A WANDERER’S NOTEBOOK.

Otago Witness, Issue 3806, 22 February 1927, Page 16

A WANDERER’S NOTEBOOK.

IN BRITISH COLUMBIA. XXI. P,y Chaxi.es Wilson, ex-Parliamentary Librarian Wo had been in the province of British Columbia since well into the afternoon before reaching Vancouver, and that province can claim most of the glories of the Rockies, including the never-to-be-for-gotten Mount Robson, to my mind finer, as you see it from the Continental express ■which has brought you from the east, than aught you shall see in the Old World and comparable only for its beauty to the Mount Cook and the Egmont of mine own '•and. This morning we are in the commercial capital of British Columbia. The political capital is at Victoria, on Vancouver Island. When the people of Vancouver Islam! found that the population ori the mainland was growing at such a rate that some day, in > the near future, the voting strength would pass from them, they pushed, in the project of having the new legislative Buildings at Victoria so that when®. Vancouver City became the great commercial entrepot of the province, the political capital had to remain on the island. And it will never be shifted despite the enormous preponderance of the population on the mainland. There was a time', many years ago now, ■when some, more or less prominent Canadian statesman sarcastically alluded to

British Columbia as a “Sea of Moutitains” and scoffed at the very idea of connecting it by an iron road with the East. British Columbia will always be mountainous but it is destined, I believe, to be one of the very greatest .of all the British overseas States. The warm Japanese current keeps climate mild in the winter which is so serious a drawback to some of .the eastern parts of the dominion, rendering it possible for men to work outside during many months which to the eastern must ever be a formidable period. It has immense forest wealth, its ocean waters and its rivers simply teem with fish; and its mineral riches are as yet only partially tapped. It has a great future. IN VANCOUVER CITY. I like Vancouver very much, and the New Zealander en voyage can spend a few days there very pleasantly. After the cold of the East the mild climate is very enjoyable ; one’s big overcoat remains on its peg; it is no colder than autumn in New Zealand. Once destroyed, almost wholly, bv fire, Vancouver is to-day a. well-built place, save for some rather tumbledown wooden quarters near the harbour. It is quite clear that the huge skyscraper craze has reached the Pacific coast. I hear some astonishing stories of the increase, of land values, and it is evident that those who invested money in city properties here are going to do very well out of them—that is, those who did not give too much. There must be some quarter of a million or so people in what is called Greater Vancouver, and yet until 1886. which is, after all not very long ago, it was but a mere village, called Granville. In that year it blossomed forth into a city which was called Vancouver,, after the gallant navigator, Captain George Vancouver, 'who, but 100 er so years before, had explored Burrard

Inlet and given it its name. A bustling, hustling place is Vancouver of to-day Rather too many foreigners, mainly Chinese and Japanese, for my fancy, but certain industries of this region, notably the salmon catching and canning, and fishing generally, seem to demand Asiatic labour, and as for economic questions, I usually leave them undiscussed iTi these letters. There is now a restraint upon Asiatic immigration into Canada, as into the United States, and I suppose these people know their own business best. It is not for me to comment thereon. A GREAT SEAPORT. One thing is quite clear to the visitor, and that is that this city is to be one of the very greatest seaports on the Pacific. Even now, although, in point of tonnage, Vancouver is behind Montreal, the former has a pre-eminence in the number of vessels which crowd its harbour. The opening of the Panama Canal has tended to shift a lot of the grain export from the east to the west. At one time everything for Europe went by the St. Lawrence ports. Nowadays a -very large proportion of the grain produced in Alberta and part of Saskatchewan goes to Europe through Vancouver, thence to be shipped by way of the Panama Canal. Whereas, but five years or so ago. only about a quarter of a million bushels of this wheat was shipped through Vancouver, the amouont has now grown to well over 60,000,000 bushels, and is still growing. Natural result—an enormous increase in the shipping trade of this place. As for its western trade, with China and the Orient generally, I need only say that the big Empress steamers, one of which is here as 1 stay in the city, bring immense quantities of tea. Nearly £1,000,000 worth of silk, all for New York, had been brought

to the British Columbian port by the stately vessel I see unloading. SIGHT-SEEING AT .VANCOUVER. Agents for the inevitable charabanc tours —“rubber-neck” excursions, the Americans call them —are early at the hotel after our arrival here, eager for business. They expatiate upon the wonders and beauties of their city and its and rapidly fill their cars. On the whole, their praises of the place and its attractions are not overdone. I rarely have had a finer drive than that round Stanley Park, which is one of the proudest boasts of the Vancouver folk. Here on Vancouver Island Here, just across immense trees through which you can actually drive; splendidly paved roads, joys exceeding to the motorist; beautiful public gardens, and a tasteful monument to the Indian poetess, Pauline Johnson, who has written so much of this region and of the beauties of the Rockies. Your car goes to a point some 300 ft above the First Narrows, whence, on a clear day, you can see the snow-capped mountains on Vaneoouver Island. Here, just across the water to the north, where, as Miss Johnson sings, “the dream hills swim into the sky/ you shall see the mighty Lions which ever stand on guard over the waters of the great inlet. At one point- your guide points out the Siwash Rock where, according to an Indian legend the figure of a young India chief, was, localise of his great fidelity, transformed • into stone by the god, Sagalie Tyee, as an everlasting pattern to his tribe. When the tide is at its height its base is surrounded b v water, and always at the top is a little tuft of trees. Needless to say, practically all the tourists on the charabancs pull forth their kodaks and set to work “snapping” for the benefit of their friends at home. During the drive you pass English Bay, which is the Manly, the Takapuna, the Island Bay, the New Brighton, and St. Glair of Vancouver, crowded with people during the summer time, but to-day looking just a little bare and cheerless. Go another trip, and you can visit the wonderful Capilano Canyon, spanned bj r a suspension bridge from which some perfectly suporb views are obtainable. THE CHINESE QUARTER.

