CHAPTER IX

PREPARATION FOR THE VOYAGE

While Jack and Mr. Fannin had been talking the vessel had been moving rapidly northward. The passengers were a mixed lot. On the upper deck were English, Scotch, French, and Americans, while on the lower were Chinamen, a negro or two, and Indians. Many of these had considerable bundles of baggage; and with the Indians were their women, their children, and their dogs.

The rounded islands that rose everywhere from the water showed gray rocky slopes, the yellow of ripened grass, and here and there clumps of evergreen trees. The scene was a lovely one.

"Mr. Fannin," said Hugh, "I wish you'd tell me what's that plant that I see everywhere growing in the water. I suppose, maybe, it's a kind of seaweed, but it's bigger than any seaweed that I ever heard tell of, and there's worlds and worlds of it. The other day on the beach I picked up some of its leaves, if that's what they are, and I found them wonderfully tough. I found I couldn't break them apart with my hands, yet they seemed soft and full of water."

"That's what we call kelp," said Mr. Fannin, "it grows in deep water, and its roots are attached to rocks or to stones or even to the sand at the bottom, and the stalk may be thirty or forty feet long. Down in the deep water the stem is very slender, often scarcely as thick as a quill, but it increases by a gradual taper, until near the top it's nearly as thick as a man's wrist. At the end of the stem or stalk is a globular swelling which varies in size, but may be as big as a baseball. From the top of this swelling point, opposite to where it's attached to the stem, grows a bundle of a dozen or twenty ribbon-like leaves, each from one to six inches wide and from four to six feet long, and fluted or crimped along its edge for the whole length. The plant is brown in color throughout. Responding, as it does, constantly to the motion of the water, it sometimes seems almost alive. It's a queer plant. Sometimes it's a great hindrance to the man who is travelling and sometimes a great help to him."

"I don't quite understand that," said Jack. "I can see that it might be hard work to get through a bed of the kelp like that one over there that we are just passing, but how should it help a man?"

"Why," said Fannin, "the stalks are very strong, and I've seen a large canoe held at anchor by a single stalk of the kelp. Then, too, a big bed of the kelp is a great break to the sea. The waves can't break over a bed of kelp; and I have known of a case when a sudden squall got up, where a canoe, unable to reach shore or to get any other lee, would lie behind a kelp bed and hold onto the stalks until the squall was past."

"Do the Indians make any use of the kelp?" asked Jack.

"Yes," replied Mr. Fannin. "A number of the Indians along the coast select the most slender stems, knot them together, and make fishing lines for the deep-sea fishing, on which they catch halibut sometimes weighing two hundred pounds. These stems are tremendously tough, and they almost never wear out. A man may coil up one of these long lines and hang it in his house for six months, and then, if he takes it down and soaks it in water over night, in the morning it will be pliable and perfectly fit to use."

Hugh had been listening to the conversation, but not taking any part in it; but now he pointed off over the kelp bed and said: "Look there! See those birds walking around on the weed. I reckon they are cranes of some sort or other." Fannin looked at them through his glasses and said, "Yes, that's just what they are. Two of those birds are great blue herons, and the others are large birds, but I can't tell just what they are. That's another thing that the kelp is useful for. You see the plants grow in thick beds, and the stems are continually moving in the current, and after a while they get tangled and twisted up so that it's impossible to force them apart. In that case it's useless to try to force a canoe through them. Then, lying there so long as they do, and keeping the water quiet, a great deal of life is attracted to these beds. There are many fish that live near the surface, and in the warm waters there are crabs that live among the stems and sometimes crawl out on them and rest in the sunshine. There are many shells. All this smaller life entices the larger life, so that gulls and ducks and sandpipers are often seen walking along or resting on the kelp. It is just one of those things that we see often, where a lot of specially favorable conditions will attract the animals that are to be favored by these conditions."

"Well," said Hugh, "I can't get over wondering at all these things I am seeing. This here is a new world to me, as different as can be from what I've been used to all my life; and I expect, come to think about it, that all over the world there are many such other strange bits of country that would astonish me, just as much as this does, and maybe would astonish you all, just as much as this does me."

"Yes," said Fannin, "I guess that's about so."

As they had been talking, the steamer had been winding in and out among the islands, stopping occasionally at some little settlement, and now and then slowing to take on goods or passengers, brought off in boats or canoes from some little house that stood on one of the yellow hillsides, half hidden among the trees. There were many settlers on these islands. Most of them were engaged in stock raising. Some of the islands had been turned into sheep ranges, and the settlers that had gone into this business were said by Mr. Fannin to have done well. Certainly there was here no winter which could by any chance kill the sheep, while food was abundant.

As the boat proceeded the settlements became fewer and fewer, until at last most of the island seemed unoccupied. All three of the travellers kept watching the open hillsides in the hope that some game might be seen, but none showed itself.

"I suppose," said Jack, "that there are some deer on these islands, are there not?"

"Yes," replied Fannin, "on almost all the larger islands that are not thickly settled there are a good many deer; and when the settlements get to be too thick they can always start off and swim to another island and try that for a while, and, if they don't like that, pass to another."

"What sort of deer are these?" asked Jack. "Are they like the one we killed at New Westminster?"

"Yes," said Fannin, "they are just like that; and I suppose they are the regular black-tail deer; not the big fellow that you have out on the plains, which, I understand, is properly called the mule deer. This is the only kind found along this north coast, as far as I know, until you get up far to the north and strike the moose. Down on the islands of the Strait of Fuca, especially on Whidby Island, they have the Virginia deer and plenty of them. But north of that I don't think they are found."

