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Tous les autres exemplaires originaux sont filmis en commenpant par la premiere page qui comporte une empreinte d'impression ou d'illustration et en terminant par la dernidre page qui comporte une telle empreinte. Un des symboles suivants apparaitra sur la derniAre image de cheque microfiche, selon le cas: le symbols — ^ signifie "A SUIVRE ", le symbols V signifie "FIN ". Les cartes, planches, tableaux, etc., peuvent dtre filmis A des taux de reduction diff«rents. Lorsque le document est trop grand pour dtre reproduit en un seul clichA, il est film« A partir de I'angle supArieur gauche, de gauche A droite. et de haut en bas, en prenant le nombre d'images nAcessaire. Les diagrarnmes suivants illustrent la mAthode. 1 2 3 1 2 3 4 5 6 The Cosmopolitan /•yniit »'?'#■> V >n,fn .t- ■ ■'* 'titii; lo ///' af'iu'ty : ■''' '•?r» r oui- .ti • orithtg to 'tr\ needs. Vol.. X.\I\-. JANUARY, 1S98. No. _v L'o/'jri^'ht, /av7, l>y La Kci he. Tin-; R -AL KLONDIKE Us JAMI-.S S. Kashy-Smitii. F'OR twenty year.s tlieie had been a small Imt gradually increasing' army f)f l,icer diii^insis had Ie;lit. iSi),S. by Jim saile(i farther on to the month of the Yukon, ])rospectiri.ea Trail over Chilkoot I'ass to the head of navigation on the Yukon. The greater n\uuber of prosjiectors were in or about Circle Cit\- in .Mask;i and l)a\^■son in the Hrilish jjossessions. They found gold in plenty and many were se- curing enough to repav them for the ter- rible hardshii>s of travel and climate they had niulei gone. The diggings were rich, .N IIKISIIK.N W.VI Kl K. ■ir 228 THE REAL KLONDIKE. Yet the work of takinjj out the gohl was so great that all secun-d was well earned, and as yet ro extraordinar\' find had been made. But among these miners there appeared in the summer of '96 a man named Carmack, a ■■ squaw man," a salmon fisher, riving his trade along the Yukon, he came to the Klondike River, across the mouth of which he stretched his nets. With him were several Indians, and some chance of fate, or perchance some hint given by the Indians, led him up this river and into a tributary for t%venty- five miles — led him farther to a gravel bank where lie gouged out a few feet of dirt, washed it over and panne(l out a dollar of gold to a pound of diit. Remote, inaccessible and untraveled as was this region, the news spread on the wings of fame to all the Yukon country: and then began the local rush. Circle Cit\- and all other mining camps were depopulated. Men risked their lives a thousand times to avail themselves of the benefits of the greatest gold discovery in the history of the wtjild. Claims were staked out where the dirt \ielded ten dol- lars of gold to the pound. In the flush times of California and .\ustralia the rieli- est gravel yielded from si.\t\ to ninety cents to the ton ; vet here in the fio/en north was dirt th<"t gave up five hundred dollans to the pan and twenty thousand to the ton. Ill the mean time the world had heard the stories of gold finds in Alaska; but such stories are frequent and the world paid little lieed to tlieiu. Rut early in July of '97 there sailed through the Ciolden Gate and up to the' docks of vSaii I-'rancisco a treasure-shi]) bearing a luotlier crowd than ever swarmed upon a buccaneer's deck and greater riches than ever lay hidden in the hold of a S})atiisli galleon. The human freight was two score men, young and niiddle-age• s came from alldiiections adding huge piles to the inan\- tons of freight al- read \- piled u p . T h i s freight was a curious assortment. Hags and boxes of provisions and bunurney of a thousand miles over the inland sea. At noon w e m a d e Port Town- s e n d a n d took on more excursion- ists, more Klondikers a n d m f) re freight — tlie latter includ- ing burros 1) r o u g h t from Califor- nia to pack across Chil- koot Pass — and at nine o'clock we landed at \' i c t o r i a , where we