce steel-traps into this +country and to thus dare the wrath of the omnipotent and indomitable +"Company of Gentlemen Adventurers." You may not know it, but the steel +trap has done as much for the Indian as the self-binder has for the +white man. + +But down here every one knows that "Twelve-Foot" Davis was held in high +esteem, and any man will tell you, as Bill the driver told me, how it +was a full hand this fine frontiersman laid on the Lord's table and +that none of the cards were lacking. + +Twelve-Foot Davis was so called because, in the days of the Caribou +rush, he staked a claim of twelve feet. Each prospector was allowed +one hundred feet and there was no claim left when Twelve-Foot appeared +on the scene. But to be assured in his mind he was not outdone, he +measured the claims and found that two of the prospectors were holding +two hundred and twelve feet. Davis wanted those extra twelve feet and +the prospectors decided to give him a place directly in the centre of +their claims on a spot where a basin of shale lay. From this narrow +claim, Twelve-Foot dug up a large quantity of gold, and this was the +only spot on the entire creek where the least trace of ore was found, +even his neighbours being unable to pan out a grain. It was from this +happening that he derived the name which, because of the question it +carries on its face, would, as a nom-de-plume, be worth a corresponding +amount of gold to an obscure author. + +Bill, who is fairly amenable to bribes, takes me over to the further +hill where the Church of England Mission stands, which Mission was the +spiritual husbandry of the late Bishop Holmes. + +It would be pleasant to tell of this place and of the school, but Bill +is in haste and will not tarry my leisure. It may be that his swaying +motive is another bribe. + +It was only three months ago that the Bishop and his family started for +England, and soon afterwards came the news that he had died in a London +hospital. The teachers tell me the family who went out together on +this holiday are never coming back, in that they cannot afford to take +the journey now that the bread-winner is gone. The furniture is to be +sold and the house will be done-over for another bishop. + +As I walk through the home which for many years has been the most +hospitable one in the north, it is with a mist in my eyes and a painful +tightness in my throat. I touch the chords of Auld Lang Syne on the +piano in honour of Madam, the mother; I kiss the house-flowers for the +love of the young girls who carried them safely over the long, long +winter; I finger the books in the library with affection in memory of +the good Bishop who once told me kindly tales of these Indians who were +his friends. + +And when I, too, have gone, may it happen that some one who understands +will touch my books in like manner, and say good-bye to them for me. I +could not so endure it of myself.... + +... It was six days later at the sports that I received a proposal of +marriage from Prosper, an Indian who is a trainer of horses. It was +not wholly a surprise, in that he had already approached the master of +our party with an overture to buy me. The master had hesitated to tell +me of this for fear I might be offended. "You see, Lady Jane," he +explained, "it is like that case in _Patience_ where the magnet wished +to attract the silver churn." + +"Yes?" asked I, "and what did you say to him?" + +"Oh! I told him he was a master-fool; that you were nothing but a +great cross-examiner who had the misfortune to be born a woman." + +And his reply. + +"He said he did not understand me but he saw you laughed a great deal +and showed your teeth. He says he would not beat you, but would be +very mild and agreeable with you." + +Now, I was not offended, for the proposal from this young Apollo of the +forest only meant I was no longer regarded as a mysterious invader from +another and strange land. + +Why should he not propose? In this northern world distinctions fall +away and all are equal. As a usual thing, the Indian regards a white +woman impersonally or with a half-contemptuous indifference. To him, +we are frail, die-away creatures deplorably deficient in energy, yet, +strange to relate, wholly lacking in the spirit of obedience. Scores +of ill-instructed novelists to the contrary, no Indian has ever +assaulted a white woman. This is an amazing fact when one considers +how, for nearly two centuries, the Indian has guided our women through +the forests; piloted them down the rivers; and has cared for them in +isolated outposts. The Indian has lived rough and lived hard, but, in +this particular, he is morally the most immutable of all God's +estimable menfolk. + +When Prosper pleaded his case personally, he broke ice by requesting me +to accept a pair of doe-skin gauntlets more beautiful than ordinary. +In spite of my declining the gift, he asked "Will you marry with me?" +assuring me, at the same time, that I was his _saky hagen_, or "one +beloved." I would not have to travel far. He is one day from here if +there be wind, but two days with no wind. He likes the noise I make in +my throat when I laugh. The master explained to Prosper, "This is only +a way she has of gargling her throat beautifully," a wicked cynicism +which was lost on the bronze-faced tamer of horses in that gargling is, +to him, an unknown and hence an incomprehensible practice. The master +also advised Prosper to keep the gloves for, if I listened, he would +indubitably need them later. + +Prosper is a hardily-built man with admirable shoulders and a bearing +like Thunder Cloud, the American Indian who was the model for Mr. G. A. +Reid's picture entitled "The Coming of the White Man." Also, Prosper +is daringly ugly. When I tell him I am already married, he says, "You +need not go back. Your man can find many women by the great +Saskatchewan River." + +It may interest the curious to know that Prosper ultimately sold me the +gauntlets for my man, and put away the money with an imperturbable +serenity worthy the receiving-teller of a western bank. + +... The sports were inaugurated by the slaughter of an ox for the +benefit of the treaty Indians. It is foolish to shudder when we see +the throat of a bullock cut. When a bird dips its long bill into the +chalice of a flower it is doing precisely the same act. + +The heart of this bullock was fat, so that good fortune abides with the +tribe. A lean heart is always unlucky. Once Ba'tiste killed an animal +that had hairs on its heart, and Holy Mother! Holy Mother! that winter +he trapped a silver-fox. + +The white men played a game of baseball which would have given cause +for thought to those impersonal pawns known as professionals; it was so +very original. But, after all, baseball is only cricket gone +hysterical, and perhaps the game may be further evolved under the +aurora. Some one must take the onus of initiative. Originally the +game was very primitive and I have heard tell, or I may have read, that +it was really a baseball club which Samson used to kill the Philistines. + +The results of the horse races are not posted, a fact which tends to a +democratic spirit. If you want to see the start or the finish you must +bunch with the crowd at the post. This also enables you to learn how +wonderfully an excited Cree can vociferate: there is no other place in +the world where a more efficient instruction can be had. And when +words fail him, Sir Hotspur says: "Uh-huh!" and makes other sounds in +his teeth like a flame when it leaps through dry rushes. + +The mysteries of straight, place, and show are not probed here and no +Indian throws a race. The best horse always wins. The Cree jockey +rides bareback and beats his horse from the start. This, they tell me, +is necessary because there is no best strain in Indian ponies. They +are as native and unimproved as the horses of Diomedes that roamed the +hills of Arcadia. + +The tents, booths, and dining-rooms skirt the track, and so the squaws +can leave their cooking to engage in their own contests without any +unnecessary loss of time. These include a tug-o'-war, a horse race and +foot races. The men engage in canoe and tub races, boxing bouts, +swimming and smoking contests, bucking-broncho exhibits and other +physical tests for which they have a fondness and natural aptitude. +Gambling is in full swing and no one thinks it necessary to apologize. +Several men squat side by side on the ground and pass a jack-knife from +one to the other under a blanket which covers their knees. The gambler +has to guess in which hand the knife is to be found. It is the same +game as "Button! Button! Who has the button?" + +The drum-song, that rude rough song of the suitor, does not start till +after nightfall. As a general thing, the man sings it in a tent lying +on his back, his face flushed and his eyes suffused. "Hai! Hai!" he +cries with a blurred staccato that is without response, +"otato-otooto-oha-o." + +After awhile, he seems to become hypnotized by the recurrence of this +measured rhythm which is without melody and without gaiety. These +drum-songs are indubitably the survivals of earlier days when the +man-animal roamed through the land and made love-calls in the trees. + +The drum-man has one pronounced characteristic; you can never mistake +him for a Christian. On one of the drums, there was a sun-symbol +marked in blue, but this may have been an accidental ornamentation. Or +it may be the drum-suitor is a Christian who merely claims the +masculine prerogative of changing his principles with his +opportunities. You can never tell. + +But on the whole, the discordancy of the drum is no worse than that of +the fiddle which supplies the music for the dance. Why people say "fit +as a fiddle" I can never surmise, for a fiddle is always becoming unfit. + +One hears much complaint in our province over oak floors well waxed, +but here is a dancing floor that is laid while you wait. Cross-beams +are placed on the ground and over them are put planks of uneven +thickness. When in use, the floor seems almost as active as the feet +of the dancers. + +The crowd is made up of dusky belles from the tribes of the Athabasca, +Slave, and Mackenzie Rivers; many braves, and some few white men whom I +pretend not to recognize. I am like the man Herrick writes about, "One +of the crowd; not of the company." + +The dancing is of a primitive order not unlike the natural movement +which street children make to the strains of the hurdy-gurdy. + +In higher circles, it is known by the name of the turkey-trot. +Scientists classify it under the more dignified appellation of +"neuromuscular co-ordination." + +As compared with a ball, say at Government House, this one has some +marked peculiarities. There are no chaperones, no refreshments, many +sitting-out places, and it is wholly in the dark save for the light of +a tolerant and somewhat remote moon. + +A white woman who watches it is considered by the men of her own race +to be one of five things--stupid, innocent, mean, obstinate, or unduly +curious, whereas to be accurate she may only be a conscientious scribe. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +A COUNTRY WOMAN AT THE CITY RACES + + Still do our jaded pulses bound + Remembering that eager race.--R. W. GILBERT. + + +This favour would never have come to me if I had not found a two-eyed +peacock feather in the paddock. It isn't reasonable to suppose that a +simple, country-bred person from back Alberta-way could have such +story-book luck on her first wager. La-la-la! + +All the way down I kept praying, "Lead not Janey into temptation," +knowing right well I would slay any one who kept me out. I take off my +hat to myself. + +"Dear me!" says John. "One would think you cut your teeth on a bit +instead of a pen." Some people like the idea of betting: some don't. + +At this Woodbine race-course in Toronto, they no longer have turf +accountants. Their days were numbered when careless people started to +call them bookies. They have been succeeded by steel slot affairs +called pari-mutuel machines. The words pari and mutuel would seem to +be almost synonymous, one meaning equal, the other reciprocal. The +reciprocal arrangements are like this; the party of the first part gets +the money; the party of the second part, the experience. "And the +machine?" you ask. (I asked that too.) The machine, which is only an +impersonal way of saying the Jockey Club, gets as its commission five +per centum of all wagers, and I am told it makes as high as eight +thousand dollars the day. There are as many ways of fixing the races +as there are of making bannocks on the Mackenzie River, but you can't +fix the machine. It never gets tired of being good. This being the +case, people must study the science of betting just as politicians +study the ways of the electorate. + +A shrewd-spoken gentleman with ruddy features and fierce white +moustachioes to whom I was introduced in the paddock, told me some of +these rules he had learned. He said "My Good Lady, I can see you have +an honest face, although you come from Western Canada where the people +are exceedingly singular. I will therefore proceed to tell you in +confidence what I know concerning the canons of betting." + +"A tip, so far as I can make out"--and here he flicked a butterfly off +my shoulder--"is a secret told to the whole betting ring." + +"Unless you have money to lose you should bet small till you are using +money which you have won." + +He told me many other rules about gambling, with much eagerness, for he +seemed to conceive a liking for me, but it avails nothing that I tell +them to you, in that no man gives heed to another man's method of +plying the art, thinking his own a vastly greater superiority, in which +respect gamblers do closely approach to the fraternity of the pen known +as authors. + + * * * * * + +This Woodbine race-course is a fair tarrying place, and I enjoy its +beauty with luxurious wonder. Outside its high palings, there are +thickly peopled, fusty streets, for this is the very heart of the city. +Why any place should be called the heart of the city I cannot +conjecture, except that both the civic and human heart are places of +huge trafficking and, above all things, desperately wicked. + +The near foreground is a finely brushed lawn that, here and there, has +burst into flame-red flowers. In the centre of the ring where the +hunters take the hedges, two beautiful elms hold themselves proudly +erect as if to say, "Look at us, O woman of little wit! look at us; we +are finer creations than man, or even than horses." + +Off in the background, with nothing intervening save the elms, little +sailing yachts like white birds, rock and dip in the sapphire blue of +the bay. Strong-built motor-boats scud across the horizon in so +terrific a hurry one can hardly follow their wake for dust. (The +editor will kindly permit me to say "dust.") We watch them, from our +box, three women of us, with a field-glass which we use in turn for all +the world like the three hoary witches who had only one eye between +them. + +I like this landscape better than our prairie. The trouble with the +prairie is that you always seem to be in the middle of it. The garden +of Time and Chance, it has no parts or passions unless, indeed, its +spaces seem unfriendly. It has no mystery, no changeability, no +complexity.... But all this is digressing from the races and from the +beautifully dressed women who look like tall-stemmed flowers. I heard +a man in the next box compute that the feathers worn in the enclosure +had cost a hundred thousand dollars, but no matter what they cost they +were worth it--willow plumes, fish-spines, aigettes, birds-of-paradise, +ostrich mounts, ospreys, and other things I cannot name. Indeed, my +own hat has two bright scarlet wings which cause me no small +satisfaction, in spite of the fact that John says they are not so much +wings as a challenge to combat. Moreover, he says when I am better +civilized, I will know that feathers of any kind are an atavism and no +fit dress for Christian people. It is trying to have a near relative +with such views. The younger men of the enclosure affect Newmarket +coats, or Burberry's, and cloth spats, also field-glasses swung across +their shoulders. They express horse-language emphatically without a +word. The older men who have attained to the dignity of the Bench or +the Cabinet, run to silk hats and frock coats. + +The enclosure is occupied by the favoured few who have boxes and who +are designed by the Grand Stand as "the society bunch." I would like +to write about this distinction, and sometime I will, but just now the +three-year olds are cavorting down the great white-way, for the autumn +cup which has $2500.00 tucked away in its inside. It is on Star +Charter that I have my hard-earned western dollars--egg and butter +money, mind you--and I must pay strict attention to this race. I think +he'll win. The Lord never gave him those legs and that frictionless +gait for nothing. I'm sure of that. + +The horses do not mind their manners at the starting bar, but pick +objections, prance, and kick each other with the most admirable +precision. I have read that when the Otaheitans first saw a horse they +called it "a man-carrying pig." It is not possible to improve on the +definition. + +But, after awhile, the horses make a clean break from the bar and are +off in a spume of dust. Gallant-goers they are, and this is sure to be +a tight race. Their necks are strained like teal on the wing, and +almost you expect to hear a sharp shot and see one tumble. Indeed, +they might be birds in autumn flight, in that they run in a wedge and +seem to obey a collective consciousness. + +The jockeys ride high on the horses' shoulders and they ride for a +fall. The purple and blue jockey holds the lead and he's going some. +The enclosure says he is. + +But the blue and silver jockey is fighting him for every inch and he's +gaining. The enclosure says he is. + +The orange and black jockey is third. He's carrying my egg and butter +money. He'll win though, for the jockey who stays second or third must +get the advantage of the leading horses as a wind-shield. Presently he +will slip the bunch; he's sure to. The enclosure says he is. John +tells me to stop adjuring the jockey, that he will never hear me. + +They've only a little way to go now--only a little way--and the orange +and black is coming steadily to the front. Even John gets excited and +keeps saying, "Good l'il ol' cayuse," and things like that, which are +bad form down East. Steadily on--steadily past the blue and +silver--steadily upon the haunches of the red and blue--now on his +shoulder--now on his neck--and now a neck ahead. This was how the +orange and black won, but you should have been there to see it. + +And to think it all came from finding a two-eyed peacock feather in the +paddock! + +Between races, we visit the paddock, insinuating our way through the +crowd in order to get near the ring where the horses show their paces +to the racegoers who make believe they are judges of speed, condition +and stamina. As a matter of fact, the horses are all very much +alike--wiry, wispy things like lean greyhounds with rippling veins that +stand out in relief, muscles of rawhide, and bell nostrils. There is +little difference in their speed either--a second, two seconds, or +mayhap three--but these seconds are, in their results, so vastly +different to the turfmen that all other contrarieties become as +nothing. The jockeys who know the horses from their hoofs up, and who +ride with instinct, are perhaps the only men who can fairly hazard what +the results will be--or should be. + +They tell me that most of these jockeys die of consumption. This is +probably owing to the fact that they must rigidly train the flesh off +their bones. Napoleon said that Providence always favoured the +heaviest battalions. The dictum has no application to jockeys. Our +Western maxim that a cowboy is only as good as his nerves would be of +more general applicability. + +But while, in the horses themselves, there seems to be little of marked +individuality, think of what volumes could be written on their names. +Here we have Ringmaster, Gun Cotton, Froglegs, Song of the Rocks, +Tankard, Scarlet Pimpernel, Porcupine, Pons Asinorum and other names +which hold a lure. So exactly co-natural are they to our extended +acquaintanceship among the humans back in the Province of Alberta, that +our homesickness vanishes into the sunny blue. + +There were nine horses in the autumn steeplechase and Young Morpheus +would have beat handily had he not fallen on the last jump. The jockey +rocketed over his head and lay still, but Young Morpheus, being a +thoroughbred and no welcher, ran on and came slashing in to the finish. +That horse has a soul like John's and mine, only better than John's. +The prize was carried off by Highbridge, who seemed to be the +favourite, for the enclosure turned itself into a pandemonium. Men and +woman who before were separate entities, became merged into a mass of +frantic arms and white faces that with a pleading voice coaxed the +winner down the homestretch to victory. It is the steeplechase that +probes to the depths mankind's capacity for physical enjoyment. + +"But the jockey was thrown," you say, "and lay still?" Think you we +wear the willow because of it? Not so, Honourable Gentleman. We are +consoled by the well-turned and doubtless truthful reflection that-- + + "Bright Lucifer into darkness hurled, + Was happier than angels quiet-eyed." + + +I did not see any more of the races because I was summoned to the +Government House box and invited to tea with the occupants thereof. +They must have heard what an excellent dairywoman I am, and things like +that, but how they heard I cannot surmise unless John has been telling. + +"I'd like to live in your Province," said the Governor, "living is +mercilessly high there, but money keeps moving; money keeps moving, and +a fellow like me need never go to work without his breakfast." + +In the Directors' room, we refreshed ourselves with little sweet cakes +and tea from a delicious brew. And in this room, I talked with the +handsome, well-mannered women from Kentucky, Virginia, and Hamilton who +have brought thither their horses--about six hundred in all--for this +autumn meet. + +I have made up my mind that John shall not argue me into going home, +not if I have to fall ill from discomposure of spirit, and, as for +Toronto, ever hereafter it shall be to me a new city of Beucephala in +honour of its horses and because of the immutable game-loving +disposition of its people. