The coming Canada

Preface

I WISH to express my thanks to the heads and subordinates of the various departments and bureaus of the Dominion Government, at Ottawa, for the assistance rendered in procuring afresh much of the material used in preparing this book. I add my thanks to many officials of provinces and cities who displayed kindly interest in my effort and also gave assistance. The number of individuals who helped me in many ways is too great for me to name all of them; and if I mention Arthur George Doughty, Esq., C.M.G., LL.D., Deputy Minister and Dominion Archivist, and Martin J. Griffin, Esq., C.M.G., LL.D., Parliamentary Librarian, it must not be assumed that the others are not gratefully remembered. Let me say "Thank you" to the Canadian people.

The officials of the great railway systems have been most liberal in supplying the photographs which have been reproduced as illustrations, and most generous in allowing me to make such use of the pictures. In the list of illustrations letters indicate from whence the original photographs came. Here I say that D.I. indicate those reproduced by permission of F. F. C. Lynch, Esq., Superintendent, Railway Land Branch, Department of the Interior; I.C, those reproduced by permission of

4 «.

VI PREFACE

the Intercolonial Railway of Canada ; G.T., those reproduced by permission of the Grand Trunk or the Grand Trunk Pacific; C.P., those reproduced by permission of the Canadian Pacific; C.N., those reproduced by permission of the Canadian Northern. That they add much to the interest of the book need not be stated.

I wish I could feel that I have done justice to my subject; I can truthfully say I have done my best.

J. K. G.

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I. Early History i

II. Colonisation — The Folklore of Canada 17

Chapter I Early History

I DO not intend to limit myself to the Canada of which most people think when they hear or speak the word. That narrow use of the name generally includes no more than the eastern provinces, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, etc., the lower St. Lawrence basin, and a strip of indefinite width, north of the United States boundary, reaching westward to the province of British Columbia and the Pacific shores.

The Dominion of Canada, to my mind, includes the whole of the 3,603,910 square miles, approximated, from the long Atlantic seaboard, stretching from Cape Chudleigh, at the extreme northern end of Labrador, to Cape Sable, the southernmost end of Nova Scotia, to the Alaskan boundary, and from the United States frontier northward far into Arctic regions.

I shall, probably, include the island of Newfoundland in my consideration of the early history of the Dominion, because that island is so intimately associated with the beginnings of European effort to establish colonies in the New World. It is true that Newfoundland is not a part of the Dominion, and, if I may depend upon the vehement declarations of the islanders with whom I have discussed the possibility of entering the Dominion, as well as those of many other Canadians, it is extremely unlikely that the island will give up its semi-independence.

In this broad view of the Dominion of Canada, we must, of course, think of the bleak, inhospitable Labrador as being a part thereof, and its earliest history antedates that of what I may, just for convenience, call Canada proper. Yet, at the very outset, I must say that observation and investigation, as well as the statements of others, justify the opinion that Labrador may erelong prove to be not altogether the abomination of desolation that the name usually connotes.

The historian may well take a good deal of comfort from the fact that recent research and effort have tended to increase our knowledge of what the brave, indeed venturesome, sailors of northwestern Europe did several hundred years before Christopher Columbus sailed from Palos, Spain, on the 3rd of August, 1492, to try to find a direct westward route to the Far East. Reference to the bibliography at the end of this volume may serve to emphasise what I have just written, and the titles of some of the books there mentioned may prove an incentive to learn yet more of these earliest precursors of Columbus, the discoverer of the New World, and of Jacques Cartier, the discoverer of Canada.

It has long been admitted by historians that sailors from the north of Europe crossed the Atlantic Ocean, at least as far as Iceland, several hundred years before the beginning of the eleventh century of our era. That island had, of course, long been known to Europeans, even when the Irish Culdees, those primitive and enthusiastic monks, made their way across the sea in the sixth or seventh century, seeking to secure absolute solitude for their meditations. If those monks carried with them a form of Christianity untainted by the influence of the Romish schism, the purity cannot have persisted very long. The hope, cherished for some time, by certain Protestants — Presbyterians especially — that in Iceland there had been preserved an absolutely primitive Christianity, has long since been dispelled. Just when Rome asserted supremacy in those regions, then so remote from European centres, is not clear, but in 1492, the very year of Columbus' first voyage. Pope Alexander VI issued a Bull * appointing a bishop of the see of Gardar, in Greenland. From about the middle of the eleventh century, Iceland had two bishops and doubtless from them went forth the influence into Greenland. But inasmuch as the entire population of the island now belongs to the Lutheran Church, it is evident that shortly after the Reformation the Roman Church lost its hold in Iceland.