re- nuuned long enough to clear and to take aboard more pas- sengers and freight. We got to Juneau at ten o'clock on Tuesday night, yet the sun had just set and there was broad daylight. Juneau is the metropolis of Alaska, having a population of about twenty - five hundred. It is a typical frontier mining town, rough and v conventional, with an o'^undance of saloons and gambling h ses, open day and night. The town . built on the water's edge at the foot t lofty cliffs, and there is apparently no room for it to oi" ciiii.KODr r.vss. 4438S ;rfic N. W. History Dept. faWOVtNCIAL LI EiR ARY VICTORIA, B. G. 23" THE REAL KLONDIKE. s])rfii(l in any direction. Tlicrc are some substantial frame business lionses and residenci'S, bnt nearly all the lionses are mere lojj lints and frame sliacks. At about seven o'elock on Thnrsday morniniet a. hore in search of information. I'or twenty-five cents I secured passage in a rowboat and was soon landed on the ed.ije of the marsh. A walk of sever.al hundred yards through mud and wiiter ankle-deep brought me to the tirst row of tents. Ilereadisniid sight greeted nie. There h,id been an unusnaHv high tide the night before ;ind the tents on the lower ground had been half submerged and the provisions in and about had been thoroughly soaked ami co\ired with mud or floated awav. Here and there a lew CK/iyrtuhl, Ifi/J, (*>• /..I K.'i/li-. C A.NOK I'K HIIJII TINd was hidden by the cloud, descended sheer to the water. From a point on this mount- ain side whence a rocky road wound out of sight into the fog, a ricketv wharf had been built out some ten y.iids into the water. We were anchored alongside this wharf, but no one was ])ermitted to laniice. All over the town men were hurrv ill};; hither and thither, some carr\- ing their snoods beyond reach of therisinjj tide, others packiiif^ their outfits into small bundles, others tr>iii,>i to subdue unruly bronchos. I-'ollowiiiK Broadway. I came to the woods, and was surprised to find more tents there than in the open. From the edjje of the woods the trail goes, a narrow, heavy road, thrf)ush the lofty pines and thick underbrush. All along its cf)urse was a line of tents, and the laiid-jiimi)ers' i)lai\irds were much in evidence, b'ollowiu};' this road for a mile and a half, I came to the tirst crossing of the Skaguay River. .\ rude log bridge had been built across it, and alread\- two men had been drowned there \V;'.gons, who.se owners were earning more th.in a hundred dollars a day, and nian\- pack- horses were passing and working the mudd\' road into great holes and ])U(lilUs. 1 CA.Mr 1.1 N I IK. M A.N. ReUiniing to town, 1 endeavored to ob- tain some reliable information concerning the Skagua\- Trail and White Pass. This was ((uite impossible. Xo one could be found who had gone farther than six miles along the trail. One man would say the trail was ojien to I,ake Bennett and the jiass low and easy ; another o\er- hearing the statements would deii\- them. Hundreds were leaving for Dyea to try the Chilkoot Pass: while every moment brought a canoe loaded with men and provisions from Dyea. All was con- fusion. Putting all stories together, I drew the following conclusions : That about twenty-five hundred men, six hun- dred hor.ses, some oxen and two thousand tons of provisions had been landed at .Skaguay ; that an indefinite number of men had started over the trail and were making slow progress, and that further tli;in this no one at Skagua\' knew any- thing. Returning to the steamer. T found that about half our ]irospectors had decided to tr\' the Skaguay Trail and weie being landed with their freight. .