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 UNIVERSITY LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 SAN DIEGO 
 Donated in memory of 
 
 John W. Snvder 
 
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 His Son and Daughter
 
 
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 THE WONDERS 
 
 A-L-A-S-K-A 
 
 ALEXANDERfBADLAM 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS AND MAPS 
 
 THIRD K E> I T I O N 
 
 (REVISED) 
 
 SAN FRANCISCO 
 
 PUBLISHED FOR THE AUTHOR
 
 COPYRIGHT, J891 
 Br ALEXANDER BADLAM 
 
 SAN FRANCISCO 
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1890 
 BY ALEXANDER BADLAM 
 
 SAN FRANCISCO
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 While the eye of almost the entire world is directed 
 to the wonders of the comparatively unexplored 
 regions of the far northwest, and while the elegant 
 steamers that weekly ply the inland channel, from 
 Port Townseiid to Glacier Bay are crowded to their 
 utmost capacity, it would seem an opportune time to 
 publish an illustrated work on the wonders of Alaska. 
 
 The author of this volume was Treasurer of the 
 California-Russian Fur Company, a corporation 
 which caused the maps to be made, and opened the 
 negotiations for the purchase of Alaska from the 
 Russian Government. Being in constant communi- 
 cation with the residents of that Territory, watching 
 with deepest interest its enterprise and progress, 
 having inade an extended trip to the most interesting 
 portion, studying the history of its strange people, 
 viewing and examining its remarkable glaciers, 
 gazing in wonder at its high and snow-capped 
 peaks, at its beautiful bays and fjords, sailing 
 through the narrow passages of the great Archi- 
 pelago from Victoria to Chilkat, receiving from the 
 queer people legends and histories of the numerous 
 tribes, the witchcraft and barbarism of its people, 
 and the great extent of its fisheries and seal-hunting 
 grounds, the writer believes himself sufficiently
 
 IV PREFACE. 
 
 informed to give a clear and concise sketch, more par- 
 ticularly of that portion of Alaska traversed by the 
 commodious passenger steamers which leave Tacoma, 
 Seattle, Port Townsend and Victoria every fourth or 
 fifth day in the months of June, July, August and 
 September of each year. 
 
 The reader can follow these pages and be fully 
 informed of all the principal points of interest along 
 the Inland Sea with its innumerable islands, the 
 great resources of this wonderful country, its native 
 villages, the grandeur of its scenery, the traditions 
 of the Indians, the success of the mission schools 
 and the extension of civilization.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 Alaska. 1542. Its Early History and Exploration. Vitus Behring. 
 His Exploits and Death. Arrival of Captain Cook. Tyranny of 
 the Russian Fur Company. The Purchase of Alaska in 1867, 
 Derivation of the Name. Western Union Telegraph Expedition. 
 Boundary. Extent of Alaska. Its Divisions, Rivers and 
 Mountains 1 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 CITIES OF THE GREAT NORTHWEST. 
 
 Beautiful Mountain Scenery. Mt. Hood. Mt. Tacoma. Portland. 
 Tacoma. Seattle. Port Townsend. Victoria. Vancouver, the 
 Terminus of the Canadian Pacific Railroad 11 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE INLAND PASSAGE. 
 
 From Port Townsend to the Great Glaciers. History of the Beautiful 
 . Country and Manners of its Queer People. Grandeur of its Scen- 
 ery. Sublimity of These Water Corridors. Description of the 
 Islands, Mountains, Fjords and Channels. Flora and Verdure. 
 Wrangell. Juneau. Glacier Bay. Killisnoo and Sitka 19 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE GLACIERS. 
 
 The Natural Formation of a Glacier. Birth in the Mountains and Grad- 
 ual Descent to the Sea. Dr. Kane's Theories. Evidences of Glacial 
 Action in the Sierra Nevadas and Rocky Mountains. Prof. Muir's 
 Discoveries. Description of the Great Muir Glacier. The Pacific. 
 Davidson. Takou. Rainbow. Auk and Eagle Glaciers. Prof. 
 Muir's Explorations. The Extent of Glacial Action. Investigation 
 in Greenland. Moraines. Definition, Description and Character- 
 istics. Moraines and Evidences of Pre-Historic Glaciers in the 
 United States... 35
 
 VI CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE NATIVE RACES. 
 
 Pre-Historic Theories. Alaska's I'rogress. Divisions of the Nations, 
 Tribes and Clans. Hyperborean Group. The Eskimo of the 
 North. Cannibalistic Koniagas. The Aleuts and Intermixtures of 
 the Aleutian Chain. The Savage Tinneh. The fierce and War- 
 like Thlinkets. Habits, Customs, Superstitions and Morals of the 
 Tribes 56 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 TOTEMS AND SHAMANS. 
 
 The Totem Pole; Its Emblematic Significance and Use. Grotesque 
 Carvings and Barbaric Conceptions. Wonderful Canoes. Graves 
 and Burial Customs. Primitive Religions. Witchcraft Among 
 Other Peoples and in Early History. The Potlach. Offering of the 
 Conscience-Stricken Indians. A System not Found Among More 
 Enlightened People 75 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 EDUCATION IN ALASKA. 
 
 History of Early Education Under the Russians. The Changes After 
 the Purchase of Alaska. Long Neglect. Present Inadequacy of 
 System. Work of the Agent and Needs of the Schools. Duncan's 
 Metlakatla Mission ; Its Prosperity and Thrift. Persecution by 
 Church and State. Final Immigration to Alaska. Work of the 
 Sectarian Missions 87 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 ANIMAL LIFE IN ALASKA. 
 
 Mammoths. Discovery of these Pre-Historic Monsters. The Remark- 
 able Bear of the Yukon. Other Species of the Bear. The Deer, 
 Buffalo and Vulpine Families of Alaska. Fur-Bearing Animals. 
 Ornithology. The Amphibia and Fishes of Alaskan Waters 97 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 RESOURCES. 
 
 Alaska's Great Wealth. Extent of Her Gold and Silver Mines. Valu- 
 able Discoveries of Mineral Wealth. The Abundance of Coal and 
 Timber. Value of Her Furs, Fisheries, etc. The Great Treadwell 
 Mine. Development of Placer Mining. Industry and Growth of 
 Her Canneries. Prospects for a Bright Future 112 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 PHANTOM CITIES AND MIRAGES. 
 
 Atmospheric Illusions in the Vicinity of the Glaciers. Professor Wil- 
 loughby's Silent City. Effect of the Late Sunset. Confirmations
 
 CONTENTS. vii 
 
 of the Discovery. The Phantom City Wonder. A Submerged City 
 Beneath Glacier Bay. The Reality Discovered in the Mysterious 
 Yukon Region, A Frozen City 130 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 CHINOOK JARGON. 
 
 Language of the Indians. Different Dialects. The Traders Introduce a 
 Common Jargon Which Nearly All Tribes Have Adopted. The 
 Chinook Used as Far South as Oregon. Examples for the Use 
 of Tourists 141 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 HOW TO GET THERE. 
 
 Prom San Francisco to Alaska. The Different Routes Open. Informa- 
 tion as to Connections. Schedule of Steamer Movements. Things 
 that Will Come Handy on the Trip, and Bits of General Information. 145 
 
 ADDENDUM 148
 
 FOREST SCENE IN ALASKA. 
 
 From photograph 7338, by PARTRIDGE, Portland, Oregon.
 
 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 The Great Muir Glacier. (Frontispiece.) Photographed by I. W. Taber. 
 
 Muir Glacier at 10 P. M v 
 
 Forest Scene near Sitka ix 
 
 Among the Ice Cakes Muir Glacier 3 
 
 Steamer Ancon Behind an Iceberg in Takou Inlet 7 
 
 Harbor of Sitka Wharf and Islands, from Baranoff Castle 19 
 
 Map No. 1, From Port Townsend to Texada Island 21 
 
 " " 2, From Texada Island to Queen Charlotte Sound 23 
 
 " " 3, From Queen Charlotte Sound to Finlayson Channel. ... 25 
 
 " " 4, From Finlayson Channel to Malacca Pass 27 
 
 " " 5, From Malacca Pass to Cleveland Peninsula 29 
 
 " " 6, From Cleveland Peninsula to Stephens Pass 31 
 
 " " 7, From Stephens Pass to Muir Glacier 33 
 
 " " 8, Sitka, Peril Straits and Vicinity 35 
 
 - Glacier Bay from the top of the Glacier looking Southward 37 
 
 Davidson Glacier, Chilkat Inlet 41 
 
 Crevasse in the Muir Glacier 47 
 
 Effect of Glacial Erosion Near Muir Glacier 53 
 
 Auk Indians near Juneau 59 
 
 Indian Funeral at Fort Wrangell 67 
 
 Ancient Mummy from Kagamil 71 
 
 Bear Totems at Fort Wrangell 77 
 
 Indian Graves at Fort Wrangell 81 
 
 Sitka, from Baranoff Castle 89 
 
 Greek Church, Sitka '. 93 
 
 An Alaskan Mammoth 98 
 
 Chief Kow-ee after a Bear Hunt , 101 
 
 Indian Bridge near Sitka 105 
 
 City of Juneau and Treadwell Mine 113 
 
 Killisnoo, near Sitka 1-1 
 
 Willoughby's Silent City 132 
 
 Taber's Phantom City 13(i 
 
 Mirage of Muir Glacier in Glacier Bay 14! J 
 
 Shaman in Dancing Costume I* 2 
 
 Transparent Iceberg in Takou Inlet W6
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 ALASKA. 1542. ITS EARLY HISTORY AND EX- 
 PLORATION. VITUS BEHRING. His EXPLOITS 
 AND DEATH. ARRIVAL OF CAPTAIN COOK. 
 TYRANNY OF THE RUSSIAN FUR COMPANY. THE 
 PURCHASE OF ALASKA IN 1867. DERIVATION OF 
 THE NAME. WESTERN UNION TELEGRAPH EX- 
 PEDITION. BOUNDARY. EXTENT OF ALASKA. 
 ITS DIVISIONS, RIVERS AND MOUNTAINS. 
 
 LASKA, as it is now known, 
 was Russian-America prior 
 to the acquisition of the Ter- 
 ritory by the United States 
 Government. 
 
 As early as A. D. 1542, 
 the Spanish explorers moved 
 northward from Mexico up 
 the Pacific Coast in search of the Anain passage to 
 India, in the existence of which they firmly believed, 
 and which they looked upon as a short cut to India 
 and to wealth. In 1592 Juan de Fuca believed that 
 "he had reached this goal of his ambition and realized 
 the dream. The point which he thought led on 
 to fame and fortune was north of the forty-eighth 
 parallel. 
 
 The Russians had gradually pushed from the west- 
 ward into Siberia and explored much, of the Kani-
 
 2 INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 chatkan coast to the northward. Their object was 
 not to enrich geography nor to aid the cause of 
 science in any way, the impulse being merely the 
 extention of trade and entirely mercenary, while 
 the tales told by returned traders stimulated in the 
 ever-aggressive court at St. Petersburg a desire for 
 conquest and territorial acquisition. As the natural 
 result, an expedition was fitted out in 1728 and 
 placed under the command of Capt. Vitus Behring, 
 who, with a corps of scientists coasted north and 
 through Behring Straits. Behring was not a ven- 
 turesome man, and, after having demonstrated to his 
 own satisfaction that Asia and America were separate 
 continents, he returned to Kamchatka without even 
 having had a glimpse of the American coast. In the 
 Spring of 1729 Behring made an effort to find a coast 
 line east of Kamchatka, but, on account of stress of 
 weather and his natural timidity, turned the head of 
 his vessel for home. But trade, which after all had 
 been as great a factor as science in the discovery and 
 settlement of new lands, was striding onward and 
 had pushed its way into the lands to the northward 
 and eastward. Rumors of a vast unexplored country 
 in the east, constantly received from the Indians, 
 and Behring' s report of his voyages, had excited 
 great interest in official circles in Russia, and, in 
 June, 1741, a new expedition consisting of two ves- 
 sels, with Behring in command, started eastward. 
 They shortly became separated, and one of them, 
 arriving off what is now known as Cook's Inlet, met 
 a horrible reception from the Indians, who killed a 
 number of its men, and they beat a retreat and re- 
 turned home. Behring sighted Kaiak Island and lay 
 to, off the coast, but without attempting exploration
 
 INTRODUCTORY. 3 
 
 put to sea the next day. Adverse weather came on, 
 the reckoning was lost, and the ship was wrecked on 
 Behriiig Island, where Behring died. The other 
 members of this part of the expedition reached home 
 after much peril, privation and suffering. 
 
 Shortly after these occurrences trade again came to 
 the aid of science. A trader, sailing eastward, dis- 
 covered Attou Island, the most westerly of the Aleut- 
 ian group, and the wealth of goods with which he 
 returned made the islands known to traders and 
 navigators and they soon had a place on the charts. 
 The incentive to discovery was stimulated and the 
 Russians at last reached Oonalaska, and meanwhile, 
 the Spaniards had arrived at Queen Charlotte Islands. 
 In 1775 they had reached as far north as Sitka. In. 
 the following year Captain Cook, a wise, yet one of 
 the most adventurous exploring navigators of his 
 time, appeared in these waters. He made no new 
 discoveries, but attempted several explorations and 
 changed many names of places into Bnglish nomen- 
 clature. He reached Behring Strait, from whence 
 he returned to the Sandwich Islands, where he was 
 killed, and, so tradition sayeth, cooked and eaten by 
 the natives. 
 
 The history of the Alaskan region for the eighty 
 years, dating to the American acquirement, is a sad 
 tale. It is a record of Russian avarice, cruelty and 
 despotism and the most outrageous atrocities by the 
 Russian-American Fur Company, which, having 
 absorbed all the other trading companies and ob- 
 tained the Royal patronage, ruled with an iron hand. 
 License lent zest to cupidity and unrestrained tyr- 
 anny gave full swing to robbery, murder and rapine. 
 International squabbles arose through the presence
 
 4 INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 of English and other foreign traders and speculators, 
 who were looked upon by the minions of the Russian- 
 American Company as interlopers. The scandal 
 became so great and the protests against the Com- 
 pany's actions so numerous, that, when its charter 
 expired, in 1862, it was refused a further concession, 
 and from that time until the transfer of the Terri- 
 tory to the United States, it had no privileges that 
 were not accorded to all organizations or individuals. 
 Some of the traders or seal-hunters in the Aleut- 
 ian group made complete and perfect maps from 
 Vancouver's survey of 1793, and adding thereto the 
 surveys and information of many subsequent explor- 
 ers and navigators, sent their maps and other data 
 to capitalists in San Francisco in 1866, with a sug- 
 gestion to purchase the property, consisting of ships 
 and furs, houses and the acquired rights of the Rus- 
 sian-American Fur Company. A company, called 
 the California-Russia Fur Company, was formed 
 with the late Gen. John F. Miller as its President, 
 Eugene L. Sullivan, Vice President, J. H. Baker as 
 Secretary, and the author of this work as Treasurer, 
 and they forwarded to Washington the first informa- 
 tion on which was based the offer of the United 
 States to purchase Alaska from Russia, which was 
 tendered by Mr. Clay, then our Minister at St. 
 Petersburg. The contract to purchase the holdings 
 of the Russian Company was signed by their agent 
 and the steamer fitted up to go north and make the 
 delivery, but through the treachery of one of the 
 officers of the California Company the contract was 
 canceled and the valuable property turned over to 
 others. The negotiations for the purchase of Alaska 
 were completed on March 30, 1867, and ratified on
 
 INTRODUCTORY. 5 
 
 the 28th of May following, when it was formally con- 
 veyed to our Government on payment of the sum of 
 seven million, two hundred thousand dollars in gold. 
 
 Public opinion was inclined at the time to ridicule 
 that step, but Secretary Seward, with rare foresight, 
 judged the value of the country, and is reported to 
 have said that it might not be in his generation, but 
 at some time the move would be appreciated. It 
 can be seen by a glance at the statistics of the past 
 twenty years the wealth that has been returned to 
 the government, the returns from the fur seal lease 
 to the government from the company now holding it, 
 and the new resources constantly discovered and 
 developed would justify this assertion. 
 
 The term "Alaska," by which the extreme north- 
 ern territory of the United States is designated, is a 
 corruption of the aboriginal word, "Al-ak-shak," 
 meaning a great country, or a great continent, which 
 is certainly appropriate when it is considered that 
 Alaska contains nearly six hundred thousand square 
 miles as great an area as is comprised in the entire 
 United States, north of Georgia and east of the Mis- 
 sissippi river. Al-ak-shak was the term the early 
 voyagers heard applied to the unknown land, and we 
 find it on French, German and Spanish maps in 
 various forms. Captain Cook was the first to give it 
 a Saxon spelling and pronunciation, in the atlas of 
 his first voyage in 1778. On its purchase by our 
 government, Senator Sumner, who had been warm 
 in his support of Seward's policy, urged the adoption 
 of "Alaska" and it was done. 
 
 Meanwhile the failure of the first cable under the 
 Atlantic induced the directors of the Western Union 
 Telegraph Company to attempt the construction of a
 
 6 INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 telegraph line which, commencing at San Francisco, 
 should traverse Oregon, Washington, British Col- 
 umbia and Alaska; then, crossing Behring Straits by 
 cable, entering eastern Siberia and traveling south, 
 form a junction with the Russian line, which had 
 then reached Amoor. 
 
 Many doubts were advanced as to the feasibility of 
 this route, but, in 1865, an expedition under Captain 
 Bulkley left San Francisco. Many miles of line 
 were built through densely timbered country, and 
 finally, after an expenditure of over $3,000,000, the 
 ultimate success of the second Atlantic cable in 1866 
 put an end to the proceedings in this direction and 
 the expeditions were recalled. Though the primary 
 object, of the expedition was not carried out, the 
 benefits resulting to geography and to science in 
 general have been great. 
 
 According to the treaty of concession, the south- 
 ern boundary of Alaska lies in the parallel of 
 54 and 40', and the imaginary line ascends north- 
 erly along the center of Portland Channel to the 
 Coast Range where it follows the indentations of the 
 coast at a distance of ten leagues until Mt. St. Klias 
 is reached, where the line strikes 141 of west 
 longitude, which then becomes an eastern boundary. 
 Attou Island in the Aleutian group, which is only 
 thirty miles from Asia, is the extreme western point 
 of Alaska, and the vast extent of unexplored ice 
 bars alone the way for the extension of territory in 
 the north. Alaska's extreme breadth from east to 
 west is over two thousand four hundred miles, and 
 from north to south about eighteen hundred miles. 
 The extreme easterly and northeasterly boundaries 
 are still undefined, the character of the country
 
 INTRODUCTORY. 7 
 
 being such that no surveys have ever been made. 
 Professor Davidson estimates the shore line of 
 Alaska, on its numerous islands, sounds and inlets 
 at thirty thousand miles; more than three times the 
 coast line of the United States on the Atlantic and 
 Pacific south of British Columbia. Congressman 
 Morrow, in his great speech before the American 
 Protective Association, at its banquet held in New 
 York on January 17, 1889, made the statement that, 
 owing to the extreme westerly boundary of Alaska, 
 San Francisco was six hundred miles east of the 
 geographical center of the extreme eastern and west- 
 ern boundaries of the United States, and therefore 
 San Francisco might be called an eastern rather 
 than a western city. 
 
 Alaska is divided into three natural divisions. 
 One, extending northerly from the Alaskan range 
 of mountains which forms the westerly end of the 
 Alaskan Peninsula to the Arctic Ocean, may be 
 called the Yukon division; another, the Aleutian, 
 which embraces the peninsula and islands west of 
 the one hundred and fiftieth degree of longitude. 
 The third may be called the Sitkan, which will 
 include the southeastern portion of Alaska from 
 Dixon Inlet, in latitude 54 40' north, to Cross 
 Sound. 
 
 Northerly from Norton's Sound the great River 
 Yukon with its tributaries covering three thousand 
 miles, and navigable at certain seasons of the year 
 for over two thousand miles, drains the northern 
 portion of Alaska, emptying into Behring Sea a 
 larger volume of water than the Mississippi pours 
 into the Gulf of Mexico. Mining is made practicable 
 and possible in this section of Alaska by crossing the
 
 INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 Chilkat range of perpetual snow, on sleds drawn by 
 dogs, early in the season, and by building rafts or 
 boats and floating down to the mining camps near 
 the head cf navigation. 
 
 The principal mountains of Alaska and their 
 estimated heights are: Mt. St. Elias, 18,000 feet; 
 Alt. Fairweather, 14,000 feet; Mt. Crillon, 13,500 
 feet; Iliamna Volcano, 12,000; Redoubt Volcano, 
 11,300 feet; Alai Volcano, 9,000 feet; Mt. Calder, 
 9,000 feet; Mt. Shishaldin, 8,955 feet; Goreloi Peak, 
 8,000 feet; the RomanzorF Mountains, 8,000. The 
 number of volcanic peaks is put down at sixty-one, 
 ten of which show symptoms of activity. 
 
 The time has now arrived when the country should 
 have a territorial form of government, with such 
 modification as may be deemed advisable, liberal 
 land laws and such other inducements as will 
 encourage the immigration of a healthful population. 
 In justice to the people of the Territory that irregu- 
 lar and irrational condition of public affairs now 
 existing should end. 
 
 This year the lease of the seal fisheries has been 
 sold to the highest bidder. It matters but little 
 which company has possession of the exclusive right 
 to take seals, as it is a wise provision to prevent a 
 complete annihilation of the seal-bearing animals of 
 the Aleutian group, and it is undoubtedly to the 
 interest of the government that this valuable source 
 of revenue should be thus protected. Reasons for 
 this are obvious and many, and it is of vital 
 importance to certain communities of Alaska's 
 people, but no private company, whatever the man- 
 agement of that company, should hold supreme 
 sway over, or a controlling interest in any domain
 
 INTRODUCTORY. 9 
 
 inhabited by citizens of the United States and under 
 its flag. 
 
 A convention, held at Juneau, on November 5, 
 1889, formulated a memorial, which is now before 
 Congress, asking that the Territory be allowed a 
 delegate in that body, that the homestead laws be 
 extended to Alaska in a modified form, that timber- 
 cutting laws be passed for the Territory and that a 
 commission be created for the purpose of forming a 
 code of laws for Alaska. There is nothing unreason- 
 able in this. Some special legislation is essential 
 owing to the anomalous conditions of the country 
 geographically, and her queer people, but there are 
 in the Territory law abiding, patriotic people in 
 sufficient numbers to govern themselves under ade- 
 quate and fixed laws, and with a delegate in 
 Congress to explain its wants and speak for its 
 people. 
 
 Land and timber laws are an absolute necessity. 
 The land taken up, that is, what is occupied, is held 
 under precarious conditions, the people being able 
 to get no titles to their claims and living in a con- 
 sequent state of insecurity. The lands are valuable 
 and the people should be secured in their possession 
 of them. Under the existing regulations there is no 
 provision by which the people can make use of the 
 timber about them. When these things are altered 
 and a good and stable government takes the place of 
 the present imperfect judicial form and corporation 
 rule in the Territory, immigration will be encour- 
 aged and attracted to this section, but not before. 
 
 I regret that the present administration seems not 
 entirely in accord with the people on this subject, 
 but Congress should early take up the matter of the
 
 10 
 
 INTRODUCTORY. 
 
 wants and needs of Alaska, and grant the wishes of 
 the people to which they, as citizens of the United 
 States, clearly are entitled. 
 
 The chapters that follow will give the reader a 
 glimpse of the wonderful grandeur of that curious 
 formation of islands, made up by the maze of pas- 
 sages and channels known as the Inland Passage; 
 they will also give a brief and concise acco,unt of the 
 native races, with their habits, customs, supersti- 
 tions and primitive religion; will inform him some- 
 what as to the natural history of the Territory, and 
 will acquaint him with the mission and school work 
 at Metlakatla, Sitka and elsewhere, giving informa- 
 tion of the great extent of the fisheries, the wonderful 
 mines, the development of numerous other resources 
 and the bright future in prospect for this Uncle 
 Sam's great northern domain.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 CITIES OF THE GREAT NORTHWEST. 
 
 BEAUTIFUL MOUNTAIN SCENERY. MT. HOOD MT. 
 TACOMA. PORTLAND. --TACOMA. SEATTLE. 
 PORT TOWNSEND. VICTORIA. VANCOUVER, THE 
 TERMINUS OF THE CANADIAN PACIFIC RAILROAD. 
 
 PORTLAND. 
 
 HE cities of the extreme north 
 west- those products of a 
 phenominal growth have, 
 surely, a claim upon our 
 attention. Should the tour- 
 ist return home without hav- 
 ing visited these pushing 
 towns, he would be regarded 
 as one whose opportunities 
 for observation were large, 
 yet one who had taken no 
 
 favorable cognizance thereof; so, glancing at them 
 as we go, Portland is the first upon our route. 
 
 It is a second San Francisco, with all its push, 
 vigor, peculiarities of nationalities and strength of 
 local position. Portland is American in her growth, 
 progress, -public schools, wharves, churches and 
 modern improvements. She is the metropolis of 
 Oregon, the railroad feeder, the supply center and 
 wholesale mart of Oregon, Washington and Idaho.
 
 12 PORTLAND TACOMA. 
 
 The city is located upon the Willamette river, 
 about twelve miles from its confluence with the 
 Columbia. It stands upon a level strip of area 
 on the west bank of the river, along which it 
 extends for several miles, reaching back upon the 
 slopes to the "Heights," two precipitous bluffs, 
 from which can be observed the wide extent of the 
 surrounding country, for, when one looks to the 
 east or north his vision takes in that scope of 
 territory embraced by the picturesque Cascade range 
 of mountains. 
 
 Portland's population can safely be set down as 
 80,000. There the same restless activity of life and 
 the same earnestness of purpose is manifested as is 
 seen in every growing city on the Pacific Slope. 
 
 TACOMA. 
 
 Tacoma lies next in our way, and this marvel of 
 tenacity and intelligent adherance to a town site in 
 which, five years ago, stumps of fir and pine stood 
 undisturbed in the heart of the embryonic city, on 
 Pacific Avenue, its now leading thoroughfare, is an 
 objective lesson in the tremendous energies of the 
 people of Washington. It is, besides, an inspira- 
 tion. Like its rival, Seattle, its growth and beckon- 
 ing future are largely due to the pluck and confi- 
 dence of those who, less than a decade ago, "came 
 to stay." Notwithstanding Tacoma's great increase 
 of population, suddenly rising from 5,000 in 1883 
 to a population of over 50,000 at the present writing, 
 her growth may be said to have been strictly con- 
 servative, the inducements for investment and the 
 opportunities for homes being all that was claimed 
 for the city by its early settlers and promoters. It
 
 CITY OF TACOMA. 13 
 
 has never oscillated with the feverish threatenings 
 between boom and panic, as has been the lainentable 
 experience of so many new towns in the middle-west 
 and on the Pacific slope. It is solid, never having 
 been over-boomed, and to predict adequately its won- 
 derful future would be equal in rashness with fixing 
 to-day the limits of Chicago fifty years hence. 
 
 Tacoma is situated on the west shore of Com- 
 mencement Bay on Puget Sound, the longest stretch 
 of deep water of good aquatic behavior known on the 
 world's map. The city is located on a high bluff ris- 
 ing by easy gradations from the water till it reaches 
 to the top of a long level area where are many fine 
 villa residences, commodious public school edifices 
 and handsome churches. It possesses electric and 
 cable lines and four railroads, and is the western 
 terminus of the Northern Pacific railroad. In fact it 
 has been the pet and protege of the latter corporation 
 and is indebted largely to its favors for its enterprises 
 and early stimulus given to its aspirations. 
 
 On its shores are shipping wharves, and in close 
 proximity are large lumber mills, grain elevators 
 and coal bunkers. Its harbor is deep and wide, and 
 from the broad extended piers ships depart daily for 
 all ports on our southern coast, and frequent ship- 
 ments of lumber are taken for China, Japan, the 
 Sandwich Islands, South America, and particularly 
 for Australia and the Colonies. From it are also 
 shipped by rail or vessel the enormous products of 
 the Puyallup hop fields, nine miles distant, as well 
 as wheat which comes from the great Walla Walla 
 and Big Bend fields of eastern Washington. 
 
 Tacoma' s leading citizens are, as a rule, young 
 men, ambitious and riveted by a zealous devotion
 
 14 TACOMA SEATTLE. 
 
 to its prosperity and permanence. Scores of for- 
 tunes have been made by individuals who., investing 
 in their town lots and filled with sublime faith, 
 u stood by their burg," as the expression runs there, 
 and sold their lots, costing originally from two 
 hundred to three hundred dollars and even less, 
 for thousands. 
 
 About fifty miles to the southeast rises Mt. 
 Tacoma, 14,444 feet above the sea level, which, 
 towering in rugged grandeur, robed in perennial 
 snows and seamed with frictions of the glaciers, is 
 visible to the best advantage in this modern city 
 of destiny. 
 
 SEATTLE. 
 