From Iceland to Greenland is such a short span, it is inconceivable that those hardy Norsemen did not

* Bulla; the most authoritative ofl5cial document issued by the pope of the Roman Catholic Church, or in his name. It is usually an open letter containing some decree, order, or decision relating to matters of grace or justice. It derives its name from the lead seal (Latin bulla) appended to it by a thread or band, which is red or yellow when the bull refers to matters of grace, and uncoloured and of hemp when it refers to matters of justice. On one side of the seal is the name of the pope who issues the bull, and on the other are the heads of Saints Paul and Peter, soon cross the intervening sea. But even after it was discovered, Greenland was for a long time supposed to be a remarkable extension westward of the continent of Europe; and this belief was, for some centuries, strengthened rather than refuted by the experience of the explorers who, in the early years of the sixteenth century, reasoned that because the coast trended backward, that is towards the east, from Cape Dan, it would eventually join the European mainland.

Greenland may have been seen by the Norwegian Gunnbjorn, son of Ulf Kraka, very early in the tenth century; at least he is alleged to have declared he did so. It is admitted that in 982 a.d., "Eric the Red {Eiriki hinn raudi Thorvaldsson) sailed from Iceland to find the land which Gunnbjorn had seen, and he spent three years on its southwestern coasts exploring the country." Eric returned to Iceland in 985, and there is no accepted tradition that he or any of his followers crossed Davis Straits; but from what we know of the habits of the Greenland Eskimo, it is not unreasonable to suppose that those people knew of the land to the westward and told Eric about it.

But his son, Leifr Eriksson (Leif Ericsson of history) visited the Court of Norway in 999, when King Olaf Tryggvason was on the throne, and told the monarch about the new land in the far west. When Leif left Norway the king commanded him to proclaim Christianity in Greenland; the name having been chosen with the purpose of deceiving people into believing that the new country was an attractive place for colonists. It was on this outward voyage in 1000 a.d., when bound for Greenland direct, without touching at Iceland, that Leif's ship was driven out of her course by heavy weather, and eventually reached the continent of North America, where he found wheat growing wild, vines, and ''mosur" (maple ?) trees. To this yet newer land he gave the name "Vinland," ''Vineland," or ^'Wineland the Good."

It is, however, to the account of Thorfinn Karlsefni's (flourished 1002 to 1007) expedition and his attempt to establish a colony somewhere in the region of Nova Scotia, that we must turn for the most plausible story of these early Norse discoverers. This twentieth century has added considerably to the literature that deals with the subject of the Saga of Eric the Red, and that known as The Flatey Book. The former is the more consistent of the two, and may now be read in an English translation, accompanied by copious notes. These sagas are supplemented, and their history measurably verified, by the narrative of Adam of Bremen, a student of history, who ''visited the Danish Court during the reign of the well-informed monarch Svend Estridsson (1047 to 1076) and writes that the king ' spoke of an island (or country) in that ocean discovered by many, which is called Vinland, because of the wild grapes i^oites) that grow there, out of which a very good wine can be made. Moreover, that grain unsown grows there abundantly (fruges ibi non seminatas abundare) is not a fabulous fancy, but is based on trustworthy accounts of the Danes.'" * This passage offers important corroboration of the Icelandic accounts of the Vinland voyages, and

♦ J. E. Olson, Enc. Brit. Xlth, ed.

is, further, interesting ''as the only undoubted reference to Vinland in a mediaeval book written beyond the limits of the Scandina\qan world." *

It is contended by some writers that these Norse discoveries exerted no real influence upon European knowledge of the world's geography in the Middle Ages, and that undoubtedly is a fact. It is declared that whatever information there was about new lands in the remote west (from Europe) was hidden away in sagas which very recent research has brought to light, translated, and edited so that we of the twentieth century possess knowledge which was not imparted to many Europeans of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. This, too, is quite correct; but if Adam of Bremen, ''beyond the limits of the Scandinavian world," knew of Vinland, there was no substantial reason why others should not have had the same knowledge.

