CHAPTER VI.
_Port Moody--Victoria--San Francisco to Chicago_.
At "Port Moody," and even at the new "Vancouver City," I felt some
disappointment that the original idea of crossing amongst the islands
to the north-east of Vancouver's Island, traversing that island, and
making the Grand Pacific terminus at the fine harbour of Esquimalt, had
not been realized. Halifax to Esquimalt was our old, well-worn plan.
The "Tete Jaune" was our favoured pass. This plan, I believe, met the
views both of Sir James Douglas and the Honorable Mr. Trutch. But I
consoled myself with the reflection, that if we had not gained the
best, we had secured the next best, grand scheme--a scheme which, as
time goes on, will be extended and improved, as the original Pacific
Railways of the United States have been.
The sea service between "Port Moody" and "Victoria," Vancouver's
Island, is well performed; and Victoria itself is an English town, with
better paved streets, better electric lighting, and better in many
other ways that might be named, than many bigger American and English
towns I know of. I spent four delightful days in and about it,
including an experimental trip, through the kindness of Mr. Dunsmuir
--the proprietor of the Wellington Collieries, a few miles north of
Nanaimo--over the new railway from Victoria to Nanaimo, constructed,
with Government aid, by himself and Mr.
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