14 



THE STIKINE RIVER IN 1898 



between the succession of stony hills had been completed for 

 some 30 miles, nearly to the Hudson's Bay Company's post, and 

 that the detachment of mounted police at Lake Teslin were rap- 

 idly putting up their buildings and laying out a permanent post. 

 The current is very swift between Glenora and Telegraph Creek, 

 twelve miles above, where the Teslin trail strikes away to north- 

 ward, and as there was no freight to carry and no passengers to 

 be called for, we did not see that last outpost reached by the 

 Western Union Telegraph Company's Avires in 1866, when their 



THE STEAMER AT GI.EN'IIRA 



surveys for a land line across Siberia to Europe were brought 

 to an end by the success of the Atlantic cable. A distracted 

 packer, however, visited the steamer to know for how much less 

 than one dollar each mule the Ogilvie would go to Telegraph 

 Creek and ferry across 75 mules that he had successfully driven 

 up from Ashcroft, on the Fraser river, but the purser could not 

 figure out any profit for the steamer to undercut the local canoe 

 ferry prices, and the mule owner was the picture of despair. 

 Above Telegraph Creek the Great canon of the Stikine extends 

 for 50 miles, a deep gorge, with terrific rapids and bends, which 



