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Vancouver Island. To Mount Edgecumbe and Mount Saint Elias he applied those respective names-the latter the great snowy peak more than eighteen thousand feet altitude upon the borders of the Alaska and Yukon of to-day, whose gleaming crest forms so notable a landmark from the sea. Onwards still went Cook, towards the frozen north, searching ever for a passage; and at last, sailing through Behring Strait, he reached "the north-westernmost extremity of all America" and named it "Cape Prince of Wales,"August 9, 1778. Immediately opposite this headland he found another cape. It was the north-easternmost point of Asia; that striking and interesting geographical condition in which the ancient continent-cradle of the human raceapproaches the shores of the New World: latitude 66° N.

So the genius of Britain completed what the genius of Spain had begun, for the work of Cook was corollary, 265 years afterwards, to the work of Magellan and Balboa.

Nevertheless, Spain claimed the whole of this vast coast, by right of Balboa's first entrance and the subsequent Papal "authority." But the sojourn of Cook at Nootka had given rise to an unexpected development—a development brought about to some extent, moreover, by an insignificant animal : the sea-otter. Canoe-loads of Indians had crowded about Cook's ships with the sea-otters' skins for barter; and when the expedition on its homeward voyage reached Canton in China, these skins were found to be of great value-a skin which had cost sixpence, perhaps, selling for a hundred dollars. The possibility of fur-trading following upon this created great interest in England and elsewhere, and ships and traders of all the maritime peoples of Europe and of the United States began to frequent the north-west coast. Spain viewed these proceedings with alarm. Were not these still her own sacred waters? Action was necessary: an expedition to Nootka followed, difficulties and preparations for war between Britain and Spain ensued; but by the Nootka Convention of November 1790 British rights were admitted, and Spain lost the sovereignty of the region.

But for the following quarter of a century the hands of Britain were full with European affairs, and the hardy and enterprising traders and whalers of New England-among

them Ledyard-journeying via the stormy Horn, made of this far-off region of the Great Pacific Coast a United States field of almost exclusive character. To an American trader -Captain Gray-moreover, was the credit of discovering the great Columbia River; that mighty stream which falls into the Pacific Ocean in latitude 46° 10', after traversing British Columbia and Washington.

The discovery of the mouth of the Columbia was attended, although to a less extent, by the same elusive circumstances as that of the Golden Gate. The bay at its mouth was discovered by the Spaniards in 1775 by Heceta, who imagined a river must debouch there; whilst a few years afterwards the English trader, Lieutenant Meares, sailed along outside the bar and called the place Deception Bay; but he denied the existence of a river such as Spanish charts had said to exist. In 1778 Captain Cook passed the bay, but even he failed to see the river's mouth; whilst yet another famous British captain-George Vancouver-whose name remains so prominently upon that coast to-day, only noted the appearance of a small inlet, as he described it; and he continued his voyage to Pugel Sound. Two weeks later, on May 11, 1792, he heard of Gray's discovery; and the American named the river after the good ship Columbia in which he entered it. This was the first ship which, two years previously, had ever carried the Stars and Stripes around the world, on Gray's voyage from Boston to China.

Thus we have seen how, step by step, the line and features of the Great Pacific Coast unrolled to the hardy voyagers of the various nations whose natural impulses took them thither. From the extremity of North America and Asia, in the frozen Arctic, to the extremity of South America at Cape Horn, twelve thousand miles of surf-beat shore, the contour of this great coast lay at the map-maker's will. Still, however, the dream remained of the North-west Passage: some open route of "silent highway" which should give access from the Atlantic to the Pacific, whose entrance, hidden perchance by some peaked promontory, should yet yield up its secret. The secret of the strait" had now transferred itself to the secret of the passage.

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But we must follow for the moment the great pioneers of

the Anglo-Saxon West; beginning their struggles with nature, with Indians, floods and mountains in the early years of the nineteenth century. The French, Spanish, American and British spheres of influence on both sides of the vast Mississippi became changed and defined, and civilization gradually took its westward way. The land highway to the Pacific from the Missouri, across the approaching headwaters of the Missouri (which, as the Mississippi, falls into the Mexican Gulf) and the Columbia (falling into the Pacific), was accomplished by the famous Lewis and Clark expedition sent out in 1803 by the wise and kindly Jefferson, president of the growing young giant of the United States. The famous fur-trading companies and their rival territories, the Oregon question and the boundary definitions, the great westward migration, the gold discovery of California are all great matters which have affected and decided the march of civilization on the Great Pacific Coast, mainly in the nineteenth century.

The instructions issued by the United States President Jefferson embodied an absolute path-finding mission to the Pacific Coast "to explore the Missouri River and such principal streams of it as, by its course and communication with the waters of the Pacific Ocean, whether the Columbia, Oregon, Colorado, or some other river, may offer the most direct and practical water communication across the continent for the purposes of commerce." So wrote Jefferson in his mandate to Lewis and Clark. He added instructions to the effect that they were to err on the side of safety for themselves, rather than in temerity of exploration, showing his kindly thought for the explorers. Just prior to leaving St. Louis the leader of the expedition happened to witness the lowering of the French flag in upper Louisiana and the hoisting in its place of the Stars and Stripes; and then they began their toilsome up-stream voyage against the swift Missouri River, passing the last white man's settlementthe home of the famous Daniel Boone. On the way they encountered British and French traders; and buffaloes, Indians and grizzly bears were companions of their journeyings. Onwards they pressed towards the source of the giant Missouri, through a wild, unexplored region; going far to the

northward along its fluvial highway. Overturned boats, dangerous rapids, fatigue and privation were but diurnal incidents of their long and interesting journey; and at length, in August 1805, Captain Clark, with a portion of his company, ascended the summit of the Rocky Mountains to the very divortia aquarum of the continent, where the foot of the white man had never trod before. Inspired by the belief that he was looking over upon the watershed of the Pacific Ocean-although 800 or 1,000 miles away from its shores -the leader crossed the summit on the same day, and descending the slopes for a space encountered a fine stream. This stream was flowing to the west! It was the headwaters of one of the affluents of the great Columbia River, that magnificent fluvial artery of the Pacific north-west, which rising in the Rocky Mountains debouches in the Pacific Ocean after traversing British Columbia, Washington and Oregon. After great difficulties and privations the expedition reached the navigable headwaters of this affluent-the Snake River-over rocks, fallen trees, through dense forests, torrential, icy streams, storms of snow and sleet, alternating with heat and fever-such elements as Nature ever prepares for the pioneer-intruders in her untrodden labyrinths. Building five canoes they descended the river, passed the now famous Dalles, and the narrows and cascades of the great salmon-bearing river, and on the 7th of November reached their desired haven. There upon their ears fell the roar of the mighty western sea; there before their eyes were the blue waves and surf-beat verge of the Great Pacific Coast. Thus was a highway first opened to the west by these intrepid young Americans.

The dawning of the great nineteenth century was pregnant with other matters of grave portent for the Great Pacific Coast. The dominion of Spain over her colonies was shaking to its core, and the birth of new nations was heralded. The long pageant of viceroy, priest and governor was drawing to its close, unrolled for three hundred years upon the shores of Mexico and Peru. The civilization of Spain had penetrated those thousands of miles of savage forest and snow-crowned Cordilleras: beautiful cities and capitalschapters in stone from the mother country-had arisen; a

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VIEW ON THE UPPER PART OF THE COLUMBIA RIVER AT REVELSTOKE, BRITISH COLUMBIA

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