 Twenty-eight miles further north and on the east 
 side of Puget Sound is the old Chinook town of 
 Seattle. Its settlement antedates that of its rival by 
 something more than a generation's span. Its 
 citizens claim to possess the best harbor on the 
 sound, while it is nearer the coal mines and the 
 almost inexhaustible lumber regions. Its harbor is 
 almost circular, leaving the city rising up from its 
 shores in gently sloping terraces with the graceful 
 sweep of a wide amphitheatre. Looking over the 
 waters which lave this beautiful city is seen the vast 
 Olympian range, while south of the city Mt. Tacoma 
 rises lofty and white, with broad gigantic shoulders, 
 like another Atlas weighted down with almost 
 unbearable burdens. Here this mountain is not 
 Mt. Tacoma. They insist that it shall be called 
 Mt. Rainier at least their side of it. 
 
 The situation of Seattle is very commanding; its 
 wharfage is almost unlimited, affording most excel- 
 lent facilities for commercial enterprises. There are
 
 SEATTLE PORT TOWNSEND. 15 
 
 her large and substantial business blocks of stone 
 and brick, schools, hospitals, fine public buildings 
 and private residences, evincing taste, wealth and 
 enterprise. Though a terrible conflagration des- 
 troyed a greater portion of the business edifices of 
 the city in June, 1889, these have been replaced 
 by more substantial and elegant ones, so that the 
 fire, though a severe blow at the occupied energies 
 of the city, will yet prove to be a blessing in dis- 
 guise. There is no such thing as dampening the 
 fervor or chilling the zeal of the people of Seattle. 
 
 Its trade is largely in lumber and coal, and it 
 has business connections all over China, Japan and 
 South America, wherever a vessel may wander to 
 exchange commodities. Five railroads are trade 
 bearers to this market, while cable and electric lines 
 ramify in every direction through this bustling, 
 prosperous, dauntless, ideal city. Its future, based 
 upon geographical advantages of location, the min- 
 eral and the timber all around it, its mills and rail- 
 road alliances, as well as upon the business sagacity 
 of its leading citizens, must surely be a grand one. 
 
 As for its population, about which there is so 
 much discussion, when Tacoma mentally takes the 
 census, it is safe to say that Seattle leads her neigh- 
 bor and sister city by about five thousand, thus 
 allowing Seattle to count a population of fifty-five 
 thousand within her city limits. 
 
 PORT TOWNSEND. 
 
 Port Townsend is another of a series of young 
 cities which has lately put on new life and is striv- 
 ing for predominance on Puget Sound. It is a port 
 of entry near the military post, Fort Townseud,
 
 1 6 PORT TOWNSEND VICTORIA. 
 
 which commands the Straits of Juan de Fuca. It has 
 a capacious harbor. Nearly all the commerce of the 
 Sound must pass this gateway and hence contiguous 
 territories are beginning to pay tribute to its mart. 
 As a port of entry it is credited with being second 
 only to New York, in the extent of export tonnage. 
 
 It has a population of from five thousand to six 
 thousand. Shrewd business men have invested all 
 their confidence and their means in this progressive 
 city which received its stimulus of rapid growth in 
 1885, when the other cities around it began their 
 career of sudden and conspicuous prosperity. Busi- 
 ness blocks worthy of any metropolis now adorn 
 Port Townsend, and more are almost continually in 
 course of erection, while two railroad companies, 
 which only recently made bids for accessible water 
 fronts, have sent surveyors in the field to select the 
 most advantageous route for connecting this city 
 with Portland, Oregon, and the country on the east 
 of th-e Cascade Mountains. 
 
 For the tourist or lover of nature Port Townsend, 
 besides being a promising place to invest in, pos- 
 sesses perhaps the most glorious mountain scenery 
 in Washington. Climbing the cliffs which look 
 down upon the city, one can behold a scene of rare 
 enchantment. On a clear day the lofty peaks of the 
 entire Cascade Range, from Mt. Baker on the north 
 to Mt. Tacoma 011 the south, can be witnessed 
 in one grand procession of white-capped summits 
 and glittering pinnacles. There is said to be three 
 score of them. 
 
 VICTORIA. 
 
 Across the Straits of Fuca, and distant three hours 
 run by steamer, is Victoria, the Capital of British
 
 CITY OF VICTORIA. 1 7 
 
 Columbia, and in point cf beauty of location is not 
 surpassed in the Pacific Northwest. Over thirty 
 years ago Victoria was a post of the Hudson Bay 
 Company and grew into a settlement during the 
 Frazer River gold excitement. Notwithstanding 
 that this activity was short lived, Victoria became a 
 place of steady growth till her population is now 
 reckoned at twenty thousand, of which the Chinese 
 are no insignificant portion. 
 
 The entrance to the city by the inner harbor, is 
 long, rocky and winding and can admit only craft of 
 lesser proportions, but its outer harbor, one mile 
 away, is ample for vessels of all sizes. Its commerce 
 embraces not only the whole North Pacific coast, but 
 extends from Japan to Montreal, New York and even 
 to England. The old Hudson Bay Company, opu- 
 lent as ever, has one of its chief stations here. It is 
 a great shipping point for fish, lumber and furs. 
 
 The city is remarkable for its well arranged and 
 well constructed roads, and has many pleasant drives 
 into the surrounding country. From Beacon Hill, 
 rising in the center of the park, there is a fine out- 
 look up the island. Gazing eastward, Mt. Baker 
 lifts its hoary head twelve thousand feet, while one 
 hundred and fifty miles further south, Mt. Tacoma 
 shows itself the most commanding of all the peaks. 
 
 In every sense of the word Victoria is a handsome 
 city. Americans on visiting it are struck by the 
 solidity and graceful style of the architecture in its 
 business houses, churches and schools. Being the 
 seat of Government of British Columbia, it contains 
 many government buildings of magnitude and beauty 
 of design. Massiveness as well as symmetry seem 
 to have been the objects of the architect.
 
 iS 
 
 VICTORIA VANCOUVER. 
 
 There is a pleasant drive out to Esquimault (pro- 
 nounced Squimalt) where the Dominion Government 
 has constructed one of the finest docks on the coast. 
 English men-of-war are to be found in this naval 
 station at any time. Victoria, distant two thousand, 
 nine hundred miles from Montreal, had hoped to be 
 the western terminus of the Canadian Pacific road, 
 but in this she was doomed to disappointment, 
 Vancouver carrying away the honors and benefits 
 
 derived from such a distinction. 
 
 
 
 k 
 
 VANCOUVER. 
 
 Vancouver is eighty miles from Victoria and the 
 two are connected by a line of swift steamers. Van- 
 couver is situated on a peninsula from the main 
 land which shuts in an arm of the sea called Burrard 
 Inlet, forming a perfect harbor. The city slopes on 
 the one side to the waters of Burrard Inlet, and on 
 the other to English Bay, which provides for perfect 
 drainage, and, surrounded on all sides by sublime 
 mountain and water scenery, Vancouver is a busy, 
 healthful and beautiful city. It is a little over two 
 years old and is a city of between twelve and fifteen 
 thousand inhabitants.
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE INLAND PASSAGE. 
 
 FROM PORT TOWNSEND TO THE GREAT GLACIERS. - 
 HISTORY OF THE BEAUTIFUL COUNTRY AND MAN- 
 NERS OF ITS QUEER PEOPLE. GRANDEUR OF ITS 
 SCENERY. SUBLIMITY OF THESE WATER CORRI- 
 DORS. DESCRIPTION OF THE ISLANDS, MOUNTAINS, 
 FJORDS AND CHANNELS. FLORA AND VERDURE. - 
 WRANGELL. JUNEAU. GLACIER BAY. KILLIS- 
 NOO AND SITKA. 
 
 S the tourist, bent on beholding 
 the scenic grandeur, the frigid 
 sublimity and the all prevail- 
 ing weirdness of Alaska's 
 shores and mountains, gener- 
 ally embarks at Port Town- 
 send, we too will put off from 
 this thriving port and grad- 
 ual ly open o.ut the panorama 
 as the numerous islands, precipices, crooks and turns 
 will permit. 
 
 Leaving the deep waters of the Sound then, a north- 
 westerly course across the Straits of Fuca brings us to 
 Victoria, a distance of thirty-four miles, where a stop 
 of six hours is usually made to receive freight and 
 passengers and make a clearance at the Custom 
 House. We leave Victoria in a northerly direction 
 and keep to the west of the San Juan Islands, noted 
 for their having been disputed territory between the
 
 20 CAPT. GEORGE VANCOUVER. 
 
 British Government and the United States ; they 
 were finally awarded by commission to the latter. 
 These Islands are about eight miles from Victoria. 
 Thence proceeding northerly through the De Haro 
 Straits among innumerable islands, and passing 
 Admiral Island on the east, at about thirty miles from 
 Victoria, AVC wind through Active Pass and take a 
 northwesterly course opposite Point Roberts; pass- 
 ing the light house at Entrance Island, opposite 
 Nanaimo, which latter is about three miles southeast 
 from Departure Bay. 
 
 On our right is the mainland of British Columbia 
 with its beautiful mountain view and on our left tower 
 the mountains of Vancouver Island, which came into 
 the possession of England about 1789, deriving its 
 name from the great explorer. George Vancouver 
 was an English navigator who had served as mid- 
 shipman in the second and third voyages of Captain 
 Cook, in 1772-75 and 1776-80. He was made first 
 lieutenant and, about 1789, was commissioned to 
 proceed to Nootka, with orders for the surrender of 
 the place, from the Court at Madrid to Quadra, the 
 Spanish Commandant. He was ordered to make a 
 survey of the coast northward from latitude 30, and 
 to ascertain if there was any connection between the 
 coast and Canada, by means of rivers, lakes or inlets. 
 
 In 1791, Vancouver left England and made an 
 examination of the Sandwich Islands, and in 1792, 
 he crossed to the American coast, secured the sur- 
 render of Nootka, and took possession of Vancouver 
 Island in behalf of Great Britain. Vancouver spent 
 the summers of 1792-93-94 surveying the coast from 
 the Straits of Fuca as far north as Cook's Inlet and 
 wintered in the Sandwich Islands. He gave the
 
 MAP No. 1. 
 
 From Port Townsend to Texada Island.
 
 VANCOUVER ISLAND. 21 
 
 island the name of Quadra and Vancouver, but the 
 first is no longer used. In 1843, the Hudson Bay 
 Company established a trading post at Victoria. 
 The Island was long claimed by the United States, 
 but Great Britain was confirmed in her possession by 
 the treaty of '46. In 1849 ^ was granted to the 
 Hudson Bay Company for fifty years. In 1859 ^ 
 was formed into a colony, and in 1866 was consoli- 
 dated with British Columbia. Vancouver Island now 
 forms the southwesterly corner of British Columbia, 
 and lies between north latitudes 48 and 50 and 
 west longitudes 123 and 128. Its length is 275 
 miles and its greatest breadth is 85 miles. The 
 Island is separated from Washington by the Straits 
 of Fuca, and from the mainland of British Columbia 
 by the Canal de Haro, the Gulf of Georgia, John- 
 stone Strait and Queen Charlotte Sound. The coast 
 is much indented and has numerous inlets. The 
 principal ones are Nootka Sound, Barclay or Nitnat 
 Sound, Victoria Harbor, Esquimault Harbor and 
 Nanaimo Harbor. The city of Victoria is the capi- 
 tal of British Columbia. Its valley contains 300,000 
 acres. 
 
 On entering these northern latitudes, one who is 
 not thoroughly acquainted with the geography of 
 these shores, or the early explorations of the coasts, 
 would probably be surprised at meeting with so many 
 Spanish names. The fact is that the old Castilian 
 voyagers have not to-day the credit that is their due, 
 for, in change of hands and the vicissitudes which 
 this country has witnessed in the course of centuries, 
 many names have been changed or, from Indian or 
 foreign corruption, have become so distorted as to be 
 almost beyond recognition. Thus many a hardy
 
 22 CASTILLIAX EXPLORERS. 
 
 explorer has lost the last tie that binds his memory 
 to this earth, and probably the only reward he might 
 have gained by risk of life and sacrifice of comfort to 
 benefit his kind, in dangerous exploration. 
 
 In rare instances have the changes in names been 
 an improvement. The most striking examples of 
 both classes of changes are probably Mt. Edgecumbe 
 in Sitka Harbor, which was called by the Spaniards, 
 Alt. San Jacinto. The Florida Blanca Islands were 
 renamed in the latter part of the last century by an 
 English captain, who gave to the Islands the name 
 of his ship "Queen Charlotte." Through foreign 
 interference, Boca de Quadra Inlet has become Bou- 
 quet Inlet, and in like manner has La Creole been 
 metamorphosed into Richreall, though on the old 
 charts they retain their original spelling. Juan 
 Perez Sound in the Queen Charlotte group and many 
 points north on the open sea coast, retain the names 
 by which they were known centuries ago. In the 
 Straits of Fuca is handed down to us the name of a 
 more fortunate, yet probably less deserving adven- 
 turer Juan de Fuca. The difference in the opinion 
 of authorities as to the merits of Juan de Fuca ? s dis- 
 covery of these Straits would make a most interesting 
 chapter, though one not within the province of this 
 work to enlarge upon. There are grave doubts as to 
 Fuca ever having entered these waters. Vancouver, 
 however, gave the Straits their name, and so it will 
 be handed to succeeding generations. In the case 
 of Fuca, certainly it was the only re\vard he ever 
 received for the " discovery of the Anain passage to 
 India." 
 
 We steam through the Gulf of Georgia from Active 
 Pass, about ninety miles to Cape Mudge, at the
 
 MAF> No. 2. 
 
 Prom Texada Island to Queen Charlotte Sound.
 
 ENTERING THE PASSAGE. 23 
 
 southerly entrance of Discovery Passage. Through 
 this Passage the water tears like a millrace, and 
 . about seven miles from Cape Mudge we pass through 
 Seymour Narrows, where over a tremendous rock in 
 mid-channel, the water fairly boils, and, at ebb and 
 flood, tide-rifts swing the great steamer, making the 
 passage of these rapids the most dangerous 011 the 
 trip. It was at this place, that in June 1875 the U. 
 S. S. "Saraiiac" was lost, and later in this neigh- 
 borhood, the steamer "Grappler" burned and drifted 
 to the Vancouver shore. Here the tourist meets the 
 first of a series of surprises which, though he may be 
 prepared for anything wonderful on the trip, will 
 take him unawares. 
 
 The route from Cape Mudge lies between Van- 
 couver Island on the west, and Valdes Island on the 
 east, and though it is scarcely three-quarters of a 
 mile across, the precipitous, evergreen-covered crags 
 on either hand, tend to make the distance apparently 
 nmch less, while the sombre cliffs to all appearances 
 bring the voyage in this direction to an abrupt ter- 
 mination; but land gradually opens out to the right 
 and we are peering in that direction, wondering what 
 new grandeur is next to be observed, when, with a 
 short turn to the left, the steamer rounds Chatham 
 Point and the passage broadens into Johnstone Strait. 
 The Strait tends westerly for about one hundred 
 miles, where it connects with Queen Charlotte Sound 
 through several short passes and channels, each 
 under a name of its own. 
 
 On the southwestern side of Johnstone Strait, the 
 mountains rise abruptly from the water to the height 
 of from two thousand to five thousand feet, capped 
 with eternal snow. From the snow line, ofttimes
 
 24 JOHNSTONE STRAIT. 
 
 to the water's edge, the evergreens, hemlock, spruce 
 and cedar, with a rank undergrowth, hide the soil, 
 save where the path of an avalanche has plowed 
 down the mountain side and left a scar for ages. In 
 some of these windrows the more delicate' green of the 
 moss which covers the stumps, fallen trunks and 
 rocks comes out in charming contrast to the darker 
 hue of the evergreen. 
 
 Beautiful valleys near the summits are many and 
 in the warmer season melting snow forms into 
 streams which, falling into the sea, create waterfalls 
 of remarkable beauty, and so near the steamer that 
 the spray is felt by those standing upon her decks. 
 
 This is one of the most tangled regions of this 
 labyrinthian voyage. Long-reaching arms, narrow 
 channels and deep fjords present themselves on 
 every hand, extending far inland or forming islands, 
 and at ever}- crook and turn taking on a new name, 
 presenting on the chart a perfect maze of quaint 
 orthography. The steamer's course lies along the 
 Vancouver shore and we pass through Broughton 
 Strait, with Alert Bay opening on the western shore, 
 to Queen Charlotte Sound. 
 
 Entering Queen Charlotte Sound we come for the 
 first time under the influence of the Pacific's swell, 
 and if a spell of mat de mcr comes over the more 
 sensitive, it is but slight and soon passes, for a short 
 run brings us to the entrance of Fitzhugh Sound, 
 at Cape Calvert, and the sheltering mountains of 
 Calvert Island. 
 
 The open sea lends variety to the beauties of this 
 wonderful panorama and adds a new touch of color 
 to the greens of the surrounding foliage. The hills 
 on the east are lighted up with all the beauties of
 
 MAP No. 3. 
 
 
 From Queen Charlotte Sound to Finlaysou Channel.
 
 BEAUTIFUL SCENERY. 25 
 
 the kaleidoscope. The red and brown of the moun- 
 tain slopes and granite crags, the glistening white 
 of the snow-capped peaks, and the deep, dark 
 shadows in some of the gloomy and narrow inland 
 bays, form a graceful blending of the blues of the 
 ocean and the everchanging bright shades of the 
 evergreen trees. Over these cliffs and crags the 
 mountain goat rambles with that agility peculiar to 
 his species. The mountains are clad from snow-line 
 to water in dense coniferous forests, principally pine, 
 hemlock, spruce and cedar, with some ash and a 
 rank undergrowth, and the tenacity with which 
 these gigantic trees cling to the precipices and thrive 
 on the rocks and atmosphere is an everlasting source 
 of wonder. 
 
 Fifty miles to the northward brings us to Lama 
 Pass. Threading this narrow channel first due 
 west, then again to the north, we come upon the 
 first Indian hamlet on the route. It is a trading 
 post called Bella Bella, prettily situated on the 
 northern end of Campbell Island, and contains per- 
 haps three or four hundred inhabitants, of which 
 some twenty-five are white. 
 
 As we take a new departure north and west 
 through Seaford Channel to Milbank Sound, thence 
 northerly, gliding through miles of glassy green 
 waters of Finlayson Channel, and successively 
 through Graham, Fraser and McKay's Reaches, we 
 are regaled with an ever-changing procession of 
 mountain scenery, waterfalls, dark fjords and open 
 stretches. 
 
 Crossing Wright Sound, with its long and unex- 
 plored arms, the ship steams into Grenville Chan- 
 nel, which, throughout its long reach of forty-four
 
 26 DIXON ENTRANCE. 
 
 miles, with barely a turn, has scarcely oue indenta- 
 tion in its mountainous sides that could be called a 
 cove. Chatham Sound connects with Grenville 
 Channel by several small straits and the steamer's 
 route takes us into one of these, Malacca Pass, 
 through a maze of islands. 
 
 The steamer comes once more under the influence 
 of the Pacific's agitated waters as we cross Dixon's 
 Entrance. Passing Dundas Island, we leave in our 
 wake the last vestige of foreign soil, and soon cross 
 the boundary line between British Columbia and 
 Alaska, which lies along latitude 54 40' to a point 
 opposite Compton Island, where it passes northeast- 
 erly up the center- of Portland Inlet. We are now 
 in that jumble of islands and channels called, in 
 honor of the Czar of Russia, the Alexander Archi- 
 pelago. This maze extends from Dixon Entrance 
 to Cross Sound, about three hundred miles in length 
 and seventy-five miles east and west. 
 
 P A rom Cape Fox the route is about se vent} 7 -five 
 miles through Revillagigedo Channel, with Port 
 Chester, or new Metlakatla on the west. The old 
 historic Metlakatla Mission is located on Chin-say-aii 
 Peninsula. Thence thirteen miles through Tongas 
 Narrows, and east into Behm Canal, we reach Loriiig 
 in Naha Bay. It was at this place the steamship 
 li Aiicon" was wrecked on the morning of the 29th 
 of August, 1889. 
 
 From Loring across Behm Canal the steamer runs 
 about twenty-five miles to Yaas Bay, a most romantic 
 spot. After visiting a cannery on its shores, we 
 retrace our course at Loring and are seen heading 
 up Clarence Strait. Wooded islands and snow- 
 capped inland mountain ranges furnish the predom-
 
 MAP No 
 
 r 
 
 From Finlayson Channel to Malacca Pass.
 
 FORT WRANGELL. 2*J 
 
 inant features of the landscape, while the same 
 placid waters, perfect reflections, marvels in color- 
 ing, canoes darting along the shore, wandering 
 birds, dark shadows and bleak distances go to make 
 np many a pretty marine view. 
 
 Ninety miles from Loring the boom of the cannon 
 on our forecastle gives evidence that we are approach- 
 ing a town of some sort, and as the echo rebounds in 
 volleys, deeper but softened by distance, the steamer 
 swings round a point, and Fort Wrangell is revealed 
 directly ahead. 
 
 Here are gathered the poor lodges of the Indians, 
 the little better dwellings of the w r hites, and a clus- 
 ter of buildings long past their prime, that once 
 composed a stockade fort. The straggling, rickety 
 appearance of the Indian huts and the gaunt totem 
 poles before the doors, lend a weirdness to the imme- 
 diate environment, while the dismal, but withal sub- 
 lime scenery of this vicinity cannot but impress one. 
 
 This forlorn nook is a landmark in Alaskan his- 
 tory. It was here that in 1831, Baron Wrangell, a 
 Russian explorer, then Governor of Russian Amer- 
 ica, preparing himself for war with the Hudson Bay 
 Company, who were organizing a filibustering expe- 
 dition into Russian territory, sent Lieutenant Zar- 
 enbo to erect a fortress on this site. Zarenbo built a 
 bastioned log fort, and soon after held his own and 
 beat off a large force of the employees of that great 
 English Company. In 1862, Wrangell was roused 
 from her lethargy by the discovery of gold at Cas- 
 siar, in British Columbia. Wrangell was the near- 
 est port to the Stikine River, up three hundred miles 
 of which the tide of immigration rushed, and soon it 
 became a little transfer station for all passengers and
 
 28 CITY OF JUXHAU. 
 
 goods, for it was here that the miners had to take 
 the river boats. Troops were stationed here at that 
 time, and business, thrived while the mines pros- 
 pered. A dull time followed the boom. The gold 
 fever was revived in 1876, but was short-lived. 
 Wrangell is now a comparatively large place and 
 drives a large trade in curios. 
 
 The waters in Wrangell Narrows are streaked by 
 the muddy, and, at times, chalky flow of the Stikine 
 River, as it issues from its many deltas; the river 
 waters are a dirty green, and vary in color consider- 
 ably with the debris of the many glaciers which line 
 its course. The current is so swift that, as the river 
 cuts through the salt water, the line of demarkation 
 is for miles very pronounced. From Wrangell Nar- 
 rows we surround ourselves with the gloomy grand- 
 eur of Prince Frederick Sound. On the east the 
 Patterson Glacier glides into the deep waters, and 
 the Devil's Thumb appears in the distance, four 
 thousand feet high. At Cape Fanshaw we round 
 north, and steaming about sixty miles through 
 Stephens Passage to Grand Island, leave Takou 
 Inlet on our right and sail northeasterly up Gasti- 
 neau Channel about fifteen miles to Juneau. 
 
 In 1879 gold specimens from this region were 
 brought in by the Indians, and a year later a pros- 
 pector named Juneau, with some associates, arrived 
 and staked out the future city. After mail}' changes 
 Juneau was settled upon as the title by which the 
 town should be known. Beautifully situated at the 
 base of an abrupt mountain and surrounded by the 
 picturesque, nature has done much for this metropo- 
 lis of Alaska. Her estimated population of about 
 three thousand, is composed of that rough element
 
 Dfc:w.i \ 
 
 From Malacca Pass to Cleveland Peninsula.
 
 THE FIRST GLACIERS. 29 
 
 usually to be found in a mining camp and they, 
 until the United States shall give them laws, have 
 established a code of their own. The town is liveli- 
 est in winter, when the severity of the climate drives 
 in the miners from the placer diggings of the Silver 
 Bow Basin and other mining camps. A. T. and J. 
 C. Howard publish an excellent weekly The Alaska 
 Free Press, and Frank H. Meyers is the editor and 
 publisher of the Juneau City Mining Record, also 
 weekly, and a sheet of fine typographical appear- 
 ance. Douglas Island, on which is situated the 
 Treadwell Mine, is opposite Juneau and forms the 
 southwestern shore of Gastineau Channel. 
 
 Returning in our wake to Stephens Passage, we 
 skirt the northern shore of Admiralty Island and 
 enter Lynn Channel, by Favorite Channel, getting 
 a view of the Auk and Eagle Glaciers in the east and 
 later we view the great Davidson Glacier which 
 conies down from the mountains on the western side 
 of the Channel. Glaciers are now becoming numer- 
 ous, and by this time we have seen a dozen of greater 
 or less importance. 
 
 Lynn Channel separates at its head into two 
 branches or forks, one becoming the Chilkoot Inlet 
 while tne other is the outlet of the Chilkat River, 
 which is the pass over the mountains to the Yukon 
 River. At Chilkat on Pyramid Bay, the tourist 
 reaches the most northerly point on the voyage, 
 59 n'. In this vicinity game is abundant and bear, 
 deer and other animals are seen from the steamer. 
 After having been shut down for years on account of 
 the hostility of the natives, three canneries are in 
 operation during the busy season, affording ample 
 employment to the colony of Indians gathered there.
 
 30 IN GLACIER BAY. 
 
 Returning en route to Glacier Bay, the steamer 
 proceeds south along the western side of Lynn Chan- 
 nel to Point Couverdeu, then once more we head 
 northwesterly through Icy Straits to the entrance of 
 Glacier Bay. Darting into Bartlett Cove and glid- 
 ing by Willoughby Island, we rest before the great 
 Muir Glacier. Far away to the northwest Mt. Fair- 
 weather, her great height of 15,500 feet lessened in 
 the perspective, keeps watch over the cold, grey 
 coast. Nearer at hand Mt. Crillon towers in all the 
 sublimity of her 15,900 feet, while Alt. La Perouse 
 peers through the mist out upon the bay from her 
 summit 11,300 feet above the water. 
 
 From Glacier Bay to Sitka, there are two routes 
 which may be taken. One is west through Cross 
 Sound out upon the ocean and down the coast. If 
 we take the other, which is much preferable, we 
 retrace our course through Icy Strait as far as Spas- 
 kaia Bay, and here we go south through Chatham 
 Straits to Killisnoo. 
 
 At this place are situated large cod fisheries, and 
 probably the largest fish-oil plant in the world. The 
 codfish are dried artificially. From the ulikon or the 
 herring the oil is extracted and the solids that are 
 left are converted into fertilizers, so that the odors that 
 penetrate the atmosphere about Killisnoo are not of 
 the most agreeable kind. Of late years this corn- 
 pan y has furnished a fine quality of cod liver oil. 
 The "character" of the place is " Saginaw Jake," 
 an old chief, who derives his name from having been 
 for some time a captive aboard the U. S. S. "Sagi- 
 naw" as hostage for the good behavior of his people, 
 who were, in 1869, very warlike. Jake is a queer 
 individual and will afford the visitor a fund of amuse-
 
 MAP No. 6. 
 
 ^ 
 
 From Cleveland Peninsula to Stephens Pass.
 
 KILLISNOO SITKA. 3! 
 
 meiit. His house is embellished with a large wooden 
 eagle, nicely carved in the center of which is a win- 
 dow, and this fact has given Jake the opportunity to 
 perpetrate the only Indian pun that is heard in all 
 Alaska. He always calls attention to his "Moun- 
 tain Eagle with a pain (pane) in his breast." Jake 
 wears a policeman's star as large as a tin plate, 
 dresses like a brigadier-general, and always salutes 
 the tourists that leave the steamers. 
 
 Across Chatham Strait we enter a pretty, tortuous 
 and swift-flowing bit of water, aptly styled Peril 
 Strait, the scene of the wreck of the "Eureka." 
 Fitting as the name seems, Petroff tells us that it 
 was not exactly for this reason that it was so called, 
 but from the fact that a hundred of BaranofPs hunt- 
 ers were poisoned here from eating mussels. 
 
 We turn south on emerging from Peril Strait, still 
 threading our inland way, and soon Mt. Edgecumbe 
 stands out upon our starboard bow to greet us. 
 When Mt. Edgecumbe has been numbered with the 
 beauties of the past, Mt. Verstova, with the town 
 clustered about its base, comes into prominence. 
 The first of old, moss-covered Sitka that one sees is 
 the Baranoff Castle on an elevation some sixty feet 
 above the water; then the emerald green dome of the 
 Greek Church strikes upon the vision in bold relief 
 against the sky, and picking our way among Sitka's 
 thousand islands we land at the wharf, off the capital 
 of Alaska. 
 