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + +IN NORTHERN GARDENS + +Away from the beaten tracks there are still by-paths where hyacinths +grow in the springtime.--ARTHUR EDWARD WAITE. + + +Far off in the Southland, it is in the habit of Spring to come lagging +over the land. She is a princess. You can tell it by her manner of +moving, and her fine lady ways. Often, she is greatly bored. + +Under the north star it is different. Spring is a wilding horsewoman, +sweet and graceless, pirouetting a-tiptoe and waving to us kisses. + +Hush! and hold you still, my merry Gentlemen. You may catch them if +you try, and they are not in the least sinful. + +Goldilocks, I call her. + +"A young mother," you say, "and no Columbine." + +Pray thee have it so, for when this season of seven sweet suns has +begun, she is all things to all men. + +What an ado there is when she calls to her flower-children and chides +them to arise and put on their dresses. + +Sleepy heads! Sleepy heads! + +The vi'lets peer out of their green bed and complain of the cold, and +as for the ferns, instead of expanding into fans of green, they curl +themselves into foolish fiddle heads and beg to finish their dream. + +The shy anemone, with flushed face, gets her up first that she may be +with her mother. She is Spring's favourite child, but mark you, the +maiden wears a ruff of fur about her neck, and snuggles into it, just +as the pussy-willow does into his coat of grey. + +Those flowers that have butter-pats to heads come on apace. Some there +are who call them dandelions but we shall call them children's gold. + +Ah! if flowers would only sing. + +How terribly long has been the winter with its tiresome monochrome of +white. Every vestige of colour has been bleached out of the earth like +one would bleach a tablecloth. + +By way of solace, our northern Indian paints his face and wears a +scarlet sash as, by the same token, you and I wear poster coats and +purple plumes. + +It was recorded a day ago that when our dogs run away from us they +always travel southward. There is no doubt in the world they are +seeking colour. + +Over the way from my study-window there is a glass-house where a man +who, aforetime, taught school now grows flowers. The transition is +surely a natural one. + +His is the last conservatory on this hemisphere--at least I've heard +tell it is. + +He lets me walk up and down its long blossom-bordered aisles whenever I +am so minded. Here, in his floral sanctuary, one may take deep +draughts from the warm subtly-scented air till, someway or other, it is +transmuted into the alembic of the soul. + +May no blight fall on his roses or his heart! May God love him and let +him live long! + +This man's roses are of ivory and pink, but a few are red as if they +might be the blood of some great wounded queen. + +Nearly all the roses are long-winged and heavy-headed. They could not +be otherwise when they come and go from the land where dreams are born. +Once, a poet told that the soul of a rose went into his blood. This +was how he came to write the _Idylls of the King_. + +One of the gardeners ties the red roses to stakes and he will not have +it that the habit is cruel. "You may have noticed, Lady"--and here he +tightly draws the cord--"that most folk are hung by their sweethearts." +I almost hate this man. + +Hath not a rose-tree organs, passions, senses? If you prick it does it +not bleed? Verily I say unto you that it hath and it does. + +It is near to April before the lilies are at flood-tide. You must +needs see them before Passion Week when the gardeners cut and send them +to a large hungry place called down the line, where, in prairie +churches of tin and pine and sod, the Eastertide worshippers consider +the lily and sing songs about death and life. + +Not an inch of space is lost in the long lines where, tall and lissome, +the stalks bend and curtsy to the passer-by. The glory of the lily is +short-lived, for always they are cut off in maturity. The message they +give is not one of prophecy and resurrection as the writers have ever +taught. You may hear the message if you are still enough. "There is +no second flowering time" they whisper. "Love while life doth last." + +But, after all, the lilies are white like the snow outside, so that I +esteem the big purple hyacinths better, and the bobbing daffodils. + +There is an osier chair in one room wherein I often sit and watch the +buyers flit from plant to plant. The women who come from the British +Isles choose primroses, while those of Ontario and the other provinces +to the south, prefer a lilac in bloom, marguerites, or +carnations--anything they knew and loved at home. + +The Fraus, Madames, and Senoritas from Europe (every one must have a +blossom for Easter, else where is luck to hail from?) are better +satisfied with heliotropes, azaleas, and claret-coloured cyclamens. + +Our erstwhile teacher places the Norway pines close under the palms; +the tree of shade and the tree of sun that sigh vainly for each other. +I like him for this. He knows that Titiana loved Bottom. He must know +it. + +Very few care for my favourite flower--the narcissus. I always buy it, +and a fern. There are folk who despise ferns because they are nothing +but leaves but I like them for their history. They are the survival of +the fittest; types which Nature, in her great printing-press, never +breaks up. They are the old-timers of the vegetable world. + +Also, I walk down the tomato avenue and take my pick--that is I do if I +have enough money, for, here, at the edge of the world, they are as +expensive as Jacob's mess of pottage. One does not dream of robbing +banks so much as stripping tomato-vines. + +Tomatoes do not ripen out of doors (but you must not tell the Board of +Trade I said so) unless on a sunny slope, or by reason of some other +special dispensation. + +Other vegetables thrive, and the cauliflowers attain a size and +perfection elsewhere undreamed of. + +Never were there such toothsome red radishes as are grown here in the +north, large, firm, and flavorous. They are not so big, though, as the +radishes the Jews used to raise long ago of which it was said a fox and +her cubs could burrow in the hollow of one. I have, however, seen a +pumpkin large enough for a fox-warren, but candour compels the +confession that the gardener fed it daily with milk by means of an +incision which he made in its stalk. + +Our strawberries are not the equal of those grown on the Pacific slope, +but are larger, sweeter and firmer than Ontario berries. + +We do not sit under our own fig-tree (nor, alas, our apple-tree), but +why should we sigh when each summer the sunflower springs up to a +height of twelve or fifteen feet? It is the palm-tree of the north, +only more beautiful. + +The Mormons on their exodus from Illinois to Salt Lake City sowed +sunflower seeds along the trail, and ever since it has been marked by +sunflowers. In the province of Saskatchewan, the Russian refugees +sometimes divide their fields by rows of poppies. In Manitoba, their +hedges are of sweet-peas; in British Columbia, of broom. + +After awhile, when all our real-estate has been sold, and all our +companies have been promoted, we of Alberta shall have time and +inclination to consider our provincial plant. + +Grant us then that it may be the sunflower! + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + +COMMUNING WITH THE RUTHENIANS + +I hear the tale of the divine life and the bloody death of the +beautiful God, the Christ.--WALT WHITMAN. + + +This is my first visit to Mundare, on the Canadian Northern Railway, +and to the Ruthenian Church--the church with glittering domes, the +foundation stone of which was laid by the great Laurier himself. "Who +is this Sir Laurier?" I ask. "Ach! I cannot tell you. He a great man +is," says Michael Veranki, "his hair is like to the wild cotton in +August, and his face is beautiful, even like the face of the great +Archbishop Syptikyi, who is a soldier and a prince, and the like of +whom there never was. Believe me, Messus, he has seven feet high and +has seven tongues wherein to speak." + +"About this Laurier? Ya! Ya! almost I forget. He the stone of the +church placed in the corner, and we drew him in a wagon with six +bullocks. He the King's man is, and a smile in his eyes there comes, +quick, quick, like the wind comes on the wheat. Ya! Ya! we much like +this King's man." + +Nearly all the people are gone into the church and I follow. There are +no seats, so all of us stand, the sexes separated like the sheep from +the goats. + +One's eyes become riveted on the large globe of cut crystals that hangs +from the ceiling near the centre of the church, and the hard white +lights from it strike sharply on my eyeballs like dagger points. All +the people are making reverences and placing something on their +foreheads like oil, but it may be holy water. Know all men by these +presents that I, even I, am the poor ignorant wife of a Protestant +person, and understand not the meaning of these obeisances, nor of this +beautiful fete to which all the Austrian folk of the countryside have +come with not so much as one mouthful of bread to break their fast. +Neither shall one drop of liquid moisten their parched lips for these +three hours unless--Holy Mother and all the Blessed Saints, pray for +our presumption--unless indeed, it might fall to the lot of a woman to +take into her lips the sacred blood from the golden spoon which the +priest dips into the chalice, the holy chalice that is surmounted with +something dazzling like a star, so that no woman may even look thereon. + +Feeling all the while like wild oats amid the wheat, I take my stand by +a pillar close to the door and pretend not to stare. Ere long, a young +girl touches me and tells me she is inquested to bring me to the +sisters. I follow her through the church and into the vestry where a +little nun presses my hands and calls me by name. Once, she was my +escort through the Monastery at St. Albert, over by the Sturgeon River. +Of course I remember her. She is the china shepherdess in black who +says "Please" instead of "What?" and who comes from Mon'real. Also she +lisps, but what odds? Plutarch tells us that Alcibiades lisped and +that it gave a grace and persuasiveness to his discourse. + +She presents me to the other sisters, none of whom speak English, and +invites me out to the monastery to visit. All of the sisters look +middling healthy, not having the parchment-like pallor of the city nuns. + +The service, she explains, is the Finding of the Holy Cross. I must +not think it idolatry when they do veneration, indeed, I must not. +"Eet is what you call--Ah, Madame! I cannot find the word--eet is what +you call--" "A Symbol," I ask. "Oui, Oui, a symbol!" + +With many gesticulations and no small difficulty she tells me how the +Empress Helena, mother of the great Constantine, once had a heavenly +dream which enabled her to discover the very piece of ground wherein +the holy cross was hidden away. It lay under two temples where +heathens prayed to Jupiter and Venus instead of to Jehovah. She caused +these temples to be torn down so as not one stone was left, and +underneath were found three crosses. Being doubtful as to which was +the cross of the Lord Christ, the Empress had all three applied to the +body of a dying woman. The first two crosses had no effect (it was the +good Bishop Macarius, you must know, who helped her), but, at the touch +of the third, the dying woman rose up perfectly whole. + +This is a story worth lingering on, and the little nun would tell me +more about it, only the celebrant priest has come into the vestry and +talks with us before he goes to the basement to change his vestments. + +They are impressive garments which he wears, but one might imagine +their proving correspondingly oppressive. Kryzanowski is the wretched +name of him. He is a large, fair man, this priest, in the full force +of life, with an unmistakable air of distinction. On a snap judgment, +I should place to his credit the ability to deal with a supreme +situation. He is a priest of the Uniat Church, which church, so far as +I may understand, is a compromise between the Greek Orthodox and the +Roman Catholic, the compromise consisting of a prayer for the Pope +instead of for the Czar. + +In our White Alberta much antipathy exists between the Orthodox Greek +Church and the Uniats, and several years ago they had a lawsuit which +they took to the Privy Council in England, and which drove to insanity +one of our cleverest barristers. They are bonny fighters, these +Ruthenians from Galicia, and if they cannot "have the law" on one +another, they may always have the consolation of fisticuffs. And what, +pray, are muscles hard for and skulls thick, except to fight? Riddle +me that! + +Presently, when we shall have tied down and diverted their tremendous +fighting energy into what is usually described as civilization, we +shall, of a surety, find a human voltage here which will send these +Slavic peasants high up the scale where well-conceived and successful +endeavour is weighed and appraised. At present, ah, well! they are +young and positive and he is the best man who survives. + +The little sister brings me back into the church, where she places a +chair for me close beside the altar facing the congregation, an act and +fact which cause me not a little amazement and considerable +trepidation. Will the priest permit an unhallowed woman of lean and +meagre accomplishments--and she a Protestant--to sit so close to the +holy of holies? Will he? + +He does not even appear to see me and swings the censor close, close to +my head, over and over again, with the same free-handed gesture of +Millet's sower. He swings it out and about, hither and yon, till all +my garments smell of myrrh and aloes and cassia; until, like Solomon's +spouse, my hands dropped myrrh. + +Sometimes it is a rude Slavic peasant who swings the censer or lays the +spice on the live coals--a rough-necked man with red-brown hands and +face. He wears a caftan, or long cloak of skin, upon which red leather +is cunningly appliqued in pleasing designs. I doubt not he is from +Bukowina, or "the beech-woods," for the women of that province are +skilled craftswomen. He swings the censer with such deftness, that +were I not benumbed by the languourous odour of the smoke-thick air, I +would be wondering how this queer shock-headed acolyte with his bovine +stolidity came to acquire the revolver wrist in such a high state of +development. Surely it is well I am stupefied, for it might be +irreverent so to wonder. + +But for that matter, all this service belongs to the people and not to +any stilted crucifers or superior choristers smacking of professional +piety. As occasion may demand, an older woman comes forward and snuffs +a candle with her fingers and replaces it with a fresh one. The women +even carry the candles through the church when the ritual so requires +it. They do not appear to have any self-consciousness, but perform +their part gladly and naturally. This may arise from the fact that +they have been accustomed in Austria to taking part in religious dramas +such as The Nativity, which drama they once staged at Edmonton. I did +not see it, but Sister Josephat at the Ruthenian Monastery gave me a +picture of the _dramatis personae_ taken during a rehearsal. + +"See! See! Madame Lady. See! See!" said Sister Josephat. "Et ees +ver' fonny. _De tree wise men are womens_, womens I tell you. Yes! +the black one too! She is Alma Knapf." + +This drama was vastly appreciated, especially by the younger fry of the +community, who enjoyed seeing the devil carry a Jew off the scene with +a pitchfork and cast him into hell with certitude and great vigour. +The older folk considered this treatment unduly drastic and an +unwarranted loss of useful material. Here in the North, we do not +believe in killing Jews--no, nor even bank-managers--where we are not +infrequently pared to the quick to provide money for real-estate +payments or to margin up against the bad news the ticker-tape has +spelled out. Yes! it would be highly unreasonable to allow the +Ruthenian folk to kill off the Jews and bankers and it would make us +uncommonly sorry. + +... I like to watch these farmer-women carry the tall, white candles +under the dome. It seems like a vision picture or some sense memory +that has filtered down to me through the ages, but what the memory is I +cannot say. Indeed, once I read of a strange country where men used to +run races with lighted candles, and the victor was he whose flame was +found burning at the goal. + +I think the memory which troubles me must be of Jacob's rods which he +made into "white strakes." He performed his rite under the _libneh_, +or white poplar-tree, even as we perform them under the white poplars +of Alberta. + +And while the women march, they chant a weird harmony, the men's voices +coming in at intervals like pedal points. There is no organ, or any +tyrannous baton, but only, "They sang one to another," as the Jews did +at the building of their temple. + +I am strangely, inexpressibly moved by this tone-sweetness. Sometimes +it is massive, triumphal, and inspiring as though the singers carried +naked swords in their