The "'Brolher Jonalhan" and Ofher Nolable Wrecks, 81eamboafing on Inferior Walers I49 found the lower end of the upper lake full of ice and had some difficulty, in making her way through it, but entered the river on the nineteenth. Carnes Creek was passed on the twenty-second, and Death's Rapids were reached on the twenty-fourth, at which point the passengers were discharged, and the steamer started down the river, returning in less than one-fourth the time occupied in going up. The mail contract between Victoria and San Francisco, which had always been an important item in the steamship business, was awarded in January to the Hudson's Bay steamer Labouchere, which received $1,5oo a-trip for the service. She steamed away from Victoria on her first voyage February 15th, carrying, beside the mail, forty passengers and ninety tons of freight, but on her return was wrecked soon after passing out of the Golden Gate, and the steamer Active was again granted the subsidy. The difficulties which beset the steamboatmen running to the Fraser at night were lessened considerably by the establishment of a lightship at its mouth in January, 1866 ; and another indication of the growing importance of the maritime commerce here was the appointment of a board of pilot commissioners, Captains Cooper and Swanson and Hon. J. A. R. Homer constituting the first board. Esquimalt harbor was becoming quite a rendezvous for vessels, and in one day in December a Victoria Colonist reporter noted the presence there of Her Majesty's vessels Sutleg, Clio, Sibarrow Hawk, Forward, Graibibler and Beaver, the latter under charter, the United States steamer Saginaw, steamship George S. lCright, ships Belmonl, Evelyn lCood and Nicholas Biddle. Other Government vessels at Esquimalt during the year were Her Majesty's steamers Scout and /lerl, the American steamers Fauntleroy and Shubrick, and the revenue cutter Lincoln, the latter having recently arrived from the East, where she had been built in 865. Another visitor of some importance at Victoria was the steamship Constanline, which came down from Sitka in command of Captain Lindfors. Her stay was brief, but she returned two years later and began an eventful career along the coast. The Constantine was an antique appearing steamship of about 5oo tons, which had been operating in the vicinity of Sitka for several years and had made occasional trips down the coast to Victoria and San Francisco. In 1868 she was placed under the American flag by her new owners, Hutchinson & Kohl, and from that time became an important figure in marine business in the Northwest. The first year after she assumed American colors she was sunk about three miles south of Active Pass, and was with some difficulty raised and towed to Port Ludlow by the steamer Fidelater, receiving temporary repairs which enabled her to proceed to San Francisco, where it was found that she had lost thirty feet of her keel, and a number of her plates were injured. After this damage was remedied, she again started in the trade to Sitka with Captain George, who afterward turned her over to Capt. M. C. Erskine. In charge of Erskine she ran north as a mail boat, leaving Port Townsend on the twentieth of each month, and /dso made occasional visits to California. In 87 she was placed in the Portland and San Francisco traffic, in command of Capt. Charles Thorn, and began an interesting opposition to Holladay's line. She made her first trip in this service in May, and remained there until bought off in September. Her next venture was on the southern route, remaining, however, but a short time, and in January, 1873, was sold to Goodall, lelson & Perkins for $45,ooo, and was put on the run between Santa Barbara and San Francisco. In 879 she was chartered for a little while by the Government and used in the engineering service, and after finishing this work jobbed around for a few years and was finally broken up in 1887. The Yukon River, which at this time seemed a long distance from civilization, was visited in 866 by a steamboat, probably the first which ever disturbed its waters. This steamer, a small sternwheeler named the lCilder, was taken up by the ship Nightingale. She was about sixty feet long, and after being put in running order continued on the river for two years, in the service of the Russian-American Telegraph Company. The same organization sent a steamer of similar build to the Anadyr River, christening it the ICade. The lCilder was in command of a man named Smith, and her engineer was J. R. Forbes, .6 who is at present employed on the Coast as chief engineer of the steamship St. Paul The Telegraph Company had quite a fleet in Northwestern waters this year, including the barks Clara Belle, Golden Gate and Palmetto, the schooner Alilton Badger, and the steamer George S. VV'right, the latter under charter to them. The Nightingale, which was the flagship, was designed by the United States naval constructor at Charlestown, Mass., as a model of American marine architecture. She registered 722 tons, and.was built at Portsmouth, 1. H., for exhibition at the World's Fair in London ; but before completion a difficulty arose between the contractors and the men who backed the project, and the vessel was sold at auction to a Boston firm, and, after sailing around the world for several years in legitimate business, she turned up as a slaver and made fortunes for her owners before she was finally seized off the coast of Africa by the.Jamestown, with nine hundred slaves aboard. She was condemned and bought by the United States Navy Department, and after the capture of New Orleans was stationed as a guard and store ship at the mouth of the Mississippi River for eighteen months. She was also in use at Pensacola and other points on the Gulf, and when the war closed was purchased for a song by a Boston house and subsequently passed into the hands of the Western nion Telegraph Company. 6j. R. Forbes was born in New York in 1843 and served his apprenticeship at the Atlantic Dock Iron Works. He then went on the steamer Ajax as third assistant and came out to the Coast wtth her. In 1865 he made two trips to Honolulu, and then visited Alaska on the Russian-American telegraph expedition in the ship NigMingaIe, which carried two sixty-foot sternwheel boats, which were fitted up on the Yukon River, where Mr. Forbes served as engineer on one of them, which was called the IVilder, in command of Capt. E. S. Smith. After two years in Alaska he returned to San Francisco and began running to Panama on the steamers Moses Taylor and Nevada, and subsequently north as first and second assistant on the Pelican, Idaho, Ajax, Victoria, Los Angeles, and other steamships. For the past ten years he has been on the Alaska route, the greater part of the time with the steamers Karluk, t?ertha and SI. Paul, and is at present chief engineer of the latter.