The suspicion is growing unto something approximating conviction that the famous navigators of the south of Europe ignored the efforts of the Norsemen, and persistently held that the Western Ocean washed the shores of Asia and that it was a determination to demonstrate the correctness of that opinion, thus refuting the Norsemen, which influenced them. I am not disposed to belittle in any way the grand achievement of Christopher Columbus, nor would I detract at all from the credit due to Giovanni Cabot; but I do think that had the exploits of Leif Ericsson and Thorfinn Karlesfni been given the publicity in Europe that they deserved, both the Italians, who have been named, would have * John Fiske, The Discovery of America.

Boat Landing, TiIte Jaune Cache, Frasek Ri\er, B. C

Laving Rails, Tete Jal ne, B. C, J

LEV 17, igi2 been in possession of information that would have assisted them materially. I do, however, take the responsibility of contradicting Mr. H. P. Biggar's statement, ''The European explorer who at the close of the fifteenth century first sighted that portion of North America subsequently called Canada, was Giovanni Cabot, of Genoa." *

It may be objected that I am trying to judge Europeans of the fifteenth century from the standpoint of one who has all the advantage conferred by the knowledge gained in the whole of the intervening four hundred years. This I disclaim, although — as a matter of fact — I do not see how we to-day can have any real information about the earliest visitors from Europe to our North American shores, which might not have been secured by the European who would take the trouble to get it. We must remember, however, that towards the end of the fifteenth century all of southwestern Europe, including England, was keyed up to the highest pitch of excitement concerning geographical discoveries, and especially over-seas exploits, while there was strange apathy as to this subject when the Norsemen sailed across the Atlantic. Conditions were exactly reversed from what they had been about the year looo a.d. It was then northwestern Europe that was interested, while England, France, Spain, Portugal, and Italy were indifferent. These states of affairs would tend to make the Norsemen's discoveries pass almost unnoticed; while they assured for Columbus' and Cabot's the utmost enthusiasm and publicity.

* The Precursors of Jacques Cartier, Ottawa, ign.

Is it, furthermore, absolutely certain that those earliest Norse adventurers left no traces of their visits to North America? In 1908, Dr. Vilhjalmar Stefansson, of Norwegian ancestry although a Canadian by birth, and educated at Harvard, went down the Mackenzie River to its mouth; thence into Victoria Land, along both shores of Dolphin and Union Straits and Coronation Gulf, well to the eastward. In Victoria Land, almost the most inaccessible part of the Arctic Dominion, he found a previously unknown band of about two thousand blonde Eskimos; many of them have blue eyes, light eyebrows, and the men sandy beards. Their whole appearance differentiates them distinctly from the typical Eskimo. Their presence in that remote region — for it is alleged that their existence was not even suspected by the Dominion authorities — may be accounted for in several ways. Dr. Stefansson's own opinion is that they are descendants of the lost Scandinavian colonists who had settled in Greenland about the year 1000 a.d. He admits the possibility that these people may owe their being to the visits of whalers and sailors to the Greenland coast in modern times; but he discredits this theory because *'in the summer time, when vessels were enabled to reach these regions, the Eskimos had pushed farther inland." Another cogent reason for giving these people a beginning far back of recent times, is the fact that they show no traces of European influence, either physical (that is, disease,) or mental (that is, language). The former of these is, unhappily, the most conspicuous evidence of foreign association wliich ethnologists now find among uncivilised peoples.

We must respect the recognised histories of Europe and admit that nothing was done towards western exploration for nearly five hundred years after the Norsemen had found Greenland and Vineland. If the curtain was raised for a moment, it was allowed to fall again so promptly and so effectually that the good lands were so completely forgotten as to make it seem as if they had never been known.

The incentives to go out into the Western Ocean appear to have been the same with several would-be explorers, and it was a desire to secure a share of the rich trade with the Indies that seemed likely to be held as a monopoly by the Portuguese, now that they had succeeded in finding a sea-road to the Far East.