upraised hands; or again, it seems to be the +sullen angry diapason of distant thunder in the hills. + +But mostly they sing a paean or lamentation of the cross, heavy with +unspeakable weariness and the ache of unshed tears. Surely this is the +strangest story ever told. It is as though they sing to a dead god in +a dead world. + +And, sometimes, sight and sound become blended into one, and the sound +is the sobbing urge of the pines ... the people as they rise and fall +to the floor are the trees swayed by the wind. The cross they are +lifting is wondrous heavy, so that it takes four strong fellows. It is +built of oak beams and the figure of the Nazarene is of bronze. As the +lights fall from the windows on the outstretched body, with its pierced +hands and thorn-stung brow, it seems as though the tragedy of Golgotha +is being re-enacted before my very eyes, here on this far-away edge of +the world. The thing is ghastly in its awful realism, so that I am +crushed and confounded. It falls like flakes of fire on my brain, till +my mind's ear catches again and again that most horrifying cry of the +ages, "My God! My God! why hast Thou forsaken me?" + +But I cannot tell you more of this story of the Lord Christ who was +crucified, except that in some way it has become a personal thing to +these worshippers, and, maybe, a joyful one. It must be joyful, for, +at last, they hang a garland of flowers over the upright beams of the +cross and from it draw long, long ribbons of scarlet and white and +blue; which the women carry to the ends of the church like floating +streams of light, and between which the men and children stand to sing +_Alleluia_ and _Alleluia_. + +I know not why the priest stoops to the ground and touches it with +fingers or his lips. Sometime the little sister from Mon'real will +tell me. + +Henry Ryecroft, in his _Secret Papers_, recounts how he used to do this +same thing. "Amid things eternal," he says, "I touch the familiar and +kindly earth." It was in the silent solitude of the night when he +walked through the heart of the land he loved. + +I have always desired to see the mysterious sacrifice known as the +elevation of the host, but, now that I am an arm's stretch from the +altar, I do not look but cover my face with my hands. Only I see that +a dull red flames behind the man's ear when he takes the white wafer, +and the veins of his neck swell as if they hurt. + +But I look into the faces of the women and the men in the front line +who receive the sacred essence from the golden cup and golden spoon, +and almost I can hear what their eyes are saying. What odds about low +foreheads, thick lips, and necks brown like the brown earth when each +has the god within? The Ruthenians--or Galicians, if you like the name +better--may be a sullen folk of unstable and misanthropical temper; +they may be uncouth of manner, and uncleanly of morals, but I shall +always think of them, as on this day, when I saw the strange glamour on +their faces that cannot be described except that it came from a +marvellous song hidden in their hearts. + +There are no seats in the church, and while the sermon is being +preached the people stand--all except the mothers with babies, who sit +on the floor. These babies have pressed their mouths to the sacred +ikon the same as the older folk, and, doubtless, some gracious kindly +angel will guard them ever hereafter. Indeed, I hope so, and that she +will give unto them those things I most crave for myself. + +Father Kryzanowski delivers the sermon in the Ruthenian language. I am +glad, for I am tired of hearing I should be a different person. I +don't want to be, except to have hands of healing and a heart that is +always young. Yes! these are the things I most crave for myself. + +.... Good gentlefolk! will you be pleased to stay and eat brown bread +with us at the wagons, and cheese and hard-cooked eggs? We shall not +give you meat, for we would discourage the beef-trust, and, besides, +this is fast day.... But you shall eat your food off flaxen towels +which we spun and wove with our own hands. Yes! and we have wrought +northern flowers and prairie roses into them. + +And further, believe us, Sirs and Mesdames, we sent five towels like +unto these to Mary, the English Queen, that she might know that we are +now Canadians and no Ruthenians. + +And Michael Laskowicz shall take your picture, Lady, with his picture +box, and you may have Hanka's necklace like as if you belonged to us, +and Anna's head'kerchief which is always in this year's style.... and +we shall clap our hands and laugh and say, "There! There! she belongs +to us, this Mees Janey Canuck, now and without end." ... They are +engaging, these beechwood folk from Austria, and their loving kindness +is like honey to my mouth. + +If it were more genteel, I would like to speak them fair, and to write +books about them, but I have set my face against authorship. I will +not go into the writing business, for I do greatly prefer wealth and +honour, and to have my picture taken on a verandah with my arm around a +pillar as an exampler of a three years of successful life in Alberta +the Sunny. + + + + +CHAPTER XX + +THE SHADOW OF THE SCAFFOLD + +_It was my harassing duty to act as death-watch to the man who wrote +the appended diary. On the day before his execution he made no entry, +although he opened the book several times and once asked me to sharpen +his pencil. I was not present at his execution, but was informed that +he bore himself with dignity and calmness. The crime which he expiated +with his life was the murder of his wife who had left him to live with +another man. He had still one year to complete before obtaining his +degree as a medical practitioner. At his trial, he refused to take +refuge behind his wife's misdemeanour, nor would he permit his counsel +to urge this plea on his behalf_. + +_I have held this unique diary for over a year, not feeling at liberty +to give it to the public while in 'the service of the Mounted +Police_.--E. F. M. + + +_There are yet six days till I die_. + +The words the judge said were "hanged by the neck till dead." Ever +since, they have haunted me like a song that fastens itself on one and +will not be forgotten. The words drag out their ghastly length to the +sound of the Fort bell as it rings the hours. They drawl to the tread +of the sentinel who walks back and forth outside my +cell--_hanged--by--the--neck--till--dead_. + +Does it take a man long to hang? I inquired of my guard, and although +we are not supposed to talk, he laughed nervously and said he had once +read of a doctor who cut down to a murderer's heart three minutes after +the drop fell. There was still enough force in the heart to ring an +electric bell. + +_Five days more_! + +They are a tireless breed, the red-police of Canada, and they have an +eye in the centre of their foreheads that never sleeps. I once heard +there was such an eye, but I forget about it. + +This boy who watches me is nearly my own age, and I can see he is sorry +for me. I will not whimper and wince, but will hedge myself about with +a fence of laughter and bravado. It is the last kindness I can do to +any one. + +I like him better than the priest who visits me. I look at the priest +with curious eyes, this man who in five days will wish me a pleasant +journey into eternity. He it is who will read aloud my burial service +while I yet live. They have no sense of propriety, these men. + +May a murderer talk of propriety? No! but he may think on it, and +write on it, and no one may contradict him. + +This ecclesiastic has never loved a woman and so has never hated one, +nor killed her in his hate. + +Her mouth was like a red wound, but it was evenly pale with her face +before I gave myself to the police. + +God! I did not mean to strike her down; I did not mean to, but I did. +Once, I read that no one was responsible for alienating a woman's +affections but her own husband. If this be true, I murdered her twice. + +I stooped to her as she lay at my feet and straightened her collar, +also I pinned back a strand of hair that had come loose. Margaret is +the best name of all. I like to say it often--Margaret. + +_There are yet four days_. + +It is not given to any living being, man or beast, to know the hour of +his death, else the monstrous horror would drive him mad. Yet, I know +it and am not mad. It must be that I cannot believe it; that nature +protects me with a density through which I may not penetrate, or that +there are yet four days--ninety-six hours! + +When I was at school, I kept a calendar on the wall and struck off the +days till Christmas or Easter, when I would be home again. Most boys +did. + +The guards in the hallways talk of horses and women and, sometimes, +they forget me and laugh aloud. I know they have forgotten me, for +when they remember their voices drop suddenly to a whisper. I heard +one of them tell of a half-Cree he shot through the heart at the time +of the Rebellion. There was, he said, no doubt of its being in the +heart, for the fellow drew up his right leg. + +The tragedy of my approaching death is its impossibility. How can one +realize his execution when the homely smell of hot wheaten bread sifts +into his cell? There is the odour, too, of horse-sweat on the guards +as they come into my cell. They are the Royal North-West Mounted +Police. + +I do not know why they are royal and I am criminal, for, after all, the +distinction between us is of slight consequence. They do by law what I +did contrary to law. The results are the same. On the whole I think +they are the worse: their killing by rule is so monstrously +premeditated. And yet, this side of the subject has never occurred to +me till now that I am the prisoner of the police. + +But why should I carp and gird at these fine fellows? They are only +the instruments of the state, that is to say of the citizens. I +myself, by taxation, have contributed to the expenses of the scaffold +whereon I shall be executed. + +The priest pleads with me that I may not die in my sin. He does not +understand, and I may not tell him, that Margaret died in hers, and +that I must do likewise if I would spend eternity with her. + +He carries the whole dogma of the Church in his face and shoulders, +this old priest, but he is a good man and sincere. His endeavour is to +help and comfort me, but his words are short-armed to relieve my agony. +Surely my soul has descended into hell. + +To-day, he spoke of my mother, but I would not have it. One need not +die a hundred deaths.... + + "Oh! little did my mother think + The day she cradled me + O' the lands I was to travel in, + Or the death I was to dee." + + * * * * * + +My dread is not from fear of the physical pain of hanging, for, after +all, the life of every man and every woman ends in a strangle. It is +that these men will lay their hands on me and bind me with a rope and +that I may not forbid them. The indignity of it is unbearable. The +prison stripes, the handcuffs, the black cap--these are from the +devil's wardrobe. + +It fills me with mute stupefaction, the mental picture I draw of myself +when I am swung out on a rope, a grisly limp nothing of humanity; I who +this minute am young and full of sap and sinew. I cannot endure that +men should look upon my countenance twisted into an inhuman grimace; on +my horribly bulging eyes, and on my tongue hanging out like the purple +petal of the wild flag. It is not decent so to mutilate a man. + +And when they have thus distorted my face, then will they blot out its +hideousness with quick-lime like one would rub an ugly picture off a +slate. + +This malign system of burying murderers in lime, and refusing the body +to friends, doubtless has its origin in the Roman custom whereby the +remains of the Christians were burned to ashes and cast into the river +so that not a vestige would remain. The Romans thought in this way +they would deprive their victims of all hope of the resurrection. + +The guard keeps a light burning at night that he may watch me the +better. It is his duty to deliver me alive to the executioner. If I +were so minded, I could sever the radial arteries in my wrists with my +teeth and he would not know. This is why I laugh out loud and will not +tell why I laugh. + +The wind blows bleak across the prairies and the brittle snow-flakes +that beat on the glass outside the iron-bars have a sound like the +whirr of swords. I wish the wind would blow always, for it lays a +salve on my soul. + +_On the third day_. + +My muscles ache for use in this two-by-nothing cell, and, now and then, +a close-shut but invisible fist hits me under the heart so that I feel +I must fall from numbness. It is stupid and super-brutal to refuse me +space wherein to walk. To-day, I went through some gymnastic exercises +and forgot long enough to hum an air that Margaret and I danced to at +the military-ball at Edmonton less than a year ago. I am not sure of +the words, but they concern "an old grey bonnet with a blue-ribbon on +it." + +My God! but I have been a bungler at living. I have wagered with life +and lost. I know it while I wait here to pay the reckoning and the +knowledge confounds me. + +I keep sifting this question over and over--why is it that men are +hanged by the neck till dead? + +I asked the priest and he quoted the verse about an eye for an eye and +a tooth for a tooth, yet it seems to me people sin more in the +observance of this law than they would in its abrogation. It used to +be said by the Jews there was a time to act for Jehovah by breaking His +commandments. + +There should come to me some severe punishment for the life I have +taken, but it should be remedial in character rather than revengeful. +Innately, I am not a criminal, and for thirty or forty years could be +made to serve my race with the labour of my body and the sweat of my +brain. It does not seem a good policy, nor economic, to kill a man in +order to kill the evil that is in him. + +_Two days_. + +This morning, a silent, fat-faced man with inimical eyes came in and +looked at me, as if appraising my weight. He dared not put his hands +on me for I have yet two days. + +I saw him once before, over two thousand miles from here, in a drug +store in Toronto. The chemist told me this was Radcliffe and that he +liked to play with children. He also said Radcliffe claimed to have +adopted the profession out of purely charitable motives, there having +been so many bunglings by amateur hangmen. + +It is quite true what some one wrote that in waiting for the +executioner to let him drop, society is revenged on the murderer. + +As I sit here writing, there comes sharply to me on the frosty air the +sound of hard hammering. There are two men working on my scaffold. I +can tell from the recurring beats of the metal on metal. + +It is appalling that the monstrous lesson these hammers are thudding +out in the barracks yard has found me too late. It must always be +late, for no man ever dreams that he will mount the scaffold. + +No! I will not whine. I will not be a coward and gag at the gall, +but, oh! I want to live so much. I want to live! + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + +THE BABOUSHKA + + There is a woman and she was wise, + Wofully wise was she.--ROBERT SERVICE. + + +Now Judea was a Province too, only smaller than Canada, and it was +subject to Rome. In Judea, there was a town called Bethlehem, which +means a house of bread. It must have been that wheat was plentiful. + +But this Bethlehem was a small, small place, and the Romans cared not +so much as one finger's fillip that a strange white star waited there +for a little while to light up a birth-bed. + +I do not know if the star did wait, but it should have, for this was +the most momentous birth which history has recorded in that, for all +time, it changed the world's ideals. Its influence could only be +weighed with planets in the balances. The baby's name was to be +Dayspring, and Wonderful, and Emmanuel. + +... It is well the baby lay in a manger else a bullock might have +crushed him with its hoof... + +And having for its central symbols a mother and a baby, this cult of +the Christ can never perish. Its ethics may change; its authority may +wane; its history be impugned, but its symbols are eternal. + +Our idea of gift-giving at the Christ-mass-tide has grown up from the +offering made at the manger by the three wise men who came out from the +East, Casper, Melchior, and Balthasar. The myrrh they offered to a +mortal; the gold to a king, the frankincense to God. + +Whether to God, the king, or the child, all our gifts should first be +brought to the manger, which is only another way of saying that without +love they avail nothing. + +I know a story about these magi, and I will relate it to the children +of the North. It was told to me by Maryam, the ninth girl-child of +Michaelovitch, a Russo-Canadian, in the Province of Saskatchewan. It +is about three wise men and a foolish woman. The woman is called +Baboushka and her heart has become as water. Once, when she was +working in her home, the three wise men passed on their journey to find +the Christ-child and they gave her greeting. "Come with us, +grandmother," they said, "for we have seen His star in the East and we +go to worship Him." + +"Surely I will come," said the old woman, "but the oven is heated for +my bread and I must even now bake it. After awhile, I will follow and +find where this star leads." + +But she never saw the Christ-child because, when her bread was baked, +the star no longer shone in the sky. Ever since she has been +searching, but has never found Him. She it is who fills the children's +stockings on Christmas Eve, and decks the fir-tree on Christmas morn, +because she hopes to find in some poor child she has fed or clothed the +little Lord Jesus whom she neglected hundreds and hundreds of years +ago. Long before dawn on Christmas Day the children in Russia are +awakened by the cry, "Behold the Baboushka!" and they spring out of bed +on the instant hoping to see her vanish out of the window, but no child +has seen aught save only the gifts she has left behind. + +Maryam thinks--indeed, she tells it to the four winds--that the +Christ-child has left Russia and has come to Canada in a big ship with +a shipmaster. + +And so Maryam is full of employment, almost every day, knitting mittens +and long white scarves for babies and poor children. You never can +tell, He may be even here on the prairie, the Christ-child whom the +unwise old Baboushka disesteemed hundreds and hundreds of years ago. +You can never tell. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + +THE HERO PRIESTS OF THE NORTH + + This they all with a joyful mind + Bear thro' life like a torch in flame, + And falling, fling to the host behind, + 'Play up! Play up! and play the game!'