 Sitka had been, for some thirty years previous to 
 the change of government, the headquarters of Rus- 
 sian supremacy and the seat of the Greek Catholic 
 hierarchy in Russian America, and is now the capi- 
 tal of that vague judicial government which Con-
 
 32 HISTORY OK SITKA. 
 
 gress gave the Territory two years ago. Baranoff 
 visited the present site in 1799 and built a fortress 
 where, three years later, occurred a great massacre 
 of the Russians. He returned in 1804 and built a 
 new fort, which he put under the patronage of the 
 Archangel Michael, the place having previously been 
 under the precarious guardiance of Gabriel, and the 
 town which grew about it received the name of New 
 Archangel. In 1832 Baron Wrangell transferred the 
 colonial capital from St. Paul, Kadiak Island, to 
 Sitka, and the place assumed a new importance. 
 
 Since BaranofPs time the Castle has been remod- 
 eled and passed 011 to partial decay. The old yellow 
 buildings of the Russians have, for the most part, 
 passed into a state ,of decline; traces of once busy 
 shipyards are scarcely visible, while the encroach- 
 ment of time leaves a rookery of the lively club- 
 house and obliterates all vestige of that extravagance 
 of the early Governors the race-course.. An old 
 grave-yard with its moss-covered crosses gives evi- 
 dence of antiquity, and an occasional fallen slab 
 marks a neglected grave of greater importance. The 
 Greek Church alone remains in some sense to attest 
 past luxury and display. The structure is not im- 
 posing from without, but within all is sanctified 
 grandeur in the coloring and appointments, and its 
 chimes, its paintings, vestments and candlesticks 
 and ghaiideliers of massive silver remain as of old. 
 But even this building has passed its prime and the 
 shadow of encroaching years dims the luster of the 
 emerald domes and roof, while Time makes his pres- 
 ence felt in the decay about. The church is built in 
 the form of a Greek cross. The paintings of the 
 Saints and the Madonna are, most of them, fine, and
 
 MAP No. 7. 
 
 From Stephens Pass to Muir Glacier.
 
 AT SITKA. 33 
 
 the massive inlaid work of gold, silver, ivory and 
 gems, representing the Last Supper, the Madonna 
 and the Child, and similar subjects, are marvels of 
 richness and beauty. Large brass doors divide the 
 altar from the auditorium, which is under the central 
 dome, but the gates are open during part of the ser- 
 vice, giving the worshippers a good view of the inter- 
 ior magnificence. The priestly raiment is rich in 
 color and material, and the service, which is orthodox, 
 is ceremonious and impressive. 
 
 At Sitka, Maurice E. Kenealy, son of the cele- 
 brated English barrister of that name, publishes a 
 well-conducted weekly paper called The Alaskan. 
 The North Star is published monthly by Dr. Sheldon 
 Jackson in the interest of the schools and missions. 
 
 The town is built in one street which continues as 
 a broad road for a mile to the beautiful Indian river. 
 The prospect from the town is grand. From Mt. Vers- 
 tova, mirrored at our feet, out over the island-studded 
 bay we have a view which would be hard to excel. 
 Mountains rise on every hand that, grim-visaged, 
 look down upon the town as from an amphitheatre 
 and return an echo as an answer to our salute as 
 we head homeward. 
 
 The reader having followed the steamer's course 
 indicated upon the accompanying maps will have 
 been able to locate the principal points of interest 
 along the . route. This route seldom varies, and 
 when it does, the steamer goes one way and returns 
 the other, lending variety to the trip. 
 
 The following is a correct table of the actual sail- 
 ing distances between the various points along the 
 Inland Passage, from Tacoma to Glacier Bay and 
 Sitka, prepared by Captain Wallace of the "Ancon."
 
 V.V- 
 
 I I 
 1 1 
 II 
 a 
 u 
 u 
 
 34 TABLE OF DISTANCES. 
 
 Tacoma to Seattle 24 miles 
 
 Seattle to Port Townsend 38^ " 
 
 Port Townsend to Victoria 34/^ 
 
 Victoria to Departure Bay 78 
 
 Departure Bay to Tongas Narrows. 572 
 
 Tongas Narrows to Loring 24 
 
 Loring to Yaas Bay 22 
 
 Yaas Bay to Wrangell 100 
 
 Loring to Wrangell 78 
 
 Wrangell to Juneau 143 
 
 Juneau to Chilkat 89 
 
 Juneau to Glacier Bay no 
 
 Chilkat to Bartlett Bay 80 
 
 Bartlett Bay to Glacier Bay 25 
 
 Glacier Bay to Killisnoo 76 
 
 Glacier Bay to Sitka.. 144 
 
 Killisnoo to Sitka 78 
 
 Sitka to Juneau 152 
 
 Sitka to Chilkat 175 
 
 Juneau to Killisnoo 89 
 
 < i 
 i t 
 1 1 
 a 
 u 
 u
 
 MAP No. 8. 
 
 Sitka, Peril Straits and Vicinity.
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE GLACIERS. 
 
 THE NATURAL FORMATION OF A GLACIER. BIRTH 
 IN THE MOUNTAINS AND GRADUAL DESCENT TO 
 THE SEA. DR. KANE'S THEORIES. EVIDENCES 
 OF GLACIAL ACTION IN THE SIERRA NEVADAS 
 AND ROCKY MOUNTAINS. PROF. Mum's DISCOV- 
 ERIES. DESCRIPTION OF THE GREAT MUIR GLA- 
 CIER. THE PACIFIC. DAVIDSON. TAKOU. 
 
 RAINBOW. AUK AND EAGLE GLACIERS. PROF. 
 MUIR'S EXPLORATIONS. THE EXTENT OF GLACIAL 
 ACTION. INVESTIGATION IN GREENLAND. MO- 
 RAINES. DEFINITION, DESCRIPTION AND CHARAC- 
 TERISTICS. MORAINES AND EVIDENCES OF PRE- 
 HISTORIC GLACIERS IN THE UNITED STATES. 
 
 OAH Webster defines a glacier 
 to be u a field or immense 
 mass of ice, or snow and ice, 
 formed in the regions of per- 
 petual snow, and moving 
 slowly down the mountain 
 slopes or valleys." By many 
 it is claimed that a glacier is 
 a river of ice; that is to say, 
 a stream seeking its course from the mountains to 
 the sea, under such climatic conditions as to congeal 
 the water, but which, under the force of gravitation, 
 must pass down as a solid mass between the confin- 
 ing walls, until it reaches an altitude where the
 
 36 GLACIAL DESCENT. 
 
 temperature, disintegrates and fractures it, and that 
 the fragments seek the sea in the form of icebergs. 
 That the glacier is the mother of the iceberg, goes 
 without saying, because scientific investigation and 
 research have clearly demonstrated such to be a fact. 
 It is contended, however, by other observers, that 
 the formation of a glacier is not necessarily depend- 
 ent on a water course, and that it can and does exist 
 without the confining banks of a stream as its habi- 
 tat; but as all descending material from mountains, 
 whether solid or fluid, it naturally seeks the most 
 available depressions in the mountains. This im- 
 pression of the glacier is in mountainous countries 
 above the snow-line, where there is a constant accum- 
 ulation of snow under a temperature too low to per- 
 mit any great proportion to become melted and to 
 flow down in the form of water, and hence these 
 accumulations fill the ravines, canyons and other 
 depressions, solidifying either by pressure or by 
 alternate melting and freezing. This ice a so- 
 called solid must in the course of gravitation follow 
 the incline of the orifice in which it is confined, and 
 the movement is naturally downward, the front pre- 
 senting an apparent wall of ice, with the tremendous 
 pressure in the rear constantly pushing the frozen 
 column downward to an altitude where, in most 
 cases, it meets the ocean and breaks off into icebergs 
 melting as it reaches warmer latitudes. Dr. Kane, 
 the great Arctic explorer, describes having seen in 
 Greenland, in 1855, in latitude 79 80', glaciers 
 extending over the western coast, and sloping so 
 gently toward the water that an inclined plane was 
 scarcely preceptible; yet the solid body of ice was 
 constantly moving toward the bay, where masses
 
 GLACIERS IN CALIFORNIA. 37 
 
 would break off and float out to the ocean as ice- 
 bergs. Glaciers of this class are certainly not ice- 
 rivers or "frozen Niagaras," as some writers describe 
 the Alaskan glaciers. 
 
 Dr. Kane went so far as to conceive of a great 
 unbroken mass of moving ice extending more than 
 one thousand two hundred miles from this glacier 
 to the southern extremity of Greenland. Arctic 
 research has not taught us a great deal of value 
 since Kane's time, and his glacial theory has neither 
 been exploded nor verified, but the discovery of the 
 great glaciers of the Alaskan region certainly gives 
 some color to a belief that he came very near 
 the mark in his idea of a great glacial belt. Evi- 
 dences of glaciers are prominent in the Sierra 
 Nevadas and in the Rocky Mountain Range, and 
 the plain signs of erosion by a force so tremendous, 
 that it could only have come from glacial action, are 
 so apparent that no other conclusion can be arrived 
 at other than that, in the past, these mountains were 
 the breeding place of glaciers, which in the natural 
 course of gravitating forces, swept down to the sea, 
 marking the face of Nature with seams and furrows 
 as they rushed on in their irresistible courses. Clar- 
 ence King, who is pains-taking, scientific, reliable and 
 thoroughly worthy of credence, discovered glaciers 
 on the north side of Mt. Shasta in 1870. Small gla- 
 ciers have also been found on Mt. Tacoma, Wash- 
 ington, and on Mt. Hood in Oregon, and also on the 
 mountains of the Yosemite and in the Sierra Nev- 
 adas, Professor Muir having located and named over 
 twenty. The explorers who have found glaciers in 
 various parts of the world, and who adhere to the 
 theory that the glacier produces the iceberg, are too
 
 38 FROM YAKATAT BAY. ^ 
 
 numerous for mention here, but their testimony and 
 narratives add largely in creating an interest in the 
 glaciers of Alaska, which are undoubtedly the great- 
 est of modern times, and which open an almost un- 
 limited field for scientific research. The greatest of 
 these is undoubtedly the Muir Glacier, at the head of 
 Glacier Bay, which is closely followed by the Pacific 
 Glacier, lying west of the Muir, and whose rugged 
 moraines, deep crevasses, together with the impossi- 
 bility of reaching the glacier in safety by any route, 
 has left this unexplored until an exceptionally open 
 summer permits the entry of some daring explorer. 
 One of the grandest views of Alaskan glaciers is 
 at Yakatat, or Behring Bay, looking at the St. Klias 
 Range of mountains or, as they are euphoniously 
 termed, the "Alaskan Alps." The scenery here is 
 magnificent beyond conception. The mountains, 
 from tide-water to the summit, are clothed in per- 
 petual snow and glistening with huge glaciers. As 
 in all mountainous countries, the air is intensely 
 rarefied, permitting of the extension of vision to great 
 distances and, as the mountains range in height from 
 sixteen thousand up to twenty thousand feet, the effect 
 on the eye of the sun's rays on that great range of 
 snow and ice, can scarcely be imagined, and to 
 attempt to describe it is a task most difficult, and all 
 but hopeless. The height of Mount St. Elias itself, 
 is placed at twenty thousand feet, and, though some 
 sixty miles distant, it is plainly discernible, from 
 base to summit, from Yakatat. The statement that 
 has been made that Mount St. Klias is the highest 
 mountain in North America is disputed by Lieuten- 
 ant Allen, who asserts that Mt. Wrangell, a volcano 
 at the forks of the Copper River, in eastern-central
 
 VEGETATION. 39 
 
 Alaska, is the highest snow mountain on earth, so 
 far as known, outside of the Arctic and Antarctic 
 regions, and also excepting Greenland, and carries 
 the most extensive glaciers known. There are said 
 to be at the base of the range in which this moun- 
 tain is contained, two thousand four hundred square 
 miles of flat plains of ice between the mountains and 
 the sea, all included between Cross Sound and the 
 Copper River. The reader's natural supposition 
 would be that within such a region all would be 
 sterile and forbidding, and that vegetation could not 
 exist. This, however, is not the case, as along the 
 banks of the stream and at the very edges of the 
 glaciers, wild flowers and grasses flourish luxuri- 
 antly, while the music of numerous song-birds fills 
 the air. A wild strawberry of large size grows in 
 profusion and is of the most delicate flavor. Hum- 
 ming-birds are also quite common. A writer who 
 accompanied one of the exploring expeditions is 
 enthusiastic over two dishes that were served to him 
 at Yakatat by the natives, one being humming-birds 
 with clam sauce and strawberry short-cake made 
 from cornmeal. Lieutenant Schwatka also speaks 
 of the luxuriance of vegetable growth extending 
 from the edges of the glaciers to the shore-line, and 
 describes it as being absolutely tropical. 
 
 Among the more notable of the great glaciers is 
 the Davidson, on Lynn Channel near Chilkat. It 
 comes down the eastern side of the watershed of 
 which the Muir Glacier occupies the western slope, 
 and their sources, rising as they do in the same sum- 
 mits and disconnected, if at all, by but a few miles, 
 have led some authorities to call the Davidson a 
 branch of the Muir, but they are as distinct as two
 
 4O DAVIDSON GLACIER. 
 
 rivers seeking the sea, one by either slope of a 
 mountain range. The Davidson is one of the most 
 beautiful glaciers of Alaska. Its great sloping area 
 between the mountains suddenly rounds and broad- 
 ens out three miles, its serrated, pinnacled face of 
 brilliant blue towering twelve hundred feet. The 
 glacier ends in a terminal moraine which is covered 
 with a dense forest about two miles deep and rising 
 one hundred feet, the green presenting a beautiful 
 and striking contrast to the blue and white of the 
 snow and ice which form the background. With 
 these inland glaciers the ice does not find its way to 
 the sea, but melting runs off in streams, as is the 
 case with the Davidson, where, at each side of the 
 glacier, a small river empties the melted ice into the 
 Channel. The Glacier is worthily named for Prof. 
 George Davidson, who, in his capacity as Assistant 
 Coast Surveyor, has done much for Alaska in obser- 
 vation and exploration. A fact worthy of mention 
 in connection with the glaciers of Alaska, is that 
 ships supplied the Pacific Coast with ice in the early 
 days of California, and "Sitka Ice" was a common 
 sign in San Francisco as late as 1856. This was 
 before the day of that great adjunct of civilization, 
 the ice machine, and before there was a railroad to 
 bring the great ice resources of the Sierra Nevada to 
 San Francisco's door. Ice was ice in San Francisco 
 in those days, and commanded what would now seem 
 a fabulous price. 
 
 Notwith standing all the investigation and all that 
 has been said and written about glaciers, they still 
 remain phenomena, and, to a certain extent, are mys- 
 teries. The only data on which to estimate their 
 rate of motion is the result of Prof. Muir's extended
 
 MIJIR'S EXPERIMENTS. 41 
 
 experiments to the velocity of the many glaciers he 
 has explored. Across the top of the Muir Glacier 
 he placed a row of signal stakes, about two miles 
 from the great wall of ice facing the Bay, and, in 
 twenty-four hours, he made a new survey, and found 
 that on the shore side, by reason of the great erosive 
 friction the movement had been but a few inches, 
 while in the centre of the Glacier the ice had trav- 
 eled seventy-eight feet, and the line of stakes were 
 in the form of a bow, the centre bending toward the 
 sea. The movement of the edges is slow, but the 
 line of demarkation between the ice and the parallel 
 moraine is perfectly defined, and so plain that for 
 miles there is not a spot where the visitor cannot put 
 one foot on the moraine and the other on the glacier. 
 It is certain, however, that the gradual descent is 
 such in the glacial system of the coast ranges of 
 Alaska and British Columbia that the glaciers are 
 rapidly decreasing in size and that the climate is 
 growing drier and warmer. The tracks of the reces- 
 sion of the ice bodies are plainly noticeable at Bute 
 Inlet and Stikine, where there is at this time but 
 slight erosive action, and small streams of pure water 
 issue from the faces of the glaciers. Another notable 
 glacier is that of Takou, on the glacier arm of St. 
 Stephens Strait. The Hudson Bay Compan3 T 's men 
 and the Russians navigated the Takou Inlet as early 
 as 1840 and the Company established a trading' post 
 in the shadow of the glacier. 
 
 Rainbow Glacier is another of the Lynn Channel 
 system. It is called " Rainbow" from the fact that 
 the ice in falling and crashing from a tremendous 
 height into the channel below gorges in the form of 
 an arch in which, in the sunshine, is reflected all the
 
 42 LYNN CHANNEL GLACIERS. 
 
 colors and tints of the rainbow, and which forms a 
 sight of grandeur once seen never to be forgotten. 
 The great Auk Glacier is also one of the Lynn 
 Channel system, and is exceeded in size only by the 
 Muir, the Davidson and the Eagle. On Lynn Chan- 
 nel, which was named by Vancouver after Lynn, Eng- 
 land, there are no less than nineteen important 
 glaciers, and Lynn Channel is pronounced by all 
 Alaskan travelers as one of the most interesting and 
 at the same time charming points in the Territory. 
 
 The author of this book has derived a great deal of 
 information concerning the glacial period theories, 
 and known existing glaciers in Alaska from Prof. 
 John Muir, who was one of the pioneer scientific 
 explorers of the Alaskan region, and who was the 
 first recorded white man who ever gazed on the gla- 
 cier which bears his name. Prof. Muir had for his 
 guide the charts of Vancouver, whose explorations 
 dated ninety years before Muir's visit, but such had 
 been his care and caution in. surveying the streams, 
 their water-sheds and confluences, that, after this 
 lapse of time, Prof. Muir found the Vancouver charts 
 an infallible guide. The coast-line marks are to-day 
 recognized as a guide by navigators, and each bay, 
 inlet, channel, cove and roadstead noted by Van- 
 couver is to-day a point for the guidance of naviga- 
 tors, traders and explorers. The numerous islands 
 which go to make up the terra firm a of American 
 territory, in what is known as Alaska, are all cor- 
 rectly placed on the charts, and all subsequent 
 soundings made by the United States have confirmed 
 those made by Vancouver. 
 
 When Muir reached Cross Sound, he took an 
 ancient native guide, and two or three Indians to
 
 MUIR IN GLACIER BAY. 43 
 
 propel his canoe and accompany him up Glacier Bay. 
 It being known that fuel was not to be found in a 
 large distance surrounding the Glacier, such space as 
 could be spared was stored with dry cedar and pine 
 boughs, to make sure that Muir and his brave band 
 could have camp-fires over which to warm themselves 
 and cook their food. When Muir and his compan- 
 ions reached a point in the vicinity of forty miles of 
 the Glacier, Vancouver's charts gave out; that is, 
 they showed that the British explorer had met an 
 obstacle which prevented him from approaching 
 nearer to the great moving frozen river. The appear- 
 ances, however, show that a fracture must have oc- 
 curred, shortly after Vancouver's time, by which 
 some thirty miles of the Glacier were broken off and 
 consequently disintegrated and carried seaward. 
 
 Prof. Muir, in describing this great example of 
 Nature's irresistible forces, said to the author that 
 the front and brow of the Glacier was "dashed 
 and sculptured into a maze of yawning chasms, 
 ravines, canyons, crevasses and a bewildering chaos 
 of strange architectural forms, beautiful beyond the 
 measure of description, and so bewildering in their 
 beauty as to almost make the spectator believe that 
 he was reveling in a dream." "There were," he 
 said, "great clusters of glistening spires, gables, 
 obelisks, monoliths and castles standing out boldly 
 against the sky, with bastion and mural surmounted 
 by fretted cornice and every interstice and chasm 
 reflecting a sheen of scintillating light and deep blue 
 shadow, making a combination of color, dazzling, 
 startling and enchanting. 
 
 The day on which the professor made his first visit 
 was warm, and back of the broad, waving bosom of
 
 44 DESCRIPTION OF MUIR GLACIER. 
 
 the glacier water-streams were outspread in a com- 
 plicated network, each in its own frictioiiless channel 
 cutting down through the porous, decaying ice, of 
 the surface into the quick and living blue, and flow- 
 ing with a grace of motion and a ring and gurgle, 
 flashing a light to be found only on the crystal hills 
 and dales of the Glacier. Along the sides, he could 
 see the mighty flood of ice grinding against the 
 granite with tremendous pressure, rounding the out- 
 swelling points, deepening and smoothing the 
 retreating hollows, and shaping every portion of the 
 mountain walls into the forms they were meant to 
 have when, in the fullness of appointed time, the 
 ice-tool should be lifted and set aside by the sun. 
 Back two or three miles from the front, the current 
 is probably about twelve hundred feet deep; but 
 when we examine the walls, the grooved and rounded 
 features plainly show that, in the earlier days of the 
 ice age, they were all overswept, and this Glacier 
 flowed at a depth of from three to four thousand feet 
 above its present level. 
 
 Prof. Horace Briggs thus describes this wonderful 
 frozen river: 
 
 " It is forty miles long, and back on the land, in 
 a basin of the mountains, being re-enforced by fifteen 
 tributaries coming down the glens from different 
 points of the compass, it swells to an icy sea twenty- 
 five miles in diameter. Thence it moves with resist- 
 less power, bearing rocks and long lines of detritus 
 on its billowy surface. Just before it reaches the 
 Bay, it is compressed by two sentinel mountains, 
 and is forced through a gorge over one mile in width. 
 Emerging from this narrow gateway, it moves on, at 
 the rate of sixty feet a day, to the waters whence it
 
 DESCRIPTION OF MUIR GLACIER. 45 
 
 originally came, buttressing the Bay with a perpen- 
 dicular wall a thousand feet high, three hundred feet 
 of ultramarine crystals tipped with purest white 
 being above the surface, and, being pushed beyond 
 its support in the underlying rock, a battle begins 
 between cohesion and gravity. The latter force 
 always prevails, and vast masses break from the gla- 
 cial torrent with the combined crash of falling walls 
 and heavy thunder, and tumble into the Bay with a 
 dash and a shock that agitates the waters miles 
 away, making navigation perilous to craft of all sizes. 
 The almost deafening roar made when these masses 
 are rent away, the splashing baptism they receive in 
 their fall and the leaping waters, are lively witnesses 
 to the birth of an iceberg, which henceforth, as an 
 independent existence, goes on girding the shores, 
 butting against its fellows, and scaring navigators. 
 While the ship was resting unmoored near the front 
 of this icy barrier, we were startled by the sudden 
 appearance of a mass of dark crystal, vastly larger 
 than our own ship, shooting up from the depths, and 
 tossing our steamer as if it were an egg-shell. As 
 the vessel careened, the frightened passengers were 
 sent whirling against each other, over chairs or pros- 
 trate upon the deck. This strange visitor had doubt- 
 less been broken off from the roots of the icy moun- 
 tain, hundreds of feet below the surface, and hence 
 had unexpectedly appeared upon the scene. Had it 
 struck the ship fairly, nothing but a miracle could 
 have saved us. Having recovered somewhat from 
 our amazement, about twenty of us were sent on 
 shore in the Captain's gig. Landing some distance 
 below the ice-wall, we climbed over a hundred feet 
 up a lateral moraine, crawled shoe-deep in wet gravel
 
 46 DESCRIPTION OF MUIR GLACIER. 
 
 down into the valley of a glacial river, forded it, 
 paddled through glacial mud covered with a shingle 
 of slime just deep enough to hide the creamy pools, 
 slipped prostrate upon ice made treacherous by a thin 
 disguise of detritus, and barked our shins and cut 
 our shoes on the sharp, angular blocks of granite 
 and basalt strewn for miles, in great profusion, along 
 our perilous route. 
 
 "Blocks of finest marble hedged our pathway; we 
 trod upon chips of jasper and chalcedony, the product 
 of different mountains far up on the Peninsula, and 
 we passed two exquisitely beautiful boulders of 
 veined porphyry weighing two or three hundred 
 pounds each, rounded and polished by centuries of 
 attrition. They were of dark purple, streaked with 
 quartz spotlessly white, very desirable specimens for 
 a cabinet or for out-door ornamentation. After more 
 than an hour of plunging and sprawling, and of pull- 
 ing each other out of the grey mire, about half of 
 our number reached the uncovered glacier. At. the 
 first glance we felt that here we should stand with 
 uncovered heads, for we were in the presence of the 
 marvelous- manifestations of superhuman power in 
 action, and looked with unveiled eyes upon the 
 potent agencies by which much of this planet has 
 been fashioned. Away in the distance was the 
 white lake fed by numerous frozen rivers, and these 
 rivers were born of mountain snows fifty miles distant. 
 The white-robed mountains themselves, aeons of the 
 past, were smoothed and grooved far up their flinty 
 sides, when this same glacier was three-fold deeper, 
 and many times more ponderous and mighty than it 
 is to-day. Stretched along the base of the mountains 
 to where they are only a line in the distance, were
 
 n, . 
 o vo - 
 
 [- 1 VO 
 
 > 2
 
 DESCRIPTION OF MUIR GLACIER. 47 
 
 the records of those grey old years in the form of 
 moraines, one hundred feet high, and appearing 
 like a range of hills. The larger portion of this 
 crystal river, perhaps an eighth of a mile in width, 
 is heaved into rounded hills and beetling precipices, 
 quite resembling the sea in a storm, while the mid- 
 dle and much of the wider part is splintered into 
 countless spires and needles and pinnacles, ten, 
 twenty and thirty feet in height, and of a beautiful 
 ultramarine at the base^ shaded to a pure white at 
 the summit. In the onward march of the Glacier, 
 these pinnacles are occasionally wrenched from their 
 seats in the solid ice beneath, they nod, then totter, 
 and then make a plunge, and are shattered into a 
 cloud of acicular crystals that sparkle like the frosted 
 snow under a full moon of a winter's night, only 
 with more of color; they are diamonds on the wing. 
 Again, the whole surface is riven by a thousand 
 crevasses, along the bottom of which streams of clear 
 water find their way, often broken by waterfalls that 
 plunge farther down into the dark blue abysses out 
 of sight. These chasms are frightful gaps to one 
 peering down a hundred feet or more between their 
 turquoise walls. A slip, a frail alpenstock, a feeble 
 grasp of the guide's rope, and gravity would close 
 the scene without further ceremony. The molecular 
 structure of the glacier is continually changing, ad- 
 justing itself to the elevation and depressions of its 
 rocky bed, and hence there is an incessant clicking 
 and crackling, interrupted here and there by an 
 explosion, heard over every inch of the surface. The 
 whole scene is weird, and strange in sight and sound 
 in the voices that rise in the air from the azure 
 depths fascinating because every step is perilous,
 
 48 DESCRIPTION OF MUIR GLACIER. 
 
 majestic from its massiveness, and awful because its 
 march is irresistible. Consider what a force in wear- 
 ing away mountains and glens an icy torrent must 
 be, more than one mile wide, almost a thousand feet 
 deep, and in the middle flowing about seventy feet a 
 day. It goes grinding, and groaning, and cracking 
 in startling explosions, all mingled in a loud wail 
 like that from the Titans imprisoned under Mt. 
 ^tna. Now let any one in fancy frame for himself 
 this picture: 
 
 "Snow-capped mountains in the background, two 
 of them, Fairweather and Crillon, more than 15,000 
 feet high, thick set with glittering peaks and clear 
 cut as silhouettes on a dark sky; the great Glacier, 
 child of Arctic snows, turreted and pinnacled, and 
 splintered into a thousand strange forms, upon which 
 Iris has flung the varied hues of amethyst, turquoise 
 and sapphire; huge masses riven from the crystal 
 river with a thundering roar, reeling and toppling 
 into an amber sea, thickly dotted with new-born and 
 vagrant icebergs, and all this scene glorified and 
 transfigured by the setting sun. Looking upon this 
 picture through the creative power of imagination, 
 one can readily conceive that the enraptured tourist, 
 standing in the presence of the realities, would call 
 that day spent with the Muir Glacier, the day of all 
 days he ever passed in gazing upon and listening to 
 the wild wonders of our planet." 
 
 All contemporary authorities coincide as to the 
 grandeur and extent of the Muir Glacier. The evi- 
 dence of the more recent visitors is not only corrobo- 
 rative of that of Muir and the early explorers fol- 
 lowing him, but becomes so enthusiastic that it 
 would seem to run to exaggeration were exaggera-
 
 DISCHARGE OK THE MUIR. 49 
 
 tion possible to the beholder of one of the grandest 
 and most awe-inspiring spectacles of the power of 
 natural forces. 
 
 Rev. Thomas Rogers, of Rochester, New York, in 
 describing the Muir Glacier, designates it, a "frozen 
 Niagara." He particularizes that great congealed 
 cataract as stretched across the neck of Glacier Bay, 
 a distance of several thousand feet, and rising per- 
 pendicularly a distance of three hundred feet, and 
 extending below the water about seven hundred feet. 
 
 Prof. Frederick G. Wright, of Oberlin, Ohio, esti- 
 mates that the ice-discharge of the Muir Glacier into 
 the waters of Glacier Bay is 140,000,000 cubic feet of 
 the clearest ice in every twenty-four hours. 
 
 Kate Field, whose great descriptive powers are so 
 well known says that no pen can do justice to the 
 grandeur of a glacier like the Muir, as all become 
 spell-bound at its majestic and irresistible force and 
 indescribable beauty. 
 