It was noon when they passed Gabriola Island, where they had heard there lived a man who owned a launch. They landed here, hoping that possibly they might be able to engage this for their trip, but soon discovered that the boat had not been inspected for a year, and therefore could not be hired, unless the party was prepared to be stopped at any minute by some government official and ordered back to its starting point.

About four o'clock in the afternoon they reached Nanaimo, and Fannin, Hugh, and Jack at once set out for the Indian village, where it was believed a canoe could be had. The brisk walk through the quiet forest was pleasant, and the Indian village of half a dozen great square plank houses interesting. After some inquiry Fannin and a big Indian drew off to one side and held a long and animated conversation in Chinook, which, of course, was unintelligible to the other two. At length, however, Fannin announced that he was prepared to close a bargain with the Indian, by which a canoe, large enough to carry the whole party and their baggage, including the necessary paddles and a bowman and steersman, could be hired for a certain price per day, for as long a time as they desired. After a short consultation it was agreed that if the canoe proved satisfactory it should be engaged, and a start made the next morning. The whole party adjourned to the water's edge, where, drawn up on the beach were a number of canoes, all of them covered with boards, mats, and boughs, to protect them from the sun and rain. The canoe in question seemed satisfactory, and, the bargain having been closed, the Indians promised solemnly that they would have the canoe at the wharf at six o'clock the next morning, so that an early start could be made.

Returning to town, the stores were visited and a number of necessary articles purchased. The party was already well armed, having three rifles, a shot-gun, and several revolvers; but a mess kit had to be bought, a keg for water, all the provisions needed, a tent of some kind, some mosquito net, rope, fine copper wire, saddler's silk or waxed thread, packages of tobacco, fishing tackle, and many small articles which do not take up much room, but which, under special circumstances, may add much to one's comfort. Each of the party also provided himself here with a set of oil-skin clothing. They knew that they were going into a country where much rain falls, and wished to provide against that.

After all their purchases had been made and they had seen them transported to the hotel close to the water's edge, where they were to pass the night, they started out to learn what they could about the town.

The sole industry of Nanaimo at that time was coal mining. Here were great shafts and inclines, worked day and night by a great multitude of miners. Many of them were Canadians, but many, also, were quite newly arrived emigrants from the Old World,--Scotch, Irish, and Welsh. The coal--a good lignite--was in considerable demand along the coast, and it was even said that it was to be imported to Puget Sound points to supply newly built railroads there. The inhabitants of Nanaimo, and indeed those of Vancouver Island, had talked much about a proposed railroad that had been partially surveyed from Victoria up through the middle of the island to Nanaimo. Such a railroad, it was generally thought, would be an enormous benefit to the whole island. Nanaimo was not an attractive place. The coal-dust with which it was everywhere powdered, together with the black smoke sent forth by the chimneys, gave the place an appearance of griminess which seemed to characterize most coal-mining towns. Just why towns devoted to coal and iron mining always used to look so shabby and forlorn and discouraged, it would be hard to say; but most people familiar with such settlements in old times will agree that this was usually the case. It may have been that the laborers and their families were obliged to work so hard that they had neither time nor inclination to devote to adorning, even by simple and inexpensive methods, their dwellings or surroundings; or it may have been that their work in the mines was so fatiguing that it rendered them blind to the town's unattractiveness.

Even then great quantities of coal were mined at Nanaimo. But as there were no railroads on Vancouver Island the coal was transported to its destination wholly by water. The coal deposits were vast, and people believed that in the future this would be a great mining town, and might yet be like some of the great mining centres of Great Britain.

That night, after supper, as they were lounging about the office of the hotel, Jack said to Mr. Fannin:

"You have told me a lot about the canoeing and canoes of these Indians, Mr. Fannin, but I don't think that you have spoken to me about the way they keep their canoes on the beach. Those we saw this afternoon were all covered with mats and blankets, and I can understand how it might be necessary to keep them protected from the weather in that way if they were laid up for a long time; but, as I understand it, the canoes that we saw were being used every day."

"That is true," said Mr. Fannin; "they are in use all the time, but, nevertheless, Indians take the greatest precaution to protect them from the weather. It is easy enough to see why this is, if you consider that the making of a canoe is tremendously laborious, and at best takes many months. Now, as I have already told you, the cedar of which they are made splits very easily indeed, and it might well enough be that exposure to the hot sun for a day or two would start a crack which would constantly grow larger, and ultimately weaken the canoe so that it could not be used. The Indians are far-sighted enough to do everything in their power to protect their canoes. These coast Indians take a great deal better care of their canoes than they do of any other property that they possess. As I have told you, they are all sea travellers, and their very existence depends on the possession of some means of getting about over the water. I do not know anything about it personally, but I understand that the Aleuts of Alaska, and the Eskimo too, are just as careful about their boats as these Indians are. Of course it is natural."

"Of course it is," said Hugh, "and you probably will see the same thing in any class of men. Look at the way our plains' Indians take care of their war horses and their arms and war clothes. Those are the things on which they depend for food and for protection from their enemy; and they cannot afford to take any chances about them. Of course their war clothes often have something of a sacred character; but you will find that if it comes to a pinch an Indian will stick to his fastest running horse and his arms, and will let his war clothing go."

"Well," said Fannin, "all this is just saying that Indians are human beings like the rest of us."

They went to bed pretty early that night, and Fannin had them astir before the day had broken the next morning. On going down to the wharf they found the canoe there, just off the shore, and the two Indians sitting in it, holding the craft in its place by an occasional paddle stroke. It took the men but a short time to bring down all their baggage, provisions, and mess kit to the canoe and stow the load. After a hasty meal at the hotel all stepped aboard and took their various stations. Jack had been surprised to see how large a pile their baggage made before they begun to stow it; and after the canoe had been loaded, he wondered where they had packed it all.