Handbook to the new Gold-fields by Robert Michael Ballantyne (ebook offline reader TXT) 📕

for his produce.

"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. Its resources are, plenty of timber, towards the northern portion producing spars of unequalled quality, which are becoming of great value in England, and will soon be demanded in France, now that the forests of Norway and of Maine are becoming exhausted; limestone in abundance, which burns into good lime for building and for agricultural purposes; coal in plenty, now worked at Nanaimo, on the northern side of the island, by the Hudson's Bay Company--the quality is quite good, judging from the specimens I saw burning--it answers well for steam purposes, and would have found a ready sale in San Francisco were it not subject to a heavy duty (of 30 per cent, I think) under the American tariff; iron, copper, gold, and potter's clay. 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. The surface earth is very fine, pulverised, and sandy, quite black, and, no doubt, of good quality; when sharpened with sheep-feeding it produces heavy crops. The fallen trees, which are very numerous, shew that the substratum of clay is too hard to produce anything. The roots of the pine never penetrate it. In some places the spontaneous vegetation testifies to the richness of the soil--such as wild pease or vetches, and wild clover, which I--have seen reach up to my horse's belly--and a most luxuriant growth of underwood, brambles, fern, etcetera.

"I visited seven farms within short distances of Victoria. The crops were oats, barley, wheat, pease, potatoes, turnips, garden herbs and vegetables, fruits, and flowers; no clover, the natural grass supplying sufficient food for the cattle and sheep. The crops were all healthy, but not heavy. The wheat was not thick on the ground, nor had it a large head. It was such a crop as would be an average only in a rich, well-cultivated district of England or Scotland; far lighter than you would see in the rich counties of England and in the Carse of Gowrie. I was informed that the ground was very badly prepared by Indian labour-- merely scratched over the surface. I believe that with efficient labour and skilful treatment, the crops could be nearly doubled. The oats and barley were very good crops, and the potatoes looked quite healthy, and I doubt not will turn out the best crop of all. The peas were decidedly an abundant crop. Vegetables thrive well, and all the ordinary fruits, apples, currants, etcetera, are excessively abundant, some of the currant-bushes breaking down with the weight of their fruit. Flowers of the ordinary sorts do well, but delicate plants don't thrive, owing to the coldness of the nights.

"Sheep thrive admirably. I saw some very fine pure Southdowns. The rams were selling at 100 dollars each (20 pounds) to California sheep farmers. Other breeds--hybrids of Southdowns, merinos, and other stock--were also in good condition, and fair in size. Black cattle do well also. The breed is a mixture of English and American, which makes very good beef. The horses are little Indian breeds, and some crosses with American stock, all very clean limbed, sound, active, hardy, and full of endurance and high spirit, until they get into livery-stables.

"During my stay, the climate was charming; the weather perfection--warm during the day, but free of glare, and not oppressive; cool in the evenings, with generally a gentle sea breeze. The long days--the protracted daylight eking out the day to nine o'clock at night--the lingering sunset, and the ample `gloaming,' all so different from what I had been accustomed to in more southern latitudes, again reminded me of Scotland in the summer season.

"So far as I wandered--about ten miles round Victoria--the landscape is totted with extensive croppings of rock, which interfere with the labours of the husbandman. Few corn-fields are without a lot of boulders, or a ridge or two of rocks rising up above the surface of the ground. Consequently the cultivated fields are small, and were sneered at by my Californian neighbours, who are accustomed to vast open prairies under crop. I have seen one field of 1000 acres all under wheat in California. But then no other country is so favoured as this is for all the interests of agriculture.

"The scenery of the inland country around Victoria is a mixture of English and Scotch. Where the pine (they are all `Douglass' pines) prevails, you have the good soil broken into patches by the croppings of rock, producing ferns, rye-grass, and some thistles, but very few. This is the Scottish side of the picture. Then you come to the oak region; and here you have clumps, open glades, rows, single trees of umbrageous form, presenting an exact copy of English park scenery. There is no running water, unfortunately, but the meadows and little prairies that lie ensconced within the woods, shew no signs of suffering from lack of water. The nights bring heavy dews, and there are occasional rains, which keep them fresh and green. I am told that in September rains fall which renew the face of nature so suddenly, that it assumes the garb of spring, the flowers even coming out. The winter is a little cold, but never severe. I have heard it complained of as being rather wet and muggy. Frost and snow fall, but do not endure long.