--NEWBOLT. + + +"For long years," said a Toronto editor the other day, "this country +has produced few outstanding personalities except politicians." + +Here spoke the little Canadian. By this country he meant the provinces +to the south of the Great Lakes. Think of that! Think of that! + +Why, man dear, north of the lakes we have outstanding personalities to +burn--and we burn them. And, here and now, let me say that under the +northern lights, politicians must, perforce, take a third or even a +fourth estate, for always we have to reckon with the missionary priest, +the business man, and the real-estate agent, before we begin to +consider the politician. Even then, I am not so sure but the editor +and the railway boss take precedence of the politician. In this large, +airy land, politicians are truly but small fry from small +places--inconsequential ephemera, who age in a heart-beat and die. + +If I had realized at the start this was to be a chapter on the +outstanding personalities among the missionary priests, I would have +begun differently. I would have said that the Anglo-Saxon hungers for +heroes, but that the heroes were rare--that this was why the raw, +ragged wolf-land lying about the Hudson Bay and along the stretches of +the Mackenzie River was of deep and peculiar interest, in that it had +the distinction of producing crops of heroes and that the breed never +seemed to run out. + +I would have said that the story of the northern priest is the story of +a man with an ideal, or, if you will have it so, with a dream; that the +dream is one that disturbs his ease and leads him in perils often. + +I would have gone further and shown this boy o' dreams to be at the +same time a supreme realist and, without question, one of the highest +types of human excellence in the last half-century; that he has the +dauntless spirit of the soldier, the enthusiasm of the explorer, the +enterprise of the merchant, and the patriotism of the statesman, and +all for the sole object of helping humanity. In a word, that he is a +special soul and must not be judged as general. + +It is to be regretted I did not begin this way, but, to quote the Roman +governor who gave judgment concerning the Nazarene: "What I have +written, I have written." + +... Among the missionary priests of the North there is, to-day, no +greater outstanding personality than Bishop Stringer of the diocese of +the Mackenzie River. + +I used to know him years agone when he was Isaac Stringer, divinity +student, a lusty young fellow, lean and clean and strong of wind, who +could carry a ball down the field past all antagonists and send it +spinning through the goal. When I say he has grown stout since those +days, you must not make the deduction that he is under-worked and +overfed like other bishops of whom we have heard tell. On the contrary +part, north of 53 deg. it is our profligate custom to starve all +dignitaries. Indeed, it was only last winter that Bishop Stringer, on +his way across the divide from the Mackenzie River to the Yukon, nearly +lost his life from starvation. He and his companion, Charles F. +Johnson, were lost in a mountain fog and missed the trail. Southern +folk who sit in offices and parlours do not grasp the full meaning of +this, and I cannot very well explain except to say that Dante had an +exceedingly fine insight when he made the Inferno foggy. + +For a week, in deep snow and deeper fog, they wandered in and out of +Fool's River, the irony of which could not fail to rub them sore. +Returning to the Fool's mouth, they spent three days making snow-shoes +and cutting up moccasins for webbing. From here they ascended the +height of land and crossed three divides before finding an east-flowing +river. But again the fog descended and now came the fight for life. +On and on they wandered, day after day, scarcely able to see a foot +ahead and more than once treading on the verge of a precipice. + +They had been living on a daily ration of a spoonful of flour and rice +and the half of a red squirrel each. But even this gave out, and the +sorely beset men tried eating moccasin leather, and ended on muckalucks +or messinke boots. For the benefit of the uninitiated, I would explain +that muckalucks are contrived out of raw sealskin. Bishop Stringer has +since told me that when he had divided the food, his companion assigned +the portions, and _vice versa_. This is one of the trail's lessons. +At last, after eleven days of blind stumbling, they came out at an +Indian camp on the Peel River. Twenty miles further down, at the +Hudson's Bay Fort, the factor weighed the much-emaciated men and found +that each had lost fifty pounds. + +In his letter to his wife, who was visiting in Kincardine, Ontario, the +Bishop says of his experiences: "The one thing that made us unhappy was +that you and the others might worry about us when we did not turn up. +But this feeling wore off when it meant a matter of life or death, and +day after day we wondered how long we would last--whether you would +ever hear from us. You can imagine we were much in prayer, and over +and over again reconsecrated ourselves to the Master's service." + +This Bishop of Mackenzie River is surely an outstanding personality, +and reminds me of what Robert Louis Stevenson said of the late John +Chalmers, a missionary of New Guinea: "You can't weary me of that +fellow," he asserted; "he is as big as a house and far bigger than any +church." + +Bishop Stringer's predecessor in the diocese was William Carpenter +Bompas, the Apostle of the North, the man who has been classified by +the Church Missionary Society as "indisputably the most +self-sacrificing bishop in the world." + +His diocese, too, was the largest in the world, consisting of one +million square miles. It had the same peculiarity as Bobbie Burns's +"cauld, cauld kirk"---there were "in't but few." + +William Bompas went North in 1865 and stayed there forty years, coming +out only twice. On the first of these occasions he returned to England +to be elevated to the episcopate. + +The only medical training the Bishop had under gone was a short course +in the treatment of snowblindness, and this when he went to England for +his consecration. This is a form of blindness that causes great +suffering among the Indians, and the Bishop had himself been stricken +with it on several occasions. On one of these, stumbling painfully at +every step, he was led by an Eskimo boy for seventy-five miles. +Writing of his agonies, he says: "They are delights. The first +foot-prints on earth made by our risen Saviour were the nail-marks of +suffering, and for the spread of the gospel, too, am prepared to +suffer." + +Like Stringer, Bompas also endured frequent starvation, but seldom +spoke of it as a personal happening, but rather as applying to +others--a virtue most hard and difficult to be practised. Writing +about it to a friend in England, he said: "Horses were killed for food +and furs eaten at several of the posts. The Indians had to eat a good +many of their beaver skins." + +Another man who endured the privations of the pioneer in this district +is the present Bishop of Keewatin, Joseph Lofthouse. + +The most interesting, and certainly the most romantic story of his +career, is that of his marriage. His sweetheart, a young English girl, +was due to arrive on the yearly vessel of the Hudson's Bay Company. +Lofthouse travelled several hundred miles to meet her, but found she +had not come, being unavoidably detained in England. The following +summer he made the same journey, but this time as the vessel pulled up +the harbour, he was able to single out the lassie's face on the deck. +Yes, sir! if you had lived among Eskimos and Indians all these years, +you, too, would tremble and choke in the throat at the ship's rope hit +the mooring-post. + +But now the young couple found themselves in as trying a predicament as +the Israelites with the sea in front, Pharaoh's army behind, and +unscalable rocks on either side. In a word, there was no minister to +marry them. Things looked badly for them, and the lassie was thinking +of returning home, when it suddenly occurred to the captain that, on +the open sea, according to law, he was entitled to act as a magistrate. +It was not long till the good ship slipped her moorings and stood out +into the sweep of the Atlantic, where to a time-honoured form, the +minister and the girl plighted their troth, symbolized it by the gift +of a ring, and ratified it by the authority of the state, in the name +of the Father, Son and Holy Ghost. + +This is a good enough story to end with, but there are other +outstanding personalities I must mention. + +There is Bishop Holmes,[1] who resides at Athabasca Landing, and who +has had many interesting experiences among the redskins. Like all true +northmen, the Bishop speaks in a quiet, low tone, admirably adapted to +the art of narrative. Once for weeks, he took charge of a Weetigo or +Weendigo Indian, in order to protect him from relatives who sought to +take his life. The man believed himself to be a cannibal, for in some +strange way the idea had been suggested to him. After a time, the +hallucination passed away, and the man returned to the camp. + +Until comparatively recent years, the untutored redmen believed that +people who were insane or in delirium were either obsessed or possessed +of an evil spirit, and that it was necessary to kill them in order to +prevent this spirit from entering into others. The plight of the +relatives in these cases was pitiable; they could not allow a violently +insane man or woman at large, and the killing was usually performed +with great grief. This custom has fallen into desuetude, for, since +the advent of the Mounted Police, the perpetrators are treated as +murderers and accordingly hanged. The most arduous duty of the police +is the bringing in of demented Indians or white prospectors from the +North. It is a task that has, in turn, driven a stalwart redcoat +insane. One's nerves are apt to snap when, for weeks, you sleep o' +nights in the snow roped to a maniac. + +And there was Rev. Henry Irwin, better known as Father Pat. He was a +railroad priest on the Canadian Pacific, and, because of his unselfish +work among them, became the idol of men. There are some misguided folk +who think of a priest as a feeble, microcephalous body with a black +coat, a shovel hat, and a superb ignorance of the ways of the world. +There are, we own, some priests like this, but Father Pat was not one +of them. Indeed, his dress and deportment were such as to often cause +scandal to good church folk who were not so conversant with his noble +deeds and self-abnegation as were the railroad navvies and gold-miners. +Father Pat had only been married a year when his wife and baby died, +and, not so long after, he was found almost frozen to death in a +snow-bank, from the results of which he died. Here was an elementary +man fighting the elements. The North stands at salute. + +Nor were the Roman Catholic missionaries less self-denying, or in any +way smaller men than their Protestant co-workers. There was Bishop +Breynat who froze his feet and amputated his toes with a penknife. +"Sirs, it's bitter beneath the Bear." + +In 1869-70, at St. Albert, the ecclesiastical head-quarters of the +Catholic Church in Alberta, Father Leduc, a complete Christian, nursed +the Indians who were sick with the small-pox until he contracted it +himself. Then the other priests in turn fell in line as nurses until +every man was a victim of the disease. + +It is a scene that reminds one of Sir Walter Scott's romance where the +clansman and his seven sons all fell for the chieftain, stepping forth +gladly into the gap and crying: "One more for Eachim." + +While the priests lay ill an Indian came for one of them to administer +the last rites of the Church to his mother. What was done? You never +could guess unless you lived in the North, so I may as well tell you. +A young priest rolled his blankets closer about, gave orders to his +attendants to carry him to the waiting sleigh, and, in this condition, +made the painful journey. Mattress and all, he was borne into the +sick-room, where he administered the viaticum to the dying woman. + +Father Lacombe, whose good grey head all men know, is the pioneer +missionary of Alberta. He is eighty-three years of age, and sixty-one +of these years have been spent in the service of the North. The story +of his life sounds like a new Acts of the Apostles. In the +science-ridden centuries to come, when these first white wanderers in +boreal regions will be almost mythical characters, tradition will love +to weave about them stories of romance and mystery--dramatic, +preternatural stories such as we frame to-day about SS. Patrick, +Augustine and Albanus. + +Perhaps the most interesting event in Lord Strathcona's visit last year +to Alberta was his meeting again with Pere Lacombe. It was in the +Government House gardens at Edmonton, overlooking the Saskatchewan +River. All the guests fell back out of earshot while the aged men +clasped hands and talked over other days and of the boys who had long +since crossed the height of land to the ultimate sea. + +At the present time Pere Lacombe is living at Midnapore, near Calgary, +in a home for poor old folk and children, the money to build which he +collected himself. + +... And there is the story of Father Goiffon who was frozen near +Emerson on the eve of All Saints' Day, 1860. It was told to me by +Father Lestanc,[2] who, eighty years ago, was born at Brest in +Brittany. Father Lestanc has been fifty-five years in the West and +North, nineteen of which were spent at St. Boniface under Bishop Tache. +In spite of his extreme age, Lestanc has a hardy-moulded figure, and a +strong, clear voice. One cannot listen to him for long without being +impressed by his affectional force and broad reach of humanity. He is +not clear about things of yesterday, but take him back over the decades +and his memory rings true as a bell. + +Goiffon had been at St. Paul, Minneapolis, making the yearly purchases +for his mission. Among other things he bought a city-bred horse to +carry him home. Fifty years ago St. Paul was seventeen days' journey +from Emerson, on the border-line, and folk travelled in caravans. + +One day's journey from Emerson, Father Goiffon left the party that he +might push on the more rapidly and reach his mission post to say Mass +on All Saints' Day. To use a northern colloquialism, he travelled +light, carrying with him but one meal and no blanket. Neither had he +matches or an axe, for, bear in mind, he was only a young priest, and +he hoped to be in his shack by fall of night. + +Soon after noonday there blew up a blinding snow-storm that made +progress impossible. A usurping, all-invading sheet of snow settled +down over the plains and turned the air into a white darkness. The man +tied his horse to a willow shrub and lay down in the snow. The hours +passed painfully on, but the youth kept his head buried in his saddle +that his face might not freeze. When at last he looked up, he found +his horse dead by his side. I told you a bit ago, it was a city-bred +horse and no trailer. + +And now came the fight for life. The boy priest had no shelter but the +flaccid, unstrung body of his horse, already cold in death. I do not +know about the pain of the night, except that at the edge of day, one +foot and leg were frozen and the toes of the other, so that he could +not stand upright. I wonder if he heard the bell from his home in +France as he lay in the snow! They say men do. Something must have +been sounding in his ears, for he did not hear the caravan as it passed +him in the morning. + +At midday he cut a piece of flesh off the horse and ate it. + +"A crude diet, Mon Pere," I remark. + +"Oui, oui," replies the old Breton. "What you Anglais call a +'sleepshod' dinnaire! What would you, Madame? One must browse where +he is tethered." + +The rescue party from Emerson met a man and boy hauling in the stricken +priest on a sledge. They had heard him sobbing in the snow. + +The Indians doctored him for six weeks until his limbs threatened to +drop off, and then sent a runner to St. Boniface to ask Father Lestanc +what they would do with him. This happened fifty years ago, but Father +Lestanc must walk to the window and look out into the garden for a +while before he can trust his voice. + +For men and dogs it was a round run of one hundred and forty miles from +St. Boniface to Emerson, but in twenty-four hours Goiffon lay in Bishop +Tache's palace at St. Boniface, on the banks of the Red River. Dr. +Bunn, the physician at the Hudson's Bay post across at Fort Garry, +awaited his arrival and amputated the already putrefied members. The +next morning Goiffon was found to be bleeding to death; the stitches +would not hold and the veins were open. Nothing could be done but to +calmly await the end. + +Father Lestanc broke the news to the household, whereupon the sorrowing +but withal practical sister in charge of the kitchen placed a caldron +of buffalo tallow on the stove, for, explains my narrator, "a priest's +wake requires many, many candles." + +The little serving-maids under the sister, doubtless whispering over +the sad happenings upstairs, forgot to watch the pot, so that it +"swelled much, Madame," over the red-hot stove till all the house was +on fire. + +Do not scold the girls, but wait till I tell you. Such a thing was +never heard of. It was really Le Bon Dieu who permitted the house and +cathedral to burn. There is no doubt of it, for, when the priest +carried the dying youth out and laid him on the snow, the frost +congealed the blood so that his veins ceased to empty themselves. + +This was fifty years ago, and last summer, Father Goiffon came up from +Petit Canada, near St. Paul, to attend a cathedral service at Winnipeg, +on the site of Old Fort Garry. + +"Oui, Madame, oui, I comprehend when you say _similia similibus +curcantur_. Literally, eet ees a frost kills, a frost cures. Eet ees +a well thing the body ees so adaptive." + +... And once Bishop Grandin was lost in the snow. It was in 1863, near +Fort Resolution on Great Slave Lake. + +With one Indian boy he was crossing the lake on the ice, following in +the wake of a party of Hudson's Bay Company men. The Bishop's dogs +were tired and fell behind. When a storm blew up he lost the trail. +The thermometer was at forty degrees below zero, and the storm was what +Father Lestanc calls a "poudrerie"--that is to say, a storm where the +snow blows up like fine powder. This does not sound unpleasant, but as +an actuality it is, in the extreme North, a sinister snow that bites +your face like driven needles. + +The Bishop had no guide but the wind, and when a storm rises the wind +veers. He gave the dogs their head, but even their homing instinct +failed them in the storm and night, so that they crouched on the ice +and howled in unison with the little Indian boy. + +At dawn the boy said he smelled smoke, for he was an Indian, and smoke +travels far in the clear, winnowed air of the North. + +On looking to the west they sighted land, and after a painful journey +met a dog-train coming toward them with men--the boy's father and +uncle. The priest was celebrating a Mass for the repose of the +Bishop's soul when he arrived, for "Les sauvages," says my informant, +"had declared the Bishop would be frozen to the middle of hees heart. +Ah, leetle Madam! Whom Le Bon Dieu guards are well guarded." + +I did not know about this Father Lestanc before. I thought he was +merely an old Oblate Brother passing from the sixth to the seventh +stage of man's little day. Now I know him for one of the outstanding +personalities of the North, and, as such, would do him honour, even I +who am of the world, worldly. I know things about him that happened +years and years ago when this was no man's land. I know how once he +nursed and buried a young man whose companions had abandoned him to die +at Rat Creek, near Portage la Prairie. + +The man had gone into the Indian camps against the wishes of his +fellow-teamsters who were travelling from Fort Garry to Fort Charlton. +But he was a gamester, and he went. This was how he contracted +small-pox, and the reason his companions were forced to leave him to +fight death for himself with a little supply of pemmican and some +bannocks as his sole backers. You may not have noticed that the life +of a gamester and the race-horse are short ones in the north-west, but +it is, nevertheless, indubitably true, and this case was no exception +to the rule. His name? I do not know. One forgets names in the +oblivious West. + +Father Lestanc rolled the loathsome body in a blanket and decently +buried it, for the buffalo hunters had learned that in cases of +small-pox the healthiest thing a traveller can do is to mind his own +special business. + +"Did any one else catch the disease?" I ask. + +"Non, non, no one else." + +The old man muses a little, for he is growing tired, and this was fifty +years ago. Suddenly memory floods in on him and he shows distress: +"Pardon, Madam, pardon! I took eet. Oui, I took eet." + + + +[1] Since deceased. + +[2] Since deceased. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + +COAL-MINING IN ALBERTA + + Till dazzled by the drowsy glare, + I shut my eyes to heat and light; + And saw, in sudden night, + Crouched in the dripping dark, + With steaming shoulders stark + The man who hews the coal to feed my fire. + --WILFRED WILSON GIBSON. + + +Solon once told Croesus that whoever had the iron would possess all the +gold, but here Solon was taking coal for granted. Iron-mines are of +comparatively little value unless coal-mines are within easy access. I +think of this as I view the underground workings of a coal-mine, +to-day, and of how our Royal Land of Canada has both minerals in +immeasurable quantities. In this Province of Alberta alone, there is +so much coal to burn that it will take a million years. Looking at +this sheer face of coal twenty feet in height, I must perforce recall +Oliver Wendell Holmes's remark that he was not at all nervous about a +certain comet which threatened to destroy the earth, for there was so +much coal in the world he couldn't bring himself to believe it had been +made for nothing. + +In time past, it was said hereabout that coal-mining did not pay; that +the profit of the industry lay in its higher mathematics, by which was +meant the formation of companies and the disposal of bonds and stocks. +The primary work of The Coal Barons, it was further declared, consisted +in laying up treasures on earth for themselves, leaving the +shareholders to find reward in heaven. The "suckers" who purchased +stock were said to have gone through the comparative degrees of mine, +miner, minus. They were "the bitten." + +From the uppermost appearance of things, these remarks would seem to be +warranted, particularly as the true westerner has always something to +sell and has even been known to lie about it, but a closer and more +careful study of affairs shows that, in this grim game, the mine-owners +received neither the honours nor the tricks, that is, unless you are +disposed to count the chicane as one. Most cases, in their futile +efforts to bolster up the exchequer of the company, the barons have +sacrificed their private fortunes, so that their titles may, with +entire propriety be spelled barrens. It was one of these men who +feelingly remarked: "When a man's affairs in this province go rocky, +you may safely reckon on coal being the rock." + +But now that the seven lean years of coal are over and the fat ones are +well begun, now that coal as a revenue producer is only second to +Mother Wheat, we can with calmer and more unbiassed judgment consider +the causes which have hitherto been responsible for its "outrageous +fortune." + +Perhaps the commonest cause of failure has been the lack of adequate +capital. The President's chair in a coal company is no place for empty +pockets. To successfully operate his mine he requires money at any +price. The initial outlay is large, the carrying expenses heavy, the +unexpected demands many. Hitherto, this capital has not been readily +forthcoming. Investors have preferred to buy town lots rather than +industrial stocks. In older and more settled communities the opposite +condition prevails. On the other hand, coal on the cars is cash. The +mine operator takes his bill-of-lading to the bank and draws up to +two-thirds of its face value. This enables him to meet his fortnightly +pay-bill and general mining expenses, but, for two or three years, +until sufficient rooms have been made in the workings of the mine, he +cannot expect it to do more. + +In the meanwhile, there is development work to be done and development +work is expensive. The entries or hallways off which the rooms open +are costly to drive and they must be beamed with great timbers held in +place by tree trunks. Initial surveys have to be made, and expert +superintendence paid for. It is for such work the President requires +ready money and free money. He cannot possibly make his working +expenses to cover those of development in that the same managing staff +is required to handle a small output as a large one. The same is +applicable to the engines and hoisting machinery. + +The second cause which has hitherto hindered successful operations has +been lack of railway facilities and lack of a steady market. Emerson +has defined commerce as taking things from where they are plentiful to +where they are needed. Coal, we have shown, is plentiful; and that it +is needed in the Canadian North-West we need hardly remark, but that it +could not be carried needs explanation. For several years our railways +were lamentably short of equipment, so that the mines had frequently to +close down for days, or even weeks, their bunkers being entirely +inadequate for storage purposes. This meant a severe loss to the mines +in that their men and machinery stood idle and that lucrative contracts +had to be cancelled. + +Probably no industry has suffered so keenly from car shortage as that +of coal-mining. The only people who have received windfalls from this +regretable state of affairs were the dishonest yard-masters who, +unknown to the railway officials, did a secret but withal brisk +business with the rival coal companies that bid for cars. It took a +goodly slice off the profits of each car of coal to grease the large +palm of the yard-master. And who in this pushful, practical age has +ever heard of a car spotter in the railway yards buying a ton of coal? +The plethora of his coal-bin is more to the credit of his wits than his +morals. My mind is fully established in this thing; as a grafter he is +the perfected article. + +It may, however, be said in excuse for the car shortage, that the +demand for coal cars synchronized with that of wheat, the rush for both +being in the autumn and early winter. At first, the pioneer coal +dealers in the villages and towns throughout the west, had neither the +buildings wherein to store fuel nor the money to permit of their +purchasing it, so that orders were seldom given until cold weather had +actually set in. + +While this condition of affairs still leaves something to be desired, +the dealers have had several salutary lessons and are, as a generality, +becoming much more forehanded. The population of the west has also +increased so vastly during these latter years, that the demand on the +dealers, and accordingly on the mines, has gradually become steadier +till, at last, the industry rests upon the well-settled foundation of a +regular demand, a regular supply, and a dependable railway service, in +other words, it fulfils the three conditions laid down in Emerson's +definition of commerce. + +A third difficulty which confronted mine operators, was the securing of +experienced miners. The supply was distinctly inadequate, so that +green hands had to be engaged--homesteaders who wanted to earn money +during the winter, newly-arrived immigrants who took the first job +which came to hand; and farm labourers who came west to take off the +harvest and decided to stay in the country. + +These men, while they came under the union scale of wages, were unable +to do little else for the first winter than spoil their shots of +dynamite, cave in the roofs, and blow out the timbers. The mine +operator, however, rarely became disheartened so long as the green man +didn't blow off his own head for, in this case, the operator would be +called upon by the courts to pay staggering damages to the miner's +heirs under the compulsion of an extraordinary statute known as the +Labourer's Compensation Act. + +But now, in these days of grace, owing to the investment of British and +foreign capital, the unskilled man has been superseded by electric +drillers and cutters--in a word, modern methods are being used in our +mines with the result that we have fewer accidents and losses. + +This application of machinery to the industry has also brought about a +maximum of output with a minimum of expenditure. The development work +can be done with more speed and less expense, so that the old +disabilities under which western operators had to labour will soon be +cancelled out of memory. + +While the application of machinery to mining must indubitably minimize +the probability of strikes, the operators must be prepared to reckon +with these until the end of time, in that throwing down their tools +appears to be the chief occupation of miners. It is hard to account +for this irresponsible vagary unless it be that they receive twice as +much pay as other workmen. Or it may be that they make a fetish of the +union, in which respect they do resemble certain stupid people in the +southern seas who have a worm to their god and are wont to sacrifice +oxen to it. + +Now, miners on strike are persons of no very marked refinement, neither +are they given to logic. What Tennyson says of the Light Brigade is +finely applicable here--"Theirs not to reason why." + +When you meet real strikers nothing counts. You may do everything +which instinct, invention or despair can suggest, except descending to +vulgar invective, yet without the slightest tangible result. No matter +how soothly their employer may speak to them, they are suspicious of +him or her. The intervention must always come from a third party. +These men are the latter-day exponents of the old rule laid down by +Dean Swift for the better direction of servants: "Quarrel with each +other as much as you please, only always bear in mind that you have a +common enemy which is your Master and Lady." + +To find yourself facing a square of irate strikers is to feel yourself +very thin, very colourless, and amazingly inexperienced. It is to +wonder at the rudeness of their speech, the largeness of their mouths, +and to speculate in a Christianly way as to just what screw is loose in +their mental make-up. I know this to be the way of it, for once we had +a strike in a mine which I, with a strutting but misguided assurance, +imagined to be the property of our family. Owing to a former +superintendent having entered into an agreement with the union, I +learned we were holding the mine co-operatively, and that I could not +dismiss the men either individually or collectively. + +The trouble happened in this wise: the president being absent for +several months, it fell to me, as vice-president, to hold the reins. +By reason of the facts that the seam of coal was pinching thin; that +the miners were receiving one-third more than any others in the +locality, and that we were producing on a falling market, we found we +were losing nearly one hundred dollars a day. The superintendent +invited the miners to discuss the matter without prejudice. They did +not disallow the correctness of his contention but refused to consider +a reduction of their wages. They were content to stand by their side +of the agreement and would see to it that the company did the same. + +And here I showed a lack of discretion in allowing this matter to be +discussed, for, while failing to deduce that it was highly preposterous +to kill the goose who laid the golden egg, they still had the +penetration to see that in closing down the mine because of lack of +orders, my primary object was to nullify the agreement. Nothing could +express their unmeasured contempt of the vice-president, and they left +me under no misapprehension as to their opinion of me. They accused me +of playing them, and being guilty of the offence, I was naturally +offended at the accusation. Still, I declined to be led into further +discussion, or to recriminate in kind, so that ultimately I came to +feel strong as one does who is intentionally weak before her enemy. +There was nothing for it. The miners had to walk out, all except the +engineers who pumped the water from the sump. Now, the night engineer +had a face so wicked that he might all his life have been stoking +furnaces in the underworld, and he it was who permitted the men to +enter the shaft and put a stick in the valve of the pulsometer so that +the mine became flooded and several entries caved in. + +I was quite as angry as my temperament allowed, and it would have given +me much satisfaction to have killed them, for, after all, this is a +most effective method of getting rid of your enemies. It was, +nevertheless, no small satisfaction when the superintendent, a +tight-built muscular Englishman, gave the engineer a touch or two that +reminded the onlooker of a piston-rod in action. If might and right +are not the same thing, they ought to be. Two weeks later, the works +were re-opened with other workmen on a new wage scale. On arriving at +the mine the following day, I found our former employees were picketing +it. They had a crow to pluck with me, I could see that. The very air +was portentous. Those workmen were like the horses of Phoebus Apollo +in that their breasts were full of fire and they breathed it forth from +their nostrils and mouths. But while the men were abusive and +loud-voiced, they were never insulting, for even Satan finds it hard to +forge a weapon against a smile and an unwavering courtesy. And, after +all, what can strikers do with a vice-president who is a woman? It +seemed like taking an unfair advantage of them. It was only when we +met the miner's wives that I learned my exceeding limitations; that the +power fell out of my elbow and the stiffening out of my collar-bone. + +When I say "we" I mean William and myself. Now, William was my driver, +and he spent fourteen years in the British cavalry. He had served in +Egypt and South Africa; he had fought his way through a screaming death +at Omdurman and yes, I will say it--William was "a nob" and handsome as +a circus horse. His deference as he lifted me down off the high seat, +his manifest concern for my comfort, and his superb arrogance as he +bade the women "Give over there!" were too much, for even these raging +furies to reckon with. His coolness under a withering fire of +invective restored me to normal and enabled me to stand pat. + +To shorten the story, we had to engage three successive gangs before we +won out. By that time the strikers had become divided, some having +accepted work in other mines, while the remainder became discouraged +and gradually gave up the picket. + +I have dwelt at some length on this matter of strikes because, as yet, +no actual operator has expressed his view point or his feeling under +the ordeal, whereas the strikers have made the street corners vibrant +concerning the villainies of their employers whom they designate as +Capital. In dismissing this phase of mining, I would say a strike is +to be avoided at almost any cost, for, apart from its factor as a +somewhat strenuous builder of character, it is a victory which costs +the operator too dearly both in the expenditure of nerves and of money. + +... Before being led into the discussion of finances and strikes, I had +started to tell you about an Albertan mine and its workings. The theme +is worth picking up again. Before you go down, it is well to have a +look around the machinery-room where the engines pump up the water and +pump down the air. You will also be interested in the great spool or +drum which unwinds the long steel cables by which the cage is lowered +or hoisted in the shaft. One man stands beside it and controls it with +a lever. The man behind the lever needs to be equally as steady and +effective a worker as the man behind the gun, for it is by this cage +the men enter and leave the mine, although they may, if so disposed, +ascend or descend by the escapement or ladder-shaft beside it. + +It is the strict duty of the foreman to examine this drum, these +cables, and the cage every day, and to record his findings in a book +which he is required to keep in compliance with the laws regulating +coal-mines. This man must also carefully test for gas. The +maintenance of the air-circuit is a matter of much concernment to the +operators, for on it depends not only the health and security of the +men but the safety of the mine itself. Carbon monoxide, which is white +damp, is more dreaded by the miners than any other gas because it is +difficult to detect, having no odour, taste or colour. + +The Bureau of Mines in the United States have recently discovered that +canary birds are extremely susceptible to it and, after being exposed +for three minutes to air containing one-sixth of the one per cent, of +the gas, show marked distress. In eight minutes, they fall off their +perches. As a result, many American miners are now using canaries to +watch out for gas while they are at work. + +Black damp, or carbon dioxide, may be detected by its peculiar odour. +It is heavier than air and tends to suffocate fire. After an explosion +has taken place these two gases become mixed and form what is known as +after damp, a mixture which surely destroys all life remaining in the +mine. + +From familiarity with danger, miners become disdainful of it and +careless to a degree that is well-nigh incredible. They will hold +dynamite caps in their mouths for convenience, a risk which pales into +nothingness the ancient simile of the weaned child who plays on the den +of the cockatrice. He is a poor man of low-funk spirit who does not +believe himself quick enough to cross a cage after the signal to ascend +has been given. To run this venture is, to them, a matter of no +moment. I have seen more than one miner caught and crushed through a +slight miscalculation in this respect, but these accidents are so +quickly forgotten that they do not act as deterrents to any noticeable +extent. In truth, there seems little reason to doubt that most of the +sudden catastrophes which result in the loss of many valuable lives, +are the result of some insane risk taken by one man. If these risks +were not among those things which the Deity is said to "wink at," all +miners would have been killed long ago. + +If you feel inclined, you might stop awhile and look at the +skeleton-like tipple of the mine, by which I mean the wooden framework +above it; at the automatic self-dumping skips and at the rocking +screens which sort the coal into the kinds known as lump, egg, and nut; +but the tempestuous torrent of coal from the hopper bottoms of the cars +would drown our talk and assault our eardrums, so, on the whole, it is +just as well to take these things for granted. + +One's first descent into a mine is an experience rather than a +pleasure. To leave the sharp intensity of the sunlight and to be +suddenly dropped into a horrible pit, is to feel oneself rolled into a +tight little ball, with every nerve as hard as a nail. You hope, you +pray, that the long, lithe cables which hold the cage are stronger than +they look. You wonder if you will come out feet foremost in Australia, +and if it will hurt very much. After a second or third experience, the +sensation is one of swift adventuring, but few people care to inure +themselves to this frame of spirit. Arrived at the shaft bottom, you +are made aware with the aid of your cap lamp, of huge square timbers +around you and of a "sump" or well, underneath. It is into this sump +that all the entries of the mine are drained. + +Without realizing it, you will have lowered your voice, for the +darkness and stillness oppress you as though you were bearing a weight +on your shoulders. The air is lifeless and leaden. This is assuredly +The City of Dreadful Night. You feel as if you were the last survivor +in a dead world. But presently, a strong hand will take yours in his +and lead you through the Stygian darkness till your eyes become +habituated to the gloom, when you will become aware of two tracks +stretching away in the channel which has been hollowed out of the coal. +Then you will be warned to step aside and keep close to the wall while +a stocky-car holding probably three tons is, with a vast grinding of +wheels, whirled by you to the cage, there to be hoisted to the tipple. + +Your guide will