On Hog'em Gulch.
On Hog'em Gulch.
After I left this silent man, I found none who showed much interest. Some of them were a little curious as to what I was doing, but most of them were fiercely and feverishly working to make the most of the hours and weeks which remained of the mining season; the run of gold was ordinarily very good, and all were anxious to make as good a final clean-up as possible. At dinner-time everybody rushed to their meal, and I sat down by the side of the trail, ate stale corned beef, broken crackers, and drank the creek water. When I was half-way through I observed two young men in a tent munching their meal, but watching me; and a sort of righteous indignation came upon me, as must always seize the poor when he beholds the abundance of the rich man's table. I walked into the tent and asked for a share of their dinner. Theygave me a place, but so surlily that I said hotly, "See here, I'll pay you for this dinner, so don't be so stingy about it." The offer to pay was an insult to the miner's tradition and one of them growled out,
"None of that kind of talk, d'ye hear? You're welcome to whatever we've got, and don't yer forget it! Only there's been a good many bums along here lately, and we was getting tired of them."
After this they were pleasanter, although I could not help reflecting that I was actually a bum, as they put it, and mentally pitied the professional tramp, if his evil destiny should ever lead him into the Yukon country.
As it grew near nightfall I climbed out of the gulch, and, crossing the ridge, dropped down into Greenhorn Gulch, which, with its neighbor Tinhorn Gulch, form depressions parallel to Hog'em. There was only one claim working here, and on this the supply of water was so scarce that not much washing could be done. The people seemed like those of Hog'em Gulch, and took little notice of strangers. Having learned a new code of manners on Birch Creek,however, I walked into the cabin where one of the claim owners was getting supper. He was a short, powerful, fierce-eyed man, who never smiled, and spoke with an almost frenzied earnestness. He did not speak for some time, however, but glared suspiciously when I walked in. I looked at him without nodding, took off my pack and put it in the corner, sat down on a stool and fished my pipe out of my pocket. He glared until he was tired, and then said: "Hallo!"
"Hallo," I returned, and drawing up to the table, began working with my specimens and notebook. Looking up and finding him still regarding me, I continued: "How's the claim turning out?"
"Pretty fair!" he growled. "What in h—l areyoureportin' for?" "Uncle Sam," I replied. He was from the moonshine district of Tennessee, and this was no recommendation to him, so he kept his eye on me. Presently his "pardner" came in and looked at me inquiringly. I spoke to him quite warmly, as if I was welcoming him to the cabin. Soon supper was ready, and the fierce-eyed moonshiner looked at me four or fivetimes, then said, beckoning me to the table: "Set up."
After supper the two men crawled into their bunks; I spread my blankets on the floor. The Tennessee man poked his head out.
"Goin' to sleep on the floor?" he asked.
"Yes," answered I. He crawled out and pulled a caribou hide from the rafters above.
"Lay on that," he said.
When I thanked him, he looked at me suspiciously.
In the morning I sat down to breakfast without being asked, and ate enormously and silently. The moonshiner warmed up at this.
"You're a better sort of feller than I thought at first," he said; "I thought you was goin' to be one of them d—d polite fellers."
"Me? Oh, no; not me," I replied, "you're thinkin' of some one else, I reckon?"
After breakfast he showed me his gold dust; a little flat piece interested me, and I said, "Gimme that, I'll pay yer; what's it worth?"
"Nothin'," he replied. "Yer can take it."
Afterwards I shouldered my pack and made for the door; when I got there I stoppedand looked over my shoulder and said, "So long!"
"So long toyou!" he answered, looking after me with more human interest than I had previously seen in him. "Stop here when you come this way again."
I climbed out of the gulch and walked along the mountain ridge for a while, encountering, whenever there was no wind, swarms of the tiny gnats which the miners often dread worse than the mosquitoes. They are so numerous as actually to obscure the sun in places and they fill nose, ears, and eyes; there is no escape from them, for they are so small that they go through the meshes of a mosquito net with the greatest ease. On top of the ridge, where the wind blew, they disappeared. As I walked along here I met a prospector, and after a friendly talk with him, dropped down another mountain-side to the bed of Independence Creek, and followed that to the junction of Mammoth Creek, so called from the number of bones of the extinct elephant, or mammoth, which are buried there. Wading across a swamp, I found in the brush another road-house, the Mammoth Junction. This was alarge log building containing a single room, which served as kitchen, dining-room, parlor, general bedroom, and barroom. At first I was the only guest, but afterwards a prospector arrived from a hard trip to the Tanana, and he related his experiences; how he had shot three bears, seven caribou, and a moose in seven days. He was a tall, well-built Cape Bretoner, Dick McDonald by name. When he got tired of talking I spread my blankets on the floor (for which privilege I paid fifty cents) and gladly stowed myself away for the night.
The next day a tramp of seventeen miles brought me to the Central House, on the way home from the diggings; for although our rendezvous should have been at Mammoth Junction, yet I concluded to wait for the others at Circle City. The trail was very bad, and during the first part of the journey the gnats were as annoying as they had been on the mountains the day before. There were millions of them. During the last part the mosquitoes got the upper hand, and gave me the strictest attention.
"Ah," I soliloquized, perspiring freely and tugging at my pack straps like a jaded horse athis harness, "the trials of an Alaskan pioneer! Stumbling and staggering through mud knee-deep, and through nigger-heads, wading streams, fighting gnats and mosquitoes, suffering often from hunger and thirst, and rolling into one's sole pair of blankets under the frosty stars or the rain-clouds!"
