R. M. Ballantyne

“ The northern portion of the coast of California and the whole length of the coasts of Oregon and Washington are thickly wooded. In fact, this vast stretch of country is one continuous pine forest. From the shore, where the trees dip into the sea, back to the verge of the distant horizon, over hills, down valleys, across ravines, and on and around the sides and tops of mountains, it is one great waving panorama of forest scenery. Timber—enough to supply the wants of the world for ages, one would think. ”

“ Should the gold suddenly disappear, the island will have benefited by the impulse just given to immigration, for, no doubt, many who came to mine will remain to cultivate the soil and to engage in other pursuits. If this be the termination of the present fever, then to the farmer who is satisfied with a competency—full garners and good larder, who loves retirement, is not ambitious of wealth, is fond of a mild, agreeable, and healthy climate, and a most lovely country to live in—the island offers every attraction. ”

“ On the left is the long-looked-for Island of Vancouver, an irregular aggregation of hills, shewing a sharp angular outline as they become visible in the early dawn, covered with the eternal pines, saving only occasional sunny patches of open greensward, very pretty and picturesque, but the hills not lofty enough to be very striking. The entire island, property speaking, is a forest. On the right we have a long massive chain of lofty mountains covered with snow, called the Olympian range—very grand, quite Alpine in aspect. ”

“ There is no longer room to doubt that all the country bordering on Fraser River is one continuous gold bed. Miners abandoning the partially exhausted placers of California, are thronging to this new Dorado, and the heretofore tranquil precincts of Victoria are now the scene of an excitement such as was witnessed at San Francisco in 1849, or since in Melbourne. Land has run up to prices fabulously high; and patches that six months ago were, perhaps, grudgingly purchased at the colonial price of 20 shillings the acre, are re-selling daily at a hundred times that amount. ”

“ No man would have turned from the prairie sward of the Pacific to the seamed elopes of the Atlantic edge. As it is, we have the energy and patience which the difficult soil of the east generates, with that magnificent sweep of western territory, which, had it been opened to us first, might, from its very luxuriousness, have generated among those occupying it, an ignoble love of ease. ”

“ It no longer comes to us as the report of interested adventurers, or the exaggeration of a few sanguine diggers, but with well-authenticated results—large quantities of gold received at San Francisco, and a consequent rush of all nations from the gold regions of California, as well as from the United States and Canada. The thirst for Gold is, as it always has been, the most attractive, the strongest, the most unappeasable of appetites—the impulse that builds up, or pulls down empires, and floods the wilderness with a sudden population. ”

“ It is not every traveller who can, with Mackenzie, expatiate on the beauty of scenery while in fear of treachery from fickle and bloody savages; or like Fremont, though dripping from the recent flood, and uncertain of the means of existence even for the day, his arms, clothes, provisions, instruments, deep in the whirlpools of the foaming Platte, stop to gaze with admiration on the ‘fantastic ruins’ Nature has ‘piled’ among her mountain fastnesses, while from his bare and bleeding feet he draws the sharp spines of the hostile cacti. ”

“ Of the southern part of this district Lieutenant Wilkes, who commanded the late exploring expedition under the United States government, says, “Few portions of the globe are so rich in soil, so diversified in surface, or so capable of being rendered the happy homes of an industrious and civilised community. For beauty of scenery and salubrity of climate it cannot be surpassed. It is peculiarly adapted for an agricultural and pastoral people, and no portion of the world beyond the tropics can be found that will yield so readily with moderate labour to the wants of man.” ”

“ As to the prospects of Vancouver’s Island as a colony, I would say that if it shall turn out that there is an extensive and rich gold-field on the mainland in British territory, as there is every reason to believe, the island will become a profitable field for all trades, industries, and labour. The population will soon increase from Canada, whence an immigration of many thousands is already spoken of, from Australia, South America, the Atlantic States,—and, no doubt, from Europe also. ”