Your Vancouver friends —the good folk here, as everywhere in Canada, arc the very embodiment of hospitality and kindness—will assure you that you must certainly have a stroll round the Chinese and Japanese quarters of the city, and naturally you take their’ advice. Truth to tell, there is not very much which is spccialy exotic and bizarre to be seen. A Chinese theatre or two, where, I am told, a drama will last-in its playing a good fortnight or so'; some Chinese ■'movies,’’ at one of which, so 1 notice, the amiable Mary Pickford, whose birthplace, by the way, is one of the sights of Toronto, is a present-day star; a small host of Chinese eating-houses, with some of the weirdest fish 1 have ever seen, and with the gory interiors of anjmals laid out as solemnly as the peaches and grapes in a Piccadilly fruit shop; several strangelooking halls, at which, 1 am informed, members of the numerous “tongs” or secret societies and political clubs arc wont to assemble; many Chinese ladies, ..with whitened faces and palpably oiled hair; vendors of Chinese newspapers crying their wares in the street, and a general atmosphere of “smelliness” which can be felt —all this you can see for yourself as -on saunter around. But for the most part there is but little that is strictly Chinese, the trail of Western, so called civilisation, is over the place. I am told the police have but little trouble with the Chinese, but, from what I hear people say, the Orientals generally do not hide their impression that some 'lay, when t,h« Warring Chinese factions shall have come to peace, they will unite in playing "Old Harry” will) the Europeans in tho Orient. The young Chinese here are, they say. becoming very “cheeky” and “uppish,” and there is distinctly some uneasiness of feeling that, sooner or hater, tho Oriental will have a big sav in things on tho Pacific Slope.

VANCOUVER ISLAND AND VICTORIA We are very comfortable in our reasonably charged hotel at. Vancouver, but the day is close at hand when we shall take the good ship Niagara upon which- thanks to the agents of the Canadian National, our baggage lias already been deposited, despite the fact that one traveller at least was unlucky or stupid enough—you shall have your choice of adjectives--to lose his steamer tickets and his baggage checks in now far away New . York. Thanks to the very practical courtesy of Mr Irons, an exNew Zealander, I am proud to say. now manager, -nt. Vancouver, of the Canadian and Australian Hue, which is practically the Union Company we know so well, and to small expenditure in cables,' the lost steamer tickets have been replaced and all anxiety ended. As to the lost baggage cheeks I have to thank some unknown gentleman at the Canadian National Depot at Vancouver for putting straight matters which had proved somewhat awkward, and I can now go on board the Niagara with my mind quite easy Personally. I have visited Victoria before, but most of my fellow passengers wisely go down there by the night boat and spend a day or two at the political capital of British Columba. Victoria, as everybody says, who has been there—to one of the prettiest towns on earth. There is a big English population on Vancouver Island, men retired from the naval and military services, men connected with what one used to call the English “county families” and so forth, and tho Victorians generally as being of inferior breeding. Be that as it may there is no doubt that life on Vancouver Island can be very pleasant if your means permit. The climate seems to be delightful, and the fishing and shooting are splendid. A good many people have gone in for fruit-growing in British Columbia, and sonyi very, fine fruit, apples especially, do thev produce, judging by tho samples I have seen at. Vancouver. But although there is a good export trade there does not seem to bo much money in it, and I was warned, at the hotel and elsewhere, not to speculate in fruit land. ACROSS THE PACIFIC.

The Niagara takes us across tjio Pacific in good, regular time, and in wonderfully fine weather, tho only fly, and that only occasional, in the ointment, being that the good ship rolls a little too much to be pleasant. It is a sailless ocean, the Pacific, and never a vessel do we see in the daytime until near Fiji. The usual stops, at Honolulu, and Fiji have been so. often

described that I shall not inflict upon you any detailed accounts of these places. At Honolulu I was told they, had had rather a bad tourist season owin'' to tho Americans favouring Florida rather than the South Seas. There is now some check upon tho Japanese invasion of the Hawaiian group, but the little brown men —and women—seem to be largely in possession, and other- races, Koreans, Chilians, Portuguese —from Madeira of all places—and the “lesser breeds outside the law,” as Kipling writes, aro all represented. It is curious to see Japanese girls shaving men in the barber’s shops, and much of the handicraft work appears to be done by foreigners. Honolulu must be a delightful winter resort, but most Americans of the moneyed classes seem to have been there, and I fancy, from what I hear on the steamer, that we are to have an ever-growing incursion of people from the United States in New Zealand. Fiji was rather slack and quiet. Everything seems to be subordinated to the presence of the Indian immigrants. Personally, although open to the charge of prejudice, I like not the Indian. .1 do not know that I should care to sec my country overrun by Japanese or Chinese, but there is something peculiarly sinuous, subtle, and sinister about the Indian that puts my back up. After a very pleasant run here is Auckland at last. Fine weather, hurray! and as the Niagara rounds the point from the gulf, and we, pass the North Shore, I am honestly proud of the pretty appearance of the city and the manifest admiration shown by the American passengers. And now I must conclude. From Auckland to Auckland we have been away for eight months and two weeks, with but four days on which it rained. Did ever a wanderer have better luck in weather?