This day is never to be forgotten, so beautiful, so calm, so still with the earth and every branch and tree muffled in deep, feathery, new-fallen snow. And all day the softest clouds have drifted lazily over the heaven shrouding the land here and there in veils of falling snow, while elsewhere or through the snow itself the sun shone. Golden shadows, dazzling peaks, fairy tracery of branches against the blue summer sea! It was a day to Live,—and work could be forgotten.
So Rockwell and I explored the woods, at first reverently treading one path that the snow about us might still lie undisturbed. But soon the cub in the boy broke out and he rolled in the deepest thickets, shook the trees down upon himself, lay still in the snow for me to cover him completely, washed his face till it was crimson, and wound up with a naked snow-bath. I photographedhim standing thus in the deep snow at the water’s edge with the mountains far off behind him. Then he dried himself at the roaring fire we’d made ready and felt like a new boy—if that can be imagined. We both sketched out-of-doors for a little while in the morning like young lady amateurs. I tried it again two or three times throughout the day with indifferent results; it was too beautiful. We cut wood too, and that went with a zest. While Rockwell dried himself after his bath I searched in the woods for a Christmas tree and cut a fair-sized one at last for its top. Christmas is right upon us now. To-night the cranberries stew on the stove.
The beautiful snow is fast going under the falling rain! With only five more days before Christmas it is probable we’ll have little if any snow on the ground then. A snowless Christmas in Alaska!
This day was as uneventful as could be. Part of the morning was consumed in putting a new handle into the sledge hammer. It was too dark to paint long, really hardly an hour of daylight. These days slip by so easily and with so little accomplished! Only by burning midnight oil can much be done.
Both yesterday and to-day it has poured rain. They’ve not been unpleasant days, however. Occasional let-ups have allowed us to cut wood and get water without inconvenience. This morning Olson, fearing that a continuance of the mild weather would melt the ice in the lake and send his bags of fish to the bottom, went out to the center of the lake where they hung suspended througha hole in the ice and brought them in. But so precarious has the ice become that he carried a rope and took me along in case of trouble. To get out upon the ice we had to go some distance along the lake’s shore.
Returning we missed meeting Rockwell who had gone to join us. Not for some time did it occur to me to call him. It was well I did call. The poor boy on not seeing us had suddenly concluded we were drowned. A strip of water separated him from the ice. He was on the point of wading into this at the moment I called him. He was still terribly excited when he reached us.
Both days I have been occupied with humble, housewifely duties,—baking, washing, mending, and now the cabin is adorned with our drying clothes. Here where water must be carried so far it is the wet days that are wash days. Darning is a wretched nuisance. We should have socks enough to tide us over our stay here. Last night after Rockwell had been put to bed I sat down and did two of the best drawings I have made. At half past twelve I finished them, and then to calm my elation a bit for sleep read in the “Odyssey.” At this my second reading of the book it’s as intensely interesting—or more so—than before. As a story it is incomparably better than the “Iliad.” To me it is full of suggestions for wonderful pictures.
Ten days from now it comes due for Olson to go to Seward. If only then we have mild, calm weather! But as yet we have seen no steamer go to Seward since early in the month. It looks as if the steamship companies had combined to deprive Alaska of its Christmas mail and freight in a policy of making the deadlock with the government over the mail contracts intolerable. Meanwhile, instead of serving us, the jaunty little naval cruisers that summered here in idleness doubtless loaf away the winter months in comfortable southern ports.
CAIN
CAIN
Up to this morning the hard warm rain continued, and now the stars are all out and it might be thought a night in spring. At eight-thirty I walked over in sneakers and underwear for a moment’s call on Olson, but he had gone to bed. And now although we’ll have no snow the weather is fair for Christmas.
If Olson believes, as he says, that Christmas will pass as any other day he is quite wrong. The tree waits to be set up and it will surely be a thing of beauty blazing with its many candles in this somber log interior. I’ve given up the idea of dressing Olson as Santa Claus in goat’s wool whiskers. Santa Claus without presents would move us to tears. There are a few little gifts,—a pocketknife and a kitchen set of knife, fork, and can-opener for Olson. An old broken fountain pen for Rockwell, some sticks of candy,—and the dinner! What shall it be? Wait!
