Sandford Fleming

Lake Superior—Early Discoverers—Joliet and La Salle—Hennepin—Du Luth—Port Arthur—The Far West—The North-West Company—Rat Portage—Gold Mining—Winnipeg.

The morning is dull, the sky leaden, and the temperature is not very enlivening for the most of us. But the boat moves pleasantly up the slight current until we reach Whitefish Point, then we enter the lake which lies before us in all its magnificent extent. Some idea of the size of Lake Superior may be formed when it is pointed out that from its two extremities the distance is equal to that from London to the centre of Scotland. In width it is capacious enough to take in the whole of Ireland. Its surface is 600 feet above, its bed is 300 feet below, the ocean level, the lake being 900 feet in depth. Its water is remarkably pure, with the colour of the finest crystal.

We pass a number of steamers and deeply laden vessels. We are now fairly in the lake, with its rugged, rocky hills on the north shore ascending to the height of a thousand feet. We are in the midst of a light fog. The air becomes chilly and raw, but the water continues smooth, and we sail calmly over it. Towards evening the fog has cleared away, and we find ourselves in the midst of this immense fresh water sea. The nearly full moon appears and is high up in view. Our horizon is the circumference of an unbroken circle, for there is not a trace of land in sight. Our position is near the meridian of Chicago, although six degrees of latitude further north; and we approach the longitude of that great western territory which on both sides of the International boundary is being developed with such marvellous progress.

Champlain appears to have known the existence of a northern fresh water lake of great size, but he never visited it. He showed on his map a large body of water under the title, Mer de Nor Glaciale. This was in 1632. GalinÉe’s map of 1670 gives the River Ottawa and Lake Ontario sufficiently correctly for those days, everything considered, but Lake Michigan was unknown to him. He considered Lakes Michigan and Huron to be one body of water, and so represented them. Lake Superior he did not appear to know, although he had reached Sault St. Mary. One of the earliest works of the Jesuit Fathers in Canada is their map of Lake Superior, published in 1671, with the title of Lac Tracy-ou-Superior. It showed that the many bays and inlets had been explored, and the map is marked by great correctness, allowing for the date of its production. They also knew of the Peninsula of Michigan. Indeed by this date the general geography and coast line of the great lakes was fairly understood. In 1669 La Salle made the first of the series of discoveries which have preserved his name. He had heard of the great river to the west, and he was desirous of proceeding thither. He descended the Ohio, probably as far as Louisville, but it was not until eleven years later that he discovered the outlet of the Mississippi. Marquette and Joliet had in the meantime ascended from Green Bay, Lake Michigan, and followed the Fox River to the Mississippi. They may be held to be its discoverers, although claims antagonistic to their priority have been advanced, I believe, without sufficient proof. Hennepin, the Recollet Friar, was the first to ascend the upper waters of the Mississippi and describe the Falls of St. Anthony, where the great milling City of Minneapolis now flourishes. On his return with his captors, for he was a prisoner of the Indians, he met Du Luth some distance below the falls. Du Luth was one of those many enterprising spirits whom France sent to this Continent, a man of untiring energy and undaunted nature. He penetrated to the then utmost limit known. He was a martyr to rheumatism, but no suffering interfered with his discoveries and his devotion to the supremacy of France. At Lake Superior he had heard that there were white men on the Mississippi. The news caused him anxiety. His first thought was that English traders had penetrated from New York, and in the interest of France he felt such intrusion had summarily to be stopped. He started with four well armed Frenchmen, followed one of the streams leading southerly and passed by the St. Croix, which falls into the Mississippi below St. Paul. It was here that he met Hennepin, who proved to be the white man he had heard of. Du Luth returned by way of Lake Michigan.

Previous to this date Du Luth had established himself on the Kaministiquia, Lake Superior. In 1680 he built a fort on the site of the present Fort William on that river, for half a century the extreme point beyond which the French did not penetrate, and in itself the first settlement on the north shore. The Jesuits had established themselves on the south shore of the lake at an early date in Canadian history at La Pointe, the modern Bayfield.

It was a brilliant summer morning, Friday, 17th August, when I awoke; we were near land. Silver Islet was in sight, and Thunder Cape, a bold headland lit up by the sun, stood forth to bid us welcome. During breakfast we enter Thunder Bay, a noble expanse of water surrounded on three sides by lofty hills. The entrance is some six miles wide, protected to some extent from the storms of Lake Superior by Isle Royale, some distance to the south. We have fourteen miles to steam before we reach what was formerly called Prince Arthur’s Landing, now known as Port Arthur. It has grown up of late years. It possesses an air of liveliness, and I do not think that those whose interests are centered in the town underrate the advantages of its situation or have any doubts with regard to its future. There are copper and silver mines in the neighbourhood, some of which are represented to be of value. They have been worked from time to time and discontinued, and their occasional operations have told on the progress of the town.

