IMPORTANCE OF CENTRAL BRITISH AMERICA. A17 
called the “Old Columbia Trail,’ with numerous horses and oxen, 
dissipates all fears for the passage of the Rocky Mountains. Where 
70 horses, 130 oxen, and 150 men, women, and children can journey 
without difficulty, the road still being in\a state of nature, it is rea- 
sonable to suppose that a small expenditure would convert it into an 
excellent waggon road. 
The Miette Pass and the Thompson’s River trail, join Cariboo with 
the Plains of the Saskatchewan,* and Cariboo is now only seven days’ 
journey from New Westminster—thanks to the energy which has 
pushed the government roads so rapidly through that “impassable ”’ 
* The Canadian Emigrant party of 1862, took through the mountains 130 oxen and about 
70 horses. When in the mountains, they killed a few oxen for provisions; others were sold to 
the Indians at Téte Jaune Cache, on the Fraser; and others were rafted down the Fraser 
River to the Forks of the Quesnelle. At the Téte Jaune Cache, a,portion of the party separated 
from the rest, and, with fourteen horses, went across the country by an old well-worn trail to 
Thompson’s River, and thus succeeded in taking their horses from Fort Garry through the 
Rocky Mountains—through a supposed impassable part of British Columbia, to the wintering 
station on Thompson’s River and Kamloop’s Lake, for the pack-animals of the British Columbia 
gold-seekers. 
The Leather, or Miette Pass, lies in latitude 54°, and has long been known to the employees 
of the Hudson’s Bay Company, and ‘is called by them the “ Old Columbia Trail,” or “ Jasper 
Pass.” It will be observed that it forms an immediate and direct connection with the great 
artery of British Columbia, namely, the Fraser River. The other passes to the south connect 
with the Columbia River, which flows for many hundred miles through Washington territory, 
Tt will not fail to be noticed, too, that the existence of this route via the Leather Pass, has only 
very recently appeared on published maps. It is shown on Arrowsmith’s Map of British Co- 
lumbia, published in 1860 ; but the success with which its long-established connection with the 
Fraser was concealed bythe late Hudson’s Bay Company, is a singular instance of the unity of 
purpose which has pervaded all the actions of that powerful corporation during their long tenure 
of absolute control over a portion of British America, containing more land suitable for the 
- abode of man than the Province of Canada itself, and which has already cost in its defence from 
aggression many millions of money and many thousands of lives. It seems remarkable that the 
Leather Pass and its easy connection with the Fraser River, escaped the attention of the ex- 
ploring party sent by the British Government, under Captain Palliser, in 1857, 1858, and 1859. If 
the existence of this unobstructed communication betweer the Athabaska Valley and British 
Columbia had been made known to the world as one of the results of that expedition, probably 
long ere this the British Goverr:ment would have taken measures to establish a separate govern- 
ment in Central British America, and open a communication across the continent through British 
territory. Dr. Hector actually passed the “ Old Columbia Trail,” but neither his guides nor the 
people at St. Ann’s or Edmonton appear to have informed him of its existence. Fortunately the 
Leather Pass has now been traversed by men, a woman, children, and numerous oxen and 
horses ;—the Fraser River has been safely descended for four hundred miles from its source, in 
canoes and on rafts, by a very numerous party, and it has been ascended in a boat from Cariboo 
to the Téte Jaune Cache ; and from this last-named place there is a well-known trail for horses 
to the Thompson River, and thence to New Westminster, which has also been traversed by 
Canadian emigiants with horses; and more recently, aceording to Victoria papers, by Lord 
Milton, with thirteen horses, The difficulties of the Rocky Mountains have in great part melted 
away, and the “impossibilities” of the overland route have vanished, just as the “ uninhabit- 
able deserts and swamps” of the Saskatchewan have given place to boundless fertile prairies, 
which will probably beecome—even in our generation—the seat of an enterprising and pros- 
perous people. 