It is midnight. I’ve just finished a good drawing. The lamp is about at its accustomed low mark—yesterday it had to be filled twice! Those nights when without a clock I sat up so late and to so uncertain an hour I have discovered by the lamp and clock together to have been really long. My bedtime then was after two or three o’clock—but I arose later. To-day I finished a little picture for Olson and so did Rockwell. These were forgotten in my list of presents as I’ve just written it. I have shown in my picture the king of the island himself striding out to feed the goats while Billy, rearing on his hind legs, tries to steal the food on the way. Rockwell’s picture is of Olson surrounded by all the goats in a more peaceful mood. Olson’s cabin is in the background. I wish we had more to give the good old man. At any rate he dines with us.
We’ve cleaned house, stowed everything away upon shelves and hooks and in corners, moved even my easel aside; decorated the rooftimbers with dense hemlock boughs, stowed quantities of wood behind the stove—for there must be no work on that holiday—and now both Rockwell and I are in a state of suppressed excitement over to-morrow.
What a strange thing! Nothing is coming to us, no change in any respect in the routine of our lives but what we make ourselves,—and yet the day looms so large and magnificent before us! I suppose the greatest festivals of our lives are those at which we dance ourselves. You need nothing from outside,—not even illusion. Certainly children need to be given scarcely an idea to develop out of it an atmosphere of mystery and expectation as real and thrilling to themselves as if it rested upon true belief.
Well, the tree is ready, cut to length with a cross at the foot to stand upon, and a cardboard and tin-foil star to hang at its top. And now as to Christmas weather. This morning, as might just as well have been expected, was again overcast. Toward evening light snow began to fall. It soon turned to rain and the rain now has settled down to a gentle, even, all-night-and-day pace. Let it snow or rain and grow dark at midday! The better shall be our good Christmas cheer within. This is the true Christmas land. The dayshouldbe dark, the house further overshadowed by the woods, tall and black. And there in the midst of that somber, dreadful gloom the Christmas tree should blaze in glory unrivaled by moon or sun or star.
It is mild; the ground is almost bare and a warm rain falls. First the Christmas tree all dripping wet is brought into the house and set upon its feet. It is nine feet and a half high and just touches the peak of the cabin. There it stands and dries its leaves while Rockwell and I prepare the feast.
SUPERMAN
SUPERMAN
Both stoves are kept burning and the open door lets in the cool air. Everything goes beautifully; the wood burns as it should, the oven heats, the kettle boils, the beans stew, the bread browns in the oven just right, and the new pudding sauce foams up as rich and delicious as if instead of the first it were the hundredth time I’d made it. And now everything is ready. The clock stands at a quarter to three. Night has about fallen and lamp light is in the cabin.
“Run, Rockwell, out-of-doors and play awhile.” Quickly I stow the presents about the tree, hang sticks of candy from it, and light the candles.
Rockwell runs for Mr. Olson, and just as they approach the cabin the door opens and fairyland is revealed to them. It is wonderful. The interior of the cabin is illuminated as never before, as perhaps no cabin interior ever was among these wild mountains. Then all amazed and wondering those two children come in. Who knows which is the more entranced?
Then Olson and I drink in deep solemnity a silent toast; and the old man says, “I’d give everything—yes everything I have in the world—to have your wife here now!”
And the presents are handed out. For Olson this picture from Rockwell. Ah, he thinks it’s wonderful! Then for Rockwell this book—a surprise from Seward. Next for Olson a painting, a kitchen set, and a pocketknife. By this time he’s quite overcome. It’s the first Christmas he has ever had! And Rockwell, when he is handed two old copies of the “Geographic Magazine” cries in amazement, “Why I thought I was to have no presents!” But he gets besides a pocketknife and the broken fountain pen and sits on the bed looking at the things as if they were the most wonderful of gifts.
Dinner is now set upon the table. Olson adjusts his glasses and reads the formal menu that lies at his place.So we feast and have a jolly good time.
It is a true party and looks like one. Rockwell and I are in clean white shirts, Olson is magnificent in a new flannel shirt and his Sunday trousers and waistcoat. He wears a silk tie and in it a gold nugget pin. He is shaven, and clipped about the ears. How grand he looks! The food is good and plentiful, the night is long, only the Christmas candles are short-lived and we extinguish them to save them for another time. Finally as the night deepens Olson leaves us amid mutual expressions of delight in each other’s friendship, and Rockwell and I tumble into bed.