 " Imagine," says she, " Niagara Falls frozen a 
 solid wall of ice, three hundred feet high, moving 
 toward the ocean at the rate of eighty feet a day, and 
 a similar wall six or seven hundred feet under water 
 and the whole mass cracking and giving forth peals 
 of thunder that rival the heavenly artillery, and 
 every few moments thousands of tons of lovely blue 
 ice, crashing into the sea and starting on a voyage 
 as icebergs a peril to the Arctic voyager and you 
 will have some slight conception of this imposing 
 spectacle." 
 
 No important glaciers are found in the Rocky 
 Mountains which is anomalous, considering the 
 great height of that range. A few small glaciers, 
 however, are found in the Wind River range in
 
 50 SOME SOUTHERN GLACIERS. 
 
 Wyoming and near the headwaters of the Flathead, 
 in Montana. The most southern series of glaciers 
 in the Sierra Nevadas are in Tuoltimue and Mono 
 Counties, just east of the valley of the Yosemite. 
 The greatest of these, however, is not over a mile in 
 length and none extend below an altitude of 11,000 
 feet. The next glaciers of any importance are on 
 Mt. Shasta, California, and then in the Cascade 
 Range in Washington, particularly on Mt. Tacoma. 
 The waters of the Cowlitz, the Nisqually, the Puy- 
 allup and White Rivers originate in glaciers high 
 up in the flanks of the mountains. From Mt. 
 Tacoma northward the glaciers increase in size and 
 number through the Coast Range of British Colum- 
 bia and southern Alaska to the Mt. St. Elias Range 
 of Mountains. It is not, however, until the Stikine 
 River in Alaska is reached in latitude 57 that 
 glaciers become easily accessible and of size suffic- 
 ient to warrant study. The water emptying into the 
 Sound from Stikine River is highly charged with 
 glacial mud a sort of "float," as a mining pros- 
 pector would call it, which acts as. a guide to the gla- 
 cier above, but the greatest of the glaciers in this 
 vicinity has not, at this writing, been fully explored. 
 A party of Russian officers made the attempt a num- 
 ber of years ago, and none returned to tell the tale. 
 Not the least interesting of the world's glaciers are 
 those of Greenland, one of the great unknown lands 
 of the earth. The area of Greenland is estimated at 
 50,000 square miles, and the whole of this broad 
 expanse, except a narrow border at the southern end, 
 is one vast sheet of moving ice, pushing onward to- 
 ward the sea. Nordenskiold, the great Arctic 
 explorer, believed that a portion of the interior of
 
 NORDENSKIOLD'S THEORY. 51 
 
 Greenland was free from ice and might be inhabited, 
 and in 1883 made the attempt to penetrate the mys- 
 tery. He ventured for a distance of one hundred 
 and fifty miles, at about five thousand feet above 
 sea-level; from here he sent two Eskimo on a kind 
 of ice-shoe, known as a skidor. These Indians went 
 about seventy miles further, to an altitude of about 
 six thousand feet. They found the ice rising in 
 terraces and seemingly boundless beyond, and as 
 further penetration was impossible, the explorer 
 abandoned his project, and Greenland remains, so 
 far as Science has demonstrated to the contrary, one 
 great continent of shifting, rushing ice. 
 
 It may be said that there is scarcely a section of 
 the known world that is free from living, or the evi- 
 dence of pre-existing glaciers. There are known 
 glaciers to-day on the island of Spitzbergen, in Nor- 
 way and Sweden, in central Hurope, in Southern 
 Asia, in Patagonia, in Chili and New Zealand, and 
 all over North America are scattered the plain and 
 unmistakable evidences of glacial action. There are 
 over four hundred identified glaciers in the Alps, 
 between Mt. Blanc and the Tyrol, covering an area 
 of 1,400 square miles and in places of a thickness of 
 six hundred feet. The line of perpetual snow in the 
 Alps is seven thousand five hundred feet above sea- 
 level, and the glaciers extend as low down as four 
 thousand feet. According to data collected by 
 various scientists, these ice bodies have enlarged and 
 diminished at various periods and still continue to 
 thus expand and contract. The Scandinavian glacier 
 snow-fields cover an area of five thousand square 
 miles. From the snow plateau of Justedal alone 
 which covers an area of five hundred and eighty
 
 52 MORAINES. 
 
 square miles there descends twenty-four glaciers 
 toward the North German Sea. 
 
 The great North American ice-sheet of the glacial 
 era would seem from the deductions of science to 
 have had an independent movement in various por- 
 tions of the continent, and an interesting evidence 
 of this is quoted in the drift region of south- 
 western Wisconsin and parts of Illinois, Iowa and 
 Minnesota, which must have remained an island 
 while all around it was ice. All the evidences go to 
 show that this particular area escaped the attrition 
 that was going on all around it by the pressure and 
 movement of ponderous bodies of ice. 
 
 In this connection a few words about u Moraines" 
 maybe pertinent. A "Moraine," as defined geo- 
 logically, is: "A line of blocks and gravel extending 
 along the sides of separate glaciers formed by the 
 union of one or more separate ones." As showing 
 that the depressions of the Sierra Nevada those 
 depressions that make channels in a westerly 
 direction, whether they consist of a gulch, a ravine, 
 a canyon, a river-course or a dead and extinct river, 
 are moraines; simple observation is all that is 
 necessary, and, this being granted, it must follow 
 that at one time the Sierra Nevada Range w r as a 
 great bed of glaciers, and that it is the attrition of 
 these great glacial forces that has stored the sides 
 of these courses with gravel and cobbles that have 
 been ground from great boulders, which, in their 
 time, had been detached in masses, smaller or larger, 
 from deep-set rocks, from a period anterior to that of 
 the Glacial. Every prospector who ever swung a 
 poll-pick or delved for gold in the ravines, gulches, 
 bars, flats or streams of California, recognized the
 
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 MORAINES. 53 
 
 moraine as the deposition from some powerful force 
 moving irresistibly from above, bnt did not recognize 
 it by the name of moraine, because that was too 
 scientific for the most of them. In the main they 
 attributed the evident attrition to the action of water 
 from the melting snows at the summits; but, even to 
 the amateur geologist, and, in fact, to any intelli- 
 gent student of the subject, there is a difference in 
 the character of the detritus which comes down from 
 the action of the water-shed, and the material which 
 forms the moraine. The one shows either a pol- 
 ished surface in pieces in size from a cobble upwards, 
 while the smaller particles show a distinct polishing 
 plainly attributable to the action of water, and the 
 smallest are merely disintegrations caused by wash- 
 ing. The material of the moraine in most cases 
 shows a striated surface as if subjected to a simul- 
 taneous pushing and grinding action, evidently the 
 effect of the friction of solid or semi-solid matter, and 
 the smaller or movable stones are ground and pol- 
 ished as smooth as glass. Terminal moraines clearly 
 traced to glacial action are found all over the conti- 
 nent, as w r ell as "kettle" moraines, the latter being 
 most prominent in the State of Wisconsin. The 
 Missouri River, that great channel from the moun- 
 tains to the sea, shows a moraine plainly along its 
 banks in its upper portions, and from this fact it was 
 once thought that a distinct line of terminal moraine 
 might be traced across the continent. Professors G. 
 Frederick Wright and H. Carvill Lewis made the 
 attempt to verify this theory in 1881, and began the 
 survey in Pennsylvania, but, on crossing the Alle- 
 ghanies and reaching the Mississippi Valley, con- 
 tinuit3 T ceased and nothing was found but marginal
 
 54 MORAINES. 
 
 deposits somewhat evenly spread over the country, 
 but ending in extremely attenuated borders, and the 
 theory of a continuous ridge of glacial accumulations 
 was abandoned and has not since been seriously 
 asserted. It is on the south-east coast of Massachu- 
 setts that the true moraine of the glacier is most 
 noticeable on the American continent, and the most 
 easily traced. Prof. Wright holds that Nantucket, 
 Tuckernuck, Chappaquiddick, Martha's Vineyard, 
 No Man's Land and Block Island, 011 that coast, are 
 but portions of a terminal moraine, whose back 
 in places emerges from the water, appearing as 
 islands. This authority cites many other instances 
 on the Massachusetts coast of prominent places that 
 are ''made land," dumped as a moraine by the gla- 
 cier's mammoth wheelbarrow. The same writer also 
 disposes of the illusion that the Pilgrim Fathers 
 landed upon a "rock-bound shore." He says that 
 the supposed rock-bound coast is composed merely of 
 " morainic accumulations of glacial margins," and 
 that the three hundred and sixty lakes of Plymouth 
 township are nothing else than a cluster of kettle 
 holes caused by glacial action. The Professor 
 destroys a good deal of Puritan tradition when he 
 makes the rock-bound shore of Massachusetts noth- 
 ing but an accumulation of sand and boulders, and 
 incurs the danger of real New England wrath when 
 he calls the Plymouth lakes nothing but kettle holes. 
 But he is a clear observer, and has made glacial phil- 
 osophy a close and earnest study. 
 
 As to this moraine theory, moraine lines are so 
 plainly marked wherever glaciers exist, or are known 
 or assumed to have existed, that the moraine simply 
 stands as a proof of the pre-existence of glaciers,
 
 MORAINES. 
 
 55 
 
 great or small, as marked by the debris. That all 
 over the world are these moraines marking the spots 
 where glaciers now extinct once existed, makes the 
 presence of great, living and visible glaciers and 
 their attendant icebergs in Alaska and other portions 
 of the west coast of North America, the more inter- 
 esting from a geological and otherwise scientific 
 standpoint, and, if we accept the theory which has 
 every semblance of reason that the movement of the 
 earth is constantly to the northward, at a rapid rate, 
 considering the size of the planet, the time may come 
 when even these great phenomena of Nature shall 
 have been dissipated and their track only marked by 
 the moraine which they themselves created. It does 
 not follow from this that the present generation, if it 
 wishes to see a real live glacier, must pack its valise 
 and start for Alaska at once; but delays are danger- 
 ous, and the person who waits a few thousand years 
 before visiting Alaska will be very liable to miss one 
 of the grandest, most interesting and thrilling 
 natural sights ever vouchsafed to human vision.
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE NATIVE RACES. 
 
 PRE-HISTORIC THEORIES. ALASKA'S PROGRESS. 
 DIVISIONS OF THE NATIONS, TRIBES AND CLANS. 
 HYPERBOREAN GROUP. THE ESKIMO OF THE 
 NORTH. CANNIBALISTIC KONIAGAS. THE ALEUTS 
 AND INTERMIXTURES OF THE ALEUTIAN CHAIN. 
 THE SAVAGE TINNEH. THE FIERCE AND WAR- 
 LIKE THLINKETS. HABITS, CUSTOMS, SUPERSTI- 
 TIONS AND MORALS OF THE TRIBES. 
 
 HEOLOGY has not, and science 
 with its profound research and 
 investigation certainly has not 
 solved the mystery of how the 
 world was peopled. The two 
 principal hypotheses advanced 
 as to the origin of mankind 
 have found advocates in the 
 thinking minds for ages. The 
 first theory presents the idea of the descent of man- 
 kind from a single pair and is advocated by theolog- 
 ians and accepted by the vast majority of Christendom. 
 Another division of this school are the dissenters 
 from this fundamental idea and advocated by such 
 scholars as Agassiz and Gliddon who support the 
 theory of the separate races with their peculiarities. 
 Darwin and Huxley support the third hypothesis, 
 which is based on the principle of evolution. There 
 have risen, possibly from the three schools, but more
 
 THE HYPERBOREAN GROUP. 57 
 
 likely from the first as they cannot grant the evolu- 
 tion or the separate creation hypotheses theorizers 
 in plenty who have not been backward in their spec- 
 ulations as the descent of the aborigines of the 
 American continent. These savants, many of them, 
 have found in these northern tribes a connecting link 
 between the inhabitants of the New and the Old 
 World. On this subject much energy has been 
 expended, much good paper wasted, and we are left 
 page upon page of dubious analogies and volumes of 
 cosmographical, ethnological and etymological hypo- 
 theses. It is not impossible, nor yet improbable, 
 that at some time people from Asia might have 
 reached these shores in numbers, but I can find no 
 authentic trace of them, and I can advance no theory 
 of a pre-historic arrival. 
 
 With this brief introduction, and without further 
 touching upon the origin of the races, I will take up 
 the discussion of this Hyperborean group whose 
 southern limits some authorities accept as the fifty- 
 fifth parallel, while others include under this head 
 the Indians of the Columbia River. The scope of 
 this chapter is too limited to permit taking up in 
 detail the various nations of Alaska, or of treating 
 separately the various tribes into which they are 
 divided; but to the Thlinkets, they being the people 
 with whom tourists come in contact, I will give par- 
 ticular attention, presenting to the reader the most 
 salient points wherein they differ from the more 
 northern nations. As every ethnologist segregates 
 these people according to his own idea, I adopt the 
 plan which is better suited to the purposes of this 
 work. Accordingly, the first of the group is the 
 Eskimo in the north, who inhabits the shores of the
 
 58 THLINKET CHARACTERISTICS. 
 
 Arctic Ocean; the Koniagas inhabiting the extreme 
 western coast, bordering on the Behring Sea and the 
 Pacific Ocean and the Koniagan Islands; the Aleuts 
 who people the Aleutian Archipelago; the tribes of 
 the Tiniieh who occupy the vast territory between 
 the land of the Eskimos and that of the Thlinkets 
 from the Hudson Bay west of the Koniagas country; 
 and fifth, the Thlinkets who inhabit the coast' and 
 islands from the Copper River south. 
 
 In the Thlinkets we find a greater development, 
 physically and mentally, than exists among the 
 inhabitants of more northern sections. While the 
 nobler qualities of the man are brought to the sur- 
 face, the savage nature is intensified, and while 
 cruelty and stoicism are reduced to a science that 
 would rival the Indians of the plains, industry, some 
 idea of modesty and conjugal fidelity appear among 
 these people, and they are spoken of as brave, shrewd, 
 intelligent and possessing a respect for women and 
 the aged not to be found elsewhere among savage 
 races. They are a more warlike nation than their 
 northern neighbors. The} 7 employ the usual Indian 
 cunning and trickery in their warfare, and their 
 male prisoners were killed by torture and the women 
 doomed to slavery. This system is, however, almost 
 entirely done away with. The Thlinkets were long 
 antagonistic to the Russians, and the fiercest of the 
 nation, the Chilkat and Chilkoot tribes, have, until 
 late years, been hostile to all whites. Other marked 
 characteristics of the Thlinkets is their ingenuity in 
 the manufacture of domestic utensils and implements 
 of w r arfare and working in metals in which they ex- 
 cel. They have a love for art and music, and exhibit 
 some skill in the former in their carving and metal
 
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 P PH
 
 PERSONAL ADORNMENT. 59 
 
 work. Not so in their personal adornment however, 
 for, in common with other Alaskans, they are given 
 to the barbaric practice of embellishing nature and 
 far surpass their neighbors in their models of hideous 
 beauty. The ears and nose of the men are pierced, 
 and from them are hung rings and devices in shell, 
 bone, wood and copper, and the head is variegated 
 with greasy colors. Tattooing is practiced by draw- 
 ing a colored thread under the skin. The women 
 also pierce the nose and ears, introducing such 
 weights as to draw the features out of place. But 
 the acme of Thlinket loveliness is attained in the 
 lip-button. To insert this, the lip is cut, at an early 
 age, in a slit parallel with the mouth and about half 
 way between it and the chin; a wire or stick is in- 
 serted which is gradual!} 7 enlarged, thus peeping a 
 constant strain upon the aperture which increases in 
 size and assumes the appearance of a second mouth. 
 
 Upon the maiden arriving at maturity a large 
 wooden button, rather the shape of the bowl of a 
 spoon, is inserted,, and as the button is enlarged with 
 age, in proportion is the dignity and importance of the 
 matron augmented. Writers give the dimensions of 
 the button vanorBTy at from one to three inches in 
 length and a quarter of an inch in width. I saw 
 some very large ones, and I think this diversity is 
 accounted for by the various sizes worn according to 
 the age of the wearer; but generally they were about 
 the size of a large button. 
 
 The Thlinket marriage is somewhat peculiar for 
 having more show of form than is deemed essential 
 w r ith most Hyperboreans. Upon presenting what 
 valuables he can afford to the maiden's parents, the 
 young brave arrives, his friends gather, and in feast-
 
 60 MARRIAGE CUSTOMS. 
 
 ing and dancing rejoice for him not with him, as 
 he and his affianced take no part in this rite. To 
 insure felicity in after life, a four days' fast is en- 
 tered upon and continued with but a single break 
 after the second da}-; in four weeks the couple come 
 together as man and wife. Polygamy is common, 
 but as the woman brings no material profit to the 
 common household fund, and as tribal taxes are 
 levied in proportion to the number of wives, a plur- 
 ality of wives comes high and is a luxury to be 
 indulged in only by the wealthy. The natives of 
 this Sitkan region formerly burned their dead and 
 the ashes were gathered into a basket and swung 
 between two poles near the water. The personal 
 belongings of the deceased were burned with him, 
 together with such things as were deemed needful 
 for his comfort in the future state; but in the present 
 condition of civilization the dead are generally 
 accorded a Christian burial. 
 
 A more distinct caste or clanship is found among 
 them than exists in other Hyperborean nations. 
 There exist individuals of long pedigree who are 
 noted for their hereditary wealth and their prowess, 
 and from these their chiefs are chosen; the choice 
 generally being elective, but in some cases the chief- 
 tainship has been inherited for many generations. 
 The authority of these chiefs is nominal, but they 
 possess much influence. As is general with the 
 Hyperboreans, each family has its own regulations 
 and the head of the house is the supreme authority 
 thereof, while the chief can do nothing without the 
 consent of the several families of the hamlet over 
 which he presides. Hunting and fishing grounds 
 are staked out and handed from generation to gener-
 
 GOVERNMENT AND INDUSTRIES. 6l 
 
 ation, while they have a custom of renting their 
 lands at a percentage of the products. The bound- 
 aries are zealously guarded, and poaching within 
 the domains of another receives the severest penalty 
 visited upon theft. These observations on the gov- 
 ernment of the Thlinkets will hold good, in the main, 
 for the Hyperborean group. Nowhere is the authority 
 of the chiefs arbitrary, but, as in every community, 
 there is a ruling spirit, so the Indian, by a show of 
 superior ability, a display of uncommon wisdom, 
 can gain much influence over his less gifted brethren. 
 It is from such that their chiefs are chosen, and in 
 this particular they are very democratic. 
 
 The Thlinkets spin and make blankets from the 
 white wool of the goat, baskets and mats from grasses, 
 and pipes and other utensils from clay. In 'trade they 
 are cunning and resort to many sharp practices to 
 dispense with their wares, while every article they 
 receive in return undergoes the closest scrutiny. 
 Many are dishonest and untruthful, and, while theft 
 among their own people has met with punishment 
 by death, the wrong, when perpetrated against a 
 member of another clan, is readily attoned for by 
 the payment of a few blankets or furs, and to steal 
 from the whites is a sin only in the discovery as 
 reflecting upon their skill. The Thlinkets are prone 
 to drunkenness, and they had a fermented beverage 
 of their own before the advent of the trader and his 
 whisky. The northern tribes, 011 the contrary, are 
 a sober people with the exception, perhaps, of the 
 Aleuts, who have been long under the influence of 
 the trader. 
 
 Cleanliness is not a virtue with the northern fam- 
 ily, and the Thlinket is no exception to the rule.
 
 62 HYPERBOREAN HABITS. 
 
 They seldom apply water to the person, and for some 
 emotion, frequently smear themselves with grease 
 and rub it off with a bark brush. They also employ 
 a steam or sweat bath by closing their houses and 
 pouring water on hot stones, and rolling themselves 
 in their blankets to enjoy the natural results. About 
 their hamlets they are even less abstersive, having 
 no conception of sanitary laws. 
 
 The chief characteristics and peculiarities, mental 
 and physical, of a savage people are formed by the 
 advantages or disadvantages under which they labor 
 for their mere existence, and the conditions of their 
 being are ordered according to their needs in their 
 struggle for life. Thus the Thlinket village is sit- 
 uated in a sheltered place on the coast, handy to land 
 the canoes and near the best halibut and salmon 
 runs, as these fish form their staple food; the Eskimo 
 hamlet is convenient to some cove of sufficient depth 
 to float a whale, which is towed in by the hunters, 
 and the Tinneh, being essentially an inland people, 
 gather their huts together in the best game regions 
 and sometimes build them as strong stockades. And 
 so with each; according to his needs and as nature has 
 placed him, man conforms. 
 
 Then, their occupations and the various climates 
 show in the man. The Alaskan Eskimo is of the 
 same stock as those of Greenland and of which latter 
 ethnologists agree upon as being of American con- 
 tinental origin. They are of medium height, mus- 
 cular and active, short in the legs and with small 
 feet and hands, broad face, high cheek bones, light 
 complexion and teeth nearly worn to stumps by the 
 practice of chewing hides in tanning. The Koniagas 
 inhabit a wild, rugged territory, and tradition records
 
 PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENT. 63 
 
 an early immigration from the north and a blending 
 with the south whereby the two characters under- 
 went a marked change. They are a hardy people 
 who once numbered many thousand, but were sadly 
 depopulated by the cruel severity of Russian rule. 
 In this respect the Aleuts too have greatly suffered. 
 Reduced by the invaders to slavery and subjected to 
 the most barbarous treatment, their numbers soon 
 decreased, and long contact and intermixtures with 
 the Russians have effaced many originalities. They 
 are sluggish by nature, but strong of body and of 
 great endurance, with strong passions that lie dor- 
 mant, but when aroused render them capable of any 
 extreme. As I have said, the Tinneh are essen- 
 tially an inland people. They spread over the great 
 area of central Alaska, for the most part unknown, 
 and extend into British territory in the east. Many 
 petty tribes go to make up a nation of tall, brawny 
 and sturdy hunters, who are described as being an 
 inferior race at least lacking in appearance. The 
 Tinneh character is variously described, but the best 
 testimony goes to give them a reputation for probity 
 and sobriety while calling them vagrant and indo- 
 lent. When more southern climes and more con- 
 genial surroundings are reached, a finer race of man 
 is found, and greater beauty in the physical type. 
 This is exemplified in the Thlinkets. They are 
 more graceful in their proportions than the men 
 of the north, but as the Thlinket seldom moves, 
 save in his canoe, his upper limbs and body 
 are overly developed in proportion to his lower 
 extremities. 
 
 I have thus outlined the marked characteristics of 
 the races of the north. Look now at some of the
 
 64 CONSTRUCTION OF HOUSES. 
 
 manners and customs prevailing more or less 
 throughout the class or group. 
 
 The Hyperborean palate is anything but delicate, 
 though taste may be a degree more refined among 
 the Thlinkets. They will eat absolutely anything 
 digestible, while cooking is not a necessity with 
 them, nor am I positive that it is deemed a luxury. 
 They are less nomadic than the Indians of the plains, 
 living in hamlets the greater part of the time and 
 migrating at such times as is, in their several 
 regions, most propitious, in quest of winter stores. 
 At such times they construct temporary abodes on 
 or near their fields of industry. Their houses are 
 very similarly constructed, the primary idea being 
 one large room below the surface of the ground and 
 roofed over from a ridge-pole with hides or bark, 
 leaving in the center a large smoke hole. Even the 
 Eskimos erect their houses so, using ice and snow 
 for a covering. Many houses have a store-room, and 
 among some people, several nooks are constructed 
 for separate sleeping apartments. The entrance to 
 the house is through underground passages, vari- 
 ously protected against the inclemency of the 
 weather and fresh air, so that the only ventilation of 
 the room is through the smoke-hole, and from three 
 to six families call this home. 
 
 The superficial marriage ceremonies of Hyperbo- 
 reans, too shallow to be so called, consist in some 
 parts of taking a wife at pleasure to be dispensed 
 with as readily while in other sections the father 
 must be compensated, more or less liberally. Poly- 
 gamy is universal with them, the number of a man's 
 wives being limited only by his ability to support 
 them. Among some of the tribes the women are
 
 BARBARIC STOICISM. 65 
 
 entitled to more than one husband. Modesty is said 
 to exist in a measure among the Thliiikets, but cer- 
 tainly nowhere in the north has it reached the par- 
 excellence of the civilized conception of the term. 
 Nor is morality a quality that carries with it much 
 weight, while virtue is variously " praised but is not 
 cherished." The Hyperborean vice is gambling. A 
 lesson, early instilled in the young mind, is the 
 doctrine of the inferiority of women, and the young 
 brave seldom deviates from the course so early 
 mapped out for him. 
 
 In the finish of their barbaric stoicism, they ap- 
 proach the American Indian proper. To toughen 
 themselves the better to withstand the rigidity of the 
 climate, the young man will emerge from, his vapor 
 bath, nude, and plunge into the nearest stream, 
 oftentimes having to break the ice, and then, after 
 rolling in the snow, return to his hut, laboring under 
 the impression that he has had a nice time. Mothers 
 subject their infants to this severe treatment with 
 the same object in view. In their improvements upon 
 nature they submit to many tortures in tattooing and 
 cutting the flesh, most of which is done while they 
 are very young, and, where shamanism thrives most, 
 cruelty is reduced to its most exquisite art. 
 
 Superstitious the Alaskan aborigine can hardly be 
 called. That is, he does not allow himself to be 
 governed by the natural phenomenon, which in such 
 a measure surrounds him, nor will he be swayed by 
 the appearance of the weather, sun, moon or stars, 
 but will fish, hunt or perform any duty he may be 
 called upon to execute under any conditions whatso- 
 ever. The one phenomenon productive of awe in 
 these tawny sons of nature is the miracle of volcanic
 
 66 RELIGIOUS FRAUDS. 
 
 action which he is so often called upon to witness, 
 and of the several extinct craters there exist myths 
 bearing upon the population of the \vorld, and many 
 others. 
 
 'The northern Indians are extremely credulous, and 
 are thus easily played upon by the scheming shaman. 
 It is said that many of this gentry believe in them- 
 selves, which is easy of credence when it is remem- 
 bered how given human nature is to come to an 
 absolute faith in its own fabrications, while others 
 undoubtedly those new to the business know that 
 they are young frauds. In keeping his hold upon 
 less enlightened brethren, the shaman performs 
 many feats of jugglery in which he is very shrewd 
 and accomplishes many truly wonderful miracles, 
 such as burning at the stake to appear later among 
 his good people, and short trips to the moon to 
 replenish the forests with game and the streams 
 with the finny tribes in times of scarcity. 
 
 Outside of Sitka and other mission towns, the dead 
 are not put underground, but where they are not 
 cremated, the remains are raised upon poles or 
 swung from the trees. Some tribes of the Tinneh 
 let their dead remain where they fall to be devoured 
 by wild beasts, while others of the same nation, place 
 the bodies in a low stone enclosure where they come 
 to the same end. With the tribes who burn their 
 dead, savage cruelty outdoes itself. When the man 
 dies his wives must gather about his pyre to attest 
 their devotion to the deceased. They must keep 
 alive the fire, meanwhile casting themselves upon 
 the body, uttering cries and lamentations, which I 
 imagine to be sincere, and they then come out of the 
 ordeal more dead than alive. The shaman is pre-
 
 INDIAN BELIEFS. 67 
 
 served upon his death in a wooden sarcophagus, and 
 the body of a slave is thrown into the water anywhere. 
 A custom which I believe to be nearly obsolete was 
 the murder of a slave upon the master's grave that 
 he might make his entree into the unknown state 
 worthily attended. 
 
 The Indian's conception of the hereafter, where 
 any belief or thought is harbored, is based upon his 
 surroundings in this sphere, and whose, indeed, is not? 
 To a greater or less degree the people of the world 
 conceive of their surroundings in the world to come 
 in the light of greatly exaggerated grandeurs of the 
 things of this world as they know them, and accord- 
 ing to their various natures judge the happiness of 
 their future existence. So the Indian builds in his 
 imagination, a mighty forest stored with an end- 
 less supply of game, in the pursuit of which is 
 attained the height of savage happiness, and being 
 a lazy mortal, he looks forward to a time of perfect 
 rest and plenty of servants, if his relations are 
 thoughtful enough to forward them, in the cycle of 
 immortality. 
 
 Some of the tribes of Alaska believe in the future 
 punishment of the wicked and imagine two paths 
 leading to eternity, both watery, but over one of 
 which the brave's canoe glides on a smooth flo\ving 
 current, while through the other passage the journey 
 is made in darkness amongst rocks, whirlpools and 
 perils indescribable. Where this latter route ends 
 I do not know. What constitutes wickedness among 
 a people who have no moral laws and no deity to 
 whom to render an account or to limit their desires, 
 absolutely no ruling or guiding power, I fail to 
 conceive.
 
 68 CAVE BURIAL. 
 
 A mode of burial quite peculiar to now exist- 
 ing forms seems to have been, in the times of its 
 practice, at an almost pre-historic date, confined ex- 
 clusively to the people of the Aleutian chain. The 
 practice went into disuse with the arrival of the Rus- 
 sians, from which we deduct that this was one of the 
 many habits revolutionized in these islands by the 
 Russian advent. 
 