When my views were thus gloomy, a smell of smoke came to my nostrils, and crossing a little stream on a fallen tree, I came to the friendly inn I was seeking.
The next morning, at five o'clock by my watch and eight by the host's, (it is unnecessary to observe that there was no standard time used in the Birch Creek district) I started for Twelve Mile Cache. The first part of the trail was fairly well worn, but was covered with small dead trees which had fallen across it, necessitating the continual lifting of the feet and the taking of irregular steps. Ten miles of this was enough to make one very weary. I lunched on my stale corned beef and cracker crumbs, and drank from a little creek that I crossed. Soon after this, I came to a place where a newly blazed trail, leading to the Twelve Mile Cache, diverged fromthe older path, which ran up over the mountains. Deciding to take the newer route, I found it very hard walking, especially as my feet were clad in the Eskimo sealskin boot, or makalok, which are soft and offer little protection. Much of the road lay among immense untrodden nigger-heads and in swampy brush, where the sticks which had been cut off in making the trail stuck up three or four inches above the ground, just convenient for stubbing the toe; and yet the long grass quite concealed them, so they could not be avoided. Afterwards the trail struck into an old winter sleighing road, and I got on more rapidly for a few miles; but the mosquitoes had increased to legions and stung painfully. The gnats and flies were also numerous, the big deer flies biting my ears where the mosquito netting rested on them, till they were bloody.
At about four o'clock the cut trail came to an end, and here was a stick pointing into the woods, inscribed:
"Foller thes blaies to Twelv Mill House. Six Mills to Twelv Mill House 9 Mills Central House."
The "blaies" (blazes) had been newly cut, andas I started to follow them, it seemed that they led through the thickest of the brush, where it was almost impossible to fight one's way, especially with a pack, which protrudes on both sides of the shoulders, and which often wedges one firmly between two saplings. Soon the blazes grew further and further apart; after leaving one it often took ten minutes to find the next, scouting around everywhere in the tangle of bushes. The mosquitoes kept up their attacks, and my head began to ache splittingly, partly from their bites and partly from the jerking of the head strap of my pack in my struggles through the brush.
At last in despair I abandoned the attempt to follow the blazes, and turning square away from them, struck off in the direction where I knew the Hog'em Junction trail, by which we had reached the diggings, must lie, steering by my compass. Very soon I found better walking,—comparatively open swampy patches, with alder thickets between—and in half a mile I cut into the trail I was seeking. Three miles of this trail brought me to Twelve Mile Cache, after one of the hardest days I had had in Alaska. Comparedwith such a trip as this the dreaded Chilkoot Pass was not so formidable, after all. The entire distance I had travelled was twenty-seven miles. I had counted my paces through it all, and they tallied with the count of my companions, who came on later.
For supper at Twelve Mile Cache we had fresh fish,—pike and Arctic trout—taken from a trap in the river, and fresh vegetables raised on the roof, which was covered with a luxuriant garden. A thick layer of rich loam had been put on, and the seed dropped into this throve amazingly, for the fires inside the cabin supplied warmth, and the plants did not have to fight against the eternal frost which lies everywhere a short distance below the surface. The long glorious sunshine of the northern summer did the rest, and splendid potatoes, rutabagas, cabbages, beets, and lettuce were the results.
The fifteen miles back to Circle City the next day was a very weary walk, for my overwork on the day before had left me tired out. The mosquitoes were maddening on the last part of the trail, in spite of gloves and veil. On getting into Circle City, however, I was kindly welcomed bymy friends, the customs officers, and given a square meal. The room we had occupied as a bedroom had, in the short time since we had left, been put to still other uses. A newly arrived physician was using it for a laboratory, and a man who had brought a scow load of merchandise down the Yukon was storing his stuff in the same room. Also a red-sweatered young man turned up who said he had been told to sleep here, but the customs officers kicked him out and he went and slept under an upturned boat on the bank. After a bath I felt refreshed, but glancing into a looking-glass for the first time for many a day, I saw that my appearance was still against me. I was a long-haired, bushy-bearded, ragged, belted and knifed wild man, not fair to look upon.
I spent the next day in wandering around town in a desultory fashion, and on returning to the customhouse found the door locked. When I knocked I was challenged and then cautiously admitted: on entering I was surprised to see the officers with their rifles ready for use alongside of them. Ross lifted up the strip of calico which formed a curtain hiding the space under the bed and disclosed two good-sized kegs. These he toldme he and Wendling (the other officer) had seized while we were away. It was, and is, entirely illegal to bring liquor into the territory of Alaska, and this law and its attendant features have brought about much of the dishonesty and corruption which have made the inside history of Alaskan government since its acquisition by Americans such a dismal one.
Custom House at Circle City.
Custom House at Circle City.
In Circle City liquor was freely brought down the river from the British side of the boundary. The first customs inspector was said to have been a notorious rascal, who had not only winked at the bringing in of liquor, but had taken a hand in the trade himself. The present representatives of the government, however, seemed to wish to do their duty, and their watching nights and sleeping days had finally resulted in their trapping the smugglers as they were landing, and they had captured the whisky and had brought it to the customhouse, where the whole camp knew it to be. The whole camp was interested in it, moreover, for it had been whisky-dry; and the feeling towards the officers was probably none of the best in any quarter, although most recognized that they were simply doing theirduty. At the enormously high prices which prevailed, these two kegs were worth several thousand dollars, and so were valuable booty. Therefore, a plot had been hatched to recover the liquor, and this plot had come to the officers' ears a few hours before thecoupwas to have taken place. Hence the caution and warlike preparations which greeted me. The men from whom the whisky had been taken were the leaders in the scheme, and they had also enlisted several miners, among them a gigantic fellow who called himself "Caribou Bill," andwhom I had met on the trail to the diggings. Bill gave the thing away by going to a saloon-keeper and trying to borrow a second revolver—he already had one. On being questioned as to why he wanted it, he took the saloon-keeper into his confidence. The saloon-keeper told a friend of his, who being also a friend of one of the customs officers, cautioned him.