The next day and the next it is mild, resting—the weather seems to be—at this peaceful holiday season. We cut no wood and do little work. We write long letters, both of us, and consume at meal-time the food left over from Christmas. I read the “Odyssey,” great story! Just now I am past that magnificent slaughter of the wooers, else these delayed pages would still be unwritten. A few more Odysseys to read here in this wild place and one could forget the modern world and return in manners and speech andthought to the heroic age. That would be an adventure worth trying! Maybe we are not so deeply permeated with the culture of to-day that we could not throw it off. Surely the spirit of the heroes strikes home to our hearts as we read of them in the ancient books.
For the first time in days the sun has risen in a clear sky and shone upon the mountains across from us. It is colder, for ice has formed again on the tub of water out-of-doors. But there is a little wind.
I am writing in preparation for Olson’s trip. He too is making ready. Food for the foxes is on the stove for many days’ feeding, his engine gets a little burnishing—it’s no insignificant voyage to Seward in the winter. If only it holds out fair and calm until a steamer comes! There’s the hitch now. We have seen none go to Seward since the first of the month.
To-morrow probably the Christmas tree must come down. The hemlock trimmings shed all over the cabin till to-day I tore them out. Last night we had our final lighting of the tree. Rockwell and I stood out-of-doors and looked in at it. What a marvelous sight in the wilderness. If only some hapless castaways had strayed in upon us lured by that light! We sang Christmas carols out there in the dark, did a Christmas dance on the shore, and then came in and while the tree still burned told each other stories. Rockwell’s story was about the adventures of some children in the woods, full of thrilling climaxes. It came by the yard. I told him of an Indian boy who, longing for Christmas, went out into the dark woods at night and closed his eyes. And how behind his closed eyes he found a world rich in everything the other lacked. There was his Christmas tree and to it came the wild animals. They got each a present, the mother porcupine a box of little silken balls to stick onto her quills for decoration, and thefather porcupine a toothbrush because his large teeth were so very yellow. After the story it was bedtime. Well ... this fair day has passed, and with the night have come clouds and a cold gloom foreboding snow. But I have learned to expect nothing of the weather but what it gives us.
Squirlie’s birthday party. Squirlie is seated in a condensed milk box. At his back hangs a brown sweater. About him stand his presents consisting chiefly of feathers. The table is spread with the feast in shells and the whole is brilliantly illuminated by a Christmas tree candle. Long life to Squirlie and may he never fall to pieces nor be devoured by moths!
Yesterday it rained gently, to-day it pours. I sit here with the door open and the stove slumbering—such weather in this country that the world believes to be an iceberg! But in Seward and on the mountains no doubt it is snowing enough. To-day I made so good a drawing that I’m sitting up as if the flight of time and the coming of morning were no concern of mine. It is half-past twelve!
New Year’s Eve! Tuesday. This is the tenth anniversary of Rockwell’s parents and I have kept it as well as I could, working all day upon a drawing for his mother and to-night holding a kind of song service with Rockwell. Rockwell, who at nine years has every reason to celebrate to-day, however he may feel at twenty-nine, has written his mother a sweet little letter. I’m terribly homesick to-night and don’t know what to say about it in these genial pages. It has been a solemn day.
When Olson was here to-night I began from playing the flute to sing. He was delighted and I continued. What a strange performancehere in the wilderness, a little boy, an old man, listening as I sing loudly and solemnly to them without accompaniment. Olson brought us a pan of goat’s milk to-day, as he often does. I make junket of it and it is a truly delicious dish, ever so much better than when made of cow’s milk. It resembles a jelly of pure cream.
THE NORTH WIND
THE NORTH WIND
It has rained hard most of the day. At times a mist has hung in a band halfway up the mountain’s height across the bay. It is a remarkable sight. To-night is as warm as any night in spring or autumn. It thaws continually and even the ice that once covered the ground beneath the snow is fast disappearing. The year goes out without a steamer having been seen to come with the Christmas mail.
It is close to midnight. I have one secret resolution to make for the new year and, that I may make it as earnestly and as truly as possible, the stars and the black sky shall be my witness. And so with the year nineteen hundred and eighteen I end this page.