Partners of the out-Trail by Harold Bindloss

Some weeks after he mended the line, Jim sat by a window in a small frame house at Vancouver city. He had been very ill and knew little about his journey on a hand-sledge from the telegraph shack to the railroad. There was no doctor in the woods and Jake Winter, his helper, engaging two Indians, wrapped Jim in furs and started in a snowstorm for the South. It was an arduous journey, and once or twice Jake thought his comrade would succumb, but they reached the railroad and he put Jim on the cars.

Now Jim was getting better and had left his bed for a rocking-chair. The house stood on the hill, and he looked down, across tall blocks of stores and offices, on the Inlet. Plumes of dingy smoke from locomotives burning soft coal moved among the lumber stacks, a tug with a wave at her bows headed for the wharf, the water sparkled in the sunshine, and there was a background of dark forest and white mountains. The picture had some beauty that was not altogether spoiled by the telegraph wires, giant posts, and advertisement signs. These emphasized the contrast between the raw and aggressive civilization that is typical of Western towns and the austerity of the surrounding wilds. In the foreground were steamers, saw-mills, and street-cars; in the distance trackless woods and untrodden snow.