Both of the officers advised me to go elsewhere till the trouble was over, but reflecting that I was their guest and so under obligations to them, and also that I was an officer of Uncle Sam, and was in duty bound to "uphold the government of the United States by land and sea, against foreign and domestic enemies" as had been specified in my oath of office, I decided to remain with them. Ross hunted up two of his old friends among the miners and told them he proposed to resist the attack till the last, and that if there should be any bloodshed he hoped the camp would treat him fairly, considering that he had simply been doing his duty. The miners offered to stay with us and help in the resistance, but as we knew their hearts were hardly in their offer of loyalty, we refused to let them stay. One ofthem, however, loaned his rifle to Wendling; and as he went to get it, a couple of forms behind the house jumped up and ran away. The other miner, who had also gone out for a moment, returned with the news that he had seen four men skulking behind the bank which lay in front of the house.
The plan of the smugglers and their friends, as Ross had learned it, was to come to the door of the cabin and knock. When the officer went to the door to open it, he would be covered with a revolver, and the second officer with another, and the whisky would be rolled out and over the bank into a boat which would convey it up the river into a new hiding-place. If the officers resisted they would be shot and the whisky taken just the same. The plan we determined upon was to leave the door unlocked, so that when the expected knock should come we would not have to go to the door to open it, but would call out "Come in" without stirring. I had my post on a box near the wall directly opposite the door, while Ross sat in the darkness close by the window, so that when the knocker should enter he would find the muzzles of repeating rifles levelledat him from two opposite directions, and be invited to drop his fire-arms and surrender. Wendling was in the other room watching the second door and window, but we did not expect the attack to be made there, since the smugglers must know very well that the whisky was in the officers' living-room, where we were.
Directly after we had taken our places a man came and stood twenty yards in front of the cabin in the dusk, and beckoned. Ross went out to him, and a long talk ensued, which ended by the officer returning. He said that the man had told him that we were three against many, and that they were bound to get the whisky anyway, since it was theirs and they would fight for it; so if Ross would simply yield without fighting it would save us. At the same time they would be willing to pay him a nice little sum as a plaster wherewith to heal his wounded dignity. Ross had replied that they had mistaken their man; whereupon he was informed that he must take the consequences. So he returned, and we waited with tense nerves, in momentary expectation of an attack, our eyes strained, our fingerson the triggers of our cocked rifles, our ears listening.
After an hour or more had passed, and no sound was heard, the suspense began to grow unbearable. Ross whispered to me, "If them fellers are coming I wish they'd hurry up, and not keep us waiting here all night." Shortly afterwards Wendling, crawling cautiously and silently around in the other room, knocked down from some shelf on the wall a pile of tin pans, which made a terrific rattle and bang; this upset our tightly-drawn nerves so that we laughed convulsively, trying to choke down our merriment so that it could not be heard. Still no noise from the outside, save that once we heard coughing behind the logs at the back of the building. Ross, peering through the window, saw now and then a shadowy form creeping along the bank in front; and Wendling, reconnoitring through the window in the other room, saw other figures passing around back of the house. And still no alarm. Sitting bolt upright on my box, I suddenly caught my head, which was in the act of falling forward—caught it with a jerk which brought my eyes wide open, and at the same timehorror filled my soul—I was in danger of falling asleep! This frightened me so that I kept awake easily after that. So we waited till the morning grey brightened in the sky, when finally Ross remarked: "Well, there's no more danger, and I'm tired enough to sleep." We rolled ourselves in our blankets and dropped asleep without a moment's delay, not waking until the day was late and Goodrich and Schrader, just returning from the diggings, pounded on the door and asked for admission and a bite to eat.
Concerning the reasons why the raid was given up, there was much inner history that I never learned. I suspect that the miners who had offered to help us afterwards warned the smugglers, telling them how well we were prepared, and that this kept them from carrying out their plans.
The next night a grand ball was gotten up by the ladies of Circle City, and our bedroom in the customhouse—being one of the largest places available—was selected as the scene of the dance. I was requested to write the announcements of the ball, which I did, and stuck one up oneach of the Companies' stores. They ran as follows:
Social Dance.There will be aSocial Dancegiven by the ladies ofCircle CityWednesday Eve. Aug. 19th,At the residence of Mr. George Ross.The supply of ice cream brought up on theArctic being exhausted, there will beno collation.No rubber boots allowed on the floor.Dogs must be tied with ribbons in the anteroom.
After the notices were posted, one of the customs officers came to me in great perturbation concerning the regulation about rubber boots, saying that such a restriction would exclude many desirable and well-meaning gentlemen who would otherwise be able to attend.