But Port Arthur does not possess unchallenged all the advantages claimed for it. Fort William on the Kaministiquia proffers an equal claim to become the Lake Superior terminus of the Canadian Pacific Railway to the west, and to the point of connection with the eastern bound steamers in summer. A propeller with freight, loaded in the canal basin at Montreal, can reach Thunder Bay without breaking bulk. A large movement in freight and passengers for transfer to the railway for Winnipeg may be looked for, even when the railway line on the north shore of Lake Superior shall have been completed. A trip by the lake steamers is pleasant and agreeable in the fine weather of summer, and doubtless these ports on Thunder Bay will retain their importance.

There is but one train in the twenty-four hours from Port Arthur to Winnipeg. We were twelve hours too late for the train which had left and twelve hours too early for the one to leave. All that could be done was to accept the situation. Human nature, however, asserts its prerogative under a sense of injustice. My mind, in spite of myself, reverted to our useless journey to Meaford and Owen Sound, and to the waste of time at these places by which we lost so many hours at the Neebish. It was the old story of the nail in the horseshoe of the Cavalier. I think the experience of all travellers is that when a journey is marked by delay, little is done in the way of remedying it. Indifference succeeds the sense of misadventure or carelessness, and the chance of making up lost time becomes every hour less and less.

I had twelve hours before me, so I determined to make good use of them. I communicated by telegraph with the railway superintendent at Winnipeg and the engineer in charge of construction at Calgary, to enlist their co-operation in our advance over the mountains. I drove with my son from Port Arthur to the River Kaministiquia, a river which assumed some importance in the early days of the construction of the railway six years back. The terminus was established three miles from its mouth. The river is upwards of three hundred feet in width, deep enough to float the largest lake craft. A bar, easily removable, extends across the entrance. When this obstruction is removed the river will be in all respects accessible, and will extend greater capacity for shipping than the river at Chicago, which accommodates the enormous business of that city.

As it was my duty, I visited the Hudson Bay Company’s post near the mouth of the river. After an existence of two centuries as a fur-trading station under varied fortunes, it is soon to disappear, the fate of all such establishments on this continent as civilization overtakes them. As Bishop Berkeley wrote a century ago, “westward the star of empire takes its way.”

In my own recollection the “Far West” was on the eastern shores of Lakes Huron and Michigan, now far within the limits of civilization. Those whose fortunes were cast there looked on themselves as pioneers of an unexplored wilderness. Twenty years ago the upper waters of Lake Huron and Lake Superior were but just coming into notice, and Fort William was regarded as the chief eastern outpost of the Hudson’s Bay Company, beyond which few thought of passing. This celebrated company, which has played such a part in the history of the North-West of this continent, was formed under a charter of Charles II. in 1670. It was the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713 which fully recognized the English title to the territory granted under the charter, and abandoned forever such French claims as had been preferred, for the Treaty of Ryswick with France in 1696 had left the question of sovereignty undecided.

As early as 1641 two Jesuits, Jogues and Raymbault, extended their missionary labours to the shores of Lake Superior. The main mission, La Pointe, now Bayfield, on the south shore, was established in 1670, and the Indians remained during French rule entirely under their influence. At the period of the conquest the trade of the French disappeared, for they had no longer the power to visit the country, and by degrees it fell into British hands. On the one side, the Hudson’s Bay Company, from the north, pushed onwards to control it, for a period with success; on the other, parties were started from Montreal to obtain a share of the great profits which were made, the value of which was fully known.

The French trade had been carried on under admirable regulations. Liquor, so ruinous to the Indian, was withheld from him. The enterprising Montreal trader introduced it, regardless of consequences: hence the orgies, the drunkenness and the quarrels which were a scandal even to the wilderness. To intensify this condition of affairs, some Montreal merchants entered into a partnership in 1787, and formed the celebrated North-West Trading Company. It then consisted of twenty-three partners, with a staff of agents, factors, clerks, guides, interpreters, voyageurs, amounting in all to two thousand persons. If the individual trader disappeared from the field, there were two powerful companies remaining, who had to operate in the same field side by side, and there sprang up the fiercest and most embittered rivalry. I shall hereafter refer more definitely to this contention. This state of things was leading to the common ruin of the two companies, when, in 1821, after forty-three years of competition, discord and disaster, the two formed one corporation under the title of the Hudson’s Bay Company.

As I looked upon the old fort on the site of its departed greatness, I thought of the many stirring scenes which it witnessed before and after the beginning of this century. The stone store houses, once so well filled with every requirement, erected around the sides of a square, are now empty, containing a few boxes of rusty flint muskets and bayonets, with chests of old papers, dating back, some of them, more than a hundred years.