\s the steamer could neither unload at the wharf nor ap- proach within a considerable distance of 232 THE RE. \L KLONDIKE. Oifyrigllt, iSi/J, by l.a Kthhe. the shore, the unloading; was accom- plished by means of scows and tufjs. Tlie scows were loaded and run on shore, and when the tide had retreated wagons drove alongside and carried the freight above high-water mark. B}' noon the rain had stopped, and, our unloading being completed, we steamed away for Dyea, leaving a drenched and disconsolate-looking crowd of Klondikers. Dyea is six miles due west of vSkaguay, around a liigh point of land. It soon be- came apparent that Dyea is higher than Skaguay, well drained and beyond reach of the tides. On account of the shallow- ness of the water the steamer anchored about two miles from shore, and pas- sengers and freight were discharged, as at Skaguay, onto lighters. Securing a small boat, I made for a near point of land, and a walk of two miles over a rough road brought me to D_\ea. Dyea is verj' different from vSkaguay. Having been for many years the regular point of departure for tlie overland jour- ney to the Yukon, it has grown to be a substantial camp, with several frame and log houses. There are stores and saloons, and some lots have been located and staked off, but there is no appearance of a permanent settlement of any size, as at Skaguay. There are several hundred tents and a population of five or six hundred, but nearly everyone is on the move and the I'ACKDCKIS ON DYK.A TRAll,. population is daily changing, l-'roin the stories heard at Skagua>- I had e.xijected to find several thousand men here. The conditions were .soon explained. Al- though four or five thousand men had come to Dyea they had delayed little, and most of them were well on their way over the pass. Seeking an explanation of the fact that .so many were deserting Dyea for Skaguay, I learned that this had hap- pened in consequence of scarcity of packers at Dyea and the false stories coming from Skaguay that the White Pass was open and that there was an abundance of pack-animals there. The Chilkoot Pass has been so long traveled and is so well known from end to end that there exists at Dyea none of the confusion and uncertainty I found at Skaguay. The trail, beginning where the Dyea Rivcr empties into the inlet, runs along the river and u]) Dyea Cafion, thence uj) a steep and rocky ascent to the summit of Chilkoot Pa.ss, which is thirty-six hun- dred feet above the sea level and seven- teen miles from Dyea ; thence b3' an easy descent and across several small lakes to I/'yri^ht, iSij7, f'y La Koih^. COI.LECTINli TDI.I, ON Tllli UVKA TRAIL. 2.U /•///■; RI-.AI. KI.OXI^IKr. leiij;jtli, is in the tnidst of jjlacins, ovir scvfial of wliidi llu- trail j^ocs. l'"oitii iialcly liicsc jjlai-icis arc vtrv solid and contain no crevasses. I'orinirlN' llu- trail wound about Crater Kake, hut small boats now ply back and forth ferryinjj passen- jjirs and freij^ht. l-'ronithe foot of Cratur Lake the trail follows the conise of a tiir- bnlent niountaiii-streani for three miles to the head of Loiij; Lake, where there is a camp of several score tents. A fei r\ of two miles over Lon.y; Lake saves two miles of roii^li Iravelin;^' around it. iMom the foot of this lake theie is a tiani]) of half a mile to Dee]) Lake, where a sail of .1 inilr.ind a sweepinij around in a euive so that its I iitire leiinlli is not \ isible fmm an\ point. Seveial miners just fKim the Klondike retiniied with me to ci\ili/.ation. and they say that all claims on the Klondike and for many miles around have been taken up. an Lake is a small camp. Shortly after leavinj; this camp a beautiful view is obtained of Lake Lindeman in the distance. The last stajre of the journey, two and a half miles lonji^, ends at Cam]) Lindeman .it the southern end of the lake. Here are several hundred tents, and about four hundred men all busy cuttinji- and sawiiiij timber, bnildinff boats, jjackiiig- them and slart- injr ofl'on the sail of li\'e hundred miles to the Klondike. Hesides the whip-saws. there is a small sawmill cuttiiisr lumber. The smallest and cheapest boats brinji' three luindred dollars. Lake ILiteii;ds to be usid in their con- struction are already bein