The shavings were swept out of the room and our beds and other stuff cleared out. Wax candles were cut up and rubbed on the floor, and by dusk everything was in readiness. One of the trading companies donated the candles, which were stuck up around the room to the extent of nearly a dozen, and furnished a brilliantillumination. The services of a pock-marked vagabond who was employed around a saloon and dance-house was secured as director of the affair, and two miners just in from the gulches (they had taken only one change of clothes to the diggings and had not had time to change them after coming back before going to the dance), furnished the orchestra, playing very acceptably on guitar and fiddle. The music was all classical,—Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay or the Irish washerwoman occupying most of the time. Each of the players was so enthusiastic in his art that he often entirely forgot his companion, and would be fiddling away at the closing spasms of Ta-ra-ra-boom-de-ay, with perspiring zeal, when his more rapid partner had finished this tune and was merrily galloping through
"Wuz ye iver inside of an Irishman's shanty?Wid salt an' peraties an' iverything planty,A three-legged stool an' a table to match,And the door of the shanty unlocks wid a latch!"
The pock-marked director yelled out "Swingyour pardners.Ladiesto the left.Forwardand back!Alleman left!etc.," loud above the squeak of the stringed instruments. The couplesgyrated in eccentric curves around in obedience to the cries; the candles flickered in the draft from the open door; and a row of miners too bashful to dance, or who could find no partners, sat on boxes close to the wall, hunched up their legs and spit tobacco-juice, until the middle of the floor was a sort of an island. In short, it was the most brilliant affair Circle City had ever witnessed; even the Indians who crowded around the open door and peered in over one another's heads murmured in admiration, and all agreed that it was a "haiootime", which is equivalent to saying a rip-roaring time. This was not the first dance held in the camp. The small but powerful contingent of ladies of adventure held nightly dances, but this was the first where the ladies were respectable.
We were hard put to it for finery. The dancer of our party, having, as we explained to him, to bear in a way the brunt of the social duties for us all, bought a new pair of blue overalls, much too large for him; these he turned up at the bottom, and braced up mightily, so that they covered many shortcomings; then he bought a green and yellow abomination of a necktie,which had been designed to catch the heathen fancy of the natives, plastered his hair down, and worried the tangles out of his beard. After this he was the beau of the evening, the gayest of the gay, being snubbed by only one woman, and she of doubtful reputation, as we consolingly reminded him.
The men in general wore the most varied costumes, high boots being the prevailing style, though even the rubber boots I had been so near forbidding were seen; then one might notice the Indian moccasins, and the sealskin makalok, which had been brought up from the Eskimos on the lower Yukon. Flannel shirts without coat or vests were the rule, for the night was warm. Here and there was a corduroy coat, or a mackinaw checked with red and green squares four inches across, but the wearers of them suffered for their vanity. In striking and almost ridiculous contrast to this picturesque attire was the black cutaway suit and polished shoes of the baker who had just arrived on a Yukon steamer from St. Michael's.
After midnight we had cake, which the ladies had brought with them, and considering the factthat they had so little material for cooking, the variety and excellence were remarkable. Underneath the festive board which covered the bed still lay concealed the two kegs of whisky which we had watched over the night before. It was at a late hour (to adopt country newspaper phraseology) that the company broke up, loud in their praises of the success of the fête, and returned to their respective homes. We then rolled our blankets out upon the waxed floor, and lay down for another night.
The same day a river steamer had arrived in Circle City from the lower Yukon, bringing our trunks to us, which we had sent around by water from Seattle. These were well filled with a goodly outfit for the winter, for we had expected that our work would take us two seasons. We had, however, gotten on twice as well as we had expected, and already saw the end of our task ahead, so there was nothing to hinder us from going out this same fall. The freight on our three trunks from Seattle was one hundred and eighty dollars, and we did not feel justified in expending a like sum to carry them back. We therefore determined to sell our things, and theday after the party I wrote out notices announcing an auction to be held in the room where we had danced.
Wendling volunteered to act as auctioneer, provided he were allowed to work in as part of our effects several hundred pounds of tobacco which he had brought up as a speculation. At seven o'clock we started in, having borrowed a pair of gold-scales for the sake of transacting the financial part of the business, for almost the sole currency of the camp was gold dust. Not being ourselves accustomed to the delicate operation of weighing, we persuaded some of the miners to do it for us, so that there should be no question as to fairness. At eight the miners began leaving and we were told that a miners' meeting had been called, so we adjourned for an hour, and attended the gathering.
The miners' meeting was the sole legislative, judiciary and executive body in these little republics. To settle any question whatever, any one had the right to call such a council, which brought the issue to a summary close. This one was held in the open air close to the river bank in front of the Company's store. The minersflocked together and conversed in groups. Nobody knew who had called the meeting or why; but presently some grew impatient, remarking: "Let's have the meeting. Who's for chairman?"
One man answered: "What's the matter with Sandy Jim for chairman? Here he is, just in from the diggings! Come over here, Jim!"
"Second the motion, somebody. Any body object to Sandy Jim?" said the first speaker. "Climb up on the box, Sandy, my boy."
Sandy Jim was a slender, blonde young man with quiet manners, and a style of speech which told of a good education. He mounted the box in the centre of the crowd, and having thus obtained a commanding position, he began, with correct parliamentary methods, to bring about order. Having requested silence, he inquired who had called the meeting. A man who acted as town clerk or some similar officer in the miners' vague system of government, explained that he had issued the call, to inform the miners that some one had settled upon a piece of land that had been set aside for town purposes, and, in spite of warnings to the contrary, was proceeding to erect a log house upon it; and thatthe tent temporarily occupied by the individual mentioned was already pitched upon the lot. As an officer of the camp he had felt in duty bound to call a meeting and let the boys decide what was to be done. Instantly there was a rattle of contradictory suggestions, everybody addressing everybody else, and forgetting to turn to the chairman. Finally a tall man with a heavy black beard mounted the box and addressed the meeting, arguing coldly and logically that the person had acted in defiance of the miners' meeting, which was the only law they had; and proposing that he be fined, and in case he resisted further, put in a boat and set floating down the Yukon. There was a general murmur of approval, and the chairman, putting the question to a vote, found a fairly unanimous verdict in favor of the speaker's suggestion.