“ The voyage from San Francisco to Vancouver’s Island, which in a steamer is made all the way within sight of the coast, is one of the most agreeable when the voyager is favoured with fine weather. I know none other so picturesque out of the Mediterranean. The navigation is so simple that a schoolboy could sail a steamer, for a series of eighteen headlands, which jut out into the ocean all along the coasts of California, Oregon, and Washington Territory, served as landmarks to direct the mariner in his course. All he has to do is to steer from one to another ”

“ In those wild regions of the Far West men are pouring in one vast, gold-searching tide of thousands and tens of thousands, into the comparatively unknown territory beyond the Rocky Mountains, for which our Legislature has just manufactured a government. How strange is the comparison instituted by the Times between the rush to Fraser River and the mediaeval crusades, which carried so large a portion of the population of Europe to die on the burning plains of Palestine! ”

“ In a year more than ordinarily productive of remarkable events, one of the most noteworthy, and that which is likely to leave a lasting impression on the world, is this discovery of gold on the coasts of the Pacific. The importance of the new region as a centre for new ramifications of English relations with the rest of the world cannot well be exaggerated either in a political or a commercial point of view. ”

“ As a natural result of all this emigration, business in the interior is becoming much deranged. The operations of the country merchants are checked; rents and the value of property in the interior towns are diminishing. Some of the merchants are ‘liquidating,’ and some have already moved their business to San Francisco, to take advantage of the business which must spring up between that port and the north-west. All the movements made in consequence of the new gold discovery have tended to benefit San Francisco, and she will, no doubt, continue to derive great advantages from the change. ”

“ The Indians all have gold, and are as much excited as the whites. It is of no use to cite various reports of individual successes in this or that locality. The impression of all who have gone is unanimous and conclusive as to the great facts of new gold fields now being explored equal to any ever yet developed in California or elsewhere. No steamer has yet returned with more than twelve or fifteen passengers, and nearly every one of these had come down to obtain supplies for himself or his party left behind in the diggings. ”

“ The Times’ correspondent, writing from Vancouver’s Island on 10th June, says, “The gold exists from the mouth of Fraser River for at least 200 miles up, and most likely much further, but it has not been explored; hitherto any one working on its banks has been able to obtain gold in abundance and without extraordinary labour; the gold at present obtained has been within a foot of the surface, and is supposed to have averaged about ten dollars per diem to each man engaged in mining. Of course, some obtain more, some less, but all get gold. Thompson River is quite as rich in gold as Fraser River. ”

“ Boats, canoes, and every species of small craft, are continually employed in pouring their cargoes of human beings into Fraser River, and it is supposed that not less than one thousand whites are already at work and on the way to the gold districts. Many accidents have happened in the dangerous rapids of that river; a great number of canoes have been dashed to pieces, and their cargoes swept away by the impetuous stream, while of the ill-fated adventurers who accompanied them many have been swept into eternity. ”

“ The people from American Oregon are, therefore, excluded from the gold district, except such, as resorting to the artifice of denying their country, succeed in passing for British subjects. The persons at present engaged in the search of gold are chiefly of British origin, and retired servants of the Hudson’s Bay Company, who, being well acquainted with the natives, and connected by old acquaintanceship and the ties of friendship, are more disposed to aid and assist each other in their common pursuits than to commit injuries against persons or property. ”

“ Snow seldoms lies longer than a week on the ground. There are frosts so early as September, but they are not severe, and do not continue long. The easterly winds are the coldest, as they come from across the mountains, but they are not frequent. Fruit trees blossom early in April in the neighbourhood of Nasqually and Vancouver; and in the middle of May pease are a foot high, and strawberries in full blossom; indeed, all fruits and vegetables are as early there as in England. The hills, though of great declivity, have a sward to their tops. ”

“ As soon as this object is accomplished, they abandon mining for farming. Did not California afford the means of gratifying this wish, thousands of our miners would have left the country. As it is, with abundance of good land to be had cheap, I have found that a large proportion of the farms in the interior of this country are owned by farmers who bought them with the produce of their labour in the mines. The same advantages can be obtained in the new gold country, there being plenty of good land in the British territory in the neighbourhood and on Vancouver’s Island. ”