 The custom of embalming and cave burial was 
 obsolete beyond the recollection of the oldest inhabit- 
 ant, and it is upon the evidences of the caves and 
 their relics the sole existing records of those ages 
 that history and science have to rely for the unravel- 
 ing of the mysteries. Numerous legends attach to 
 these caves and the once mortal remains therein con- 
 tained, but they mostly partake of the weird, and are 
 little to be depended upon. The deductions that have 
 been arrived at as to methods and customs are as 
 follows : 
 
 Wrapped in their best clothes and mats, and with- 
 out weapons or other goods, contrary to the usual 
 custom, the poor were placed in a sheltered place 
 and, sometimes, heaped with stones and driftwood. 
 In all cases a mask without eyes was placed over the 
 face, that the dead might not look upon the spirits 
 he was to meet in the mystic spheres. 
 
 The remains of wealthy or distinguished person- 
 ages were treated with more ceremony. The bodies 
 were carefully prepared and placed in running water 
 for some time to remove the fatty matter. The 
 knees were drawn close to the chest, and the bones 
 of the limbs ofttimes fractured that they might be 
 gotten into a more compact form. The remains were 
 carefully dried, wrapped in furs and bound with seal
 
 LEGEND OF KAGAMIL. 69 
 
 skin, that the whole might be water tight, and this 
 ponderous bundle was suspended in a cave or some 
 rocky shelter. 
 
 Numerous burial caves have been discovered or 
 reported, and many explored and rifled. In 1874, 
 the Alaska Commercial Company explored the 
 largest known of these caves, and bringing away the 
 contents donated the relics to the Smithsonian Insti- 
 tute and to the California Academy of Sciences. 
 The picture herewith presented is from a photograph 
 of a mummy in the Company's museum. The cave 
 thus explored is situated in the Island of Kagamil, 
 one of the group known as the Islands of the Four 
 Craters. Besides the incased remains of eight adults 
 and three infants, there were found in this cave num- 
 erous weapons, implements and utensils of all sorts, 
 beads and furs and the remains of canoes. 
 
 By Prof. Ball's computation, the age of these 
 relics w r ould now be one hundred and thirty-four 
 years. Writing in 1876, he says: 
 
 " I was informed in 1871, by several of the more in- 
 telligent natives, that they fixed the date of the earli- 
 est interment in the following manner: It occurred 
 in the autumn or winter. During the following 
 spring the first Russians that were ever seen by the 
 natives of the Four Craters, arrived in the vicinity. 
 These may have been TrapesnikofPs party, which 
 left Kamchatka in 1758, but did not reach Umnak 
 until 1760; or they may have been that of the infam- 
 ous Pushkareff; or possibly of Maxim LazerofT; but, 
 in any case, they can hardly have been the expedi- 
 tion of Behring. In 1757 Ivan Nikiferoff sailed as 
 far east as Umnak, being the first Russian to' do so, 
 except those of Behring's expedition, who did not
 
 70 LEGEND OF KAGAMIL. 
 
 land on any of the Andreanoff group, though in 1741 
 they saw the shores of numerous indeterminate 
 islands from a distance. The earliest date therefore, 
 which we can assign to these remains would be 1756, 
 making the oldest of them about one hundred and 
 twenty years old." 
 
 Among the numerous traditions of the burial 
 places is the following 
 
 LEGEND OF KAGAMIL. 
 
 On the island of Kagamil lived a distinguished 
 toyon, Kat-haya-Koochak by name. He was a very 
 small man but, being very strong and active, he was 
 much respected and even feared by the natives of the 
 adjacent region. Between the people of a neighbor- 
 ing island and Kat-haya-Koochak's clan, had existed 
 a long-standing feud. But a bold young warrior, 
 called Yakaga, had just risen to the chieftainship of 
 these unfriendly islanders, and by the marriage of 
 Yakaga with Kat-haya-Koochak's only daughter, the 
 enmity between these people was laid aside. 
 
 Now the pride of old Kat-haya-Koochak was his 
 son Zampa, a youth just coming into manhood, in 
 whom the old chief saw promises of an able successor 
 to himself. He built for his son a fine bidarka, and 
 when it had been decked out as befitted the son of a 
 mighty chief, the boy gained his father's permission 
 to try the boat upon the open sea. After having 
 enjoined him not to venture too far from shore, the 
 father, from a pinnacle of rock, watched with admir- 
 ation the bold young seaman as he set out in pursuit 
 of a diving bird, shooting at it with his arrows. But 
 soon the father became alarmed. Zampa did not 
 hear his father shout to him to return, but, intent
 
 MUMMY FROM KAGAMIL 
 
 Photographed from orig'nal in possession of Louis SLOSS & Co.
 
 LEGEND OK KAGAMIL. 71 
 
 on getting the duck, which dove under to rise again 
 at some distance, the boy got further and further 
 from the shore. Finally he discovered that, in the 
 dusk, he could not distinguish the land from which 
 he came. He made for the nearest shore and soon 
 found himself in his brother-in-law's village. Ya- 
 kaga was away, having gone to visit his wife, for 
 according to the Aleut custom, the husband did not 
 take his wife to his own island, but went often to 
 visit her, but the boy was recognized as Yakaga's 
 brother-in-law and made welcome by the hospitable 
 islanders. After feasting and merry-making, and 
 when the whole village was about to retire, in accord- 
 ance with the Aleutian custom of hospitality, Zampa 
 was given the companionship of Kitt-a-youx, the 
 daughter of Yakaga's first chief, and without a doubt 
 the belle of the village. 
 
 Next day Zampa showed no inclination to return 
 home, nor yet the next, and it was rumored that he 
 was enamored of the great chiefs daughter. Such 
 w r as the fact, for on the third day he made an offer 
 for Kitt-a-youx' hand, and when his suit was rejected 
 by the chief, Zampa left the barrabora in a towering 
 rage. Now Kitt-a-youx favored this bold youth and 
 they laid plans to steal away that night and seek the 
 protection of Zampa' s father, the mighty Kat-haya- 
 Koochak. A dark November night came on and all 
 went well. With Kitt-a-youx in his canoe, Zampa 
 pulled a strong stroke for home. Suddenly he heard 
 some one coming after him. Though he redoubled 
 his exertions, his pursuer gained on him, and soon 
 began to throw arrows at him. Kitt-a-youx urged 
 him to his utmost, and he was straining every nerve 
 when an arrow struck his paddle and he, losing his
 
 72 LEGEND OF KAGAMIL. 
 
 balance, the canoe was overturned. Zampa's pur- 
 suer came up and taking the half dead girl into his 
 boat, tried to right Zampa's canoe, but was unsuc- 
 cessful and the boy was drowned. When the man 
 dragged the body to the surface, he uttered a pierc- 
 ing shriek. He was no other than Yakaga, who, 
 returning from his visit to his wife, had left his 
 father-in-law in a state of fear for the safety of his 
 son, and having seen a bidarka with a woman in the 
 stern heading from his island, had started on the 
 pursuit, which ended in the drowning of his brother- 
 in-law. Yakaga wept over the boy, but fearing the 
 anger of his father did not dare return with the body 
 to the village, so he towed it with the overturned 
 canoe to the shore and, leaving it in the kelp, 
 returned with Kitt-a-youx to his own island. 
 
 Next day the body was found and wild was the 
 lamentation of Kat-haya-Koochak for his son. He 
 called together his clan that they might mourn after 
 the manner of the Aleuts, and that they might bury 
 his son with honor. Swift was the vengeance of the 
 spirits visited upon him w r ho caused Zampa's death, 
 as we shall see. At the proper time and with much 
 lamentation and song the body was borne to the 
 burial place. Among the mourners was Zampa's 
 sister, Yakaga' s wife, and she was with child. 
 Across the path of the procession lay a stone which 
 all had to pass. The ground was slippery with 
 melting snow and in carelessly stepping on the 
 stone, the sister slipped and was thrown on her 
 back, being prematurely delivered and dying soon 
 after. Kat-haya-Koochak was distracted. He had 
 come to bury one, and instead had three to bur}-. 
 The procession returned to his barrabora and he gave
 
 LEGEND OF KAGAMIL. 73 
 
 orders for the funeral of his daughter and grandson, 
 but was perplexed as to where to dispose of them. 
 Then he bethought him of the cave near the village, 
 in which he stored his furs and other goods and gave 
 orders that this should be converted into a mauso- 
 leum for the whole family, and there he had his dead 
 placed, and with them he placed the little canoe, 
 the paddles, arrows and many valuables. Then he 
 gave orders that he should be placed there himself, 
 and soon after the chief died of grief for his children 
 and was placed in this cave as he had desired, with 
 all his wealth, household goods and weapons. And 
 this was the end of the distinguished chief Kat-haya- 
 Koochak and his family, and the origin of the great 
 burial cave of Kagamil. 
 
 But our story is not done. Kitt-a-youx lived to 
 mourn her betrothed. Cast off by her father and sold 
 to a neighboring toyon, looked upon with little pity 
 by her people, her life was miserable and all but 
 slavery. But her husband seldom came near her, 
 and for this she was thankful. Soon Zampa's child 
 was born, and the young mother was comforted. 
 Still her outward persecution was continued, or 
 rather was increased, making life unbearable for the 
 young girl. She saw but misery in life for herself 
 and child, a girl, and took a resolve so common with 
 the women of Her time and condition; she would end 
 the existence so miserable for her and her little one, 
 and leave the rest to the Great Unknown Spirit. 
 Stealing away in a canoe one night she headed for 
 Kagamil. Putting forth her best exertion to be 
 away from her own island, and chanting to the stars 
 as she paddled, her canoe dragged in the sea-weed 
 ere she realized how far she had journeyed. She rose
 
 74 
 
 LEGEND OF KAGAMIL. 
 
 and looked about her. The morning was breaking 
 and she knew where she was. With a relieved sigh 
 she stooped, took up the sleeping child and bound it 
 with her blanket to her breast. Then with one 
 glance about her and calling to her Zampa, she 
 sprang into the chilly water. The kelp gathered 
 about her and she rose no more, while the canoe, 
 released of its burden, drifted out to sea. Some days 
 later the remains of mother and child were found 
 washed up on the beach near where they picked up 
 poor Zampa. The story of the ill-fated runaway had 
 reached the Kagamil Islanders soon after the old 
 chiefs death, though no suspicion was attached to 
 Yakaga. Therefore, when poor Kitt-a-youx' body 
 was found it was tenderly cared for by the people, 
 and with much ceremony placed in the mausoleum 
 which the distinguished toyon, Kat-haya-Koochak 
 had consecrated, and at last poor Katt-a-youx rested 
 with her Zampa and her child. 
 
 And since these happenings has the island of 
 Kagamil been deserted by the living.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 TOTEMS AND SHAMANS. 
 
 THE TOTEM POLE; ITS EMBLEMATIC SIGNIFICANCE 
 AND USE. GROTESQUE CARVINGS AND BARBARIC 
 CONCEPTIONS. WONDERFUL CANOES. GRAVES 
 AND BURIAL CUSTOMS. PRIMITIVE RELIGIONS. 
 WITCHCRAFT AMONG OTHER PEOPLES AND IN 
 EARLY HISTORY. THE POTLACH. OFFERING OF 
 THE CONSCIENCE-STRICKEN INDIANS. A SYSTEM 
 NOT FOUND AMONG MORE ENLIGHTENED PEOPLE. 
 
 HE Indians of Alaska are, as I 
 have said, divided into five 
 principal nations, which are 
 segregated into tribes. These, 
 in turn, are subdivided into 
 families, each having a dis- 
 tinctive name, and each mem- 
 ber being provided with a 
 Totem. This Totem is a dis- 
 tinguishing badge representing the family, or, rather 
 the caste, of its owner. These emblems consist of 
 some representative of animal nature, such as a fish, 
 a bird or a mammal, and are marked on the houses, 
 the canoes and clothing, and are sometimes worn as 
 personal ornaments. These totems give to the 
 Indians a rather peculiar connection and carry some 
 strange inhibitions. Members of the same tribe or 
 tribal family may intermarry, but not members of 
 the same badge. A bear may marry into the salmon
 
 76 CASTE BADGES. 
 
 badge, but a bear may not marry a bear, a wolf a 
 wolf, nor a crow a crow. Though the totem ma}- 
 appear merely an evidence of barbaric superstition, 
 there nevertheless seems to be some method in the 
 workings of the system. The prevention of inter- 
 marriage which it imposes necessarily keeps down 
 clannishness and consequently averts tribal and 
 family Avars. The Indians of some parts of Oregon, 
 Washington and British Columbia follow a method 
 somewhat similar to the totem, each being provided 
 with some emblem significant of caste in his tribe. 
 It also serves as a sort of luck} 7 charm, just as the 
 negroes of the south carry amulets as a protection 
 against evil spirits or to secure good fortune. While 
 the Alaskan aborigines attach some significance of 
 this nature to the totem, its chief use seems to be as 
 a kind of genealogical record. At their burial places 
 and in the front of the leading houses in each village 
 are erected tall totem poles, on which are carved 
 representations of birds, beasts and fishes. These 
 constitute the " Family Bible" of the particular fam- 
 ily. Strange to say, for a barbaric people, to whom 
 money is but a comparatively recent revelation, these 
 totem poles are sometimes very expensive, often 
 'reaching a cost as high as two thousand dollars, or 
 an equivalent in blankets and furs. They will range 
 from two to five feet in diameter and to one hun- 
 dred feet in height. Small totemic carvings, in all 
 sorts of grotesque forms, are made by the Indians 
 and sold to travelers in the towns and at the various 
 trading posts. Some of them are very unique and 
 display considerable handicraft in a rude, artistic 
 way, and some of the more elaborate command high 
 prices from visiting whites. Human nature is
 
 BEAR TOTEMS AT FORT WRANGELL. 
 From photograph 433, by WINTER PHOTO Co., Eugene, Ore.
 
 INDIAN CARVINGS. 77 
 
 human nature the world over, from the native sav- 
 age to the king upon his throne, and these untutored 
 sons of Nature will barter that which, to them, is 
 sacred for the glittering coin that rules the world 
 from "Greenland's icy mountains to India's coral 
 strand." The making and erection of totem poles is 
 not frequent since the whites have increased in the 
 country, as the enterprising white man has in many 
 instances managed to secure them for museum pur- 
 poses in the " States" or in Kurope, but those that 
 are still standing are religiously guarded and care- 
 fully preserved. Totems are also often carved on 
 the walls of the houses. The natives of Alaska seem 
 to be possessed of a passion for carving. They 
 whittle and gouge figures and canoes out of every 
 material the country affords that will take a tool. 
 Bone, wood, horn and ivory of animals, fish-bone and 
 sinew and even skins of animals, are formed into 
 crude figures of everything in and out of nature 
 such as they can see in their country, or that comes 
 within the scope of Indian imagination, from a 
 grasshopper to a bear, from a minnow to a whale, 
 a sea-gull to an eagle, or a swaddled infant to 
 an exaggerated idol, that would scare into devout - 
 ness the most hardened sinner on running across it 
 unawares. 
 
 Remarkable, in connection with their carving, is 
 the construction of the Indian's canoe. It is called 
 a "dug-out," being hewn and shaped from a single 
 log or trunk of a tree. After the canoe is excavated 
 and outwardly formed, the shell is made pliable by 
 steam, which is generated by filling the excavation 
 with water and then throwing into the water red 
 hot stones. Having produced pliability, and the
 
 78 CAXOK lU'ILDING. 
 
 shell having been shaped to the lines required by the 
 savage naval architect, it is left to season for a time. 
 All canoes are built upon the same model, in grace- 
 ful, clipper lines, a carved stern and sharp prow 
 which projects gracefully out over the water, the 
 latter usually surmounted with the family badge 
 withal wonderful and beautiful specimens of savage 
 naval architecture. A common canoe is fifty feet 
 long, and one much longer is not a rarity, accommo- 
 dating from ten to twenty paddles a side. A Haidah 
 canoe exhibited at the Centennial was eighty feet 
 long and five feet deep, constructed without a joint, 
 and propelled, when sculled by her full complement, 
 by forty paddles a side. 
 
 The almost invariable custom of the Indians in 
 putting away their dead is to make the tomb close to 
 a river bank. Among some the body is bent so that 
 the knees will touch the breast, and is put in a rough 
 box of hewn boards which may be covered with gaudy 
 paintings or carvings in totemic designs, or may be 
 left plain. This box is placed upon four supports, 
 of a height varying with different people, which will 
 then be enclosed with a rough fence, or over which 
 will be built a substantial hut. Over these tombs is 
 planted a pole from which streams a rag, and near 
 by is another pole, of about twenty-five feet in height, 
 to which is attached a totem, carved in the shape of 
 some animal-object, representative of that particular 
 family or sub-clan to which the deceased belonged. 
 The fence posts and grave coverings are also adorned 
 with these grotesque emblems. Some of the Chris- 
 tianized Indians build crude houses over the graves 
 and surmount them with the Greek cross; others 
 more civilized, enclose the graves in neat picket or
 
 SHAMANISM. 79 
 
 latticed fences, but in each and every case the totem 
 is present. 
 
 If the aborigines of Alaska have any religion 
 at all it can only be defined under the name of 
 "Shamanism," and as a matter of fact, Shamanism 
 can scarcely be properly defined as a religion. Of 
 course I do not in this connection refer to the Indians 
 who have been converted to Christianity by mission- 
 ary and other white influences. A few of these are 
 devotees in Christianity; many have a sort of remote 
 idea of what a living Deity means, and others are 
 Christians only because they have been baptized by 
 a Russian priest. All, however, have either a ling- 
 ering or a positive belief in Shamanism. This term 
 is not in itself Alaskan. It represents a sort of 
 Fetchism common in western Asia, in India, Siberia 
 and Alaska. The Shamanist is a believer in witch- 
 craft, and the shaman, the high priest of witchcraft, 
 is a witch, who is supposed to be in communication 
 with unseen powers, which enables him either by 
 intercession or denunciation to settle the fate of a 
 friend or a foe, to regulate his or her success or fail- 
 ure in all undertakings, and to heal the sick or 
 cause death by certain incantations. 
 
 By various modes the shaman is selected to fulfill 
 his office, but in no case is he an ordinary personage. 
 With some tribes a child with any abnormity, from 
 a cast in the eye to a humpback, is consecrated to 
 the office. Among others, a young man has a dream 
 which he thinks, or makes his people think, has 
 come to pass, and enters upon a long fast from which 
 he emerges a full-fledged shaman. The Thlinkets once 
 had a much longer and more laborious rite of install- 
 ing a shaman, but with them Shamanism is almost of
 
 8O POWER OF SHAMANS. 
 
 the past. From what I could learn from questioning 
 numerous natives, this Shamanism is a sort of spir- 
 itualistic belief, with the shaman as the medium. 
 Those who are the strictest adherents to the super- 
 stition are very reticent in giving information to the 
 whites as to the origin, rites and mysteries of the 
 belief, if belief it can be called, while many of the 
 younger element, having partly drawn away from it, 
 ridicule and defy the shamans, and are ignorant of 
 the history and rites of Shamanism. The shaman 
 rules with an iron hand and exacts the most exor- 
 bitant tribute from his devotees, who are comprised 
 mostly of the aged, sick and unfortunate In many 
 senses the shaman occupies a similar position toward 
 his adherents as that of the "medicine-man" of the 
 wild Indian tribes of other portions of the American 
 continent. His methods of healing are, like the 
 medicine-man's, by incantation; he has a rough 
 knowledge of a few medicinal herbs and roots; he 
 contorts himself into a sort of epilepsy when invok- 
 ing the spirits and works upon the superstitious 
 fears of his people. The medicine-man, unlike the 
 shaman, however, exacts no fee. If he cure the 
 patient, he is u heap big medicine"; if the patient 
 die, the doctor is often stoned to death; then some 
 other unfortunate is selected to take his place. Gen- 
 erally some very old man is selected as the medi- 
 cine-man, some poor wretch broken down by age and 
 disease; and I have been answered by the Indians, 
 when I asked why they selected their old and 
 decrepit men for their medicine-men, that it was 
 because they were too old to be good for anything 
 else, and that, as they were a burden on the tribe, if 
 they did not soon die in natural course, the time was
 
 DIVERGENCE IN CODES. 8l 
 
 not long off when they would incur the usual pen- 
 alt}' by losing a patient. 
 
 In Alaska Shamanism, all birds, beasts and fishes 
 are supposed to be inhabited by either good or evil 
 spirits, with whom only the shaman is on speaking 
 terms, and all elemental disturbances are supposed 
 to be manifestations of the good will or wrath of the 
 spirits, only to be interpreted by the shaman, for a 
 fee. Each tribe and family has its own peculiar set 
 of spiritual legends and its own set of bugaboos, of 
 whom the shaman is the embassador. Where the 
 shaman has devout followers, he is the most over- 
 bearing and exacting, frequently, by threats of 
 spiritualistic vengeance, demanding and receiving 
 everything of value possessed by his devotee. Many 
 of the natives who hover about the trading posts have 
 acquired a sort of notion as to what Christianity 
 means, but have not abandoned their fetishistic 
 ideas, nor have they gained much in morality by the 
 teachings inculcated through contact with the whites. 
 Shamanism is confined more particularly to the 
 Indians, who look upon the Innuits, Eskimo and 
 Aleuts as sorcerers, and yet these latter tribes also 
 believe in sorcery and witchcraft and have their 
 totems and shamans the same as the Indians, only 
 in different forms, while the principle is the same. 
 The Indian name for sorcerer is Uskeemi, and the 
 Innuit name for Shaman temples, Kaguskcemi, and 
 it is from the root of these words that Eskimo comes. 
 Among the Innuits, the totem system differs from 
 the other systems in Alaska. A boy when arrived 
 at puberty selects some living object as his patron, 
 and the spirit which inhabits that particular bird, 
 fish or beast is his guardian through life. If bad
 
 82 PHILOLOGY OF SHAMANISM. 
 
 luck pursues him, he has the right of secession from 
 his guardian and can choose another, and if he feels 
 like it can eat his former patron; that is, if his totem 
 is a duck, he may eat duck. This is not permissi- 
 ble in the totemic code of other tribes. Deer, seal, 
 salmon and badger are regarded by all with special 
 veneration, as they form the food suppty, but while 
 these animals are worshipped, it is not forbidden to 
 eat them. 
 
 The philology of the word "Shaman" is some- 
 thing difficult to trace, but its intent and the word 
 itself, runs through a certain theology in both civil- 
 ized and barbaric literature for ages. Persia had its 
 shamans and its believers in Shamanism, and even 
 the Parsees with their beautiful and, in its da}', 
 enlightened theology, were largely shamaiiistic. 
 Shamanism simply means witchcraft, and from the 
 day when Shaman Satan tempted Eve in the Garden 
 up to the highest civilization of to-day, there have 
 been, and still are, shamans and Shamanites. The 
 newspapers of every large city contain advertise- 
 ments by fortune-tellers otherwise witches and 
 many an intelligent, refined and educated man or 
 woman consults these oracles, though they would 
 hardly acknowledge their superstition to themselves. 
 The Roman Empire, at the very height of its civili- 
 zation and culture, had its Augurs, who were merely 
 shamans. Joseph, who engineered a grain deal when 
 in captivity in Egypt, and dreamed of the seven lean 
 kine and the seven fat kine, was a shaman; and 
 King David was a Shamanite. Moses, when he led 
 the children of Israel out of captivity and into the 
 wilderness, was a shaman when he smote the rock 
 and drew forth water; Aaron was a shaman when,
 
 SHAMANITES. 83 
 
 while Moses was prospecting the summit of Mt. 
 Sinai, he induced the ladies of the excursion to 
 make a potlach of their jewelry to form a golden calf 
 for all to worship. It is not necessary to multiply 
 instances of a belief in witchcraft and witches. Bveii 
 among the Pilgrim Fathers and the earliest settlers 
 of New England rugged, sturdy, brainy, and wor- 
 shippers of the Christian God, sincere, honest and 
 pious Shamanism prevailed, and to-day there are 
 millions of intelligent people who sincerely believe 
 that Christ drove the devil out of the swine, and 
 accept the story literally. When we have these 
 numerous examples among an enlightened people, 
 dating from the dawn of civilization to our own time; 
 when the Bible records sacrifices made on the altar 
 of the Diety, and which are even carried out in form 
 if not in effect, tp-day by various sects of civilized 
 religion, who shall ridicule the Innuit, the Aleut, 
 the Eskimo, the native races of all climes on which 
 civilization has not shed its light, for being Sham- 
 anites? The very forces of Nature are something to 
 inspire awe, not only in the untutored, but in the 
 tutored mind; and the foundation for this is the 
 mystery surrounding those forces, especially to those 
 whose only communication with Nature is, not in 
 book knowledge, science or philosophy, but in the 
 mountain and vale, the thunders and lightnings, the 
 sun, moon, stars, sky, flood, storm, glacier, or other 
 natural powers of phenomena. 
 
 The native Alaskans do not stand alone among 
 the native races of the American continent as Sham- 
 anites. There never was a tribe or sub-tribe of 
 Indians on this continent that did not have its 
 shaman, or u medicine-man. " To a great extent,
 
 84 MKDICIXK-MEN. 
 
 
 
 the word medicine-man is a misnomer; for, in many 
 tribes of Indians the functionary so-called is not 
 looked upon as a physician, but only as an incantor. 
 The " Diggers" of California at certain seasons of 
 the year go down on all fours and eat vegetation as 
 medicine, and the only function of the "medicine- 
 man " in case of the sickness of a member of the 
 tribe is to frighten off evil spirits by incantation. 
 The same rule applies among the Piutes, Shoshones, 
 Washoes and Goshutes of Nevada, and, in fact, 
 among all the Indian tribes of the entire country 
 from the Rocky Mountains to the Pacific Ocean. It 
 is civilization that has made the real medicine-man 
 among the aborigines, and it is civilization that has 
 put upon them the diseases which have made drugs 
 and doctors necessary to them. When once an 
 Indian begins to learn that a white man is a doctor, 
 'heap big medicine " he becomes a hypochon- 
 driac and the slighest twinge or ache is to him a disease 
 requiring medical treatment, and he is the more 
 ready for this because it is seldom that a reputable 
 physician charges an Indian for advice or treatment, 
 and, if there is one characteristic in an Indian that 
 is predominant, it is the laudable desire to get some- 
 thing for nothing, from a dose of cathartic pills to a 
 pair of worn-out pantaloons. A friend of the author 
 once related to him an anecdote about an Indian 
 Avho, having some slight ailment, applied at the 
 camp of some white men for "heap medicine." One 
 of the party, with more cruelty than brains, gave 
 him a dose of a dozen purgative pills. The pills 
 were sugar-coated, and, as all Indians like sweets, 
 the victim swallowed them with avidity, and went 
 to his wickiup. The man's companions rebuked
 
 THE POTLACH. 85 
 
 him for His miserable practical joke and predicted 
 the death of the Indian. But he turned up next 
 day, pale, sad and attenuated and asked for another 
 dose. 
 
 In this connection a reference to the potlach seems 
 to me to be pertinent, as it is a custom common in 
 various forms among all the Indian tribes of the con- 
 tinent, but particularly among the natives of the 
 northwest coast, comprising Oregon, Washington, 
 Alaska and British Columbia and extending as far 
 interior as Idaho and Montana, and among all the 
 Coast Indians, the same word is used. It is believed 
 to be of Chinook origin. " Potlach," as interpreted 
 does not mean a gift in the ordinary sense, as a 
 Christinas gift, a birthday gift, a wedding gift or 
 other present given in love, friendship, affection or 
 compliment, as aitiong civilized people. Among the 
 native races it means a total surrender of all hold- 
 ings and belongings as a sort of propitiary gift to 
 appease evil spirits through the medium of a shaman, 
 or other agent of witchery. In Oregon, Washing- 
 ton, British Columbia and Alaska a native who has 
 acquired a large share of this world's goods becomes 
 at times stricken with a sort of ecstasy, when he feels 
 it incumbent on himself to organize a sort of con- 
 science fund on his own hook. He calls his neigh- 
 bors together, has a big feast and distributes to his 
 guests all his earthly belongings. In some instances, 
 when the spasm is particularly acute, he strips 
 himself of the last stitch of wearing apparel and 
 recovers from his convulsion with the consciousness 
 of a duty well performed. This potlach is only 
 indulged in by the crude, untutored natives, and is 
 not " catching" among civilized and cultivated peo-
 
 86 
 
 THK 1'OTLACH. 
 
 pie, and there is no instance cii record of any of the 
 leading capitalists of America ever having held a 
 potlach, though the records of the Conscience Fund 
 at Washington do show that many Americans have 
 potlached with the Government according to the 
 extent of their misdoings, some with and some with- 
 out legal interest.
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 EDUCATION IN ALASKA. 
 
 HISTORY OF EARLY EDUCATION UNDER THE RUS- 
 SIANS. THE CHANGES AFTER THE PURCHASE OF 
 ALASKA. LONG NEGLECT. -PRESENT INADEQUACY 
 
 OF THE SYSTEM. WORK OF THE AGENT AND 
 
 NEEDS OF THE SCHOOLS. DUNCAN'S METLA- 
 KATLA MISSION; ITS PROSPERITY AND THRIFT-. 
 PERSECUTION BY CHURCH AND STATE. FINAL 
 IMMIGRATION TO ALASKA. WORK OF THE SEC- 
 TARIAN MISSIONS. 
 
