Page:Canadian Alpine Journal I, 1.djvu/113

72

I well remember how deeply I was impressed at the time of my first visit to the Canadian Alps in 1890 by the sight of the superb Ottertail range, as the eastbound train approached the old bridge over the creek of that name, and the peculiarly alpine features of the range were revealed, with the portentous towers of Mt. Goodsir looming in the distant background. Though we had just passed a glorious day at Glacier House and had revelled in the grandeur that the intervening journey offers in so rich measure, this seemed the fitting climax. Little did I suspect that I was to return to these scenes again and again, that I was even destined to be of the first party to scale the frowning, glacier-crowned rampart dividing the Ottertail from the Ice River valley, to tread the virgin snows of the summit of Mt. Vaux, and to have the alternate experiences of failure and success in assaulting the highest peak of the monarch of them all.

At that time the name of Goodsir was, to be sure, on the Palliser map, but it was not yet generally recognized as belonging to the mass that now bears this name. Indeed, it is more than doubtful whether Dr. Hector intended to apply it here, and not rather to some peak of the Bow range. In the first photograph of it that I saw on sale in those early years, the massif was entitled "The Beaverfoot Mountains." In his