Before passing on to the facts accepted by historians of the discovery and occupation of Canada, it will be interesting to discuss briefly the efforts which were made prior to 1492 to discover something in the Atlantic which myth and legend declared to be there. In 1480 an expedition was sent from Bristol, England, to discover, if possible, the Island of Brazil, or the Island of the Seven Cities, or Antilia (Atlantis). Again, in 1491 and 1492, vessels were sent from that same port for the same purpose. This last mentioned expedition, there is good reason to believe, was placed under the command of John Cabot. It gave him his English name. That nothing came of these efforts need not be stated; but they indicate clearly the opinion which prevailed in Europe in the fifteenth century as to there being some wonderful islands in the ocean far away from the mainland. So firm was this conviction that it was not until lO THE COMING CANADA

1876 that ''the official sepulture of the old tradition of the Island of Brazil took place."

Returning to history, we find that in March, 1476, Giovanni Cabot was given the privilege of citizenship (we should call it ''naturalised"), both internal and external, by the City of Venice, after fifteen years residence. Inasmuch as the same privilege was granted his sons, the brothers Giovanni, Sebastiano, and Stephano, on the 28th of September, 1484, only six years later, it is reasonable to suppose that the father Giovanni was born some years before Christopher Columbus, whose birth year is usually accepted as having been 1446 (although we do not know this).

Both Columbus and Cabot were firm believers in the theory that the earth is round. It will be remembered that this idea was not then endorsed by all navigators and cartographers: the religious danger of insisting upon it will also be known to all. Those two men were equally convinced that the rich merchandise and the coveted gems of the farther Indies, might be brought to western Europe in vessels crossing the Western Ocean direct from Asia.

Cabot's conviction was based upon something more practical than Columbus' speculations. In a letter which Raimondo di Soncino wrote to the Duke of Milan, 1 8th December, 1497,* there is given a brief account of Cabot's reasons for his belief. He claimed to have visited Mecca, ''which city was then the greatest mart in the world for the exchange of goods of the west for

* Original in the Reali Archivi di Stato, Milan. Translation in H. P. Biggar's Tlie Precursors of Jacques Car tier.

EARLYHISTORY II

those of the east." There is no doubt but that Cabot did make several trading voyages to the Levant, and that he inquired whence came those precious wares. He was told that they were brought by caravans from northeastern Asia. Arguing that this meant Cipangu (Japan), he wished to make the attempt to reach that country by sailing westward from a port of Europe.

The same reasons were assigned by Columbus for his desire to sail to the west, and with precisely the same results so far as reaching Japan was concerned ; although the Indies which Columbus discovered served better to satisfy the preconceived notions of Cipangu, than did anything which Cabot found in the bleak north.

Columbus' return in 1493 ^-nd his report that he had reached the Indies, created a great sensation at the English Court, and on the 5th of March, 1496, letters patent were issued by Henry VII granting to John Cabot, Lewis (the first son, otherwise known as Giovanni 2d), Sebastian, and Santino, his sons, authority to sail "to all parts, countries, and seas of the East, of the West, and of the North, under our banners and ensynes," but "upon theyr own proper costs and charges." They were to take possession of all newly found lands in the king's name, and "as often as they shall arrive at our port of Bristol, at the which port only they shall be holden to arrive," they were to pay unto the king, after deduction of their necessary expenses, "the fifth part of the gain of all fruits, profits, gaines and revenues accruing from said voyage." Comment upon the Uberality (?) of this concession is unnecessary. . Columbus having returned in June, 1496, from his second voyage with much gold and valuable merchandise, the English king and the merchants who financed the enterprise, were hopeful that Cabot would meet with like success. On the 2nd of May, 1497, Cabot sailed from Bristol in a small vessel, the Mathew, with eighteen men in his company. Much controversy has been had as to the time and place of Cabot's landfall; but I think the Rt. Rev. M. F. Howley, Bishop of Newfoundland, has satisfactorily demonstrated that it was June 24th, 1497, and that — after sighting Cape Farewell, Greenland— he steered westward (as he thought), but because of the remarkable variation of the compass needle, being then 66 f° West, and of the set of the ocean current, he actually took the true course from Cape Farewell to St. John's, Newfoundland, although he supposed he was saiHng due west. This statement directly contradicts Mr. Biggar, who thinks the landfall was Cape Breton, but I must give my allegiance to the Bishop.

