100 SETTLING IN BRITISH COLUMBIA. [June 



night in August was the heat too great for walking to be pleasant. 

 However warm the clay, a cool southern breeze, blowing across the 

 Olympians, would rise about four o'clock p.m. ; while there were few 

 evenings in which a wrap of some kind was not acceptable. The 

 snow did not vanish from the Olympians before August. When 

 everything in Victoria was covered with frost and snow, and even 

 the dark fir trees were stretching out white feathery branches, the 

 distant mountains alone remained dark and sombre. And now that 

 spring has come again, and flowers are once more filling the gardens 

 with perfume, the Olympians have donned their white raiment, and 

 they too look fresh and delicate, and dazzlingly fair in the sunshine. 

 One feels that among them, if anywhere, must be 



"The island valley of Avilion, 

 "Wliere falls not hail, or rain, or any snow, 

 Nor ever wind blows loudly." 



If the summer evenings are colder, the winters are, on the whole, 

 less severe than in England. There are heavy rains in the autumn ; 

 and last December we had what was regarded by the older in- 

 habitants as an exceptionally cold " snap." For a fortnight the 

 thermometer registered from eight to fourteen degrees of frost, and 

 this was intensified by the north wind which found its way into 

 every corner of the slightly-built frame-houses. Every morning the 

 cream in the pantry, the water in the filter, and even the beer had 

 to be thawed ; while our China boy put on every day some addi- 

 tional article of clothing, until he more nearly resembled a tea cosy 

 than anything else. But this state of things, happily, did not last 

 long. In January and February we had mild, moist weather, with 

 showers of rain every day ; then spring burst suddenly upon us. 



A year has passed away since we landed at the Outer AVharf on 

 that lovely Sunday morning in March. England now does not seem 

 to be so far distant from us as Vancouver Island to our friends at 

 home. Indeed, a young Englishman assured me that one of the 

 advantages of Victoria is that it is not " shut off " from the world, 

 or from what has hitherto made our world. " It is only twelve days 

 from London," he continued, speaking as we should have done a 

 year ago of a country place in Surrey or Kent, connected by hourly 

 trains with town. This young fellow's ideas are somewhat ahead of 

 his time, no doubt. Xevertheless the day is approaching when the 

 wonderful power of steam will practically annihilate distance. At 

 any rate, within a few months we shall be able to travel from Van- 

 couver Island to England without setting foot on foreign soil. 



ViCTOEiA, Ajiril 5. 