explain that you are in the main entry or tunnel of the +mine, and that there are other entries at right angles. These with the +rooms which open off them, are surveyed by engineers with great +exactness and according to certain regulations laid down in the mining +statutes. + +Here and there in the blackness, thin tongues of flame move about like +fireflies. These are the lamps in the miners' caps. You have also a +fire-fly in your bonnet, but, of course, it is only visible to the +onlookers. These lamps are like little coffee-pots and are filled +either with carbide or seal oil. In the more modern mines which are +lighted by electricity, lamps are not required so much, although no man +ventures into the mine without one. Faith is not nearly so estimable a +virtue as sight, no matter what the theologians may say. It was a +miner poet (you must not spell it a minor poet) who wrote the lines-- + + "God, if you had but the moon + Stuck in your cap for a lamp, + Even you'd tire of it soon + Down in the dark and the damp. + + Nothing but blackness above + And nothing moves but the cars-- + God, in return for our love, + Fling us a handful of stars." + + +These lamps are the footlights the miners hold up to Old King Coal as +they pierce his sides with their electric drills, and wrench open his +wounds with their ripping charges of dynamite. They call this shooting +the coal, so it is just as well to keep your peculiar fantasies to +yourself. + +In a coal-mine one loses his sense of direction, for there is no heaven +above, no earth beneath--nothing but silence and black impenetrableness. + +And yet, when you are alone in a mine, you may hear a sound like the +sighing of great trees. This is probably the utterance of your own +blood to which you are giving audience as when you put your ear to a +conch-shell; or it may be the surging sigh of the enormous primitive +ferns, sigillarias and lepidodendrons who lay down in these strata as +though for an eternal rest. In the counting-house of the years, vast +cycles have come and gone till, now in these impertinent days of +dynamite and electricity, uncouth, ungentle men have broken their rest +forever. The complaint of the trees is not without judgment. The +thing seems ill-done and almost, of myself, I can hear their tragical +murmurings. + +The temperature in the coal-mine does not vary with the seasons, and +the men believe it healthier to work in this underworld than to be +subject to the changes of climate above. They have also told me that +there is no echo in a coal stratum. I do not know if this be true, +but, of a surety, one's voice does not carry far in the dead air, and +even the shots of dynamite seem to be muffled and indistinct. +Nevertheless, it is my opinion--an irrational one, no doubt--that men +who dig in mines should have music rather than men who eat in cafes. +We need to recast our ideas about these things. + +It makes no difference how you have quarrelled with these miners in a +strike; it makes no difference that once you felt like murdering them +in bulk, it is impossible to follow them day after day through the +working of a coal-mine without seeing something heroic in their crude +bent figures. You may not be able to understand the language they +speak, for many of them are foreign born, but in time you come to talk +to them through the smile, the touch on the arm, or the clap of the +hands, which signals are, after all, the universal language of the +world. Most of these men are kindly disposed and, when left free from +the machinations of the lawyer, are capable of self-sacrifice for their +employer, and even of affection. In every gang of men, whether in +railway construction, lumber camp, or coal-mine, there is always an +unamiable workman of ferocious egoism who is known as the camp lawyer. +The legal fraternity will probably resent this misuse of their name, +and properly so, for this fellow is froward in manner and has the same +loving heart as a tiger. He it is who stirs up all the internal +strifes and keeps them at boiling point. It is an art in which he +greatly excels. In olden days, they called a man of his ilk a gallows +knave, and the epithet was selected with care. Foremen are, nowadays, +beginning to pay less attention to the communion of saints in their +camps and vastly more to the communion of sinners. It is a foreman's +particular business to spot the lawyers early in the game and to deal +with them as the occasion warrants. + +There are many things to be observed down in these black entrails of +the earth, but, before we leave, we will look at the stables. They are +lighted by electricity. It is the work of the horses to haul the cars +to the main entry where they are switched on to the electric cable. It +is commonly believed that horses who live in mines become blind. This +is not true. What they lose is their sense of colour, for in the dark +all things are hueless. These horses are fat-fleshed and healthy, and +are so tame they can almost be mesmerized into talking to you. They +seem highly interested in the story I tell them of how once the +Frenchmen put twelve thousand dead men and their horses down three +coal-pits at Jemappes, and things like that. They appreciate carrots, +sugar-lumps and apples, which have been steadily purloined from the +cook's pantry at the bunk-house, in a way that is positively human. It +would be unkind to enter the mine without carrying a treat for the +horses, but now, having done so, let me bid all of you on the day-shift +a very good fortune, and a safe return to God's blessed sunshine. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + +THE PLAYGROUNDS OF THE WEST + + Come, my love, and let us wander + Cross the hills and over yonder.--CY WARMAN. + + +Banff, in the Rocky Mountains, has been so often called the playgrounds +of the West, that the words have become trite and fail to carry their +true significance. This fact is inevitably borne in on the Canadian +who visits the place, and he wonders to himself why he has failed to +understand it before. + +Assuredly this is my experience as I ride around Tunnel Mountain this +beautiful August day. The road is seven miles long, and from its +winding ascent, one may look across the hills and down the wide valley +where the green waters of the Bow River foam into white over the rocks. +This is the full-robed, full-voiced choir of the mountain temple, but I +do not know what it sings. + +The Valley of the Bow River with its amphitheatre of hills is the +wonder picture of the Rockies, combining, as it does, all that is most +beautiful in are and nature. [Transcriber's note: because of the +oddness of the grammar of this sentence, it may be that one or more +words are missing.] + +Across it, on Tunnel Mountain, is the splendid hostelry of the Canadian +Pacific Railway; warm sulphur springs that bubble up out of the earth, +and a cave of waters which is an extinct geyser, but might be the +matrix of the hills themselves. + +Geologists say that the eastern ranges of the Rocky Mountains are of +the Eocene Age, and that the western ridges are Pliocene, and eons +younger. But these revelations of science are almost as overwhelming +as our ignorance. They tell of the immensity of time but do not sound +it. It is not possible to level them to our mental capacity. + +A wealthy Sheik who once lived in the Land of Uz told us how God +challenged him to answer certain questions about the mountains. + +"Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth?" + +"Who hath stretched the line upon it?" + +"Who hath divided a watercourse for the overflowing of the waters?" + +But Job could not answer so much as one question, and he said, "Behold +I am vile; what shall I answer Thee? I will lay my hand upon my mouth." + +This Job, it would appear, was no ordinary sort of man, and one who was +very wise. + +And ever since, mankind has puzzled itself with these riddles, even as +you and I are puzzled. Sometimes we do not so much as believe in the +great Lord, who is thought to have made this world, and we say, "Aha!" +and other scornful words that are wicked exceedingly. But, up in the +hills, we comprehend God without so much as an effort. He is natural +here. These scenes of sublimity break in on our life's dead level and +show us depth within ourselves unsounded before. Impulses which have +been informulate, and aspirations which the years have strangled are +brought to life and sentience. "Blessed be the hills," say I, and you +must reply, "Amen and Amen." + +This road twists upward easily, but, in one place, they have made it +into stone stairways, with each tread many feet wide so that the horses +can find firm footing. This stairway looks to be a hundred feet in +height. All the horses must go one way round the mountain, and not +turn backwards, for there is no room to pass on the trail. Every +little while, you stop to look at the savage rock forms which surround +you, or at their colours. It was no stinting brush that laid them on. +Opal and wine-red, purple and ochre, splash the rocks with living hues +of wonderful beauty. It is a pity we have not more lavish words for +these transfiguration scenes of Nature. It is foolish to try and +explain them with our worn-out ones. Every traveller realizes this. +For my part, in the mountains, I always feel like that Eton boy of +fourteen, who was at the Battle of Waterloo. His first letter home was +to this effect: "Dear Mamma: Cousin Tom and I are all right. I never +saw anything like it in my life." + +There are few birds hereabout. I have only seen a robin and a hawk. +The hawk hovered above as if undecided what to do and then fell as if +he had been dropped from a plummet. This bird has an instinct for the +straight line that might shame even a Dominion land surveyor. This and +the fact that the hawk has been known to eat mosquitoes, are his only +claims to our attention or respect. All the world knows him for a +predaceous bird, and that his heart is a fierce furnace. + +A nice-seeming man who is working on the road tells me there are many +kinds of animals in the Banff Park, but that they are all preserved. +In the corral there are eighty buffaloes. The corral consists of two +thousand acres. The white-tailed deer are so tame they come up to the +village. There are wolverines, too, and these animals are of so +covetous a nature they will steal even a frying pan. The Indians call +them _carcajous_, which means "the gluttons." + +This man says he was formerly a fur-pup, by which expression he means a +trapper. He left the trap-line because his partner was always +objecting to bacon for dinner. Huh! Huh! to hear him complain, one +might almost think the Lord grew bacon for consumption at breakfast +only. + +Riding up the hill through the green trees, I feel as if I were in the +opening paragraph of a story, and an half expecting at each bend of the +road to meet a knight in armour with a retinue of servants. As he +fails to appear I talk to Swallow, my mare, and she twitches her ears +as though she understands. Indeed, there is little doubt but that she +does. + +"Let us stay awhile here," say I, "and look at this gay young squirrel. +He is enlarging his burrow as if he intended finishing it in five +minutes. He is no hireling squirrel. What say you, Swallow?" + +If a mare can laugh, this one does, but maybe it is only her way of +coughing. + +"And I have an idea, Swallow, that she is inside with four or five baby +squirrels, who think the world is lined with fur and that life consists +in drawing nutriment from a warm breast. This must be the way of it." + +"Step along, my pretty one, and may it happen we shall find the Knight +round the next turn. Do you notice how the green trees grow like a +mane on the hills?" + +Swallow thinks differently. It is her opinion that the dark +needle-like pines stand erect in the same way as the fur on a grizzly's +back. I know this, else why does she shy violently as we make the turn? + +"You are wrong, my pretty one," say I. "These pine-trees are very +religious and much too dignified to attack you and me. Besides, the +needles of the pines drive devils away, and if you carry a sprig of +spruce with you in the woods, no ill-luck will ever come to you. +Theophile Trembly, who is a woodsman and a ranger, told me this. + +"Do not linger, Sweet-o'-my-Heart; the world is young and you and I may +ride forever. + +"These are juniper-bushes, any one can see. Maybe if I were to lie +under one, like the Tishbite did, an angel might touch me. And maybe I +should also find 'a cake baken with coals', and a cruse of water. I +would tell you, Swallow, how it tasted in my mouth, for the Tishbite +forgot this thing. And I would mention where the angel got the coals. +They must have been the 'coals of juniper' of which King David wrote, +for these are, to this very day, the best charcoals in all the world. +Where the divine visitant found the match to kindle the coals... + +"Ah, well! I'll ask the Padre about this, but like as not he'll say, +"An irrevelant and irreverent question, M'Dear!" although it is neither +one nor the other, for it argues well for humanity that an angel, who +is generally portrayed as a rather offish being, should know where to +find a match and how to use it. A lot could be said on this very +point. It pleasures me not a little that an angel from the skies built +a fire out of doors and cooked cakes on it. This surely means that +when the angels take recreation they play at being men and that they +have a kindly feeling for us. It might be that there are more of them +around about than we have any idea, neighbourly-like angel of sap and +sinew, who occasionally bear a hand in our work and who loaf around of +evenings by the campfire. If an angel can cook on an out-door fire, he +must know how to hang a blanket to the windward side, and an angel who +knows this is no nidnoddy fellow, I can tell you. + +"If you were listening more attentively, Swallow, and if I were not +afraid of the Padre finding out, I would push this idea further and say +that, when the angel was through with his meal, he would in all +likelihood be humanely tired and would fall asleep on a heaped up +mattress of fir needles and dried juniper leaves. These, as is their +wont, would whisper immemorial secrets to him, so that he might come in +time to be a little more tolerant of our failings and to wonder if it +were altogether fair that the soul of a man should be damned for his +body's needs. He might even think the same about a woman's soul. It +cannot fail to vastly affect an angel's opinions when, instead of +looking down from the sky, he lies on a bed of leaves and looks up at +it. The whole colour and texture of his ideas must be altered. I +believe he would come to feel that religious truths should vary to suit +the needs of humanity, as those needs change, and that religion should +serve men rather than men religion. + +"A young god-man said something about this one day in a wheatfield, but +he was reproved by his wincing hearers whose descendants are with us to +this very day." + +This conversation has become too philosophical for Swallow, whose ears +are sweetly holden and who shows her wish to change my thought by +single footing whenever we come to a level stretch. Doubtless, she +hopes to draw my attention to her easy and right pleasant gait. If I +owned her we might become great cronies. + +On the top of the mountain to which we have come, the leaves on the +deciduous trees seem smaller and about the size of rabbits' ears. On +my way hither, I passed bluebells, ferns, heather, roses, wild cotton, +and painter's brush, the plant which combines colour with heat. From +several thousand feet below comes up to me the bellow of the train's +engine, that makes long hollow echoes among the peaks. A peculiarity +of the north is that the sounds seem only to emphasize the silence and +loneliness. This engine makes an ill-noise, but without the railway, +these mountains must have remained unseen to all except a hard-muscled +and adventurous few. For this reason, we must feel something of the +gratitude of the Chief of the Blackfeet Indians, who, in 1885, because +of the friendly spirit of his tribe towards the builders, was given a +pass ticket over the Canadian Pacific Railway by the President thereof. +The ticket was given him in a carved frame. The letter in which he +acknowledged the courtesy read like this: "I salute you, O Chief, O +great One! I am pleased with railway key opening road free to me. The +chains and rich covering of your name writing; its wonderful power to +open the road show the greatness of your chieftainship. I have done. + + his + "Crow X Foot," + mark. + + +Standing on this hill and looking off into the sky, I and my horse seem +poised in mid air. It wouldn't be so hard to fly. Hitherto, I have +been following pleasure as something to be caught, and, of a sudden, I +have ridden into it. Don't you know me? I am Columbine pirouetting on +the white horse of the North. + +Don't you know this is summer time on the hills where Nature has wealth +to spill like a mad-woman and spills it? On this mountain-top, there +is a wandering wind soft as a child's caress. I must make the best of +it and of the fierce radiance of the sunshine, for, sooner than we +bargain for, the Lord in his derision may send a cutting blizzard and +it will be cold, so cold. + +As I ride homeward down the trail, I lift up my voice and hallo to the +sun for joy. You may call this mountain madness if you care to. Don't +you know that it matters not a finger's fillip what any one says about +a climber's mood or manner once she has reached the heights? Barbed +arrows fall off in this rarefied air, and this, I take it, is the great +reward of the climb. + +There are other compensations on the heights. You may shut your eyes +and have a vision of the land that lies beneath you ... let us say a +vision of Mother Canada and her nine daughters, and of the part they +are destined to play in history. You may open your eyes again to +ponder how they will grapple with the problems of race assimilation; of +arbitration and war; of morals and politics; and of labour and capital. +You will conclude that nothing unfair can exist long in this land of +wide spaces, and that Canada is sure to think and act greatly. And +right here is a good place to repeat her prayer which it rests with +each of us to answer-- + + "Bring me men to match my mountains; + Bring me men to match my plains; + Men with empires in their purpose + And new eras in their brains." + + +When you are come down off the mountains there are other things to be +seen at Banff, like the golf-links, the aviary, and the museums, but +you will enjoy the water pastimes best, that is, if you are a Canadian +or an American. The European will be shocked to see the sexes bathing +together at this famous spa, for in Europe, it is their wish to bathe +privately even in the ocean. + +The outdoor swimming pool is a sulphur water, and comes up from the hot +underworld. The pool is set in a splendid quadrangular court of grey +stone, open to the sky, but shielded to windward with glass. +Red-lipped flowers drip over its pillars, adding vastly to the charm of +the scene. The pool is flanked on the hotel side by retiring-rooms +which are as luxurious and sleep inviting as those of ancient Rome or +Pompeii. Overhead, the guests may look down into the green waters and +watch the bathers spring from the diving-boards or cavort about like +young dolphins, tritons, or lightsome naiads. No matter how phlegmatic +you may be, you will wish to tarry here indefinitely and to rest from +your labours, for a voluptuous languor slides into your veins till even +the mountains round about seem illusory and unreal. Here it is +"Paradise enow." With this alchemy of water and sun and these electric +currents of earth and sky, you could hardly expect aught but healing +and enchantment. + +But the attendants will not let you stay too long in the water, for it +is not wise to accumulate any more sulphur on your person than is +necessary to strike a light, for, owing to our proximity to the +magnetic pole, most of us are already dynamos. + +At the fall of day, a storm rises in the hills. These seem to come +close together and whisper, and the sound is like the whirr of swords. + +Many people who are wise talk about storm spirits, so there must be +such ... poor distracted beings who wring their hands and moan in black +discord. It may be they are the souls of murdered folk, and those who +have been executed, and they cry curses on all who live and love and +laugh. You must be afraid of them if you are like me. My windows look +down on the Valley of the Bow and out upon a riot of hills. There is +nothing more beautiful in the girth of the Seven Seas, but, to-night, +this scene is awesome and full of strangeness. The black clouds are +laced with streaks of lightning, or it may be that the spirits thrust +out red tongues in derision. + +Lord, how it blows! and I am afraid of this thunder and the shouting of +the storm. The wind grapples with the trees as though they were living +creatures and it makes no difference that they crouch and cry for +mercy. It is Bendan, the Pine Wrestler, who is out there, and when +angry he can pluck up a young tree with his little finger or break it +with a push of his shoulder. But he does not do this often; he only +wrestles to make them strong. + +It is better for a woman to go down to the great stone dining-hall with +its yellow floor, where there is music, and dancing, and love-making. +It is a pretty play even to the onlooker. Or in the big central +rotunda, which is the heart of this hostelry in the hills, she will +find "there is always fine weather," and "the good fellows" are from +all over the world and have strange stories to tell Canadian folk who +stay in the North. In the cavernous fireplace, spruce logs burn redly, +and by their light you may decipher the words on the mantelpiece: "The +world is my school; travel our teacher; Nature our book, and God our +friend." Overhead, in the fourth gallery, a deep-voiced singer is +taking us into captivity. Listen, then, for it is only in music that +critics are taken captive: literature has no such thraldom. It is +about a perfect day that the singer sings, and this is what she says-- + + "And this is the end of a perfect day, + Near the end of a journey too; + But it leaves a thought that is big and strong, + With a wish that is kind and true. + For Memory has painted this perfect day + With colours that never fade, + And we find at the end of a perfect day + The soul of a friend we've made." + + + + +CHAPTER XXV + +THE OVERLAND TRAIL OF '98 + +Out of the North there rang a cry of Gold!