Page:Scented isles and coral gardens- Torres Straits, German New Guinea and the Dutch East Indies, by C.D. Mackellar, 1912.pdf/425

Rh to get into this berth, undress and dress in it in the most uncomfortable way; and all along the car legs and arms every now and then protruded out of the bulging curtains. The coloured attendants would not permit us to undress outside these curtains, though there were few people in the long car. Of course, I could not sleep never can under such circumstances.

How I hated that car and that weary journey! At 7.25 in the morning we were at Glacier House (4122 feet up), with the pyramidal peak named "Sir Donald" after Lord Strathcona, rising above the hotel, and the glacier near by. A little later Rogers' (4275 feet), discovered by Major A. Rogers in 1883, before which time no human foot is supposed to have penetrated to the summit of the Selkirks. It is all very fine, but dreadfully monotonous—the spruce, Douglas firs, and cedars grow to great heights—it is grand, silent, still, almost no sign of life. I called the car attendant up and, much to his amusement, demanded why stuffed Indians, grizzly bears and things were not posed about to give local colour, and let us photograph them from the train? They would make striking pictures; you would not have time to see they were not alive, and think how interesting for the passengers! I am astonished the C.P.R. does not attend to this—especially at Six-Mile-Creek and Bear Creek and such places. We lunched at Field, crossed the Great Divide where a stream trickles down on one side to the Pacific and on the other to Hudson's Bay, and at 1.15 were at Stephen (5296 feet), the summit station of the Rockies. Then at Laggan you become an hour older or younger, according to which way you are going, though I cannot say I felt any different, and Captain Farquhar and Aitken looked just the same—so did the scenery