 HAT education is the funda- 
 mental principle of republican- 
 ism, and the main stay of our 
 American Institutions, is an 
 undisputed fact. If education 
 is a necessity, in the midst of 
 our civilization whose princi- 
 ples are by nature inculcated 
 in more enlightened minds 
 the inheritance of generations what must be the 
 needs of our aboriginal surroundings darkened by 
 ages of superstition to raise them to that much 
 mooted height of civilization. 
 
 When Russian America became United States 
 territory, to the question as to what would become of 
 the schools, General Lovell H. Rousseau, U. S. 
 Commissioner in the transfer, is said to have re- 
 plied: "America is far ahead of Russia in that
 
 88 EARLY SCHOOLS. 
 
 respect, and that ample provision would be made for 
 them." He was right in part, while his promise has 
 been fulfilled but in a measure. 
 
 A glimpse at the past and present of the schools of 
 Alaska will suffice. As earl y as 1775 Governor 
 Sclilikoff established a school at the capital of Rus- 
 sian America, then situated on Kadiak Island. This 
 school, in 1803, had thirty pupils studying arithmetic, 
 navigation and four mechanical trades. In 1805 Count 
 Nikolai Resaiioff at the same place organized a 
 school which he called the " House of Benevolence 
 of the Empress Maria." The Greek religion, the 
 Russian language and arithmetic only were taught 
 here. In 1803 a school was opened in Sitka which 
 experienced many vicissitudes until it passed into 
 the hands of a naval officer in 1820. In 1833 this 
 school saw another change for the better, when a 
 Creole, Etolin by name, chief director of the Fur 
 Company and Governor of the Colony, took it 
 in charge. 
 
 A school was established for boys and girls at 
 Oonalaska in 1825 which maintained its efficiency to 
 the date of the transfer. Another school was opened 
 here for children of the employees of the Fur Com- 
 pany. These schools, I believe, or a successor to 
 them, with all their traditions, thrive under the con- 
 trol of the Greek Church to-day. The Russian 
 language and the Greek religion are taught and 
 their holidays and fetes observed. 
 
 Dr. Sheldon Jackson, General Agent of Education 
 for the Territory, in the report of his. visit to the 
 Aleutian Islands, tells us that he met at Oonalaska: 
 " American citizens who have never heard a praj-er 
 for the President of the United States, nor of the
 
 UNDER THE RUSSIANS. 89 
 
 Fourth of July, or the name of the capital of the 
 Natibn, but have been taught to pray for the Emperor 
 of Russia, to celebrate his birthday and commemo- 
 rate the victories of Ancient Greece." A severe 
 commentary that requires no particular emphasis. 
 
 There was another of the Fur Company's schools 
 for boys situated at Sitka at this time, and in 1831 
 one was established for girls. In 1841, a theological 
 seminary was established in Sitka. 
 
 In these schools, where they went beyond the 
 Russian language and the Greek religion, they 
 taught reading, writing and arithmetic and different 
 industries for boys and girls, and it is noticeable 
 that they often sent students to Russia for further 
 advantages. In 1859, however, we find the schools 
 at Sitka broadening their field of usefulness and 
 introducing the Slavonian and English languages, 
 history, geography y book-keeping, geometry, trigo- 
 nometry, navigation and astronomy. 
 
 At the time Russian America changed hands there 
 were five schools supported by the Russian Govern- 
 ment in Sitka, and others outside, besides many con- 
 ducted by priests and under the control of the Greek 
 Church. When the change came, the Russian 
 instructors naturally stepped out. Some of the 
 ecclesiastics still continue their schools and some of 
 the American Missionary Societies have made 
 attempts. 
 
 After years of neglect, in March, 1885, the Secre- 
 tary of the Interior made over the care of the educa- 
 tion of the Alaskans to the Bureau of Education and 
 an agent was appointed, who immediately set to 
 work. Among innumerable disadvantages under 
 which he had to labor, probably the greatest were
 
 90 DELAYED IMPROVEMENTS. 
 
 the delays of Congress in making appropriations for 
 this important work, and when the bill was filially 
 passed, the inadequacy of the amount, the severity 
 of the climate, their poor quarters, the distance from 
 home and between his schools and having to teach a 
 new language, were circumstances that helped only 
 to impede progress. 
 
 There were two schools in Sitka, two, I believe, 
 at Wrangell and one each at Juiieau, Hooiiah, Kill- 
 isnoo and Jackson which were continued. Then 
 in 1885-86, schools were established at Unga, in 
 the Shumagiii Islands, St. Paul, Kadiak, Afognak 
 Islands, Klawack, Prince of Wales Island and Lor- 
 ing, the latter of which was moved to Fort Tongas. 
 These schools were but poorly provided for, especi- 
 ally in the way of accommodations, and none of their 
 wretched quarters were owned by the Government. 
 This is the situation to-day. 
 
 Dr. Jackson, Prof. Kelly and the corps of teachers 
 whom we met, cannot be too highl}^ commended for 
 their persistent efforts in this uphill fight. They 
 can exhibit as the result of their labors, children, 
 neat in appearance, who can read and write, and 
 many of whom are acquainted with the rudiments of 
 arithmetic. In the schools and missions man}' of 
 the pupils sing and perform upon some musical 
 instrument, and the Metlakatlans have a well-trained 
 band. 
 
 Industrial exercises have been introduced grad- 
 ually into the schools and the people, coming under 
 the influence of the spirit of civilization, are one by 
 one giving up their old mode of life, and Dr. Jack- 
 son advocates for the 3'oung men of Alaska, training 
 in cutting and rafting logs, the running of saw-mills,
 
 MANUAL TRAINING. 91 
 
 coopering, furniture-making and all sorts of wood- 
 working. 
 
 I have treated of the Hyperborean characters and 
 shown many points wherein they differed from the 
 Indians of the lower latitudes. In many respects I 
 think his customs and tribal relations more conducive 
 to advancement and the man more apt to learn. In 
 this I may be mistaken; however I am not prepared 
 to say that the liberal educational advantages sought 
 for him will not apply as advantageously to the 
 American Indian. 
 
 The Government owes its Indians preparation for 
 an intelligent citizenship, if for no other motive than 
 its own protection and its glory. And surely the 
 properly educated Indian will be as valuable an addi- 
 tion to our population aiid as worthy an element in 
 our cosmopolitan nationality as the hordes that pour 
 into Castle Garden. We have seen how little the 
 Alaskans know of the flag under which they now 
 live, and writers and travelers tell of the little respect 
 paid to authority. In the development of character 
 a prime factor in education the high principles of 
 patriotism and fidelity to duty should be instilled in 
 the young mind. 
 
 Fish packing, agriculture, mining and the devel- 
 opment of other resources of the country will devolve 
 upon these young men, as it will be some time be- 
 fore any but a shifting population will inhabit these 
 regions. It is, therefore, plainly essential that this 
 wealthy region of our territory should not be 
 neglected. 
 
 The moral training of the people is necessary to 
 the well being of the community, and must follow as 
 a natural consequence of enlightenment, though the
 
 92 MORAL TRAINING. 
 
 ethics of morality should have a prominent place in. 
 their education. We have seen that immorality and 
 witchcraft are still practiced. Under these hurtful 
 influences and amidst uncleanliness are the young 
 brought up to lie and steal without thought or knowl- 
 edge of disgrace. In the abolition of these many and 
 serious evils and replacing them with ideas of the 
 principles of Christianity, respect for the rights of 
 others, personal purity, self-respect and independence 
 the school finds one of its most sacred missions. 
 
 Probably the success of the sectarian missions 
 would warrant their being called more than attempts. 
 As early as 1793 the missionaries of the Greek 
 Church landed on Kadiak Island, where they erected 
 a church building and opened schools. To the sup- 
 port of these missions the Russian Fur Company 
 contributed annually $6,600. In 1845 a Lutheran 
 mission was established at Sitka. It was ten years 
 after the Territory was handed over to the United 
 States, despite urgent appeals, that the missionary 
 societies of America turned their attention to this 
 field, and then several sects sent out .missionaries. 
 
 The "Girls Home " in Sitka has proven itself 
 efficient in rescuing girls from slavery, and the 
 schools at Wrangell and elsewhere have done good 
 work in this direction and in the spread of civilization. 
 
 For the influence that they have had and will have 
 upon the missionary and educational work in this 
 field, brief mention of the labors and success of 
 William Duncan among the Tsimpsean Indians 
 imprecedented as they are in missionary history- 
 will not be out of place here. 
 
 In 1857, Duncan arrived at Port Simpson, in 
 British Columbia, having given up a lucrative posi-
 
 DUNCAN'S METHODS. 93 
 
 tion in England to volunteer in the service of the 
 English Church Missionary Society. Here he found 
 the natives sunk in the lowest depths to which canni- 
 balism, the darkest rites of superstition and traders' 
 whisky can reduce even savages and still retain the 
 image of their God. 
 
 He did nothing until he had mastered their lan- 
 guage -meanwhile studying their nature and man- 
 ners from the Fort. Then he went among them, 
 teaching them in that soft dialect and taking them 
 completely by surprise. 
 
 Duncan was dealing with a primitive and simple- 
 minded people. He showed them the material 
 advantages to be gained by adopting a higher civil- 
 ization, and as one writer puts it, " recognized a fact 
 which has, unfortunately been little appreciated in 
 the past by those attempting to civilize heathen 
 people." 
 
 He recognized the fact also, that it w r as the 
 tutor of civilization, the instructor in the mater- 
 ial, as much as the teacher of religion that was 
 needed, and that the civilizing Christian missionary 
 as Stanley says, "must belong to no nation in par- 
 ticular, no sect, but to the entire white race." 
 
 Simplicity was the key-note of Mr. Duncan's suc- 
 cess. Doing away with every show of form or cere- 
 mony, Mr. Duncan taught his people the fundamen- 
 tal truths of Christianity, presenting to them the 
 one central idea of the Omnipotent God, and upon 
 the darkened, superstitious mind broke a ray of 
 light. Further, he trusted them and confided in 
 them. The effect was not long in making its appear- 
 ance and he soon had about him a circle of devotees. 
 
 About four years later he saw that it would be wise
 
 94 Dt'NCAN'S TRIALS. 
 
 to get his little colony away from the detrimental 
 influences of the trading post. So he gathered a few 
 together, and selecting the site of a deserted village 
 about fifty miles south of Port Simpson, founded the 
 town of Metlakatla. More of the tribes, among them 
 many of their chiefs, soon followed and Metlakatla's 
 population numbered twelve hundred. 
 
 From a tribe reduced to the lowest level of savage 
 degradation, we see, in a community here living 
 in Christian civilization the result of thirty years 
 of untiring efforts on the part of one man. At 
 this time Metlakatla had an industrious population, 
 trained in agricultural, commercial and mercantile 
 pursuits, and could boast of a large and handsome 
 church, well-built cottages, a school building, black- 
 smith and carpenter shops, a store, a saw-mill and a 
 cannery, and built entirely by the natives under the 
 instruction of Duncan, who has, from time to time, 
 visited the outside world to learn of these things 
 himself. 
 
 Peace was not to reign in this prosperous com- 
 munity forever. Bigoted hierarchy was at work in 
 an underhand way, and in iSSi a storm burst over 
 Metlakatla which threatened it with destruction. 
 
 The Church Missionary Society objected to Mr. 
 Duncan's liberal policy of church rule, and urged 
 him to take orders. Not thinking it for the best of 
 the cause, he declined, and after several attempts 
 on the part of the Society to reduce him to subjection 
 they sent him a. bishop. This narrow-minded bit of 
 sectarianism took upon himself the government of 
 the mission, and from then on mischief was rife. 
 Bigotry, arrogance and childish display characterized 
 this man's stay.
 
 CONTINUED PERSECUTION. 95 
 
 Mr. Duncan and his party seceded and formed 
 themselves into a body under the name of the Chris- 
 tian Church of Metlakatla. The Missionary Society 
 then laid claim to the site of this little settlement, 
 and when the Dominion Government was turned to 
 for relief and their appeals treated with evasion, they 
 decided, as the last alternative, to abandon their 
 homes and to seek a refuge within the territory of 
 the United States. Annette Island in Alaska was 
 about ninety miles north and uninhabited. As this 
 seemed a favorable location, Mr. Duncan visited 
 Washington to obtain permission to settle on this 
 Island; this he obtained with the promise that, 
 "when the general land laws of the United States 
 were extended to Alaska, ample provision would be 
 made for all law-abiding inhabitants." In the sum- 
 mer of 1887 they commenced their exodus, and 
 found they could take from their homes nothing but 
 their personal property. A site was selected at Port 
 Chester, Annette Island (named New Metlakatla) 
 and here Duncan with about eight hundred of his 
 people have begun anew, under the Stars and 
 Stripes. 
 
 The story of their wrongs would fill a volume. 
 Sectarianism, the bane of Christianity, and the 
 desire for gain with politicians, are at the bottom of 
 the trouble, and to the personal aggrandizement of 
 the few has been sacrificed the well-being of a thous- 
 and. Alaska has, however, gained an addition to 
 her population which will be of the greatest value to 
 her in the future spread of civilization and in the 
 development of her resources. 
 
 The achievements of the civilizing influences 
 brought to bear in the Territory I have attempted to
 
 9 6 
 
 SECTARIANISM. 
 
 show in various pages through this work. In the 
 labor of reclaiming a savage people there are always 
 two contending factions whose aims lie in vastly 
 different directions; these are the trader and the 
 missionary influences; I may say three, for there is 
 the disinterested speculator or the resident who, in- 
 different to both, does the latter no good and the 
 former no harm. Then there is the religion we 
 would instill into this people. Christianity is not 
 the unit it should be, especially in this work. Sect- 
 arianism is allowed to figure more largely than the 
 primary principles of Christianity, presenting to the 
 darkened intellect a maze it cannot possibly untangle. 
 With what most natural and evil results? They 
 have been demonstrated wherever missionaries have 
 set foot, and even in the midst of Christian lands. 
 Leave it to more enlightened minds to find, if they 
 are there and necessary, the virtues of sectarianism, 
 and present to the savage the truth of the living 
 Deity and the material advantages of civilization. 
 For such tuition the Alaskan aborigine is well pre- 
 pared; such was the course of William Duncan at 
 Metlakatla, and the consequent result is his success 
 without precedent.
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 ANIMAL LIFE IN ALASKA. 
 
 MAMMOTHS. DISCOVERY OF THESE PRE-HISTORIC 
 MONSTERS. THE REMARKABLE BEAR OF THE 
 YUKON. -OTHER SPECIES OF THE BEAR. THE 
 DEER, BUFFALO AND VULPINE FAMILIES OF 
 ALASKA. FUR-BEARING ANIMALS. ORNITHOL- 
 OGY. THE AMPHIBIA AND FISHES OF ALASKAN 
 WATERS. 
 
 RAVELERS in the interior of 
 Alaska, and those who have ex- 
 plored close to the head-waters of 
 the numerous streanis of that in- 
 teresting region, are thoroughly 
 in accord with the assertion that 
 there are still existing specimens 
 of pre-historic animals. 
 Mr. C. F. Fowler, for a long time a resident of 
 Alaska as an attache of the Alaska Commercial Com- 
 pany, is responsible for the story that live mammoths 
 have been seen by some Indians of the Yukon. The 
 assured ability of the soil to bring forth prodigiously 
 vegetable life, makes it not unreasonable to suppose 
 that in the unknown and unexplored regions there 
 are large food resources available for the support of 
 such animals as natural history puts under the 
 generic name of " Mammoths." The history of the 
 elephant, the hippopotamus, the rhinoceros, and other 
 bulky animals of that class, shows that they exist and 
 thrive amid fastnesses where the tread of man seldom 
 enters; and if this be the case in the Orient, why
 
 98 MAMMOTHS. 
 
 diould not similar conditions, as to isolation, etc., 
 work similar results in the far northern Occident? 
 
 In the growth of the human body it has been 
 demonstrated that cold climates produce larger and 
 more vigorous men than are bred in the enervation of 
 tropical clime. Therefore, if India grows elephants, 
 why should not Alaska produce a mammoth; and if 
 China has produced the giant Chang, why might not 
 the latitude of Alaska bring forth as great if not a 
 greater animal wonder? 
 
 But the facts as to past-existent life of mammoth 
 
 proportions in Alaska are self-evident and indis- 
 putable. The ivory tusks of these animals are a reg- 
 ular article of commerce, and cumber the earth of the 
 interior, while the natives are unanimous in the asser- 
 tion that animals of proportions unknown to the civ- 
 ilized countries of the world roam through the fast- 
 nesses of what has been called a terra incognita. The 
 Alaska Commercial Company bought a large amount 
 of supposed fossil ivory from one of the chiefs of the 
 Innuit tribe of Alaskan Indians, and, on examina- 
 tion, blood stains and fragments of flesh were found
 
 MAMMOTH REMAINS. 99 
 
 adhering to the tusks. The agent questioned the 
 aborigines, and learned from a young man who had 
 led the hunt in which the ivory was taken that the 
 party had encountered a bull and cow of the mam- 
 moth species. The cow had fled on the male trumpet- 
 ing an alarm, but the bull was killed by a musket 
 ball through the brain, and, subsequently, the female 
 seeking her mate, was encountered and dispatched. 
 A rough sketch of the bull, drawn by the Indian 
 who had led the hunting party, would make its 
 dimensions over twenty feet in height and thirty 
 feet in length. The American aborigine, whether 
 in Alaska or other section, is more or less given to 
 exaggeration in describing natural objects, either 
 animate or inanimate; but, making all due allow- 
 ance for this, the tusks themselves, are evidence 
 sufficient to show that they had been worn by animals 
 of a size greater than any living species in any other 
 part of the known world. 
 
 Prof. John Muir, undoubtedly the greatest living 
 authority on Alaska, a close observer and a most 
 conscientious and conservative man, in his writings 
 and personal assertions adds his testimony to the 
 undeniable fact that the mammoth did make his home 
 in Alaska. He has seen the bones of these animals 
 with the fresh flesh adhering to them, and has seen 
 them all over the southwestern slope of Alaska. 
 The theory that the flesh was preserved by climatic 
 influences is not tenable, as in some of the valleys 
 the atmosphere while -humid, is at certain seasons of 
 the year, mild, balmy and dessicating. Prof. Muir 
 has told me that all over Alaska are the remains of 
 hundreds of these monsters, and that the natives 
 along the coast have a supposition that the skele-
 
 100 THE YUKON BEAR. 
 
 tons are those of some mammoth burrowing animal 
 like the mole. We are not, with the evidence shown, 
 however, ready to believe that mammoths at present 
 inhabit Alaska or any other portion of the globe. 
 
 While it is conceded that the bones are those of an 
 animal either of or closely related to the elephant 
 species, it would be most interesting to the cause of 
 science if a live specimen could be procured, and 
 perhaps when the mysteries of the sealed book of 
 this Northland shall be exposed by the enterprise, 
 daring and push of the Americans as they surely 
 will be in time some zoological garden may contain 
 a Simon-pure, real live and kicking mammoth as a 
 relic of a geologic age which all the rest of the world 
 but Alaska has passed countless centuries ago. 
 
 Among the great wonders of Alaska, unfortunately 
 not vouchsafed the tourist's vision, is an un-named 
 marvel of the Yukon region, a species of bear, which 
 has a strong claim upon our esteem. A miner, one 
 McQuestin, well known for his veracity, is responsi- 
 ble for the discovery and addition of this animal to 
 the natural history of Alaska. The animal as seen 
 by McQuestin possesses some of the peculiarities of 
 both the cinnamon and the grizzly bear of the south. 
 He inhabits solely the mountainous and unknown 
 wilderness of the Yukon, never leaving his steep and 
 rugged fastness for the more convivial regions of the 
 low lands. He is described as large, fierce and rather 
 awkward; but the peculiarity of this brute is that, the 
 better to enable him to roam about the mountain-sides 
 and steep places, his legs on one side are shorter than 
 the other two. Surely Nature is provident! 
 
 Alaska, while not rich in variety of animal life, 
 for a new and comparatively unsettled and unknown
 
 THE BEAR SPECIES. IOI 
 
 country, is fruitful of the species which are known 
 and identified. Admitting the existence of living 
 mammoths on portions of the Territory as yet unpen- 
 etrated by white men, and for which there seems to 
 be at least a plausibility, the next animal in propor- 
 tion is the bear. The well-known polar bear is 
 familiar in all our school books, pictured often as 
 lazily floating on a cake of ice, seeking something 
 on the surface of the waters that he may gobble up 
 and devour, and his skin large, white and glossy, is 
 familiar in the fur stores all over the world, and 
 makes a sleigh-robe for the prince in Europe and the 
 ordinary, every-day millionaire in America. In 
 addition to the polar bear, which is found only in 
 the Arctic regions, Alaska has the cinnamon bear, 
 once common and not yet extinct in the Alleghanies, 
 the Rocky Mountains and the Sierra Nevadas, the 
 grizzly, still an inhabitant of those places and the 
 Coast Range of California, though not so plentiful 
 as when he wanted to shake hands and exchange an 
 affectionate embrace with the hardy prospector in the 
 early days of gold hunting. There is also the black 
 bear, a harmless, kittenish sort of an individual if 
 you don't get too close and take liberties with him 
 when he is hungry. There is an un-named species 
 of bear found in portions of Alaska, that is merely 
 known as the Mt. St. Elias bear on account of his 
 most frequent habitat being in the vicinity of Mt. St. 
 Elias. This animal does not belong to McQuestiii's 
 breed of bears. The head is broader than that of any 
 other species of bear known to natural history, the 
 fur resembling that of the gray fox or brindled wolf. 
 It is a bear to all intents and purposes, but it has a 
 sort of undercoat of slate-gray fur, through which
 
 102 DEER AND MOOSE. 
 
 grows an outer coat of coarse hair, alternating with 
 black and white, the combination giving silvery yet 
 brindled tints. Specimens of this animal are quite 
 rare near the coast and its skin is very highly prized, 
 the Indians even refusing as high as one hundred 
 dollars in gold for a single skin. Where one of 
 these skins is taken, the shaman of the family to 
 which the mighty hunters who took it belong, 
 demands that it be hung up in front of the ' ' big 
 house " of the village, not only as a trophy of the 
 prowess of the entire family, but as a totem or talis- 
 man for success in the chase. 
 
 Next in importance as regards size is the moose, 
 or elk, as it is variously called. All the Rocky 
 Mountain region and the coast line ranges from Ore- 
 gon northward, at one time contained large herds of 
 moose, and it is not more than a quarter of a century 
 since they were so plentiful in parts of Montana and 
 Idaho that one could scarcely make a day's journey 
 without encountering pairs or herds of them. It is 
 the largest of the deer family, and the specimens 
 found in the Arctic exceed in size those found in any 
 other portion of the world. As an average, a full- 
 grown moose in Alaska has dimensions of about six 
 feet in height and measures from seven to eight feet 
 from nose to tail, the tail being about eight inches 
 in length. The weight of the animal runs from 
 twelve hundred to fifteen hundred pounds, inclusive 
 of the horns, which range in weight from seventy 
 pounds up to one hundred and fifty. The moose 
 is not a pretty animal. He is as awkward and 
 clumsy and apparently as much out of place as 
 a creature of grace in the deer family as a rich coun- 
 try uncle in a family reunion in a city mansion.
 
 DEER AND MOOSE. 103 
 
 But like the country uncle he is useful. His meat 
 is "jerked" and affords winter food for the natives; 
 his hide, hoofs and horns are articles of commerce, 
 and used, when he was in the prime of his plentiful- 
 ness and before the inroads of civilization made him 
 scarce, to constitute an important factor of trade 
 among the Indians, trappers, traders and commercial 
 organizations which extended from the Atlantic to 
 the Pacific seaboard and all the great marts of the 
 world. The elk is still occasionally found in the 
 higher latitudes of the continent even, however, as 
 low as that of Maine; but the tread and snorting of 
 the iron horse, the repeating rifle and the westward 
 march of Empire have all but obliterated the animal, 
 and its last refuge is in the romantic wilds of 
 Alaska. 
 
 The buffalo, so far as magnitude of structure and 
 stature are concerned, is about contemporaneous with 
 the moose. In Idaho, Montana, Oregon and Wash- 
 ington the animal is invariably called the elk. To 
 the northward, especially in British territory,, it is 
 called the moose. 
 
 Buffalo are occasionally seen in Alaska, but they 
 are smaller in size than the noble animal that in 
 great herds used to roam the vast plains of the north- 
 west, and which, but for the fostering care of the 
 Government, would be as nearly extinct a species as 
 the mastodon itself. 
 
 Various kinds of deer are also found in Alaska. 
 The white-tailed and the black-tailed deer are abun- 
 dant in the interior of some of the islands of the 
 Archipelago, and the musk-ox, which northwestern 
 hunters and trappers associate with the deer species, 
 is occasionally met with. Another member of the
 
 104 FUR BEARERS. 
 
 < 
 
 deer family, the most graceful and beautiful of all 
 though, sad to say, the flavor of his meat does not 
 come up to the beauty of his appearance which is 
 met with in Alaska, is the antelope, or " gazelle." 
 
 The industrious and pains-taking beaver that 
 thorough emblem of the maxim that, by the sweat of 
 thy brow thou shalt earn thy bread; that complete 
 exponent of labor as the main factor in the struggle 
 for existence is frequently found in the streams of 
 Alaska, but the hunt that has gone on, year after year, 
 for its furry envelope has diminished its numbers 
 so, that ere long it will be but a relic and a memory, 
 as it is to-day in Montana, where once it flourished 
 and where its cunning architecture could be seen on 
 almost every stream. 
 
 The Alaskan country, isolated as it has been to 
 the world in general, has not been free from the 
 inroads of the trapper and hunter; in fact, in the 
 pursuit of fur-bearing animals, it was a fruitful field 
 long before more accessible localities had been worked 
 for furs. While Alaska is to-day rich in fur-bearing 
 animals, both land and amphibious, the evidences 
 are apparent that over two centuries of trap, bow and 
 arrow and gun have all but decimated many species 
 once plentiful, but now represented only by occas- 
 ional specimens. The chamois (a wild, goat, but 
 familiarly known among the early mountaineers as 
 the mountain sheep) was plentiful in Alaskan 
 ranges, as it was in the Rocky Mountains not so 
 many years ago; but the swift and unerring bullet 
 of the hunter overcame the remarkable agility and 
 cunning of this animal. Specimens are occasionally 
 seen from the coast and from the banks of the rivers, 
 sadly contemplating the smoke of the steamer and
 
 MINK AND WOLF. 105 
 
 wondering at the sound of the whistle that echoes 
 in their native forests, but they are so wary and make 
 themselves so scarce on the approach of man that it is 
 not considered worth while to hunt them. 
 
 The mink, that pretty little animal, whose fur 
 some thirty years ago was as fashionable for a lady's 
 outer habiliments as the skin of the seal is to-day, 
 roamed Alaska in what seemed inexhaustible num- 
 bers; but the stern demands of fashion, that hand- 
 maid of commerce, have almost entirely obliter- 
 ated this animal. Moreover, the mink is out of 
 fashion in the make-up of a stylish lady's garments. 
 Only a few years ago the mink w r as quite common 
 in Montana, and it is less than thirty years ago 
 that they were trapped on the forks of the Yuba in 
 California. 
 
 The Siberian wolf is found in Alaska. The story- 
 books represent the Siberian wolf as a fierce and 
 dangerous animal, running in packs, maddened by 
 hunger and ready to attack and devour anything and 
 everything; and almost every school-boy has read 
 the thrilling stories of the pursuit of sledges by 
 packs of wolves in Russia, when the frightened occu- 
 pants would cast out their babies and other valuables 
 to stay the progress of the maddened and all-devour- 
 ing fiends. The Siberian wolf, as found in Alaska, 
 is like all his cousins in the wolf family, a coward. 
 He will run at the sight of a human being, and the 
 sound of a shot from a gun, even if he be not pinged 
 by the ball, will give him a celerity in his escape, and 
 his alacrity in avoiding danger is phenomenal. The 
 saying " runs like a scared wolf," applies as well to 
 the fabled Siberian wolf as it does to the humble 
 coyote of the great North American plains. The
 
 IO6 WOLF AND FOX. 
 
 pelts of all the various species of wolves in Alaska 
 find a market, and that of the Siberian is most valu- 
 able. Among the species are Canis Lupis, or the 
 European wolf, now almost extinct in most parts of 
 Europe. It is a close relative of the Siberian wolf 
 and -is found in Alaska. It is not a ferocious animal 
 and is easily tamed, and the genealogy of the Eskimo 
 and other domesticated dogs in the Arctic is traced 
 to this animal. In its native state, however, it is 
 hunted for its hide and is still quite common. The 
 coyote (prairie wolf) is likewise found in Alaska, but 
 is not even distinguished by being represented as a 
 totem, let alone being hunted for its hide and fur. 
 It is a sort of Pariah in the wolf family, is both a 
 coward and a thief and, unfortunately for itself, pos- 
 sesses no attribute which makes its component parts 
 valuable to man, and it therefore enjoys an immunity 
 not shared by other wolves. When the country 
 becomes more settled and grazing becomes one of the 
 industries of parts of Alaska, as it will in time, the 
 coyote will find a price set on his head. In Alaska 
 are also found the gray wolf, the white wolf, whose 
 skins are valuable, the Oregon giant wolf (so-called), 
 and the silver wolf, which bears a strong resemblance 
 to the silver-gray fox. 
 