--TOM McINNES. + + +Only this spring, a widow near Edmonton sold her quarter-section to a +real-estate syndicate for eighty thousand dollars. She was one of the +women who "stayed at home with the stuff" while her husband fared forth +in search of gold at the time of the Klondike stampede in 1897-8. He +died on the trail, and ever since the woman has ploughed the lone +furrow both literally and metaphorically. + +The handsome reward of her industry and pertinacity calls to mind that +fable of AEsop's where the young men found that the hidden treasure +their father had described to them was in the yield the soil had given +after they had industriously digged it over. + +We were talking about this the other night, and the humour and +tragedies of the gold stampede, over the last bottle of +champagne---positively the last--that remained of the most prolonged +and celebrated spree that ever took place in the North. The vintage +was a _Koch Fils_ of 1892 and, therefore (to save your mental +arithmetic), I may add, twenty-one years old. It was brought in by the +Helpman Expedition, familiarly known to the local wiseacres of the day +as "The Helpless Proposition." + +Did it taste well? + +I do not know. + +I like lemonade with maraschino cherries better than champagne, but the +party were agreed that it was excellent drinking. One said it had a +pulse; another, that European grapes sucked in more sun than those +grown in America; "The stuff that makes the world go round," remarked a +third. Assuredly it looks well, thought I, and the bubbles caper like +they were alive. + +Under the balm and stimulus of the champagne, the men (all of them +old-timers) were not indisposed to talk concerning the party who +brought it into the country and of the things that befell them. Also, +they tell about the other parties who attempted to reach the +gold-diggings by the overland route from Edmonton. These were +heart-breaking tales, with, here and there, a golden thread of humour +showing up in the black fabric of despoliation and defeat. + +The thirty members of the Helpman Party came from Great Britain. They +were unfortunate from the start. They arrived at Edmonton on Christmas +Eve, one of them, Captain Alleyn, being ill with pneumonia, from which +disease he died a couple of days later. He was the artist of the +party, and correspondent of Reuter's News Agency. + +His was the first military funeral held in the North, so that it was an +event around which much interest centred. + +The expedition was under the command of Colonel Helpman and Lord +Avonmore of Gortmerron House, County Tyrone, known to the local folk by +the unkind name of "Lord 'Ave-one-more." He died last year in Ireland. +"A truly remarkable man, my dear," said an old lady of our lemonade +group, "and always he talked of smashing niggers." + +All provisions and supplies for the gold crusade were brought from +England, except the horses, and the duty thereon amounted to several +thousand dollars. In truth, they were provisioned under War Office +approval, for, said they, "We are English gentlemen and must travel as +English gentlemen." Baled hay and hay-choppers, baths, beds, tents, +sanitary conveniences, and other impedimenta were imported by the +train-load. + +These Canadian men will have it, moreover, that the Britishers brought +in snowshoes for their horses, which gear they were wont to designate +as "bloomin' tennis racquets." I might have believed this +extraordinary statement had I not guessed that my narrator gleaned his +idea from the _Voyages and Explorations of Samuel de Champlain_, for +these imperturbable northmen never so much as blink an eye when adding +the inevitable pinch of spice to a story. + +It is quite true though that the party did bring enormous supplies of +"arrested" foods, egg powders, Westphalian hams, almost unlimited +quantities of tinned ptarmigan, woodcock, plum-pudding, and other +toothsome delicacies well calculated to pique the most jaded and +club-debauched palate. Unfortunately, on being opened, nearly all +these delicate edibles were found to be spoiled, so that the travellers +were forced to exist on such crude diet as pig's face, rice, and beans. + +But the liquors still remained. Allah be praised!--barrels and cases +of it; yes! even kegs and demi-johns--brandy, burgundy, benedictine, +claret, champagne, and canary--these and other brands which I forget, +for my interest was attracted from the list to the wistful faces of +these historians who think with love and longing on those rare old, +fair old golden days that are gone beyond recall. + +On their arrival at Edmonton, the commanders of the expedition were +informed that a prohibition law was in force in the Yukon and that, in +consequence, no spirituous liquors could be carried across its borders. +This being the case, there was nothing for it but to drink the liquors +in Edmonton. They had no licence to sell it, and to pour it upon the +unappreciative prairie would be manifestly absurd--even wicked. This +is why I was correct in saying that our vintage of the night was the +last bottle of the most prolonged and celebrated spree that ever took +place in the North. In truth, it was an Homeric carousal. + +The spree lasted for six weeks, and fights with their legal sequences +were frequent. To use the most generally approved northern expression +of the day, "They just fit and fit," so that more than once the good +Archdeacon of Alberta had to pour oil and balm into the broken bones +and brittle nerves of the combatants. Indeed, he went so far as to +have them nursed in his own home. He is a hale-hearted, fine-fibred +gentleman, our Archdeacon. + +It is hardly fair, however, to lay the entire spree to the credit of +the stampeders. The population of Edmonton, in the late nineties, +consisted of fifteen hundred people, and all the male portion of it +used their utmost endeavours to prevent any good liquor going to waste. +The gentry of the community were invited to partake, but the hewers of +wood and drawers of water who had been engaged to exercise the +pack-horses by walking them up and down, these, and the disorderly +arrant idlers who hung on the borders of the camp, helped themselves. +Their motto was the same as Lord Nelson's--"Touch and take." Indeed, +the speedy manner in which they relieved the expedition of any +encumbering wealth was truly most astonishing. They have a theory in +the North that everything belongs by right to the man who has the +greatest need. Now, the need of the North is a very big pocket and +there are holes in it. + +Ultimately, the party got away. They took the Swan Hill route that +leads to the Old Assiniboine Crossing, but spring had already set in so +that the trails were deep with water, and the muskegs were bottomless +pits. + +The leader of the expedition (by which they meant the foreman as +distinct from the director) was Mr. Matthew Evanston O'Brien, an Irish +solicitor and erstwhile Chief of Police in Australia. It is also said +he was an English secret-service man. He died in April of this year at +Wetaskawin, Alberta, where he was practising law. + +The breeds and other packers who accompanied the party became insolent +and purposely lost their loads. One man smashed the camp stove and +dropped it into a river; others lost tents; while some found hay and +oats as hard to hold as quicksilver. Being badly sheltered and +underfed, nearly all of their hundred horses died, so that long +afterwards teamsters coming to the south picked up wagon loads of +harness besides other useful gear. In a word, like the man who tried +all the rheumatism cures, the members of the Helpman Expedition were +"done good." + +Some of the party got as far as Fort Simpson on the Mackenzie River, +but in the end every man, greatly chastened in spirit, turned back to +Edmonton, where some of them were stranded for several months before +money came to take them on to England. + +Do not laugh at their misfortune. It is not seemly so to do, for, in +all this wildly-warring world, there are few more bitter cups than the +failure of a big financial coup in the which you have invested your own +(and alas!) other people's money. + +Besides, few of the scores of parties who started fared any better, +while many faced worse. Some of them, like the Moody Expedition, +returned because they could not make over two or three miles a day, +they having to fell the impeding timber. At this rate of travel, the +journey would have occupied five years. + +Other crusaders returned because they had no food or money, a condition +that scarcely makes for progress or health. + +Still others came back because they had fallen out by the way, for the +trail has the satanic peculiarity of developing all that is surly, +selfish, or yellow in human nature. People who are tired, ill, and +hungry lift the curtain of their character and forget to let it fall, +so that the result is disillusionment to all concerned. Not a few men +who started in on pronouncedly amicable terms, eating from the same +plate both actually and figuratively, came out brimful with umbrage, +hatred and pique. Murder on the trail may be almost a natural impulse. + +But all the derelicts who returned had one well-defined peculiarity +(albeit a negative one), they came in quietly by the back trails--they +who had gone forth full-fed and wanton as young gophers. The North had +rolled out their individuality like one might roll out dough. They +were "the bitten;" gaunt-eyed starvelings; tatterdemalions who might +have posed for Rip Van Winkle or The Ancient Mariner. The North is a +goodly country and attracts goodly men, yet, even here, one may lose +both his sense and his competence. + +"Did no one succeed?" I ask. + +"Oh yes!" replies a jocund old gentleman who has lived here these +thirty years. "One man got through by hook or crook--chiefly crook. +He was a real-estate agent and insurance broker." + +Further questions elicit the fact that this broker was not so much a +stampeder as an absconder. He was short in his returns to the +insurance company and took this means of avoiding arrest. At least, so +it was rumoured. He left Edmonton in the late winter with no money, no +food--nothing but a small hand-satchel containing collars and blank +premium forms. All the way along he insured the trailers on the +straight life, endowment, or accident policies, or for sick benefits. +They were far enough on the trail to realize that there was a distinct +possibility of their requiring one, if not all these premiums, so our +broker found fat pickings. Resides, each trailer had begun to think +lovingly and longingly of his family at home, and of what a comforting +compensation a ten-thousand dollar policy might be to them in the event +of his death. Indeed, it seemed almost like swindling the company to +take out a policy on this journey. But what would you? Here was their +properly certified agent with the requisite papers to boot. One must +take what the gods send. + +At Athabasca Landing, our broker man stole a boat and made his way down +the river. He fed at each camp he encountered; related how he had +become separated from his party, and how he was hurrying forward to +rejoin them. Under the circumstances, it was only natural that his +hosts should supply him with enough food for a day or two. Besides, it +would never do to let him die of starvation and he carrying their good +money and insurance policies in his satchel--the little black +hand-satchel wherein he kept his collars. + +He reached Dawson early in the rush, but we do not know how it fared +with him there---whether he crushed his money from stones or bones--for +it was probable he took a new name, and, needless to say, he did not +return via the overland route to Edmonton. + +Two others who reached the northern Eldorado were Jim Kenealey and Jack +Russell. It took them two years to get in. Russell struck pay-dirt in +the Cape Nome District, but Kenealey, after abandoning several claims, +came out penniless. He died recently at the Cameron House, Strathcona, +of which hotel he was proprietor. Kenealey, who came from Peterboro', +Ontario, in the early eighties, was a clever sleight-of-hand artist and +one time had an encounter with an Indian, it being natural and entirely +reasonable that the Indian should demand the fifty cents that Kenealey +claimed to have taken from his ear. + +"But there were others who reached the gold zone," explains a lawyer +who was, in those days, a cub-reporter, type-setter, and I know not +what besides. "I have forgotten their names, but you may find them in +the files of _The Bulletin_." + +One of these parties comprised four men, Martin McNeeley from Sault +Ste. Marie, Michigan, George Baalam, W. Schreeves and W. J. Graham. + +Schreeves and Baalam reached Dawson safely; Graham was drowned on the +way, and McNeeley, who injured his foot, was left behind by the others +somewhere near the Devil's Portage. + +Some months afterwards, Mr. E. T. Cole of Pelican Rapids, Minnesota, +with his party, stumbled upon a small tent in which they found a +terribly decomposed body. It was McNeeley's. By his side there was a +knife, a compass, a rifle, twenty-five rounds of cartridges, twenty +pounds of flour, some meat, matches and wood. The following excerpts +are from his diary-- + +"December 28, 1897--My partners deserted me and tried to cripple me +further by taking my grub. + +"January 5, 1898--Walked eight miles on my awful foot and am crippled +on an Island alone. The pain of my foot is terrible." + +The files reveal another tragedy in which two men from Brantford, +Ontario, were the principals--the Strathdees. + +Mr. A. C. Strathdee was one of the early stampeders. He went north +with sixteen pack-horses. His only companion was his son, aged +twenty-two, W. Harvey Strathdee, a member of the Dufferin Rifles. They +camped one night beside the Taylor Trail that leads to Nelson. In the +morning, while cooking breakfast, Harvey sighted a moose and, +straightway, started in pursuit. At noon he had not returned and his +father, becoming anxious, tried to follow the trail, but +unsuccessfully. At night, the now frantic man lit a fire and shot off +his rifle in the hope that Harvey might see or hear them. He did this +for eight terrible days and eight more terrible nights, till he +realized that further delay would endanger his own life. In these +eight days, half of his horses died from lack of food, the man being +afraid to shift camp in case Harvey might find his way back. + +Further on, he met James and John Fair of Elkhorn, Manitoba, who +returned with him to spend yet eight other days in unavailing search. +At Dunvegan, Mr. Strathdee engaged a white man, an Indian, and a +dog-train to go in and make quest till spring. Then he came back to +Edmonton, where he exacted promises from the journalists to forward to +him at Brantford any report that might come in from the trails +regarding the lost youth. + +For a long time nothing came but, one day, some Indians brought in word +how on their way north nearly a year before, they fell on the fresh +trail of a lost white man and had followed it up. They knew he was +white for he wore boots, and that he was lost because of his uncertain, +round-about course. They found his body on a mountain between two +logs. His arms were outspread and his cartridge belt and rifle lay by +his side. The trees around had been burned, and the Indians were of +the opinion that he had set them on fire to try and attract his +father's attention. + +That the public of Canada and the United States had little idea of the +hardships to be endured on the overland trail was evidenced by the fact +that a number of women attempted to take it. Some of them wore +ordinary clothes with plumes in their hats, but the more knowing ones +were attired in jaeger skirts and jerseys, also they wore jaeger caps +that covered the face except for the nose and mouth. In their belts +they carried six-shooters. + +Letters were received here asking if the writers could get through to +the Klondyke on bicycles; if there were good boarding-houses on the +way, and if the Indians were troublesome. + +For the instruction of the stampeders, the Honourable the Minister of +the Interior, then Mr. Frank Oliver, issued a special number of _The +Bulletin_, which was the farthest north newspaper, mapping out the +route and the distances between the points. + +By the shortest and best travelled trails, the entire distance from +Edmonton to the Klondyke was 2,728 miles. This route was via the +Athabasca, Great Slave, Mackenzie and Peel Rivers. From thence it +crossed to Summit, La Pierre House, and down the Porcupine River to its +junction with the Yukon River. From this point to Dawson was the +home-run. + +There are said to be sixty-eight roads to heaven, but this road to +Dawson is not one of them. + +Each man had six pack-ponies to carry in his supplies, which consisted +of 900 lb. of food and 150 lb. of clothing and hardware, making in all, +1,050 lb. The ponies cost from twenty-five to thirty dollars, and it +was conservatively estimated that the supplies cost $250.00. + +The food was calculated on the basis