“ Until the value of the country as a gold-producing region be established on clearer evidence than can now be adduced in its favour—and the point will no doubt be decided before the close of the present year—I would simply recommend that a small naval or military force should be placed at the disposal of this Government, to enable us to maintain the peace, and to enforce obedience to the laws. ”

“ The problem of colonisation in the north-western portion of British America is fast working itself out. The same destiny which pushed forward Anglo-Saxon energy and intelligence into the rich plains of Mexico, and which has peopled Australia, is now turning the current of emigration to another of the “waste-places of the earth.” The discovery of extensive goldfields in the extreme west of the territories now occupied by the Hudson’s Bay Company, is a great fact. ”

“ The islands lying close to the shore follow its sinuosities, and through the narrow channels thus formed the currents are rapid; those more detached are more fertile; they are all the resort of the natives during the fishing season. Their formation is granite, the prevailing rock north of latitude 49 degrees. Distant thirty miles at its nearest and ninety at its furthest point from the line of islands which cover this coast, and under parallels 52 degrees and 54 degrees, lies Queen Charlotte’s Island, called by the Americans Washington. ”

“ Fort Hope is, as we have said, about one hundred miles up the river—that is to say, about one hundred and ninety from Victoria in Vancouver’s Island, the voyage across the Gulf of Georgia being about ninety miles. The rich diggings between Fort Yale and Fort Hope are, therefore, not so far from the fertile land of Vancouver’s Island as London from Hull and the distance from Victoria to the mouth of the river, where gold is at present found inconsiderable quantities, is not so great as the distance from Liverpool to Dublin. ”

“ On the north the shore is not so high, the ascent more gradual from thence to the tops of the mountains, which are less covered with snow than those to the south. They have from the strait the appearance of a compact range. Proceeding up the strait about seventy miles, a long low sandy point attracted Vancouver’s attention; from its resemblance to Dungeness, on the coast of Kent, he named it New Dungeness, and found within it good anchorage in from ten to three fathoms; beyond this the coast forms a deep bay about nine miles across ”

“ The excitement in Vancouver’s Island itself is quite insignificant compared to that in Washington and Oregon territories, and in California, and which, of course, is increased by every possible means by interested parties. The result has been that several hundred persons from American territory have already flocked to the newly reported auriferous regions, and by the last accounts fresh steamers, and even sailing vessels, were being chartered to convey passengers to Puget Sound, or to Vancouver’s Island, whence they have to find their way to the diggings principally by canoes. ”

“ Mr Wilkes says, “In comparison with the United States, I would say, that the labour necessary in this territory to acquire wealth or subsistence is in the proportion of one to three; or in other words, a man must work throughout the year three times as much in the United States to gain the like competency. The care of stock, which requires so much time with us, requires no attention there, and on the increase only, a man might find support.” He further says, “There will be also a demand for the timber of this country at high prices, throughout the Pacific. ”

“ I have no doubt that a gold-field will be discovered on the island as it gets opened up to enterprising explorers. A friend of mine brought down some sand from the sea-beach near Victoria, and assayed it the other day. It produced gold in minute quantity, and I have heard of gold washings on the island. The copper is undeveloped. The potter’s clay has been tested in England, and found to be very good.
“The character of the soil is favourable to agriculture. It is composed of a black vegetable mould of a foot to two feet in depth, overlaying a hard yellow clay. ”

“ This is the peninsula, composed of a series of mountains running for many miles in one unbroken line, which divides the Straits of Fuca from Puget Sound. It belongs to America, in the territory of Washington, is uninhabited, and, like its opposite neighbour, has a covering of pines far up towards the summit. The tops of these mountains are seldom free from snow. The height is unknown, perhaps 15,000 feet. We ran up through this scenery early in the morning, biting cold, for about forty miles to Esquimault Harbour—the harbour—which confers upon Vancouver’s Island its pre-eminence. ”