COLUMBIA, British, the first of the Canadian pro vinces organized on the Pacific, was admitted into the Dominion in 1871. Including Vancouver s Island, it em braces an area of 233,000 square miles, of bold sea-coast, lofty mountain ranges, and rugged picturesque river courses, as well as rich fertile valleys. Unlike the great river sys tem to the east of the Eocky Mountains, the rivers of British Columbia make their way by abrupt rapids and falls, in their comparatively brief courses from the Rocky Moun tains to the sea.
British Columbia owes its rise to the status of a pro vince of Canada to the sudden influx of gold-diggers in 1856 and following years. The bed of the Fraser River had been discovered to be a rich auriferous deposit ; and all who preferred the lottery-like chances of the diggings to the more laborious but certain fruits of patient industry hastened to this new Eldorado. In a serai-official publication of 1864, it is stated that, in 1860, " Antler, the most important creek, yielded at one time, at the lowest estimate, gold to the value of $10,000 per day. On one claim $1,000 worth was taken out of the sluice- boxes as the result of a single day s work." But it was not till 1862 that the unsystematic process of mere surface diggings and washings of nomad adventurers was super seded by sinking shafts and carrying on a regulated system of mining under the direction of experienced engineers. Companies were formed ; large capital was invested ; and an official report of 1870 states the yield of gold for that year from the mines of Cariboo, Silionet, Lilloet, Columbia, Yale, and Lytton at $1,333,745, in addition to the large quantities of the precious metal carried out of the province by private adventurers. It appears from authentic returns that from 1862 to 1871 gold to the value of 816,650,036 was shipped from British Columbia by the banks, and so registered and put on record ; while the estimated value of that which was carried out of the country by miners themselves during the same period is probably not over-estimated at $6,000,000. Nor is this a mere temporary supply derived from surface washings. Extensive tracts of gold-bearing quartz rocks constitute an important element in the permanent mineral resources of the country. According to the Tables of the Trade and Navigation of the Dominion of Canada, printed at Ottawa in 1875, the export of gold in dust and bars from the province of British Columbia during the previous year is valued at $1,072,422.
As explorations and surveys are carried further into the interior the auriferous regions prove to be widely extended, and rich in their promised yield. Gold has been found over an area of not less than 200 miles, and is readily obtained by the simple processes of the adventurous gold- washer, in the beds of the Fraser, the Thompson, the Peace, and Ominica Rivers, or the creeks and tributaries flowing into them. Stickeen River, towards the Alaska frontier, the most recent gold-field, has been successfully worked since 1875, and continues to yield an abundant return. But though the rumour of river-beds of golden sand is the readiest of all stimulants to emigration, a rush of gold-diggers is not the most satisfactory addition to the population of a young colony ; nor is wealth thus easily acquired generally turned to good account. The immigrant population included bands of lawless adventurers, Texans, Mexicans, Spaniards, Californian, Australian, American, and Chinese gold-diggers, with a heterogeneous gathering of reckless fortune-hunters from all parts of the world. The necessity for some regularly-organized form of government to control such a population made the organization of the territory beyond the Rocky Mountains into a province of the Dominion all the more welcome to the industrious settlers who were there seeking a permanent home.
Under the new orderly rule the crowd of gold-seekers was speedily followed by emigrants in pursuit of more settled industry. Agricultural labourers soon found that the golden harvest could be secured to themselves by providing for the miners the fruits of the soil. It is probably no exaggeration to estimate the worth of the gold carried out of the province from 1856 to 1875 as not less than $36,000,000. Much of this might be considered as pro ductive of no direct benefit to the country, Indirectly, however, it has largely contributed to the opening up of the new province, and making its many attractions known. It led to the construction of roads, developed the mining districts, encouraged agricultural and general trade, and stimulated the growth of permanent settlements. In 1841 the " Vincennes " ship of the American exploring expedition entered the Straits of De Fuca ; and Dr Pickering has preserved a vivid picture of the forbidding aspect of rudest savage life which then met his eye. Contrasting the then strange uncultivated scenes of that wild coast with the familiar centres "of American civilization on the opposite shores of the same continent, he says, " Scarcely two centuries ago our New England shores presented only scenes like that before me : and what is to be the lapse of the third?" Within less than twenty years thereafter the town of Victoria was rising on Vancouver s Island, and that of New Westminster on the neighbouring mainland. The printing press was in full operation. The British Colonist, the New Westminster Times, and other newspapers were in circulation, where so recently the Indian trail and wigwam were the sole evidence of the presence of man. The produce and manufactures of the province exported during the year ending June 1874 are valued in The Trade and Navigation Return* for the year at $2,120,624 ; the customs receipt? are being chiefly expended on public works, and the varied resources of the country have been rapidly developed and turned to the best account.
Minerals.—The mineral products of British Columbia still occupy the foremost place in its exports. They are valued in 1874 at $1,351,145. But it is important for the future progress of the young province on the Pacific that its minerals include coal. Mr Horetsky, in his Canada on the Pacific, describes the shipping of coal at Vancouver Island for the San Francisco market, where it sells at $12 per ton ; and Mr Grant, in his Ocean to Ocean, reports his visit to Nanaimo, with a population of seven or eight hundred, all depending on the neighbouring Douglas mine. " The man ager," he says, "informed us that they would probably ship 50,000 tons this season, and that next year they would be in a position to ship 100,000 or more. The coal measures which the few seams now worked represent extend over the whole eastern coast of Vancouver Island. Fine anthracite coal is also found near the coast, and in vast quantities, of superior quality, on Queen Charlotte s Island ; and about 160 miles in the interior, on the River Nicholas, 50,671 tons of coal were exported in 1874 to the United States and Mexico, the value of which was $278,2] 3. When the census was taken in 1870, the population of the little capital of Victoria amounted only to 3,270, including 211 Chinese, but exclusive of Indians. Already it exceeds 5,000 souls, of very diverse character and nationality, but with abundant energy, and an assurance of progress. The Government of the Dominion is extending its aid to the young province with a liberal hand. In the fiscal year 1872-3, the total receipts to the Dominion from all sources in British Columbia amounted to $417,409; while the expenditure, apart from railway surveys, was $639,037. The same spirit still prevails. Buildings are in progress in Victoria for a post-office, savings bank, Government and Indian department ; plans have also been prepared for a custom house and revenue office ; and the efficient organization of courts of law and a system of police is being followed up by the erection of a penitentiary.
treasures of the ocean, the value of which has long been familiar to the native tribes. Mr J. W. Powell, Indian commissioner, in a report to the minister of the interior, dated at Victoria, February 4,
1875, after a general survey of the condition of the Indians of the