 Various kinds of foxes are found in Alaska, con- 
 spicuous among which is the silver-gray fox, which 
 is hunted for its skin, and forms quite an item of 
 trade with the natives. The most prominent of the 
 vulpines, however, is the Arctic fox. The fur of the 
 adult is of a clear, glistening white and is very beau- 
 tiful. The fur of the young is of a dull leaden color, 
 and the natives never kill these animals until they 
 have attained their maturity, and the fur has assumed
 
 ERMINE. 107 
 
 its peculiar snowy gloss, when the skins command 
 a good price at the trading posts. 
 
 Mephitis Americana, commonly known as the pole- 
 cat, is one of the prettiest little animals known to the 
 North American continent. As to him we may use 
 the aphorism, "handsome is that handsome does; " 
 but comment on his attributes, aside from his looks, 
 is not necessary. The pole-cat is, nevertheless, a 
 valuable fur-bearing animal, and his skin is in high 
 demand in Europe for robes of royalty. The ermine, 
 whose fur has for centuries been a token of rank and 
 royalty, was plentiful, according to native traditions, 
 generations ago, and specimens of this pretty animal 
 are still met with in Alaska. Naturalists aver that 
 the ermine and pole-cat are first cousins, but certain 
 it is that, with the practical extinction of the ermine, 
 the fur of the pole-cat has taken its place, and many a 
 judicial robe that passes for ermine is simply pole- 
 cat. This animal is very common in Alaska. 
 
 The porcupine is an animal who makes himself 
 somewhat too unpleasantly numerous in Alaska. 
 One might be out looking for stray glaciers, or try- 
 ing to get a shot at a mammoth of the Pliocene 
 period, and he would be just as apt to corne across a 
 curious looking ball, and when he got too close to it 
 the vicious little varmint would open his battery of 
 quills, and the investigator would think he had 
 struck a new thing in botany in the shape of a 
 live and kicking member of the cactus family. Of 
 other animal life (quadrupedal), it is only necessary 
 to say that Alaska contains nearly all the fur-bear- 
 ing animals known to the Temperate .and Arctic 
 Zones, from the smallest rodent up to the highest 
 mammalia.
 
 IO8 ORNITHOLOGY. 
 
 This is not a work on Natural History; it is merely 
 descriptive of a land of comparative isolation full of 
 romance and mystery and offering a magnificent field 
 to the student of Nature, to the scientist, to the trad- 
 der, to the curiosity-seeker, to the traveler either on 
 pleasure or enterprise bent, and full of possibilities, 
 commercial, progressive, geographical and develop- 
 mental. The resources of Alaska, other than so far 
 referred to, will be treated in other chapters, and 
 though the literature of Alaska is rich and exhaus- 
 tive as already written, the effort in these chapters 
 on the possibilities of Alaska, will be to show that 
 the half has not been told. 
 
 The ornithology of Alaska is not specially remark- 
 able, exclusive of the fact that near the coast and far 
 up along the banks of the rivers even in the winter 
 time, and amid the vegetation at the foot of glaciers 
 are found many kinds of song-birds and birds of 
 beautiful plumage known to more southern climes, 
 among which are the canary, thrush, linnet, vesper- 
 sparrow, wood-pecker, humming-bird, whip-poor-will 
 and other small feathered bipeds. The majority of 
 the birds found in Alaska, however, are aquatic and 
 migratory, such as duck, goose, curlew, sand-thrill, 
 crane, diver, pelican, land-gull and sea-gull, snipe 
 and the shag, a member of the cormorant family 
 and so plentiful in the Pribyloff Group that the 
 flocks at times darken the sky. It is asserted that 
 the summer home and breeding ground of the wild 
 goose, duck and other migratory-aquatic birds com- 
 mon all over the American continent is in the far 
 North and particularly in Alaska. 
 
 Among the most interesting animals of Alaska, 
 and in fact the most important in a commercial
 
 AMPHIBIA. 109 
 
 sense, are the amphibia; the most conspicuous of 
 these dual-lived animals being the sea otter, the 
 river otter, beaver, walrus, sea-lion and the fur-seal. 
 The beaver has heretofore been mentioned in these 
 pages, and the river otter and the beaver are now 
 scarcely more than relics of the past. The walrus is 
 still an important land-marine animal for its ivory, 
 oil and hide, and is hunted by both native and white 
 fishermen. The walrus belongs to the seal family, 
 but its proportions are the largest of any member of 
 that tribe; its fur is coarser and closer and its skin 
 thicker, being sometimes as much as two inches in 
 thickness. Under the skin it carries a coating of 
 fat, which wise Nature seems to have made as a pro- 
 vision in all the marine and amphibious animals of 
 the Arctic regions as a protection from cold. The 
 walrus attains a growth of from twelve to fifteen feet 
 in length and eight to ten feet in circumference. 
 Specimens are taken at times which measure twenty 
 feet in length, twelve feet in circumference and 
 in weight over two thousand pounds. The tusks are 
 fashioned by the natives into various articles of 
 household use and into weapons, and are bartered 
 and sold to ships' crews and officers and at the trad- 
 ing posts. Arctic sailors of an artistic turn do some 
 beautiful engraving on the walrus tusk, and this art 
 has no doubt been learned from the natives, who are 
 apt in the work, but whose representations are crude 
 and barbaric. Walrus ivory is a standard article of 
 trade the world over, also walrus oil, as are the 
 marine oils of the Arctic region. The uses of this 
 oleaginous material are too multifarious for mention 
 in this work. The flesh of the walrus is eaten by 
 natives and ships' crews, and the skin tans a heavy,
 
 110 AMPHIBIA. 
 
 porous leather over an inch thick, and is used for 
 various purposes in Russia. 
 
 The sea-lion a member of the seal family, closely 
 allied also is common in Alaskan waters and extends 
 far to the southward. On the ocean coast of San 
 Francisco and up into the harbor almost to the mouth 
 of the Sacramento River, these amphibia are found. 
 Their land habitation is on reefs of rocks, and they sel- 
 dom approach the shore. They are protected by 
 State law in California, notwithstanding that they 
 devour large quantities of salmon and other valuable 
 food-fish; though sometimes hunters are permitted to 
 lassoo specimens for museum purposes. The object of 
 this protection is that the seals on the Seal Rocks, just 
 off the Cliff House, a prominent place of San Fran- 
 cisco resort, may be kept as a show for strangers 
 visiting the city, and among sights exhibited to 
 the tourist in San Francisco are the sea-lions. These 
 animals are not hunted extensively in Arctic waters, 
 as their fur being sparce and stubby has no commer- 
 cial value; their skins are too porous for leather, and 
 they do not carry enough blubber to make their oil 
 profitable, though the natives use the skin for house 
 roofs, and from the viscera fashion various household 
 utensils. 
 
 But the chief of all the animals of Alaska for num- 
 bers, richness of fur and commercial importance is the 
 fur-seal. As a matter of fact, notwithstanding the 
 great material resources known to exist in Alaska, 
 the seal industry next to the fisheries is of the most 
 value. 
 
 Another great resource of Alaska at the present 
 time, and one which, with proper precautions and 
 care, will last indefinitely and perhaps perpetually,
 
 AQUATICS. 
 
 Ill 
 
 is its fisheries. The principal species of fish found 
 in Alaskan waters are cod, salmon, halibut, herring, 
 tomcod, ulikon, mullet, trout and suckers. At the 
 present time the most important of these in a com- 
 mercial sense is the salmon fishery, and next to that 
 the cod. Including the halibut, these are the only 
 fish that are largely used for trade purposes, though 
 of late the ulikon has been caught in large numbers 
 and the oil extracted. The ulikon is said to belong 
 to the same species as the menhaden of the New 
 England coast, which are taken in enormous quan- 
 tities for their oil, and the residue is desiccated 
 and used as a fertilizer. The herring fisheries of 
 Alaskan waters have not, so far, been extensively 
 worked, though the fish are exceedingly numerous 
 and of fine flavor and are said to strongly resemble 
 the famed Yarmouth bloater, both in taste and size 
 and in general appearance. 
 
 The candle-fish, of which large numbers are 
 caught, are almost a mass of oil, if such a term could 
 be properly used to convey the intended idea. They 
 can be found in the stores of San Francisco, but are 
 not highly prized, as they are too rich. The natives 
 preserve them and use them for torches, as when 
 lighted they will burn like a candle; hence the name, 
 " candle-fish."
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 RESOURCES. 
 
 ALASKA'S GREAT WEALTH. EXTENT OF HER GOLD 
 AND SILVER MINES. VALUABLE DISCOVERIES OF 
 MINERAL WEALTH. THE ABUNDANCE OF COAL 
 AND TIMBER. VALUE OF HER FURS, FISHERIES, 
 ETC. THE GREAT TREADWELL MINE. DEVEL- 
 OPMENT OF PLACER MINING. - - INDUSTRY AND 
 GROWTH OF HER CANNERIES. PROSPECTS FOR A 
 BRIGHT FUTURE. 
 
 HE material resources of Al- 
 aska, though they can only 
 as yet be said to be in mere 
 progress of development, are 
 many and varied. The most 
 important can be summed up 
 as follows: skins, oils of land 
 and amphibious animals, tim- 
 ber, coal and mining in silver, 
 lead, iron and copper, which is now carried on 
 extensively. 
 
 Recent mineral exploration has added much that 
 is new to the known material wealth of the Terri- 
 tory. At Glacier Bay and elsewhere, has been found 
 traces of silver, iron and gray copper, and plumbago 
 that may equal the Siberian. Garnet is found on 
 the Stikine River, but seems of little value. It is 
 blasted out of black slate which bears it, and is full 
 of blemishes. Galena ores are quite common, but no
 
 TREADWKLL MINE. 113 
 
 extensive mining and reduction of them is carried on. 
 Mica, asbestos, lime-stone and red ochre have been 
 discovered in several localities, but have been mined 
 to no great extent and some not at all. Great 
 deposits of native copper exist at various points and 
 several mines are worked for this mineral on Prince 
 of Wales Island. 
 
 The principal gold mines of Alaska are on Douglas 
 Island, southeastern Alaska. The island is about 
 eight miles in breadth. The ledges lie along the 
 eastern side of the island, from one thousand to one 
 thousand five hundred feet. The only mine thus far 
 developed sufficiently to be on a paying basis is the 
 famous Treadwell mine. This mine, though in a 
 well-defined true fissure vein, is more like a great 
 quarry of gold quartz and is probably the most 
 extensive solid body of that precious material in the 
 known world. It is true the ores are of low grade, 
 ranging from six dollars to eighteen dollars per ton, 
 but such is the immensity of the vein, the facility of 
 extraction and the u freeness " of the ore for simpli- 
 fied extraction that the rock is extracted and worked 
 at so small a cost as to leave a large margin of profit 
 in the aggregate. The quartz mill on the Treadwell 
 is the largest in the world, containing the enormous 
 number of two hundred and forty stamps under one 
 roof. The machinery is run by water-power 
 furnished by a ditch which taps several mountain 
 streams. Douglas Island, like Baranoff, upon which 
 Sitka is located, is seamed all over with aurif- 
 erous quartz and has been prospected and staked 
 off into mining claims by the industrious pros- 
 pector. Auriferous pyrites are also found on 
 Douglas Island and milled for gold. Besides abun-
 
 114 MINING ABOUT JUNEAU. 
 
 dant indications of gold and some silver all along 
 the coast as well as upon the islands, the mountains 
 of Alaska abound in 'gold-bearing quartz, and the 
 extent of these deposits, it is claimed by experienced 
 miners, will be equal to any similar discoveries in 
 California or Australia. 
 
 Capital is but just being attracted to this field. 
 Eastern and European capitalists are largely inter- 
 ested, and there are several companies in San Fran- 
 cisco organized for the purpose of developing the 
 mining industry in Alaska. Active work has been 
 going on for some time in the Silver Bow Basin, four 
 miles from Juneau, where hydraulic mining has been 
 successfully and profitably carried on, and extensive 
 plans are on the tapis for the tunneling and sluicing 
 of these claims. These mines are owned by Thomas 
 S. Nowell, of Boston, a man of excellent judgment, 
 who is now driving a tunnel, a half a mile in length, 
 to tap the Basin one hundred feet deep. Mr. Nowell, 
 an experienced miner, is the superintendent of this 
 undertaking, which promises a rich reward. 
 
 The gold and silver product of the Territory, which 
 has entered the market through the express com- 
 panies and private hands, amounted to $2,230,000 in 
 the year 1889, since which time it has increased. 
 
 A short time ago it was believed by many intelli- 
 gent miners that silver could be found here in paying 
 quantities, but the comparatively recent opening up 
 to the Sheep Creek region proved differently. Prom- 
 inent among the various mines discovered here is 
 the Silver Queen which exhibits enough ore in sight 
 to warrant the erection of a ten stamp mill, concen- 
 trator and other working conveniences. It is esti- 
 mated that five hundred thousand dollars worth of
 
 COAL FIELDS. 115 
 
 silver ore is awaiting extraction at this time, while 
 in the upper and lower levels some two feet of fine 
 ore is shown up. 
 
 Coal of a superior quality has been found on the 
 Keiiai Peninsula, and a company is now engaged in 
 the work of prospecting and developing the mines. 
 This company owns nearly four thousand acres of 
 coal lands, and it is estimated that the two principal 
 veins will yield 2,500,000 tons per quarter section. 
 The coal lies in such large and compact bodies that 
 the cost of mining is small, compared to that in 
 other coal fields of the Pacific Coast. Coal is also 
 found and mined in quantities on Admiralty Island. 
 Large veins of coal exist on the shore of Cook's 
 Inlet, which were known to the Russians who mined 
 it for Colonial use, at Port Graham. Immense out- 
 cropping seams are conspicuous here as elsewhere on 
 the Inlet, and some coal is found on Unga Island. 
 Experts say that there is sufficient coal here to sup- 
 ply the whole Pacific Coast with a better and cheaper 
 article than is now on the market. Accessibility is 
 a great advantage to the development of these fields. 
 Petroleum is reported in some localities, and the 
 presence of coal would seem to give color to the 
 report. Iron is known to be abundant; a fine mar- 
 ble has been found in plenty, and about the many 
 volcanic peaks and craters an abundance of sulphur 
 exists. 
 
 When it is recollected that Alaska, by reason of 
 her geographical location, has been under the ban, 
 because neither her climate nor natural possibilities 
 were known and understood; that she was sneered 
 at, at the time of our acquisition, as an iceberg bor- 
 der to an expanding map; that she had to grow
 
 Il6 MINERALS AND TIMBER. 
 
 slowly into our esteem as the prejudices engendered 
 by ignorance were removed by conscientious tourists 
 and explorers, it becomes a matter of astonishment 
 to note the rapid development of the mining and 
 other resources of Alaska. 
 
 In the discovery and exploration of minerals 
 Alaska bids fair to realize the prophecy of Professor 
 Muir, who was certain that this region would prove 
 to be one of the richest gold fields of America. It 
 was also his belief that the great mineral vein from 
 Mexico to British America continued through Alaska 
 to Siberia. Mining developments are daily strength- 
 ening the correctness of this theory. Not only has 
 gold been found in numerous localities such as Sitka, 
 Cassias, Douglas Island, Skeena, Silver Bow Basin, 
 Sheep's Head and Bernier Bay, but prospectors have 
 returned from the head-waters of the Yukon carrying 
 specimens of silver, copper, nickel and bituminous 
 coal. 
 
 The timber resources of Alaska are as yet un- 
 touched. In numerous places along the coast there 
 are huge groves of cedar and pine; juniper and birch 
 of large proportions are found further inland. The 
 presence of immense logs in the drift that comes 
 down the rivers is evidence of great forests further 
 up, and most anywhere inland pine, spruce and cedar 
 can be found five and eight feet in diameter, and a 
 valuable timber which is not found south of Port- 
 land Channel but in very small quantities, is a cedar 
 said to be impregnable to the toredo. No extensive 
 explorations for timber have yet been made, but it is 
 more than probable that forests will be found which 
 will place timbering and lumbering among the lead- 
 ing industries of Alaska.
 
 THE SEAL LEASE. 1 17 
 
 Sufficient has been said in this work about the 
 necessity of protecting the fur-seal to imply some- 
 thing of the value of this source of Government 
 revenue, an important element of American trade 
 and industry. It is the second product of the country 
 in assessed value, fish coming first, while mining at 
 present stands third. The fish values include, 
 besides the actual pack, the bone, oil, ivory and 
 other products of the fish and amphibia. 
 
 Secretary Windom has awarded the Seal Fisheries 
 lease for the next twenty years to the North Amer- 
 ican Commercial Company of San Francisco. That 
 much capital in the country was interested in the 
 great Alaska investment is shown by the fact that 
 twelve bids were presented by nine separate and dis- 
 tinct companies, the successful corporation putting in 
 three of these. 
 
 The directory of the Company which is about to 
 supplant the Alaska Commercial Company, consists 
 of L/loyd Tevis, Henry Cowell, Mathias Mayer of 
 San Francisco, and Albert Miller of Oakland, and D. 
 O. Mills, now of New York, is an interested party. 
 Of the three bids of the North American Commer- 
 cial Company, the first offered $55,20x3 annual rental, 
 $2 revenue tax and $8 75 bonus for each sealskin, or 
 the bidder was willing to pay in addition to the rent 
 45 per cent of all receipts from the sale of sealskins. 
 This, it was claimed, would net the Government at 
 least $8 per skin. As a second alternative, this 
 company offered to pay 10 per cent more than any 
 other bidder, but wanted the Government not to 
 restrict the annual kill to less than 100,000 seals. 
 The third bid offered $57,100 rental, $2 revenue tax, 
 $8 25 bonus and 50 cents a gallon for oil.
 
 Il8 ACCEPTED PROPOSAL. 
 
 Their second was the bid accepted by Secretary 
 Windom and the full text of this proposal was as 
 follows: 
 
 ;< Now, therefore, the North American Commercial 
 Company, a corporation duly organized and existing 
 under and by virtue of the laws of the State of Cali- 
 fornia, in the United States, and having its principal 
 place of business in the city and county of San 
 Francisco, in the said State of California, all of 
 whose stockholders and Directors are citizens of the 
 United States, and its officers, and some of the 
 Directors, being familiar with the fur business and 
 the taking and preserving of skins of fur-bearing 
 animals on the Pacific Coast, makes the following 
 proposal or bid for the exclusive right to take fur- 
 seals upon the islands of St. Paul and St. George, in 
 the Territory of Alaska, for a term of twenty years, 
 from and after the ist day of May, 1890, and to send 
 a vessel or vessels to the said islands for the skins 
 of such seals, the same being made under and in 
 accordance and subject to the terms, provisions, lim- 
 itations and conditions of Chapter III, Title 25, of the 
 Revised Statutes of the United States of America, 
 and of all the laws of the United States, and all the 
 decisions, rules and regulations now in force, or that 
 have been or may hereafter be made or adopted by 
 the Secretary of the Treasury in the premises, or in 
 relation thereto, and under and in accordance with 
 and subject to all of the terms, provisions, limita- 
 tions and conditions of the advertisements and notices 
 above set forth and referred to. 
 
 "That is to say, the North American Commercial 
 Company propose to pay and will pay an annual 
 rental of $60,000 for the lease of said islands of St.
 
 ACCEPTED PROPOSAL. I 19 
 
 Paul and St. George, and in addition to the revenue 
 tax or duty of $2 laid upon each fur-seal skin taken 
 and shipped by it from said islands, said company 
 will pay the sum of $7 62 }4 for each and every seal 
 skin that shall be taken and shipped from said 
 islands of St. Paul and St. George under the provi- 
 sions of any lease that it may obtain; all such pay- 
 ments to be made at such time and places and in 
 such manner as the Secretary of the Treasury shall 
 direct. 
 
 " In addition to said payments, said company stip- 
 ulates and agrees that it will faithfully comply with 
 all the laws of the United States and all the rules 
 and regulations of the Treasury Department in rela- 
 tion to the taking of fur-seal skins on said islands; 
 as also with all the terms, provisions and conditions 
 of the advertisements or notices for proposals above 
 set forth and referred to. 
 
 "The North American Commercial Company also 
 proposes in the event that it should obtain said lease 
 during the existence thereof to pay 50 cents a gallon 
 for each gallon of oil made from seals that may be 
 taken from said islands and sold by it; also to furnish 
 free of charge to the native inhabitants of said islands 
 of St. Paul and St. George annually such quantity 
 or number of dried salmon as the Secretary of the 
 Treasury may direct; also to furnish, under direction 
 of the Secretary of the Treasury, said native inhabi- 
 tants with salt and barrels necessary for preserving 
 meat. 
 
 u It will also allow and pay to the Alaska Com- 
 mercial Company, if it shall so demand, a fair and 
 reasonable price for all the buildings or improve- 
 ments erected or made on said islands and for all
 
 120 ACCEPTED PROPOSAL. 
 
 implements used by it in its business and that may 
 be useful to said North American Commercial Com- 
 pany, or required by it for the operation of its lease, 
 and that it will undertake and bind itself to operate 
 any lease it may obtain in the interest or for the 
 benefit of American citizens, and so far as may be 
 practicable and consistent with the interest of said 
 company it will encourage the dressing, dyeing and 
 marketing of sealskins within the United States. 
 
 ' ' This proposal or bid is accompanied by a prop- 
 erly certified check drawn on the Bank of New York, 
 a national bank of the United States, payable to the 
 order of the Secretary of the Treasury in the sum of 
 $100, ooo. 
 
 "Should the foregoing proposal or bid be accepted, 
 this corporation will at once make, execute, furnish 
 and deliver all undertakings and bonds with good 
 and sufficient securities to the satisfaction of the 
 United States and the Honorable Secretary of the 
 Treasury, in such sums and upon such terms and 
 conditions as may be required by law or by the Hon- 
 orable Secretary of the Treasury. 
 
 ' ' In case this proposal or bid be accepted, this 
 corporation will at once make a deposit of United 
 States bonds in the amount and as required by law, 
 and will at once do and perform all such acts and 
 things, and enter into, make, execute, acknowledge, 
 deliver, deposit, accept, receive, take, register and 
 record any and all leases, and any and all under- 
 takings, bonds, contracts, agreements, covenants, 
 checks, securities, documents, papers or other 
 instruments, or writing that may be necessary or 
 proper in the premises, and to carry out any or all 
 of the objects or purposes herein mentioned or
 
 <! w 
 * -
 
 FISH INDUSTRY. 121 
 
 alluded to, or that may be required by the United 
 States or by the Honorable Secretary of the Treasur}' 
 thereof." 
 
 The limit of the annual kill has always been fixed 
 at 60,000, and the Secretary of the Interior has made 
 that figure the limit for the future, but it is intimated 
 that, after the first year, the limit may be increased 
 to 100,000. 
 
 In May of 1890, the Alaska Commercial Company's 
 lease expired and the new lessees entered into posses- 
 sion. 
 
 I shall not enter into a detailed description of the 
 seal, as the subject has been so thoroughly handled 
 and repeatedly published by writers who have given it 
 much thought, time and study. I will only mention 
 the fur-seal, " Callorhinus Ursinus," which is at 
 present the great feature of interest owing to the 
 immense value of their skins and their wonderful 
 instinct and intelligence. 
 
 The male is considered full grown in the sixth or 
 seventh year, weighs at least four hundred pounds and 
 measures fully seven feet in length. His massive neck 
 and shoulders, in contrast with the delicate small head, 
 make the latter greatly out of proportion. The pecu- 
 liarly shaped and interesting face is brightened by a 
 pair of large, clear, dark gray eyes, that speak at one 
 time with tenderness and again flash with anger and 
 revenge. His jaws are large and firmly set. The 
 compressed lips, which support a large, light, yellowish 
 moustache, give an air of determination which lends 
 greatly to the character of the face. This feature is 
 particularly noticed when he gracefully swims shore- 
 ward, his head proudly erect, and his calm eyes 
 sweeping over the surface of the banks. They move
 
 122 FISH INDUSTRY. 
 
 very rapidly on the shore and can outrun the fastest 
 pursuer for some distance, but finally overcome with 
 fatigue they fall trembling and exhausted. Yet they 
 are ever on the defensive and when driven to bay will 
 fight desperately for their lives. 
 
 Of the many seals the eyes rest upon lying grace- 
 fully on the sea-washed rocks, some curled up like 
 young spaniels while others, with faces raised heaven- 
 ward, close their large, sad eyes in sleep, none impress 
 you more deeply than the female, who rises from the 
 watery depths like a " fair Undine," her dull gray 
 dress brightened by the sparkling drops which glisten 
 in the sunlight and rest upon the soft, snow-white chest 
 like a necklace of diamonds, the small head gracefully 
 poised on well-shaped shoulders, the great languid 
 hnman-like eyes lit by the tender light of mother-love, 
 or darkened by shades of sorrow even to tears. The 
 life of so fair an " Undine" is not unpoetic. Her very 
 nature seems to court admiration. She leaps and moves 
 coquettishly into the glistening waters, revels in her 
 graceful caperings under the vigilant eyes of her 
 admiring lord. Envy and jealousy are no strangers 
 in these coquetries, and many desperate fights even to 
 mutilation and death occur among the males during 
 these jealous brawls. 
 
 The young seals, or, as they are generally called, 
 pups are, after a certain period left to themselves and 
 their own devices. Still the mother seal looks tenderly 
 on and is amused at the antics and sports of the young 
 in their attempts to swim, and her bright eye flashes 
 with pride in witnessing the successful efforts of the 
 young swimmer. 
 
 The natal coat of the pup is a sleek, shiney black, 
 which form strange, fantastic groupings in their sports
 
 FISH INDUSTRY. 123 
 
 and gymnastics with older pups who have already 
 donned the second dress, which is of a soft, light brown 
 hue. 
 
 The skin when taken from the seal is of a harsh, 
 dull-colored hair and passes through several processes 
 of cleansing, dipping and dyeing before the fur is 
 prepared for use. Three of these are then required 
 to make a lady's sacque. The following, given by a 
 leading furrier, is an accurate description of the tedious 
 preparations through which the undressed skins pass. 
 
 " When the skins are received by us in the salt, we 
 wash off the salt, placing them upon a beam somewhat 
 like a tanner's beam, removing the fat from the flesh 
 side with a beaming knife, care being required that no 
 cuts or uneven places are made in the pelt. The skins 
 are next washed in water and placed upon the beam 
 with the fur up, and the grease and water removed by 
 the knife. The skins are then dried by moderate heat, 
 being tacked out on frames to keep them smooth. 
 After being fully dried they are soaked in water, and 
 thoroughly cleansed with soap and water. In some 
 cases they can be unhaired without this drying process 
 and cleansed before drying. After the cleansing 
 process they pass to the picker, who dries the fur by 
 stove-heat, the pelt being kept moist. When the fur 
 is dry he places the skin on a beam, and while it is 
 warm he removes the main coat of hair with a dull 
 shoe knife, grasping the hair with his thumb and 
 knife, the thumb being protected by a rubber cob. The 
 hair must be pulled out, not broken. After a portion 
 is removed, the skin must be again warmed at the 
 stove, the pelt being kept moist. When the outer 
 hairs have been mostly removed, he uses a beaming 
 knife to work out the fine hairs (which are shorter),
 
 FISH INDUSTRY. 
 
 and the remaining coarser hairs. It will be seen that 
 great care must be used, as the skin is in that soft 
 state that too much pressure of the knife would take 
 the fur also and make bare spots. Carelessly cured 
 skins are sometimes worthless on this account. The 
 skins are next dried, afterwards dampened on the pelt 
 side, and shaved to a fine, even surface. They are 
 then stretched, worked and dried, afterward softened in 
 a fulling-mill, or by treading them with the bare feet 
 in a hogshead, into which the workman gets with a few 
 skins and some fine hardwood sawdust, to absorb 
 the grease while he dances upon them to break them 
 into leather. If the skins have been shaved thin as 
 required when finished, any defective spots or holes 
 must now be mended, the skins smoothed and pasted 
 with paper on the pelt side, or two pasted together to 
 protect the pelt in dyeing. The usual process in the 
 United States is to leave the pelt sufficiently thick to 
 protect them without pasting. 
 
 " In dyeing, the liquid is put on with a brush care- 
 fully covering the points of the standing fur. After 
 lying folded, with the points touching, for some time 
 the skins are hung up and dried. The dry dye is then 
 removed, another coat applied, dried and removed, and 
 so on until the required shade is obtained. One or 
 two of these coats of dye are put on much heavier and 
 pressed down to the roots of the fur, making what is 
 called the ground. From eight to twelve coats are 
 required to produce a good color. The skins are then 
 washed clean, the fur dried, the pelt moist. They are 
 shaved down to the required thickness, dried, working 
 them some while drying, then softened in a hogshead, 
 and sometimes run in a revolving cylinder with fine
 
 FISH INDUSTRY. 125 
 
 sawdust to clean them. The English process does not 
 have the washing after dyeing." 
 