of the Mounted Police rations and +was supposed to last a year, being doled out at the following ration +per man, per day: flour 1-1/4 lb., beef 1-1/2 lb., bacon 1 lb., potatoes 1 +lb., apples 3 oz., beans 4 oz., coffee or tea 1/2 oz., salt 1/2 oz., butter +2 oz., sugar 3 oz. + +With praiseworthy discretion, many of the Old-Timers opened up depots +to supply the parties with outfits, but, on the whole, there was no +over-charging or money-grabbing such as one might have expected. On +the contrary, the prices that prevailed were from 25 to 75 per centum +less than those of to-day. Flour was $2.50 per hundredweight; bacon 11 +cents per pound, evaporated apples 8 cents, rolled-oats 3 cents, +raisins 10 cents, and black tea from 25 to 40 cents. Pack-saddle +blankets cost $2.00 a pair, and large grey blankets $3.25. Long arctic +socks cost from 50 cents to $1.00, sweaters from $1.00 to $1.50, and +cardigan jackets from $1.00 to $2.00. + +Many kinds of costumes were affected. Some men were clad in fur from +head to feet; others wore khaki, or sheepskin coats; and in one party +every man had a coonskin coat. + +Nothing, however, caused so much excitement in the burgh as the various +modes of conveyance that were planned and built by the gold-seekers. + +"Texas" Smith started alone on the longish trail with all his +provisions packed in three barrels. These were equipped as rollers or +wheels with a platform on top for sleeping purposes. He calculated +that on the rivers the barrels would act as floaters and so could be +comfortably navigated. + +Texas travelled nearly nine miles before the hoops came off. He was +able to retrace his steps to town by the beans the barrels shed on the +road. They took his photograph, and that of his conveyance, before he +started but, on his return, good-naturedly refrained, for it was +distinctly noticeable that Texas had the air of having eaten the canary. + +Breneau Fabian, a Belgian, invented a boat which, being intended for +all elements, was constructed from galvanized iron. He called it +Noah's Ark. It was built in two parts with a hinge in the middle. +When open, it could be used on the river, for it had a keel; or on the +snow, for it had runners. If he cared to, he could close up his boat +by means of the hinge--that is, it would turn over, one part on top of +the other, in which shape it was a caravan with wheels attached. His +yoke of oxen were to be killed at Athabasca Landing and salted down as +food for the journey. + +For the information of the curiously inclined, I might say that until +recently, Fabian's Ark served as a float at all civic processions such +as Labour Day and the Queen's Jubilee, but it has had its day and its +scrap heap. + +Another man, whose name I could not learn, built an ice-boat on the +Saskatchewan River. He had figured out that he could reach the +placer-diggings by means of sails, thus acquiring a distinct monetary +advantage over the folk and fellows who had horses, in that sails would +not require to be fed with hay and oats. + +Be it said to the credit of the folk and fellows that they cherished no +grudge in their hearts, for, the sails refusing to act, they loaned him +fourteen teams wherewith to haul his ice-boat on to the bank. + +Considering the length and nature of the trail, perhaps the most +bird-witted scheme of reaching the Klondike was that evolved by the "I +Will" Steam-Sleigh Company of Chicago. They ought to have known better. + +They built a train of four cabooses or cars, the motive power of which +was steam. A marine boiler and engine were imported from the United +States, upon which they paid $500.00 custom toll. Also, they imported +a revolving drum equipped with teeth, similar to those used on the +log-roads in the big timber-limits, and sprocket-wheels, band-chains, +and other things no mortal woman could be expected to remember. All +the cars were on steel-runners. The one behind the engine contained +fuel; the second was the living car, while the third held supplies. + +Everything was packed and loaded ready for the hour of starting before +the builders had tested the machine. All Edmonton was assembled to see +the sight, while scores of Indians squatted around and stared like +gargoyles. The workmen, with an air of high concern, twisted a bolt +here, or a belt there; oiled a hub, or did one of the hundred things a +mechanic does to an engine and boiler when he would have you believe he +is earning his pay. + +It was a proud moment when one of the builders stepped forward and +touched his hat to a blue-uniformed official--a moment, too, that was +fraught with serious issues, for the blue-uniform said, "_Let her go_!" +All Edmonton ceased to breathe and the Indians looked almost pale. + +There was a vast creaking; a shudder as if the caverns of the deep were +opened; the wheels turned--and turned--and turned, and with each turn +buried the machine deeper into the earth, there to remain till the day +that Kenneth Macleod bought the marine boiler and engine for his +sawmill. They say he bought it for a song, but no one ever heard the +song. Ah! but those were right royal days for the Old-Timers, the like +of which can never be. + +I nearly forgot about the three cabooses. These stampeders who did not +die of scurvy, hardship, starvation, or accident, and who returned via +Edmonton, used the cabooses for shelter while they wrote home for money. + +It was a long time before they were free of occupants. + + + + +CHAPTER XXVI + +A SONG OF THIS LAND + +Out of the North comes tumult, say they who are poets, and clangorous +challenge to battle. + +True, O Poets! And out of the North come men of robust mood who will +keep our nation's honour, for this is a country where courage and truth +are inborn; a land which sways the souls of its citizens unto high +endeavour. From this country where, of old, dwelt the bow-bearers who +were eaters of strong meat, will come high-hearted men of loyal temper, +for this is the world's House of Youth. This shall be its nurse of +heroes. + +Money-flingers and careless, are these Northmen, says another, and +wasters of wealth. + +True, O Sir Time Lock, but when the gods would be thrifty they give +their money away. The Gods are master-spenders and have learned the +wide wisdom of being foolish. Do you follow me aright? + +And this is the wisdom of our Northmen who have well tamed Dame Fortune +and have set their sure brand upon her. + +But, if money sticks not in their purses, and if they haggle not over +coins, yet are these men businessful with a purpose for large +enterprise. In these latitudes, we have deep-counselled companies of +traders who, while they love the sweet power of money, have ever +bartered fairly, and know that 'mine' and 'thine' are different words +which rhyme well in all reckonings. I have sure grounds for knowing +this, and am minded to say, "Hail! and all hail!" + +The North is a numbed and haggard land of and snow, say many voices. +In its vast voids lives a dark spirit which lures men on and tricks +them so that they come, in time, to love that which punishes them. And +if by some fair hap they are led into other and softer climes, then do +they fret and fever for the wolf-lands of the Yukon or the Mackenzie, +as though some secret and unforbidden magic had entered their blood +forever. + +I will not speak contrariwise to these men, for it is meet that I +should speak fairly. The love of the North, like the fiery kiss of +genius, is a sorrowful gift, and none can say whether it is greater in +joy or pain. She is an exacting mistress, this white-bodied, +rude-muscled North, and, of times, she breaks and hurts a man till he +drags his brokenness away to die. Yet, is she beautiful and +passionately human; full of vigour and drunken with life, and her house +stretches from the dawn to dayfall. + +And why should men complain of the stabbing cold and of the +unrestricted range of the young winds? Why do they wish to regulate +God's snow and rain? What could be more hateful to men than +unfaltering sunshine and ever-flowering fields? + +In the winter of the fortressed North, animals turn white as do the +birds and the very earth itself. All were pallid and colourless but +for the yellow belt of the setting sun and the black-green tree shadows +that fall toward the pole. The rivers cease their singing; the birds +are silent, and all is stilled to the bounds of the world save only the +sonorous wind which is the breath of Claeg, the Bound One, who is the +earth. Here, the north-east wind is Lord Paramount, and the Crees and +Chipewyans have long known that Death comes from his direction. + +Listen! I made an error, to say that all is stilled, for, of occasion, +there is the mewl of the lynx; the yap of the timber wolf as he gives +tongue in pursuit of _ah-pe-shee moos-oos_, the jumping deer; the +howling infamy of the huskies seeking their meat from God; the raucous +roar of the hulking moose blind with rage of love. + +Listen! I made an error to speak of an all-whiteness, for, where the +Aurora pins her colours to the sky, it is like unto an angry opal. +This is Beauty Absolute. Her swinging swords of flame none have +measured: who shall tell the measure of this land? + +But listen! It is not beyond our understanding that men should feel +the urge of this Northland and its strange enticement. Some there are +who speak of it as the lure of the North; the fret of spring, or the +call of red gods. Surely we may understand aright if we do but watch +the birds flock hither of spring-time, and how the fish fight up +against the streams though it be to suffer and to die. These cannot +resist the drag of the magnetic pole, any more than you and I who have +souls and are feeling folk! + +But it is not always frigid here, for we have springtide and the season +of seven sweet suns. "Good morrow!" shouts the tired Winter in the +time of melting snows. "Good morrow!" shouts back the nimble Spring as +he throws a mist of green over the young aspens. "Come fly with me and +touch the sun," pleads the eagle to his sweetheart. "Come with me and +be my love," woos Kiya, boatman of the Athabasca; "already the young +birds are in their nests and soon they will fly away. Soon will the +time of mating be past." + +Aye! but the summer winds are honey-mouthed. + +Aye! but the skies are star-enchanted, and there are fair stories I +might tell about yellow grain fields and of red lilies like blown +flame, but none save those who are prairie rangers would understand +aright. + +Besides, there are woolly-mouthed men and chattering daws who say +secretly that we of the North are boasters, and that we tell ill tales. + +But though we are impeached, yet will we say that our song is tinged +with no lie. We are young men, and sowers of grain, and it is pleasant +to glorify the largess of our harvest. + +We are boasters, they tell, and full-mouthed, but why should we keep +hidden and unshared the all-golden treasures of our fields? We will +not hide this thing in our hearts, but, with fair speech, will sing it +in a million-voiced canticle of praise. There is no need that we sing +restrainedly of our goodly dower, or in measured words, for we are no +servile race of hirelings, but free men and proclaimers of this land. +Because we are witnesses that the talent of our country is folded in +the fecund earth, we will speak aloud to our neighbouring Saxons of +friendly mind, and to the brotherhood of the soil throughout the +universe. We will speak with them concerning our gold, and vineyards, +and fine flour; of our forests, and fisheries, and apple orchards, till +their veins stir as with the tang of old wine. These folk have need to +know that in the North prosperity groweth widely; that here the +unbelievable is achieved. This is the true fairy-land where swineherds +and barbers, and much labouring men are raised to riches and power. +Here is a dining-hall whose friendly feast is spread for all. Here +every man may come and eat of our cakes and melons, of our honey and +fat things. + +The North has no need of an interpreter: it has need of heralds. Then +ho! for our fierce and beautiful country; our strong and fertile +country. + +We will send these tidings Europeward and the far-delivered message +shall not fall to the ground. It is a blithe young tune we shall sing, +with a resonant chorus of "Canada, O Canada." + +Fitting is it that we should sing to the Isles of Britain, for from +them is the birth of this breed and theirs is the royal stamp we bear +upon our fighting arm. We are the wide-ruling seed of the Saxons and +ever shall we answer to the rally of the race. All hands around! We +will pledge the homeland of Britain! + +And who will sing this song of the North? Sit you here till we talk of +this thing. I pray you prompt my pen as it forgets. + +They have come hither to sing it from Ottawa, which is the Place of +Councils, and the sovereign city in this fair house of Canada. + +Hither have they come from the tobacco plantations of Essex; the yellow +cornfields of Lambton; the luscious peach groves of Kent, and the +vineyards of Welland. These are lusty fellows and of fine fibre. + +Here are men of consideration from the thick-leaved apple orchards of +Nova Scotia and from the dairy steadings of Oxford. Have you never +heard concerning the round towers of Oxford which are stacks of grain, +and of the herds of black bulls which feed fatly on her meadowlands? +Then it is small knowledge you have of this Dominion and the bright +fortunes of its people. + +Others have joined our chorus who are from mailed Quebec, which is the +eye of Canada; from Montreal, whose traffickers are among the +honourable of the earth, and from Niagara, where, with subtle cunning, +men have bridled Neptune, the Lord of Waters, and have made his trident +into one of fire. + +These courtly and free-handed fellows have hailed from Toronto. +Beautiful Toronto! The city of work and play. I like well its stately +homes and its women with honey-throated voices. And, here where I +write at Edmonton under the aurora, these men of the Southern Provinces +have assembled with our lads of the North and West who are +leather-fleshed and hard-sinewed, but withal, comely. This is Edmonton +on the Saskatchewan, which the bow-bearers call by another name, +meaning the great river of the plains. This is the stranger-thronged +city of the North; the city that has merited a cheer. It is here our +glorious Lady of Alberta has placed her throne whereunto all her sons +come up that they may pay her tribute of honour. + +To this place come the farmer-folk from the wheatlands of the queenly +Peace, and the priests and trappers from the Athabasca, which the +bow-bearers call by another name, meaning the great river of the woods. +And hither come the traders and road builders from the pass between the +cleft mountains where, of old, dwelt Jasper of the yellow head; these, +and the horse-taming men from young Calgary. We who love games and the +glory of them, stand at salute. + +These are the men from Winnipeg, the Mother City of the North. Honour +upon honour be to her! + +Right pleasant is it to present the likely-looking lads of Regina and +of the deep soiled plains of Saskatchewan. On the plains, the +straight-blowing wind is scented from the grassed headlands dappled +with flowers. On the plains, dwell strong, glad men in the joy of +their youth. On the plains there lives some common mother of the +common weal, who is the ancestress of our kings to be. + +These others whom I have held back until now that your attention might +not falter, are the dauntless, high-adventuring men who crossed the +mountains to where the land lieth soft to the sea. These are the men +of the new appointed city of Prince Rupert; the men of the fortunate, +fair-built city of Victoria, and those of sure-seated Vancouver. May +they build strongly and well. It is seemly that the forefront of our +royal House of Canada should be of far-shining splendour. + +We have high delight in this Province of British Columbia; in its +unshorn hills that are furrowed with rifts of roses, in its +fair-watered fruitlands, and in the rice and silk ships that come +reeling down its bays. This is a new-peopled land of fostered folk +and, of times, men's hearts fail them lest these stranger-guests march +not in step with the genius of the race. We who are your sister +provinces, O Columbia by the Sea, stretch forth our hands to you and +pray you as sentinels to keep our portals straitly, but, +notwithstanding, that you be wise in love to all things living.... +And, now, to the hither side of the mountains have come these western +men of erect spirit to sing with us the song of the North and of Canada. + +I wish my pen might tell you of our song, but this were a hard task, +for while our voices are tuned to one chord our themes are manifold. +Whatsoever things a man may desire, these may he find in his Mother +Canada. Some men sing of her ample skies and the incorruptible glory +of them; of her changing climes, limitless fields, and law-loving +spirit. Others have pleasant cause of song in the rivers that give +water to the people; in far-strung wires and clear highways to the sea; +and in her great institutions of beneficence which conserve the moral +energies of the citizens. + +Some, in voice which sounds like supplication, sing that a sense of +safety may be preserved in our homes, and that sweet tranquility may be +the lot of our aged folk. + +Others would have it that our ballot-strips fall from clean hands, and +that no man thinks only of his own Province but of the well-being and +good health of all. + +May our children, O Canada! have strong bodies and souls above the +lusts of gain, urges one, and let the women of our Dominion be skilled +in mother-craft, but with their house windows open to the intellectual +breezes of the world.... And I, of myself, am stirred to do tribute of +praise. I am thy child, O Canada, dear Mother! How shall I have +wisdom to order my words aright? O my lips sing this song! Sweet, my +pen, tell this tale, for the fullness of my heart has made heavy my +hand. + +I will make a crown of maple leaves for you, and will twist them with +flowers of the lily. See! I bring you native flowers; mint and roses +and clover blooms. I bring you golden-rod and marigolds, and berries +that are red. Take these from my hands, Good Mother! My heart is awed +and I cannot speak aright. + +Listen! All of us who sing to you have joined hands--Northmen and +Southerners and men of the coast-line. It is our wish to tell your +glory aloud that all may hear. It is wiser still to leave a part +untold that the world may the better know it. + +Hail to thee, O Canada, and hail to the flag! We who are thy children +salute thee! + + + + +THE END + + + + +T. H. BEST PRINTING CO. LIMITED, TORONTO + + + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Seeds of Pine, by Janey Canuck + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SEEDS OF PINE *** + +***** This file should be named 32409.txt or 32409.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/2/4/0/32409/ + +Produced by Al Haines + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +https://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at https://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +https://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at https://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit https://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including including checks, online payments and credit card +donations. To donate, please visit: https://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/32409.zip b/32409.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..92d9ec6 --- /dev/null +++ b/32409.zip diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..fc6d40b --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #32409 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/32409) |