BRITISH COLUMBIA

BRITISH COLUMBIA, the most westerly province in Canada, a western fertile prov. of British America, extending between the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific, and from the United States on the S. to Alaska on the N., being 800 m. long and four times the size of Great Britain; rich in timber and minerals; rain is abundant, and cereals do well. The capital is Victoria, in the S. of Vancouver.

It is a mountainous country, rugged and picturesque, containing the highest peaks on the continent, Mount Hooker, 15,700 ft., and Mount Brown, 16,000 ft, with a richly indented coast-line, off which lie Queen Charlotte Islands and Vancouver. The chief river is the Frazer, which flows from the Lake region southwards through the centre and then westward to the Gulf of Georgia; the upper waters of the Columbia flow southward through the E. of the State. The climate resembles that of northern England, but is in some parts very rainy. The chief industries are lumbering - the forests are among the finest in the world, fishing - the rivers abound in salmon and sturgeon, and mining - rich deposits of gold, silver, iron, copper, mercury, antimony, and many other valuable minerals are found; there are great coal-fields in Vancouver. In Vancouver and in the river valleys of the mainland are extensive tracts of arable and grazing land; but neither agriculture nor manufactures are much developed. Made a Crown colony in 1858, it joined the Dominion as a province in 1871. The completion of the Canadian Pacific Railway in 1885 joined it to the eastern provinces.