The buildings will all soon be unroofed, to make way for a railway station. A year ago I saw two old cannon in the front of the courtyard. On that occasion I believe they fired their last salute. They are now removed. The old rickety flagstaff still remains, and so soon as it is known that a member of the Company of Adventurers is within the precincts the flag is run up as a salute, a service probably for the last time performed at Fort William. In a few months the whole scene will be changed. There is still an agent of the Hudson’s Bay Company in charge, Mr. Richardson, whose complexion of bronze tells of many years of exposure; and his attendant, an Indian, who has been attached to the fort for forty years.

On leaving Mr. Richardson we called on a retired Hudson’s Bay officer, Mr. John McIntyre, who lives in a comfortable house a little further up the river. He is an Argyleshire Highlander, who has the stalwartness of his race, and is as active as ever. At his suggestion we go to Point de Meuron, named after the soldiers of that regiment in Lord Selkirk’s service, camped here in the memorable days of 1817. There was nothing to be seen but the farm, so we returned to the town plot, and, as the hour suggested, took dinner at the Ontario House, a place of some local reputation. There were several vessels from Ohio discharging coal at the railway wharves adjoining, showing that even the narrow cut dredged some years ago across the bar at the mouth of the river was still sufficient to admit their passage; establishing, moreover, how easily a properly excavated channel can be maintained, and plainly showing that the completion of navigation at the entrance of the Kaministiquia will eventually have an important bearing on the commerce of the North-West.

I returned to Port Arthur to prepare for the train, when some of my friends kindly gave me an invitation to a ball to take place in the evening. I should have liked to have accepted it for several reasons, not the least of which was to see that phase of social life in this region; but it was impossible to lose the twenty-four hours, the price of my attendance.

It was dark when the train left, so all that could be done was to turn to the comfortable Pullman, and in due time retire for the night. The railway to Winnipeg is far from being completed; indeed, it has but lately been put in operation. Many of the station buildings have yet to be erected. As a consequence, the following morning the breakfast was served under a large canvas awning. There was no pretension about this breakfast, but what there was of it was good; certainly the ventilation was perfect.

The distance from Port Arthur to Winnipeg is some 430 miles, and, as the unfinished condition of a considerable portion of the line necessitated travelling at reduced speed, the journey to most of the passengers seemed very tedious. To me every mile was full of interest. We pass over that portion of the line known as “Section A,” which extends to a point 230 miles from Port Arthur. Civilization and settlement have not penetrated to this district, lying, as it does, intermediate between Lake Superior and the prairie region. We have traversed a long stretch of black, boggy swamp, to which the Indian name of Muskeg has been given. One is reminded of Chatmoss, where similar difficulties in the infancy of railway construction were so triumphantly met by the elder Stephenson. Muskeg is much of the character of peat. It is here inexhaustible, and hereafter may be valuable from its capacity to be formed into fuel.

As the train moves on, nothing is to be seen but rock and forest in their most rugged forms. The falls of Waubigon and those of Eagle River, as we pass them, are the more striking by the contrast they present. We reach the far-famed “Section B,” of which we have heard so much, and which is still a theme of such varied comment by politicians and newspaper writers. This section of railway passes through a country rugged in the extreme. The surface is a succession of rocky ridges, with tortuous lakes and deep muskegs intervening. The line has been carried across these depressions on temporary staging, and steam shovels and construction trains are busy converting the miles of frail looking trestlework into solid embankment. Our train moves slowly over this portion of the line; indeed, until this work is further advanced it would be hazardous to adopt a high rate of speed. Eagle Lake, with the numerous lakelets which we see from the railway, are sheets of water with beauty enough to command attention. A few rude graves on the hillside mark the violent death of the poor workmen who suffered from the careless handling of that dangerous explosive, nitro-glycerine. Although the most effective of instruments in the removal of rock, the least want of caution and care often exacts the most terrible penalty. In the fifty miles we have passed over, upwards of thirty poor fellows have lost their lives by its use. This explosive may be used with perfect safety, but in its handling it exacts prudence and attention to details; otherwise there will be no immunity from want of care. With the reckless and negligent it is a constant source of danger.

There is no great area of land suitable for profitable farming in this district. A few good townships may be laid out, but the country generally through which the railway runs is not adapted for agricultural purposes. Every acre of soil, however, is covered with timber of more or less value. Care should be taken to prevent the destruction of these forests. Stringent regulations should be made with regard to them, and no reckless waste permitted. In a few years these forests will prove sources of considerable wealth, and the ground over which we are now passing should be jealously guarded as a preserve for the supply of timber in coming years.

The passengers begin to be clamorous for the next refreshment station. We learn that it is at Rat Portage. We trust that the name does not suggest the cheer we are to receive. There is an old tradition that the Chinaman delighted in that rodent, and we all have read that during the siege of Paris it was an established article of food. Rat Portage is beginning to be an important place. It is situated where the waters of the Lake of the Woods fall into the River Winnipeg. Four large saw mills have been constructed here, and immense quantities of lumber have been despatched to Winnipeg and the country beyond. At present Rat Portage is the watering place for the City of Winnipeg. Gold mining has been commenced, but it is a pursuit on which but little calculation can be made.