"Before I appoint a committee," said the chairman, "the meeting should know who the person is who has to be dealt with, and I will ask the gentleman who called the meeting to give the information."
The clerk of the camp elbowed his way forward a little. "I've been trying to get a word in fora long time," he said. "I don't think we ought to be so hard in this case. You all know the person—it's Black Kitty. She's a woman, even if sheisblack and a fighter, and she's alone and working for a living. I move we go it easy."
Amid another buzz the tall bearded man got up and remarked: "That's different. I don't think any one wanted to quarrel with a woman, and a black one at that." This was only his way of expressing it, for he certainly did not mean that he would rather have quarrelled with a white woman. "Anyhow, there's plenty of land for public purposes out there in the brush, and I move an amendment that we let Kitty alone!"
In defiance of all parliamentary usage, this amendment was accepted with a chorus of approval by the crowd, which, satisfied with itself, scattered almost before the chairman could make himself heard, sanctioning and proclaiming valid the last expression of opinion.
Most of the miners returned to our cabin, where the auction began again, and lasted till twelve o'clock, by which time we had sold nearly everything we cared to, at prices a little above cost in Seattle. Wendling also succeeded in disposingof a hundred pounds of his tobacco, putting up lots every now and then. Some miners expressed surprise to Ross that we should use so much tobacco, and Ross winked and put his finger on his nose and said, "You don't know the inside, that's all. See that little feller over there?" indicating me. "That little feller chews a pound a day. Yes, sir! He eats it sometimes."
The next morning we weighed out our gold dust and found it some twenty-five dollars more than we had any record of, from which we inferred that the miners who had so kindly superintended the weighing of the various sums paid in had been a little generous, and always given full weight. When we got to San Francisco, and presented our gold dust at the mint, where it was weighed accurately, we received several dollars more for it than we made it from our final weighing; so it appears that the Yukon miner's currency is none of the most accurate. Stories were told around camp, of barkeepers who panned the sawdust on their floor and made good wages at it; and it was alleged that one had a strip of carpet on hiscounter, into which he let fall a trifle of gold dust every time he took a pinch for a drink of whisky, and at the end of the day, by taking up his carpet and shaking it, he had a nice little sum over his day's earnings.
The next day, the 21st of August, we loaded up the Skookum again, and dropped away from Circle City with the current. The customs officers were short of rice, but they sent a pair of old slippers flying after us as we moved away; and several of the ladies who had been at the dance stood on the bank and waved us adieu. Soon the river broadened out, with many channels flowing amid a maze of low wooded islands. This was the beginning of the great Yukon Flats, which stretch in dreary monotony for so many miles below Circle City.
The wind blew strong, with gusts of rain, in the morning, and increased to a gale which lasted nearly all day. The proper channel was difficult to determine, and we were often sucked into some little channel or slough (pronounced "sloo"), only to find our way back again, after a long circuit, to the larger body of water, at aplace near where we had left it. No hills were visible in any direction—nothing but the waste of waters, the sandspits, and the level wooded islands and banks. At night we reached Fort Yukon, a trading post, which is situated at the junction of the Porcupine with the Yukon; we had made the distance from Circle City, estimated at about eighty miles, in sixteen hours. So bewildering are the various channels here that one would hardly suspect that any stream entered the Yukon, and the current is so varied and sluggish that one might easily attempt to ascend the Porcupine, having the impression that he was still descending the Yukon—a delusion that would be dispelled after the first few miles.
Like other so-called "Forts" in the Alaskan country, Fort Yukon was simply a rough log building inhabited by one white man, who had a scanty stock of very poor provisions, such as flour and tea, to exchange for skins with the natives. Around the building the Indians had made their camp, as usual, a trading-post being always the nucleus of a dirty and foul-smelling congregation of natives. From one Indian we bought a whitefish, and on his presenting it to uswhole, we motioned him to clean it; he did so, laying the entrails carefully on a board. He wished tea in exchange for it, and not being experienced in native trading, we gave him what we afterwards learned was ten or twelve times the usual price. We had the best English breakfast tea, and he was at first doubtful at this, having seen only the cheap black tea always sold to the natives; but he was vastly pleased at the quantity, and, laughing delightedly, proceeded to "treat" his friends on the occasion of his good fortune, by handing around the raw entrails of the fish, which they divided and ate without further ceremony.
Not liking to sleep within reach of the Indian dogs, who are very dangerous enemies to one's bacon, we dropped down the river half a mile below the post and made camp in a spruce grove—a beautiful spot, cool, and free from mosquitoes.
The next day we were still in the flats. There was a high wind blowing and the sky was spotted with curious clouds. Some were like cauliflowers in form; others were funnel-shaped; and still others were dark, with long black tentacles of rain. Whenever these tentacles passed overthe river in a direction against the current, an ugly chop sea was the result, and our boat, stout dory though she was, shipped water in some of these places.