Cabot was convinced that he had reached the northeastern extremity of Asia, but conditions disappointed him greatly. He cruised to the southward and a little to the westward along the southern coast of Newfoundland. From Cape Race he shaped his course for England, arriving in Bristol harbour on Sunday, August 6th, 1497. His enthusiasm led him to promise that on his next voyage he would reach Cipangu, and then ** London would become a greater depot for species than Alexandria itself."

In May, 1498, the second expedition, two vessels and three hundred men, sailed from Bristol. In their company were several vessels that were engaged regularly

EARLY HISTORY I3

in the Iceland trade, fishing smacks probably. With Cabot was a Portuguese, Joao Fernandez, called Llavrador, who had been from Iceland to Greenland in 1492. Early in June the east coast of Greenland was sighted, and inasmuch as Fernandez was the first to report the landfall, Cabot named the country ''The Labrador's Land." The ships first cruised to the northward, but the increasing cold, the ice, and the fact that the land bore ofT to the eastward, discouraged Cabot and he turned westward again.

After rounding Cape Farewell, he went up the west coast of Greenland to the Sukkertoppen district, in latitude 66°, and was again blocked by the ice. Altering his course once more, he sighted Bafhn's Land, passed into Hudson's Straits, and then turned back and went along the coast of modern Labrador. The Strait of Belle Isle, between Labrador and Newfoundland, was assumed to be a bay, and the east coast of Newfoundland merely a prolongation of the Labrador coast. Some parts of the country that had been seen on the first voyage, were revisited; but the disappointment, at finding no evidence of the Wealth of Ind, was even greater than it had been before, although the expedition went as far south as 38°, nearly opposite the Capes of Chesapeake Bay. Thence the course was shaped for home, and the reception accorded the explorers on their arrival at Bristol was nearly as frigid as the Greenland icebergs. The English king and merchants were disgusted with American exploration, and no further expeditions were sent from Bristol until 1501, and that was not led by the Cabots.

The Portuguese enterprise in 1500, under the command of Caspar Corte Reale, achieved practically nothing new, and about the only evidence remaining of it are some geographical names. We may, too, pass by the Bristol venture of 1501, since it accomplished nothing beyond \dsiting Newfoundland. In 151 1, Spain entered the list of those seeking advantage in these northern parts of the North American continent, and during the next decade many European fishing vessels made yearly voyages to the Newfoundland Banks.

In 1520, a Portuguese, Joao Alvares Fagundes, of Vianna (probably Vianna do Castillo in the province of Entre-Minho Eduardo) explored the coast of Nova Scotia as well as Placentia Bay, Newfoundland. He missed the chance to identify the Culf of St. Lawrence and perhaps discover the river. King Manoel gave Fagundes title to the islands from Chedabucto to Placentia bays; a grant that was simply productive of needless compHcation. In 1524-5, the Portuguese, Stephen Comez, although in command of a Spanish vessel, applied to the Spanish Court for permission to seek, between Newfoundland and Florida, for a passage to the East Indies. He explored the coast as far south as the island of Nantucket, at least, and then went south to Santiago in Cuba, where he replenished his stores and then sailed for Corunna, reaching that port in June 1525.

In 1527, two vessels, the Samson and the Mary Guildford, fitted out at London to try to find a northwest passage to the Far East by way of Davis Straits. The former ship probably foundered with all on board, since nothing was ever heard of her. The latter did nothing to add to our fund of information, and when she returned to England is not known. From 1527 until Jacques Cartier began his explorations in 1534, fishing vessels visited the coasts of Canada, Newfoundland, and Greenland annually; but there are no authentic records of further attempts to find a northwest passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific until Cartier's effort. Although unsuccessful in his prime desire, yet he was really the first European to discover the territory which was the nucleus of the great Dominion.

In 1534, Jacques Cartier (sometimes written Quartier), an experienced navigator of St. Malo, France, was recommended to Francis I, King of France, as being competent to secure for his sovereign some advantage from the effort of his predecessor, Verrazzano. I have omitted previous mention of this man, because on his expedition of 1524, for Francis I, he discovered nothing. He *' approached to the lande that in times past was discovered by the Britons," and after *' being furnished with water and wood," he sailed away to Dieppe. Later, when pilot of the Mary Guildford, he was killed in a fight with some Indians.

