"The Trip Down Burrard Inlet, The Straits Of Georgia, And Through The
San Juan Archipelago To Victoria, A Distance Of About 90 Miles From
Port Moody, Occupied 9-1/2 Hours, And Victoria Was Reached At 10.30 On
The Night Of The 21st September."
To this memorandum I may add a few words.
First, in praise of the
excellent rolling stock; secondly, of the good discipline and smartness
of the service; and, thirdly, of the wonderful energy, boldness, and
success of the whole engineering features of this grand work of modern
times. I should be ungrateful if I did not thank the chief officers of
the Canadian Pacific, whose acquaintance I had great pleasure in
making, for their exceeding kindness, for the full information they
afforded to me, and for showing me many cheap, short, and ready plans
of construction, which might well be adopted in Europe. These gentlemen
have looked at difficulties merely in respect to the most summary way
of surmounting them; and, certainly, the great and bold works around
the head of Lake Superior, the many river and ravine crossings of
unusual span and height, and, especially, the works of the 600 miles of
mountain country between Calgary and the last summit of British
Columbia, so successfully traversed, would make the reputation of a
dozen Great George Streets.
CHAPTER IV.
Canadian Pacific Railways.
The pioneer suggestion of a railway across British territory to the
Pacific has been claimed by many. To my mind, all valuable credit
attaches to those who have completed the work. The christening of "La
Chine" - the town seven miles from Montreal, where the canals which go
round the rapids end, and the St. Lawrence and the Ottawa rivers join
their differently coloured streams - contained the prophecy of a future
great high road to the then mysterious East, to China, to Japan, to
Australia; and it is to the Sieur de la Salle, who, 200 years ago,
bought lands above the rapids from the Sulpician Fathers of Montreal,
and began his many attempts to reach the lands of the "setting sun,"
that we owe the name; while the resolution of Sir Charles Tupper,
carried in the Dominion Parliament, finally embodied in an Act which
received the Royal assent on the 17th February, 1881, and was opposed
throughout by the "Grit" party, was really the practical start. It
would be inadequate to write of the Great Canadian Pacific Railway
without some reference to the history of railways in Canada itself.
In the interesting book, "Rambles on Railways," published in 1868, it
is remarked that great as has been the progress of Canada, in no
respect has the growth of the country shown itself in a more marked
manner than in the development of its railway system. It was in 1848,
or almost immediately after the completion of the magnificent canal
system of Canada proper, and by which vessels of 800 tons could pass
from the ocean to Lake Ontario, and vice versa (ships now pass
from Chicago to Liverpool of over 1,500 tons burthen), that the
Canadians discovered it was necessary, notwithstanding their unrivalled
inland navigation, to combine with it an equally good railway
communication; and accordingly, in 1849, an Act was passed by the
Canadian Government pledging a six per cent.
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