Floating down through the network of channels we suddenly ran hard upon a sand-bar, and it took a couple of hours' work to get us off, for as soon as we were lodged the sand which the Yukon waters carry began settling round the boat and banking it in, making it the hardest work imaginable to move it. While we were tugging and groaning in our efforts, a steamer—the Arctic—came down the river behind us, and being steered by experienced Indian pilots, struck the right channel only a short distance from us and floated past triumphantly. The deck was swarming with miners who were bound for St. Michael's, and they made many jocose remarks at our expense, offering to take word to our friends, and do other favors for us. We said nothing, though we fumed inwardly. Finally we succeeded in getting free, and floated off. Some time afterwards we saw behind us what appeared to be the smoke of another steamer; but when we stopped for lunchthe craft caught up with us, and proved to be an ordinary open boat like our own, but with a Yukon stove made of sheet iron set up in it, whereon the solitary passenger cooked his dinner while he floated.
In the afternoon we caught sight of a bona fide steamer ahead of us, and as we came steadily closer, it seemed as if she must be stopping; soon we recognized the Arctic, and saw that the crew and all the passengers were laboring excitedly in many ways, trying to get the boat off the sand-bar on which she was stuck. We ran close by her, for there was water enough for our little boat, although the rapid deposit from the river had built up a bank to the surface of the water on one side of the steamer. We were sorry for these men, who were in a hurry to get to St. Michael's, and so on home; at the same time we could not resist the temptation to return to them their greetings of the morning, and offer to take letters to their friends. They did not seem to be so much amused at the joke as they had been in the morning—probably because they had heard it before.
We were several days floating through thismonotonous part of the river. There were always the same banks of silt, from which portions, undercut by the current, were continually crashing into the stream; these were immediately taken up and hurried along by the current to form part of the vast deposit of mud which the Yukon has built up at its mouth, and which has filled up the Behring sea until it is shallow and dangerous. On the higher banks, which were forty feet or so above the river (it was then low water), spruce and other trees were growing, and as the soil which bore them was undercut, they too dropped into the river and started on their long journey to the sea. Along the vast tundra at the Yukon mouth, and the treeless shores of the Behring sea, the natives depend entirely upon these wandered trees for their fuel. The quantity brought down every year is enormous, for the stream is continually working its way sidewise, and cutting out fresh ground.
Everywhere we noticed the effects of the ice which comes grinding down the river in the spring. The trees had been girdled by the ice and were dying, the underbrush cut down, the earth plowed up, and occasionally there werepiles of pebbles where a grounded cake had melted and deposited its burden.
The Break-up of the Ice on the Yukon.
The Break-up of the Ice on the Yukon.
We used to camp on the gravel bars mostly, to avoid the mosquitoes; but every now and then a night was cool and even frosty, and the mosquitoes and gnats, after starting in their assault, were gradually numbed, and their buzzing grew fainter and fainter till it disappeared. When we felt such nights coming on, we camped in the spruce groves on the higher banks, built roaring fires and sat by them comfortably and smoked,looking out on the smooth river with the dark even fringe of trees between it and the sky with its snapping stars; and for the first time on our trip we began to have some of the pleasures which usually come to the camper-out.
We passed Indian hunting and fishing camps occasionally, and once a solitary white man engaged in cutting wood for the river steamers. The natives seemed always to have plenty to eat, and we frequently obtained from them fish, duck, moose, and berries. As we passed a camp the inhabitants would put out in their tiny birch-bark canoes, if we did not stop; and, overtaking us with ease, would hold up for purchase such articles as they had. The berries were in native dishes of hewn wood, or of birch-bark tied with wooden thongs, and were so quaint that we took them home as curiosities.
After several days in the Flats, we saw—when the clouds lifted after a prolonged rainstorm—that the course of the river was apparently barred by low mountains, level-topped, with occasional higher peaks rising above the general level, but all with smooth and rounded outlines. As we drew nearer we saw a narrowvalley cutting through the mountains, and into this the river ran. Just before entering, we found a trading post, Fort Hamlin by name, and from the trader, who was the only white man here, we each bought a pair of Eskimo water-boots, made of the skin of the makalok or hair seal, soaked in oil. We had long ago worn out the most of our civilized foot-gear, and were obliged to adopt the native styles. These Eskimo boots often have soles of walrus, and yet they are too thin for walking over stones, so they are made very large, and dried grass is put into the bottom; the foot, too, is wrapped in as many thicknesses of cloth or skins as possible, and thus is protected against bruises and against the cold of the severest winter weather.
Leaving Fort Hamlin, we floated down through picturesque hills, on the sides of which the birch was beginning to yellow. Another day brought us to Mynook Creek, of which we had heard at Circle City as likely to be a good gold producer. At the mouth of the creek we found the temporary camps of a few prospectors, who were on their way up to stake out claims. There were also numerous Indians encamped in the vicinity—truesavages, with very few words of English among them, "yes" "no" and "steamboat" making up almost their entire vocabulary.
A sort of chief among them was a Mynook, a half-breed with more Indian than white in his features. It was after him that the creek had been named (or rather renamed, for it had formerly been known as the Klanakakat or Klanachargut, the native name); he had been the first to discover gold, and was engaged in working a claim with a crew of natives, notwithstanding the fact that Indians have, according to our somewhat peculiar laws, no legal right to stake mines. He was a good-looking fellow with a fair knowledge of English, which he was very proud to air, especially the "cuss-words," which he introduced into conversation very gravely and irrelevantly. He said when he got dust enough he was going to "San Francisco," that being to him a general name for the world of the white men. He had always hired natives to work his claims, although he admitted that they did not work nearly as well as white people; they would labor only until they had a little money ahead, and then would quit until it was all spent, although itmight be the very busiest season; and if perchance a steamboat was reported on the river, the gang to a man would drop pick and shovel and trot down the trail to the mouth of the creek, there to stand open-eyed and open-mouthed, gazing at the smoking monster which held them with a fascination stronger than even Mynook's displeasure.