On the 20th of April, 1534, Cartier's two small vessels, the combined crews numbering some one hundred and twenty men, sailed from St. Malo. Little was accomplished on that first voyage. In the second, which sailed from the same port on the 19th of May, 1535, there were three ships, one hundred and ten sailors and a number of *' gentlemen volunteers." The great river, St. Lawrence, was discovered and ascended to Hochelaga; that is, modern Montreal. To the hill from which he had a grand view that assured him of the rich possibihties of the surrounding country, he gave the name of Mont Royal, around which has grown up the city of Montreal, one of the world's great ports. Limitations of space forbid carrying on the historical record, and already we have reached the time when Canada began. It is interesting to note that the Indian word Canada meant simply a village. That it has developed into an Empire, almost, is one of the astounding facts of history.

Chapter II Colonisation — Tee Folklore Of Ca Nada

ON May 23, 1541, Cartier sailed again from St. Malo upon his third voyage to Canada. He had been commissioned Captain-General, and the phraseology of his appointment indicates the French King's appreciation of the discoverer's merits, for tribute is paid to ''the character, judgment, ability, loyalty, dignity, hardihood, great diligence, and experience of the said Jacques Cartier." While, as his title implies, the actual navigation of the fleet was entrusted to Cartier, yet the chief command of the expedition was given to Jean-Francois de la Roque, superior of Roberval, who by a royal commission dated January 15, 1540, was appointed Viceroy and Lieutenant- General of Newfoundland, Labrador, and Canada. He was empowered to engage volunteers and emigrants, and if these did not come forward in sufficient numbers, he might take persons from the prisons and hulks.

Roberval could not complete his arrangements in time to satisfy Cartier's impatience, who sailed without his superior officer. When the two met in the harbour of St. John's, Newfoundland, the Captain-General homeward bound after a very trying winter for which he held the other responsible, and the Lieutenant- General outward bound to take up his work, Cartier deliberately disobeyed the order of his superior to return with him to the St. Lawrence.

Thus it seems that about sLx years after the French had formally taken possession of Canada, an attempt was made to colonise this New France. It was a failure, however, as were others until the time of Samuel de Champlain who made his first voyage to the St. Lawrence in 1603. In 1604, Pierre du Gua, Sieur de Monts, sailed from France with four vessels, well manned and supplied with whatever was required, both for carrying on the fur trade and for starting a colony. Two ''were destined to commence the traffic for the company in peltry at Tadousac; thence proceeding to range the whole seaboard of New France, and seize all vessels found trafficking with the natives, in violation of the royal prohibition. The two other vessels were destined to bear the colonists embarked to such landing-places as should be agreed upon, and to aid in suitably locating them afterwards. Several gentlemen volunteers, some soldiers, and a number of skilled artisans, were embarked in these vessels." *

De Monts was a Huguenot, and it was ordered that all French Protestants were to enjoy in America, as in France at that time, full freedom for their public worship. It was distinctly asserted, however, that they should take no part in native proselytising; the privilege and duty of converting the Indians being reserved exclusively for the Roman Cathohc clergy.

Under De Monts, who had been appointed Lieutenant- Governor by King Henry IV, were de Champlain, Pont-

* History of Canada, Andrew Bell, Vol. I, p. 74-

THE FOLKLORE OF CANADA 19

Grave (a mercenary wretch), Poutrincourt, a nobleman who had decided to take his family and settle in America, and a lawyer who was subsequently to become a celebrated historian, Lescarbot. This expedition did not go direct to the St. Lawrence, or Canada proper, but to that part of New France then called Acadia (Nova Scotia). Even this beginning did not develop into a colony without undergoing many discouraging vicissitudes, and later attention was almost concentrated in the valley of the St. Lawrence. It must be admitted that so far as Canada was concerned, the French did not display great ability in colonisation; for on the loth of February, 1763, when by the terms of the Treaty of Paris, all French possessions in North America, east of the Mississippi were transferred to Great Britain, the navigation of the river being thrown open to the subjects of both Powers (the city of New Orleans was excepted), the total population of New France did not much exceed 80,000 souls, and even this estimate is declared by some authorities to be over liberal. When from that number are subtracted those representing the civilian officials and their families, the members of the rehgious orders, the officers and men of the army and navy, and the many others who cannot be classed as immigrant settlers, the number of actual colonists is reduced to insignificant proportions.