| Show CANADIAN YUKON BOAD Journey of Months Will Soon Be Reduced Re-duced to Seven Days Toronto Ont Jan 29 Nothing could create a much livelier interest than has been aroused all over Canada by the announcement of the contract between the Dominion government and Messrs McKenzie and Mann for the construction of a railway between the Slickeen river and Teslin lake In the Yukon country Everyone is talking of it and the newspapers government and opposition alike concede the deal to be a master stroke on the part of the government gov-ernment The Toronto Globe government prefaces a strong leader with the following fol-lowing The extent of the revolution which will be effected in the problem of transportation trans-portation to the Yukon gold country Is best understood when it is stated that the journey between Victoria and Vancouver I Van-couver and Dawson which is now a matter of months and attended with appalling difficulties and hardships will during the season of navigation and after the projected railway has linen l completed be reduced to about seven days while the dangers and privations pri-vations will be little more than those which any traveler undergoes in a train or steamboat The Toronto World opposition in an equally strong article says The deal not only calls for the construction con-struction of this railway altogether in Canadian territory but it prohibits the j I construction e > f any rival line This j I through rail and water route is not I only a purely Canadian enterprise but its duplication by the United States is an impossibility Herein have we despoiled de-spoiled the Americans of their power to harass us in the Klondikp trade All traffic whether passenger or freight Is bound to gravitate to the line of least resistance and will certainly be identified identi-fied with the Yukon railway The only possible rival the allCanadian route II may have Is that via St Michaels and the Yukon river but this involves an i I ocean and river voyage of 4700 miles One would as soon travel from New I York to Chicago by the canal and lake route as to go to Dawson by the Yukon I river This then is the first great feature I fea-ture of the allCanadian route It will command the traffic It will have no rival and in addition to its unique advantages ad-vantages In this respect the allCana tVan route will be handicapped by no I I contractors to insure the construction I of the Yukon railway by that date II Mr Mann left Montreal this morning for the scene of operation All day yesterday yes-terday the transcontinental wires were I kept hot hurrying men and supplies to the front A small army of laborers i and wagon teams that have been work ing on the Crows Nest railway are already I al-ready working toward the Yukon Thomas White civil engineer of St I Thomas Ont has been engaged as chief engineer of construction In six weeks according to the terms of the I contract a sleigh road has to be completed com-pleted from Wrangel to Teslin lake nearly 300 miles and it is expected I thousands of men will take advantage of this to go as far as Teslln lake this winter During the summer as the railway pushes inward travelers can go to the end of the line and then go by wagon roads to the lake Contractors McKenzie and Mann are to have a monopoly of all railway connection con-nection for five years from the Pacific coast to the Yukon country |