We camped on the beach, and made preparations the next morning to visit the diggings. We separated, as usual, each taking a different route, and each hiring an Indian to accompany him and carry his pack. The first Indian I hired had on a new gingham jumper, and a sly smile which gave an impression that his subsequent actions did not belie. He wanted to be paid before starting, and when this was refused said he was hungry, and was so weak that he could not walk without food. So we administered to him a substantial breakfast, after which he disappeared and never could be found again. Soon another Indian presented himself—a particularly wicked looking fellow, with red bulging eyes that gave one a sort of shiver to look at him. He wanted to go with me, and I hired him, having no otherchoice. Then he too explained by gestures, that he was starving and must have some breakfast to keep him strong on his long walk; whereupon I explained, also by gestures, that the first Indian had gotten the second Indian's breakfast already, and that, having delivered the breakfast, the rest was no affair of mine (I having carried out my share of the transaction as was fitting), so that the only possible subject for discussion lay between him and the first Indian.
He seemed to be impressed with the logic of this, shouldered his pack and trotted off meekly enough. As we started, the smoke of a steamboat became visible down the river; the natives raised the excited cry of "shteemboot" and my guide showed signs of sitting down to wait for it to come and go before he should proceed with his journey. However, a few studiously stern looks, accompanied by prodding in his ribs with a stick, started him along the trail, to which he kept faithfully after that. This led through a thick growth of alder brush, across brooks, but always kept in the valley of the main stream, on each side of which were hills with the bare rocks peering from among the yellowing foliage.
After three hours' tramp, we turned up a little side valley, and soon came upon a claim that was being worked by a number of miners. This was the only active one on this creek, and with the exception of Mynook's claim on another small branch, the only one being exploited on Mynook Creek as a whole. Several other men, however, had staked claims and were engaged in building log cabins, preparatory to the winter's prospecting.
Here I dismissed my Indian, telling him by signs to come back again on the next day. During the two days he and I were out together, we did not utter an articulate sound in trying to communicate with one another. It was of no use, for he could not understand the English any better than I Yukon. So in this case I looked at him fixedly and silently, and pointed to the miner's cabin, laid my head on my hand and shut my eyes, signifying that I intended to sleep there. Then with my finger I followed in the sky the course the sun would take on the following day, halting at a point midway in the afternoon; then, pointing to him, I imitated the motion of a man carrying a pack, and with arapid movement of the finger indicated the trail back to the mouth of the creek; finally with a comprehensive gesture I gave him to understand that he might do as he pleased in the meantime. He disappeared immediately, coming back at night to beg for food from my hosts; failing in that, he bivouacked at a camp-fire, with a few other Indians who were working on the creek, in front of the miner's log cabin, and before we were up in the morning had disappeared again. At exactly the appointed time the next day, however, he returned, ready for the harness, as red-eyed, dumb and vicious-looking as ever.
The sign language of all these Yukon Indians is wonderfully clever; it is also very complicated, and I have seen two natives conversing fluently behind a trader's back, using their faces and hands in rapid movements which, however, conveyed no idea to the uninitiated observer as to their meaning. Some of their signs which I have understood are remarkable for the clever selection of a distinguishing characteristic to designate a given object. For example, a white man was expressed by stroking the chin as if it were bearded. In this wild country razors wereunknown and even scissors a rarity, so that all white men wore thick and usually bushy beards, while the natives had very little or no hair on their faces. Since I wore spectacles, I was described in sign language first by a gesture of stroking the beard, which indicated that I was a white man, and then by bending the thumb and forefinger in a circle, and peering through this circle, thereby sufficiently identifying me among others.
At the cabin where I spent the night was a man who had been on the exploring expedition of Lieutenant Allen some years before, when that young officer accomplished such a splendid journey under such great difficulties, through a barren and unknown country, ascending the Copper River, descending the Tanana, exploring the Koyukuk, and finally returning to St. Michael's by way of the Yukon. On learning that I was in the government service, this man insisted on my becoming his guest. He slept and ate in a little log cabin of his own, where he had a bed built of hewn wood, which was pretty exactly proportioned to his own length and breadth. By a little careful manipulation,however, we both managed to stretch out on it and as the night was frosty and our covering none of the thickest, neither of us objected to the proximity of the other, although we were so crowded that when one turned over the other had to do so at the same time. In the morning my "pardner," as he might fitly be called, had a savory breakfast well under way when I opened my eyes.
After our meal my host went to his work, while I undertook a journey a little further up the main stream to a tributary gulch. Here one man was engaged in prospecting—Oliver Miller, one of the remarkable prospectors of early Alaskan times. He had been in this region many years already, always prospecting, often lucky in finding, but never resting or stopping to reap the benefits of his discoveries, and always pushing restlessly onwards towards new and unexplored fields. In the early eighties he had been among the first who had come to the Forty Mile district from Stewart River and the other affluents of the Yukon above the international boundary. He discovered the creek still known by his name—Miller Creek,—which really lies atthe headwaters of Sixty Mile Creek, but is separated only by a low dividing ridge from the gold-producing gulches at the head of Forty Mile Creek, and is therefore usually reckoned as a part of the Forty Mile district.
