CHAPTER XXXII. 



The Hudson's Bay Route. 



contemplations at churchill — the transcontinental short 

 line — port simpson to churchill — the calgary, prince 

 albert and hudson's bay line — the winnipeg and hud- 

 son's bay road — roads from winnipeg to the pacific 

 coast — the future of canada and the north-west — gov- 

 ernment control of railways. 



ET the reader accompany me to Churchill, and there let us 

 together betake ourselves to the high, broad, grass-covered 

 ramparts of old Fort Prince of Wales, and, with the accom- 

 panying map in our hands, view the vast country to the 

 south and west, and the placid waters of the Bay to the east, and 

 contemplate the future of our country: Here, upon the walls of this 

 gigantic ruin, nearly as old as the foundations of Montreal, we are 

 strangely impressed with the idea that we are in the centre of the 

 continent, not far east of the longitude of Winnipeg. At our feet 

 is one of the world's finest harbours — one that may be entered by any 

 navigator without a pilot, and without the slightest danger. The 

 entrance is something less than half a mile wide. It is between two 

 points of rock, some twenty-five feet above high water, which over- 

 lap, that on the western shore — the side the fort is on — being situated 

 half a mile farther north than the point on the eastern side, thus 

 guarding the harbour from any storm that may arise in the Bay. The 

 depth of the water in the channel is from ten to twenty fathoms at 

 low water. 



In this channel the tide-race is very strong. Its rising waters 

 lead into a magnificent basin from one to two miles broad and from 

 two to three miles long. An anchorage may be had anywhere in 



