12 CAMP-FIRES IN THE CANADIAN ROCKIES 



Coal Company owns the whole place; red is a good, 

 cheap, durable color, and what more would you have? 

 The coal-mines are in both the northern and southern 

 mountains, the veins are very thick, the coal is good, and 

 the profits are said to be eminently satisfactory to the 

 parties of the first part. The post-ofUce is a freak, no 

 more, no less. Not the slightest attention was paid to 

 "In care of Charles L. Smith" on our letters; and to 

 find the ofBce open one must stalk the postmaster as if 

 he were a mountain lion. 



The Hotel Michel is a wonder. In a small mining 

 town, in the heart of a wilderness, one does not expect 

 much of a hotel; but here is every needful luxury, and 

 from bottom to top everything is as clean as a new knife. 

 The food is excellent, and the service away above par. 



All this excellence is due to Mr. Thomas Crahan, 

 an American, who is one of the most interesting men in 

 that region. The story of how he tamed the bar-room 

 when he assumed control of the hotel, and has since ruled 

 it with a hand of steel in a velvet glove, is both interest- 

 ing and instructive as a study in conglomerate human 

 nature. Twenty-four nationalities are represented in 

 that little town, and the place is quiet and peaceful to 

 the point of dulness. 



Three weeks previous to our arrival, Professor Henry 

 Fairfield Osborn, of New York, took his family up the 

 valley of the Elk to the Sulphur Springs, for an outing 

 under canvas, with plenty of fishing and photography. 

 We found them all on the veranda of the hotel, happy and 

 aglow with the spell of the mountains. They said it was 