Miller Creek was one of the richest creeks in the district and was soon staked out by eager prospectors; but Miller himself got restless, and saying the place was getting too crowded for him, sold his claim one day for what he could get, and investing the amount in "grub" and outfit, started out over the hills alone, prospecting. In the Birch Creek district, which was discovered later, he found gold again, but as soon as miners came in he sold out and went further. Now after many wanderings he was in Mynook Creek, and it was characteristic of the man that instead of being industriously engaged in washing gold in one of the already prospected tributaries nearer the Yukon, he had vanished into the brush, out of reach of the sound of pick and shovel, and was nosing around among the rocks and panning gravel.
According to directions, I left the trail, which indeed ran no further, and followed the bank ofthe main stream, working my way through the brush, till I came to a little brook, then went up along this nearly to where it emerged from a rocky gorge in the hills. At this point I came upon a grassy nook under the birches, where a fire was smouldering; and under a tree a man's heavy blankets were spread on a bed of green boughs, as if he had just stepped out. A couple of kettles were standing near the fire, and a coat was lying on the ground, while an axe was sticking in the tree above the blankets. There was no tent or any superfluities whatever, and it was evident that this camping outfit was one of those which a man may take on his back and wander over hill and dale with. Not hearing or seeing any sign of life, I sat down and waited, but no one appearing after half an hour, I began following a man's trail from the camp up the gorge, tracing him by the bent grass and broken twigs. After having gone a short distance, I heard the thumping of a pick on a rocky wall in front and above me, and gave a hail. The prospector came down very slowly, his manner not being so much that of a man who was sorry to see one—on the contrary, he was pleasant and cordial—as thatof one who is reluctantly dragged away from a favorite employment. We went back to his camp under the birches and as it was now noon he invited me to dinner with him.
It was a sunny day, and the grass was warm and bright, with the shadow of the delicate leaves falling upon it; the mosquitoes had disappeared in this period of frosty nights and chilly days, so that the sylvan camp was ideal. Some boiled beans, boiled dried apples, and bread, baked before an open fire, constituted the meal; yet I remember to this day the flavor of each article, so delicious they appeared to my sharp appetite. Miller was embarrassed somewhat about dishes. He had by good luck two kettle covers, which served as plates for us, and he was, he explained, in the habit of using his sheath-knife to manage the rest, for he had neither table-knife, fork, nor spoon. I produced my own sheath-knife and assured him that I was born with it in my mouth, so to speak, and we set to eating cheerfully.
For a professional recluse, I found Miller very cordial and communicative. He travelled alone, he told me, not because he would not have been glad of company, but because it washard to find any one to go with him, and almost impossible that two "pardners," even when at first agreeable, should remain very long without quarrelling; so he had decided, as the simplest solution, to carry out his ideas alone. He was in the habit of exploring the most remote parts of the territory, searching for minerals. He had tramped over the mountains between the Yukon and the Tanana, back and forth; and had been a thousand miles up the Koyukuk, to where it headed in a high range, climbing which, he had looked out upon the Arctic ocean. On returning down the river, he had been knocked out of his boat by a "sweeper" (a log which extends out from a bank over a stream, two or three feet above the water). The current was so rapid where he met with the accident that when he rose to the surface his boat was some distance ahead of him. He struck out swimming to catch up with it, but, as if animated with a perverse living spirit, the boat moved off on a swifter current toward the centre of the river. Soon he was in danger of being benumbed in the icy water, and he was exhausted from his efforts, yet he knew if he should swim to thebanks and lose his boat he would eventually perish in the wilderness, without resource and hundreds of miles from the nearest human being. So he swam desperately, and when on the point of giving up and sinking, a check in the current ahead slackened the speed of the boat so that by an effort he was able to reach it and grasp the gunwale. But it was some time before he gathered strength enough to pull himself aboard.
The history of the prospectors in any new country, especially in Alaska, would be a record of intensely interesting pioneering. Unfortunately these men leave no record, and their hardships, lonely exploring tours and daring deeds, performed with a heroism so simple that it seems almost comical, have no chronicler. They penetrate the deserts, they climb the mountains, they ascend the streams, they dare with the crudest preparation the severest danger of nature. Some of them die, others return to civilization and become sailors or car-conductors or janitors; but they are of the stuff that keeps the nation alive. By that I do not mean the false or imitation prospector, who has no courage or patience, but only the greed of gold. Thousands of suchpoured into Alaska after the Klondike boom, and many of them turned back at the first sight of Chilkoot Pass, which is nothing to frighten a strong boy of twelve. Many more got enough of Alaska in floating down the Yukon, and kept on straight to St. Michael's, scarcely stopping in any of the mining regions; thereby benefiting the transportation companies greatly, and adding much to the territory's sudden apparent prosperity. But before the Klondike rush nearly all the Alaskans were of the hardy true pioneer type I write about.
In the afternoon I returned, and finding my Indian punctually on hand at the appointed time, we went back to the Yukon together.
The next day we broke camp, and floating down the river, soon entered the main range of the Rampart Mountains. They were not high, but picturesque, and the lower parts and the valleys were gay with green and gold. It was a perfect day, cool and clear. We stopped for the night below the so-called rapids, which at this time of low water were hardly noticeable. An Indian came to our camp from his village across the river, and we traded a can of condensed milk with him for a silver salmon. I got into his little narrow birch canoe, and managed to paddle it with the feather-like paddle, thanks to my experience in rowing a racing-shell; but it required infinite care in balancing. I could not help admiring the ease with which the Indian managed the delicate boat when he left us for home again, and wondering how these people catch salmon out of canoes like these.