For the moment there is excitement in the district, and many explorers are engaged in examining the rocky ledges which crop out on the shore and are exposed on the innumerable islands of the Lake of the Woods. It is to be seen if this is a passing spasm or an assured success. When some instance of individual good fortune in gold mining becomes known, crowds for a time push forward eagerly, many desperately, on the path which they impulsively trust is to lead them at once to fortune. Such hopes are often built on imperfect foundations. The slightest reverse depresses the sanguine gold-hunter, and the pursuit is most often abandoned with the recklessness with which it was undertaken. How many may with bitterness repeat the well known words of my countryman, John Leyden, in his ode to an Indian gold coin:

When the train came to a stand the proverbial rush for dinner was made. No regular refreshment room could be found. In fact, none had yet been erected. But there were several temporary shanties built around, whose merits were loudly proclaimed by the several touts in a great many words and the ringing of bells. We had made the acquaintance of some New Zealand travellers on their way to see two sons settled in Manitoba, and we agreed to take our dinner together. We selected one of these establishments. Our recollections of Rat Portage are not impressed by any excellence in its commissariat. That which was set before us was execrable. I am not difficult to please, but there is a lower depth in these matters. Such a meal would scarcely have been palatable during the hunger of the siege of Paris, and a man could only have swallowed what was given at Rat Portage when suffering the pangs of starvation. There is evidently a call for improvement at this place before the line is fully opened to travellers.

Leaving Rat Portage, we pass to what is known as “Section Fifteen.” It is nearly forty miles in length, and, like “Section B,” runs through a district remarkable for its rugged aspect. For a long distance west of Rat Portage the country is much the same in character as the Lake of the Woods: full of rocky, tree-covered ridges and islets, the former a labyrinth of deep, narrow, winding sheets of water, separated by tortuous granite bluffs. If the lake has within its limits hundreds of islands, the land embraces innumerable lakelets. It was this rugged and broken country, so repelling in its condition in the wilderness, which dictated the opinion of a quarter of a century back of high authorities that the country between Lake Superior and Red River was not practicable for railway construction. The difficulties have, however, been grappled with and overcome, necessarily with great labour and great cost; and, as I was passing over it, it struck my mind as no bad example of the danger of positively asserting a negative. The necessary work of placing the trestlework in good condition on “Section Fifteen” is more advanced than on “Section B.” The train, therefore, runs at a higher rate of speed. As we proceed we can observe that the roadbed is fairly well ballasted, and we run at about thirty miles an hour on the finished portion of the line, over the gigantic earthworks of Cross Lake, Lake Deception and the succeeding lakes.

The distance from Lake Superior to the Red River at Selkirk is 410 miles, and notwithstanding the extreme roughness of the country through which it passes, the railway, when completed, will bear comparison with any other line on this Continent. The utmost care has been exercised to establish gradients favourable to cheap transportation. In this respect I know of no other four hundred miles of railway in the Dominion or in the United States that can be compared with the section west of Port Arthur.

We leave “Section 15” and the rugged country behind us, and enter on the prairie land of the West. We pass Selkirk, which once promised to be a centre of importance, but the City of Winnipeg, twenty miles to the south of it, has grown up, is rapidly increasing, and asserting its claim to be the first city in the North-West. As we proceed the sky becomes darkened and we are overtaken by a thunderstorm, during which the rain falls in as heavy masses of water as it has ever been my fate to see. The wind increases to a hurricane, but art triumphs over the elements. As the train continues its course on the well ballasted road, at the rate of twenty-five miles an hour, the passengers generally seemed scarcely aware of the tempest raging outside. An unusual phenomenon is presented: we pass through an electrical snowstorm, which, in a few minutes, whitens the ground over a stretch of a mile. Hail storms are in no way uncommon when the conditions of the air are disturbed, but I have never before witnessed a snowstorm under similar circumstances.

We reach the station at Winnipeg, having been twenty-four hours on our journey. A few years ago the distance from Lake Superior to this point, by the old canoe route, exacted twelve or fourteen days. When the railway is in complete working order the journey may be performed in fourteen hours. On my arrival at the station the night was black and forbidding, for the rain continued to fall in torrents. Nevertheless several old friends were there to extend me a welcome and the offer of a temporary home. Among others I grasped the hand of Dr. Grant, of Queen’s College, who again is to be my companion to the Pacific Coast. Before leaving the station I made definite arrangements with the railway officials to leave in thirty-six hours for Calgary. We groped our way through the wind and rain to profit by the hospitality so kindly offered, and I was not sorry to find myself again under a roof with the best of good cheer before me.