"The climate is usually represented as resembling that of England. In some respects the parallel may hold good; but there is no question that Vancouver has more steady fine weather, is far less changeable, and is on the whole milder. Two marked differences I remarked--the heat was never sweltering, as is sometimes the case in England, and the wind never stings, as it too often does in the mother country. The climate is unquestionably superior in Vancouver."

To resume our description of the coast, the southern shore of the Strait of Juan de Fuca is described by Vancouver as being composed of sandy cliffs of moderate height, falling perpendicularly into the sea, from the top of which the land takes a further gentle ascent, where it is entirely covered with trees, chiefly of the pine tribe, until the forest reaches a range of high craggy mountains which seem to rise from, the woodland in a very abrupt manner, with a few scattered trees on their sterile sides, and their tops covered with snow. 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; and three miles from its eastern point lies Protection Island, so named from the position it occupies at the entrance of Port Discovery. Vancouver landed on it on the 1st of May 1792, and thus describes its appearance:--"On landing on the west end, and ascending its eminence, which was a nearly perpendicular cliff, our attention was immediately called to a landscape almost as enchantingly beautiful as the most elegantly finished pleasure-grounds in Europe. The summit of this island presented nearly a horizontal surface, interspersed with some inequalities of ground, which produced a beautiful variety on an extensive lawn covered with luxuriant grass and diversified with abundance of flowers. To the north-westward was a coppice of pine trees, and shrubs of various sorts, that seemed as if it had been planted for the purpose of protecting from the north-west winds this delightful meadow, over which were promiscuously scattered a few clumps of trees that would have puzzled the most ingenious designer of pleasure-grounds to have arranged more agreeably. While we stopped to contemplate these several beauties of nature in a prospect no less pleasing than unexpected, we gathered some gooseberries and roses in a state of considerable forwardness."

From this island, lying at the entrance of Port Discovery, commences the maritime importance of the territory, with, says Vancouver, as fine a harbour as any in the world, though subsequently he awards the palm to its neighbour Port Hudson. Its shores and scenery have been thus described by Vancouver:--

"The delightful serenity of the weather greatly aided the beautiful scenery that was now presented; the surface of the sea was perfectly smooth, and the country before us presented all that bounteous nature could be expected to draw into one point of view. As we had no reason to imagine that this country had ever been indebted for any of its decorations to the hand of man, I could not possibly believe that any uncultivated country had ever been discovered exhibiting so rich a picture. The land which interrupted the horizon below the north-west and north quarters seemed to be much broken, from whence its eastern extent round to south-east was bounded by a ridge of snowy mountains, appearing to lie nearly in a north and south direction, on which Mount Baker rose conspicuously, remarkable for its height and the snowy mountains that stretch from its base to the north and south. Between us and this snowy range, the land, which on the sea-shore terminated like that we had lately passed in low perpendicular cliffs, or on beaches of sand or stone, rose here in a very gentle ascent, and was well covered with a variety of stately forest trees; these, however, did not conceal the whole face of the country in one uninterrupted wilderness, but pleasantly clothed its eminences and chequered the valleys, presenting in many directions extensive spaces that wore the appearance of having been cleared by art, like the beautiful island we had visited the day before. A picture so pleasing could not fail to call to our remembrance certain delightful and beloved situations in Old England." Both the approaches to this port, round the extremities of Protection Island, are perfectly free from obstruction, and about a league in breadth.

Separated from Port Discovery only by a narrow slip of land from a mile and a-half to two miles broad, which trending to the east protects it from the north and west, is Port Hudson, having its entrance at the extremity of the point on the east side, but little more than one mile broad;