A great
sleepiness
lies on
Vancouver as compared with an
American town:
men don't fly
up and down streets
telling lies
and the
spittoons
in the
delightfully
comfortable hotel
are unused;
the
baths are free
and their doors are unlocked ....
I thank God for it.
Give me
hewn granite... and
peace....
All that Vancouver wants
is a far earthwork
fort upon a hill --
there are plenty of hills --
a selection of
big guns,
a couple of
regiments of
infantry,
and later a big
arsenal....
It is not seemly
to leave unprotected
the head-end
of a big
railway;
for though
Victoria and
Esquimalt,
our
naval stations,... are very near,
so also is...
Vladivostok.
- Rudyard Kipling, from From Sea to Sea, ch. XXVIII; Complete Works, Doubleday, vol. 18, pp. 46-47. Arranged by Earle Birney.