i88 WITH GUN AND GUIDE 



horses. The time made on the various roads, which 

 aggregate altogether 650 miles, is as fast as any one 

 could wish for. There is no stinginess about the use 

 of horses. Our first day's run took us to the " Eighty- 

 three-mile House," and for that trip twenty-two horses 

 were used four relays of four horses each and one of 

 six. The second day's trip carried us beyond the " One- 

 hundred-and-fifty-mile House," to Soda Creek, and 

 thirty-six horses were employed in pulling the stage 

 six relays of six horses each. The animals were fat, 

 well groomed and full of life. 



The fare from Ashcroft to Barkerville is $38.50, 

 while the rate for carrying merchandise is twelve and 

 a half cents per pound. Over the road an enormous 

 amount of freight is hauled in wagons made on the old 

 prairie schooner build, with rounded canvas covers. 

 Two of these wagons are hitched together, and they 

 are hauled with from six to eight horses. The out- 

 ward trip for these freight wagons to Barkerville takes 

 about twenty-three days, while the return trip with the 

 empty wagons occupies perhaps thirteen days. The 

 lowest freight charges are six dollars per hundred 

 pounds. 



The stages stop to deliver and pick up mail at almost 

 every house along the route. During summer and fall 

 months a stage leaves Ashcroft Monday mornings at 

 four o'clock and is due in Barkerville, about three hun- 

 dred miles away, at 3 p. M. the following Thursday. 