 The great amount of labor and time undergone in 
 the treatment of skins make a thoroughly well dyed 
 one very expensive, while the cheaper grades soon 
 show careless handling and defective work, and will 
 fade very quickly to lighter shades, if not spotted. 
 
 The introduction of the furrier's statements will not 
 only interest the reader but give a necessary knowledge 
 of the treatment, cure and dressing of sealskins and 
 how to value and select a thoroughly dyed one in 
 purchasing. 
 
 A most important and constantly growing industry 
 in Alaska, is that of fish canning. In this land the 
 rivers fairly swarm with life. All the early naviga- 
 tors and explorers, from Cook down to the present 
 time, have testified with astonishment to the immense 
 numbers of salmon, cod, halibut, herring, mullet, 
 ulikon, etc. Out of the teeming rivers and bays of 
 Alaska, the world can be supplied with salmon, her- 
 ring and halibut of the best quality; and so prodigal 
 has nature been in the supply that it is a well authen- 
 ticated fact that as many as eleven thousand salmon 
 have been taken in one haul of the seine. 
 
 The principal fisheries are the cod and the salmon, 
 since these fish are most readily prepared for export; 
 halibut, Arctic smelt, brook trout, flounder and 
 other specimens will afford ample variety for local 
 use. Cod, which is most abundant on the banks of 
 Kadiak and the Aleutian Archipelago, is a branch 
 of the fish industry of very great commercial import- 
 ance. Shipments thereof are made regularly by 
 every steamer leaving Alaskan points. As early as 
 1864 this industry began to exhibit its magnitude. 
 In 1870 three San Francisco firms shipped three
 
 126 FISH INDUSTRY. 
 
 thousand tons of cod from off the banks of the Shu- 
 inagin Islands. The annual catch of codfish on the 
 Alaskan banks is one thousand six hundred tons, 
 and about the same amount is taken in the Ochotsk 
 Sea, all of which is marketed in San Francisco. Of 
 course, the salmon trade, in the curing and canning 
 of that fish for the market, outstrips all other in 
 bulk and importance. The abundance and unex- 
 celled quality of Alaska salmon have drawn the 
 attention of the world to this great industry. Where 
 a few Russian weirs and rude fish traps were found, 
 now over thirty canning establishments are in pros- 
 perous operation. While six different varieties of 
 salmon swarm in the rivers and inlets of Alaska, 
 yet only two are used in the canneries. These are 
 known as the "king" salmon and the "red" sal- 
 mon. The king salmon runs or enters the rivers 
 from the middle of May till August, being most 
 plentiful in June. Its greatest length is six feet, 
 and greatest weight one hundred pounds. It is 
 found chiefly in the Kasiloff and Kenai Rivers in 
 Cook's Inlet, also in the Alamuk River at the mouth 
 of Copper River. The red salmon runs all summer. 
 In salmon canning in Alaska, which has only 
 begun to attract attention, some idea may be formed 
 of the extent of this growing business when it is 
 stated that from January to June, 1889, the equiva- 
 lent of seventy vessels of 35,655 of tonnage left the 
 port of San Francisco for Alaska in the interest of 
 salmon caiiners. Most of these took up men and 
 supplies for the canneries, thus showing at a glance 
 the importance of the salmon trade. But its magni- 
 tude can perhaps be best comprehended when it is 
 stated that the product for the season of 1889 was
 
 CANNED SALMON. 127 
 
 717,000 cases, or 34,416,000 cans. This does not 
 include the salmon salted and put up in barrels, the 
 pack of which in 1888 amounted to 15,000 barrels; 
 in the last season it probably came to half as much 
 again. The following is the pack of the last seven 
 years prior to the season of 1890. 
 
 YEAR. CASES. 
 
 1883 36,000 
 
 1884 45,OOO 
 
 1885 75) 000 
 
 1886 130,000 
 
 1887 240,000 
 
 1888 ; 440,000 
 
 1889 79>347 
 
 1890 688,332 
 
 As to the wisdom of the policy which resulted in 
 the acquirement of Alaska by the United States, there 
 has never been a dissenting voice ; it has demon- 
 strated itself. The resources and industries already 
 devsloped have proven ample repayment, to say noth- 
 ing of the geographical, naval, military and diplomatic 
 advantages accrued and accruing from the possession 
 of the Territory. Russia is interested with the United 
 States in the issue of the present controversy. The 
 purchase of Alaska from Russia gave our country the 
 then undisputed title to the seal grounds of the Terri- 
 tory thus transferred, with all the appurtenances and 
 hereditaments thereunto belonging, together with all 
 and singular the things animate and inanimate, of the 
 land thereon and in the waters beneath.
 
 128 VEGETABLE LIFE. 
 
 By the terms of the treaty of cession the Behring 
 Sea is an inland body. The United States leases the 
 exclusive right to seal killing in these waters to a 
 private company, and if Behring be not the enclosed 
 sea, the United States leases what it has no title to, 
 and cannot protect its lessee. Consequently both 
 Governments become liable for heavy damages the 
 United States to its lessee, and Russia to the United 
 States. I do not propose to treat of the infringement 
 of our vested rights in these waters or of the intru- 
 sion upon a claim purchased and developed by the 
 United States. 
 
 That the Territory is rich in minerals has been 
 conclusively proven, and, on the miner's theory that 
 where there are paying mines in a certain region 
 there are more of them yet to be found, the prospects 
 of Alaska as a mining region are not only nattering, 
 but unbounded. 
 
 We have seen the extent of the fisheries. Despite 
 the large number of canneries in operation, several 
 new plants will begin work next season on a paying 
 basis. The vegetation of Alaska is by no means 
 co-incident to that of a barren and desolate country, 
 such as popular belief accredits it with being. In 
 the immediate vicinity of great glaciers wild fruits 
 and berries thrive, and at Kadiak and Oonalaska the 
 residents grow many of the kitchen vegetables knoAvn 
 to the temperate zone, such as radishes, lettuce, 
 carrots, onions, cauliflower, cabbage, peas, turnips, 
 celery, potatoes, tomatoes and corn. With this 
 faculty of vegetation for immigrant plants, it follows 
 that the soil is capable of producing largely of 
 indigenous vegetable foods for the sustenance of 
 animal life.
 
 INTERIOR EXPLORATIONS. 
 
 129 
 
 The interior of the country is not as little explored 
 as people generally suppose. There is very little 
 that has not been seen by prospectors, travelers, 
 adventurers and explorers. Its character is pretty 
 well understood by such people, and by Government 
 officials of the coast, geodetic and other survey corps 
 that have visited the Territory. The anomalous 
 conditions of the country and its laws and the little 
 that is known of it by the general public are great 
 drawbacks to the development of that section; but 
 those who have been in a position have great faith 
 in its future, and believe that it contains a vastness 
 of resources sufficient to make it an industrial 
 empire, and that it can be made another great field 
 for the profitable investment of American capital. 

 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 PHANTOM CITIES AND MIRAGES. 
 
 ATMOSPHERIC ILLUSIONS IN THE VICINITY OF THE 
 GLACIERS. - - PROFESSOR WILLOUGHBY'S SILENT 
 CITY. EFFECT OF THE LATE SUNSET. CONFIR- 
 MATIONS OF THE DISCOVERY. THE PHANTOM 
 CITY WONDER. A SUBMERGED CITY BENEATH 
 GLACIER BAY. THE REALITY DISCOVERED ix 
 THE MYSTERIOUS YUKON REGION. A FROZEN 
 CITY. 
 
 HAT mirages exist in all por- 
 tions of the earth in hot 
 weather is not disputed by 
 the most incredulous persons; 
 but I look upon it as a reflec- 
 tion on the intelligence of the 
 average mind when the public 
 is requested to believe that 
 the city of Bristol, England, has been photographed 
 on the top of the Muir Glacier, or that two miners, 
 while taking a sail on Glacier Bay on the Fourth of 
 July last, had looked into a pan of quicksilver, and 
 by counter-reflection from the water to the sky had 
 discovered a Phantom City which is supposed to 
 exist under the waters of that bay which, by the 
 way, are as muddy as the Missouri River, from the 
 detritus consequent upon the erosion that is con- 
 stantly taking place under the great glacier. In the 
 first place, Prof. Willoughby is a character who has
 
 WILLOUGHBY'S MIRAGE. 131 
 
 long resided in Alaska, and is familiar with every 
 portion of it, from Metlakatla to Mt. St. Elias, and 
 is selling a picture which has been recognized as the 
 city of Bristol in England. From its appearance it 
 seems to have been taken in twilight or with a very 
 short exposure, and sold to Prof. Willoughby as a 
 dry plate, the old gentleman being something of an 
 amateur photographer. There is no doubt in my 
 mind but that some humorist furnished the Professor 
 with his dry plates and run this in as a glacial joke. 
 I have implicit confidence in the integrity of the 
 Professor, as he is well known in Alaska as an 
 honest man; but having left civilization thirty years 
 or more ago, and having chosen the wilds of Alaska 
 for his home, he has become a simple child of nature, 
 and is recognized as such in all parts of the Terri- 
 tory. He has never seen a locomotive, and is as fair 
 a sample of credulous humanity as one would meet 
 in a lifetime, and the very man upon whom a practi- 
 cal joke could easily be perpetrated. Photography 
 is a pastime with him, and his roving mountain trips 
 are rewarded by some rare views which more timid 
 artists would fail to procure. 
 
 Mirages in the glacier regions are of frequent 
 occurrence in pleasant weather, and as the sun does 
 not set before nine o'clock during June and July, 
 some charming views are obtained at or about that 
 hour. During my trip on the " Ancon " a great 
 mirage was visible in Glacier Bay when the steam- 
 ship was eight or ten miles south of the Pacific 
 Glacier, and what seemed to be a block of large 
 white buildings; the reflection from the two great 
 glaciers stood out upon the northern horizon. Beau- 
 tifully formed spires, apparently three or four him-
 
 132 WILLOUGHBY'S MIRAGE. 
 
 dred feet high, reached above the buildings. The 
 doors, windows, streets and gardens appeared to be 
 visible, but this mirage was like those of the great 
 desert. It was general in all its characteristics, and 
 not at all like Prof. Willoughby's alleged reflection 
 or shadow of a city, which must of necessity be more 
 than three or four thousand miles away. The mirage 
 witnessed by the passengers of the u Ancon " was 
 like those witnessed on the great deserts of the sink 
 of the Humboldt and Carson Rivers, in Death Valley, 
 and in many portions of San Bernardino and San 
 Diego Counties, California. It is a frequent and 
 almost daily occurrence in the summer to witness 
 representations of objects in the air of the deserts, of 
 trains of emigrants, men or Indians on horseback, 
 droves of horses and cattle, beautiful gardens, lakes, 
 rivers and waterfalls, with rank vegetation, and upon 
 reaching the spot nothing is found but a barren, 
 sandy desert which has been reflected through its 
 remarkable atmospheric condition from the bunches of 
 greasewood and sagebrush, as a beautiful panorama. 
 
 Two gentlemen, Robert Christie and Robert Pat- 
 terson, have signed the following card which proved 
 the existence of a mirage in front of the great Muir 
 Glacier, which confirms what I have said in regard 
 to mirages in general, but has no reference to such 
 silent cities as Prof. Willoughby claims to have 
 photographed over a year previous, and to have pro- 
 duced the city of Bristol, England. 
 
 BARTLETT BAY CANNERY, Aug. 22, 1889. 
 
 Robert Christie and Robert Patterson, in the pres- 
 ence of Lamar B. French, Charles R. Lord, R. Wil- 
 loughby and Minor W. Bruce, make the following 
 statement, to wit:
 
 WILLOUGHBY'S MIRAGE. 133 
 
 "On the 2d of July, 1889, while sailing from the 
 main or Glacier Bay, just south of Willoughby 
 Island, about five o'clock in the afternoon, we sud- 
 denly saw rising out against the side of the moun- 
 tains what appeared to be houses, churches and 
 other huge structures. It appeared to be a city of 
 extensive proportions, perhaps of 15,000 or 20,000 
 inhabitants. We watched the apparition for a long 
 time, and think it was visible for an hour or more. 
 
 " We further aver that at that time we had never 
 heard of what is called the Silent City, or that Prof. 
 Willoughby had photographed it. We are satis- 
 fied that it was a mirage from its position and 
 appearance." 
 
 The certificate I do not doubt is true in every par- 
 ticular; but I am quite sure they would not make 
 an affidavit that the picture of the Silent City which 
 Prof. Willoughby has issued has ever been seen by 
 them or by any one else, and from my personal knowl- 
 edge of Prof. Willoughby, I am equally as sure that 
 he will not say he ever saw in the sky the picture he 
 is selling as the Silent City. 
 
 The mirage seen by the gentlemen in Glacier Bay 
 is without doubt the one seen by myself and the pas- 
 sengers of the "Ancon." I have a photograph of 
 one of these mirages witnessed by one hundred pas- 
 sengers, which is published in this book, and I can- 
 not but express the sentiment that the scenery, 
 inhabitants and glaciers of Alaska are sufficiently 
 wonderful and beautiful to the seeker after the 
 marvelous and curious, without presenting Prof. 
 Willoughby's picture as a fact, when it should be 
 treated as a joke, to show how easily a humorist 
 might impose upon an honest but simple-minded old
 
 134 MYSTERIOUS REFLECTIONS. 
 
 man, who has been isolated for over thirty years from 
 this world of civilization and improvement. 
 
 The next Phantom City wonder was first published 
 in the Daily J^ranscript of Nevada City. It goes on 
 to say that James O'Dell left Nevada City last April 
 to look after a mine, located in Alaska a year ago by 
 D. H. Jackson. Mr. O'Dell said to his room-mate, 
 Robert Renfrew, that he had investigated the Silent 
 City controversy and gave the following description 
 of his investigations: 
 
 "We set sail in a hired boat on the ist of July, 
 
 early in the morning, with a full stock of provisions 
 
 and other necessaries. By ' we ' I mean Bill Thomas 
 
 the old Hale & Norcross man and two other men 
 
 unknown to you Idaho men. 
 
 ' We had many adventures in going up, but what 
 I want to tell you is what I think we discovered in 
 regard to the Silent City, or mirage. You know 
 that during the debris war I was up at Omega, in 
 Nevada County, California. Well, there I learned 
 a trick that I was determined to make use of here. 
 In watching for the anti-debris spies, we used to pour 
 a few pounds of quicksilver into a gold-pan, place it 
 on a rock in an open place and then peer into it with 
 a magnifying glass. In this way we could detect 
 anything that moved on any road or in any place for 
 miles around. The face of the country and all upon 
 it was first reflected upon the heavens or upper 
 stratum of air, and thence down upon the pan of 
 quicksilver, where we could scan it with our glasses. 
 
 " Well, when we arrived at the glacier, we cruised 
 about for a day or two, but could see nothing. We 
 feared that we had not found the right place, and 
 were about moving on, when there came a favorable
 
 THE SUBMERGED CITY. 135 
 
 calm and we tried the gold-pan and the quicksilver. 
 At once we saw depicted on the surface of the bright 
 metal what appeared to be the ruins of a large city. 
 There were the remains of walls, towers and many 
 large buildings, but all were seen in a wavering sort 
 of way. We saw enough, however, to convince us 
 that the city was at the bottom of the bay, was thence 
 imaged on the clouds and then reflected down upon 
 the quicksilver. It may be that, in certain favor- 
 able stages of the weather, the image of the sunken 
 city is thrown upon the glacier, where it resembles 
 a mirage. 
 
 "Having decided in our minds that the city was 
 one at the bottom of the bay, we spent a whole day 
 getting on the top of the glacier, and at great risk 
 ventured near to its perpendicular face. There we 
 erected a mirror upon a sort of tripod, placing it at a 
 height of about five feet, facing the ba}^ and using 
 our glasses, saw in it the image of the same ruins 
 seen on the quicksilver when we were down on the 
 water. We could also get a part of the city in our 
 pan, when tried, on the surface of the glacier. 
 
 "We were not a scientific expedition, but in our 
 rough way we were able to satisfy ourselves that 
 what is called the 'Silent City,' is in reality a 
 sunken city resting at the bottom of Glacier Bay." 
 
 I. W. Taber, the reliable photographer, has shown 
 his usual enterprise in these matters, and has sent a 
 competent artist out with his pan of quicksilver and 
 thinks he has corroborated the theory of a Phantom 
 City being seen under the dirty waters of Glacier 
 Bay, seven hundred feet below the surface, by simply 
 looking into a pan of quicksilver with a magnifying 
 glass.
 
 136 A PERILOUS TRIP. 
 
 - 
 
 The photographers and scientific men have also 
 expressed the opinion, almost unanimously, that 
 Prof. Willoughby saw the picture of Bristol on the 
 crest of the Muir Glacier just as surely as Mr. O'Dell 
 saw the Phantom City under seven hundred feet of 
 muddy water. 
 
 Inasmuch as I have taken pains to give the imagi- 
 nary wonders of Alaska to the public, it is a source 
 of pleasure to present the latest in the way of 
 Silent and Phantom Cities. From the telegraphic 
 news published in the San Francisco Examiner, it 
 seems that a man named George Kershon joined a 
 party of miners who were bent on exploring the ice- 
 bound secrets of Alaska. In an interview Mr. 
 Kershon said: 
 
 " In the summer of 1888, I was one of the party 
 who left here to go north prospecting. At Juneau 
 we purchased a small sloop to take our outfit up to 
 the Yukon, which we reached after many weeks of 
 toil. I disagreed with my partners and engaged an 
 Indian canoe with two Indians, and started to pros- 
 pect along an unknown fork of the Yukon River. 
 We had a terrible time. The stream narrowed 
 in between high cliffs and shot with dizzy swift- 
 ness down the gulches, making it necessary to 
 tow the canoe by means of a line from the banks, two 
 doing this while the third man rested. Progress was 
 necessarily slow, and for many days we toiled before 
 the first range of cliffs and mountains was passed. 
 Once a hundred-foot water-fall barred us, and it took 
 three days to get around it. 
 
 " After this it was a bit easier. The river broad- 
 ened out and the country was more level. The 
 banks were well wooded and game was plentiful.
 
 A PERILOUS TRIP. 
 
 We kept on like this, always going north, when, 
 after six weeks, a range of mountains was sighted; I 
 believed this to be the head of the river, and pressed 
 on to reach it before the cold weather set in. Snow 
 was now falling very often, and it was evident that 
 the short summer was nearly done. At length we 
 reached the wild country again, and the stream which 
 had been sub-dividing itself into lesser ones soon 
 became too difficult to navigate. This was almost at 
 the foot of the range of mountains spoken of. Here 
 we determined to camp for the winter, and good 
 quarters were found. Everything was made snug, 
 as the weather up there is something awful, but we 
 were in a deep ravine, overhung by high cliffs, which 
 broke the fury of the winds, and the best was made 
 of it. Game was plentiful, and large quantities of 
 elk and deer were shot and frozen for use through the 
 long winter months. 
 
 " Before long the cold came, and at times it was 
 impossible to stir from cover; especially was this the 
 case when the terrible winds blew. At other times 
 it was fairly comfortable, although the lack of sun 
 made it gloomy enough. Toward the end of winter it 
 began to get lighter and the gales were less frequent. 
 
 " One day I determined to try and scale one of the 
 mountains near us, as I got so tired and weary 
 with being penned up in such a confined place. This 
 idea I put before the Indians. One of them said he 
 would go with me; the other would not risk it, so he 
 was left in camp. A storm shortly arose, blowing 
 heavily for three days, but as soon as the weather had 
 settled, the Indian and myself started off on our trip. 
 
 " We went right up the line of the frozen river, 
 which, being a solid mass of ice, made a good road-
 
 138 THE LATEST WONDER. 
 
 way. Following this for about twenty miles, at a 
 pretty steep rise, we reached a plateau between the 
 foothills and high range. Here the stream ended, 
 and we started to climb one of the big hills. After a 
 lot of hard work we reached a point near the summit. 
 A wonderful view was had from here, but the strang- 
 est thing was a city in one of the valleys below. 
 You may depend upon it, I was surprised to see it. 
 At first I thought it was some fantastic arrangement 
 of ice and snow which had assumed the form of a city, 
 but examination with the glass showed that such was 
 not the case, it being too regular in appearance. It 
 was a city sure enough. Determined to see more of 
 it r I commenced to work downwards, although the 
 Indian was rather frightened, he evidently not con- 
 sidering it l good medicine.' After several hours of 
 hard work I reached the outskirts of this mysterious 
 city, and found that the place was laid out in streets, 
 with blocks of strange-looking buildings, what 
 appeared to be mosques, towers, ports, etc., and 
 every evidence of having been built by art. The 
 whole was not of solid ice, though it seemed to be, 
 but blows from a hatchet on one of the walls dis- 
 closed the fact that beneath this barrier of ice was 
 some sort of building material. It looked to be 
 wood, but of a stone-like hardness and apparently 
 petrified. The silence around the place was some- 
 thing ghostly. Not the slightest sound broke the 
 awful stillness of the place which, added to the weird 
 look of the empty streets, made it gruesome enough. 
 I soon got tired of investigating the city, as the 
 streets were blocked in many places with huge 
 masses of ice, rendering passage almost impossible. 
 The Indian, too, became uneasy, and we started on
 
 THE MYSTERIOUS CITY. 139 
 
 the return trip, reaching home the next day, tired 
 but satisfied that we had been the first men to gaze 
 on that silent city for centuries. 
 
 "After spring broke I made some strikes in nug- 
 get gold at the head-waters o the river, working 
 with the Indians through the summer months, leav- 
 ing camp for the Yukon about the end of August. 
 We reached that river all right, the trip down being 
 easy, and in due time I got back to Juneau, where I 
 took the steamer for the south. 
 
 "It was while I was at Juneau I saw a newspaper 
 with an account of the mirage seen at Muir Glacier. 
 I did not make any allusions to this, though, as I 
 did not think any one would believe me, but I am 
 positive that the mirage of Muir Glacier is the reflec- 
 tion of the frozen city found by me. In accounting 
 for the presence of this wonderful reflected city I'll 
 have to leave to abler heads. You might ask me 
 how the ruins of big cities came in the interior of 
 Central America. They are there, but who built 
 them nobody knows. Perhaps at one time it was 
 not so cold north as it is now." 
 
 This ended Mr. Kershon's story, told with an air 
 of truth which made it evident that he had truly seen 
 the things he said he did. 
 
 The public have been shown the entire history of 
 the Silent City, the Phantom City and the reflected- 
 city business last mentioned, and they may draw 
 their own conclusions. That mirages exist in 
 Alaska as well as on the great deserts, and are easily 
 accounted for by the condition of the atmosphere, is 
 a fact; but a photograph of Bristol, another by Mr. 
 Taber's artist and still another picture shown in a 
 pan of quicksilver, with this last candidate for fame
 
 140 
 
 THE MYSTERIOUS CITY. 
 
 as the discoverer of a real deserted city, I think will 
 rank high among Baron Munchausen's fairy tales, 
 and the public who are easily amused will doubtless 
 look upon these pleasantries from their own stand- 
 point in accordance with the intelligence they possess 
 and in the extent of their credulity. 
 
 ,
 
 O H 
 
 of g 1 
 
 UJ 2 
 
 DC 

 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 CHINOOK JARGON. 
 
 LANGUAGE OF THE INDIANS. DIFFERENT DIA- 
 LECTS. THE TRADERS INTRODUCE A COMMON 
 JARGON, WHICH NEARLY ALL TRIBES HAVE 
 ADOPTED. THE CHINOOK USED AS FAR SOUTH 
 AS OREGON. - - EXAMPLES FOR THE USE OF 
 TOURISTS. 
 
 F course, the native races of 
 the region comprehended as 
 Alaska had a distinctive lan- 
 guage of their own prior to the 
 advent of foreigners in their 
 midst, though there were un- 
 doubtedly different dialects in 
 each tribe, dependent on local- 
 ity, surroundings and family 
 divisions provincialisms, so to speak. But in the 
 past century these languages have been so corrupted 
 by certain forms of lingual and philological contact 
 that they have lost their distinctive character and 
 become condensed into a sort of jargon general 
 among all the aborigines of the region. Some of the 
 contacts leading to this revolution of tongues were 
 the Russian traders, French voyagers, trappers, 
 hunters, sailors and whalers causing the introduction
 
 142 CHINOOK JARGON. 
 
 of the Chinook jargon, used as a trade language for 
 man}' years in British Columbia and on the coast of 
 Oregon and Washington and still the principal 
 linguistic medium between natives and whites. I 
 give herewith a few examples of some of the jargon 
 words in most common use. T. N. Hibben & Co., 
 of Victoria, have published a book entitled, "Dic- 
 tionary of the Chinook Jargon, or Indian Trade 
 Language of the North Pacific Coast," and tourists 
 will find it an interesting study to provide themselves 
 with one of them. It is a peculiarity of Indians all 
 over the western continent that it is difficult and next 
 to impossible for them. to give the sound of the letter 
 "r," they almost invariably, where it occurs, giving 
 it the sound of " 1." It is also the habit of Indians 
 to give the sound of "p" for the pronunciation of 
 "f," as "pish," for "fish." A few of the principal 
 words are selected as follows: 
 
 Admiration, hwah. All, kon-a-way. 
 
 American, Boston. Anger, sol-leks. 
 
 Apple, le pome. Arrow, ka-li-tan. 
 
 Axe, la-hash. Bad, mesahchieorpeshack. 
 
 Bargain, mahkook. Boat, boat. 
 
 Basket, opekwan. Beads, kamosuk. 
 
 Bear (black) chet-woof; its-woot. 
 
 " (grizzly) siam. Bottle, labooti. 
 
 Bread, piah sapolill. Berries, olillie; olallie. 
 
 Biscuit, lebiskwee. Bit or Dime, bit. 
 
 Blanket, paseesie. Buffalo, moosmoos. 
 
 By-and-by, winapie. Canoe, canim. 
 
 Cat, pusspuss. Copper, pil chickamin. 
 
 Cheat (to), la lah. Chief, ty-ee. 
 
 Cry (to), cly. Dark or darkness, polaklie.
 
 KITCH KAWK, OF SITKA. 
 
 In Dancing Costume, photograph 7983, by PARTKIDGK, Portland. Oregon.
 
 CHINOOK JARGON. 143 
 
 Day, sun. Dear, hyas mahkook. 
 Dog, karaooks. Deer, mowitsh. 
 Dollar, dolla or talila. Dime,' bit or mit. 
 Drunk, pahtlum. Do (to), mamook. 
 Fight with fists, mamook pukpuk. 
 Fish, pish. Fingers, le doo. 
 Fork, la poosshet. Flour, sapolill. 
 Gamble, mamook itlokum. Frying-pan, le poel. 
 God, saghalie tyee. Ghost, skookum. 
 Gun, musket, siikwalal. Good, kloshe. 
 Heaven, saghalie illahie. Hair, yakso. 
 House, house. Hat, seahpo; seahpult. 
 I, iiika. Hungry, olo. 
 Knife, opitsah. Jealous, sick tumtum. 
 Laughter, heehee. Language, Ik lang. 
 Look out, kloshe nanitsh. Little, tenas. 
 Money, chickamin. Meat, itlwillie. 
 Night, polaklie. Mosquito, melakwa. 
 One, ikt. No, not, wake. 
 Two, mokst. Seven, sinnainokst. 
 Three, klone. Bight, stotekin. 
 Four, lakit. . Nine, kwaist. 
 Five, kwinnum. Ten, tahtlelum. 
 Six, taghum. Eleven, tahtleum pe ikt. 
 One hundred, ikt tukamonuk. 
 Twenty, mokst tahtlelum. Old, olemaii. 
 People, tilikum. Pistol, tenas musket- 
 Rain, snass. River, chuck. 
 Ship, ship. Sea, salt chuck. 
 Silver, t'kope chickamin. Skin, skin. 
 Small, tenas. Snow, snow; cole snass. 
 Steal (to), kapswalla. Stone, stone. 
 Strawberries, amotee. Sugar, le sook; shughae. 
 Thank you, raahsie. Tobacco, kinootl; kinoos.
 
 144 
 
 CHINOOK JARGON. 
 
 Very, hyas. Wait, winapie. 
 
 Water, chuck. We, nesika. 
 
 Wicked, mesahchie. Witchcraft, tamahnous. 
 
 Woman, Klootchman. Wind, wind. 
 Yes, nawitka; ah-?h; e-eh. You, Your, Yours, mesika. 
 Young, tenas.
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 HOW TO GET THERE. 
 
 FROM SAN FRANCISCO TO ALASKA. THE DIFFERENT 
 
 ROUTES OPEN. INFORMATION AS TO CONNECTIONS. 
 
 -SCHEDULE OF STEAMER MOVEMENTS. THINGS 
 
 THAT WILL COME HANDY ON THE TRIP AND BITS 
 
 OF GENERAL INFORMATION. 
 
 O this comparatively untraveled 
 region is being" attracted the 
 attention of the whole travel- 
 ing public and of that class of 
 tourists, the student and the 
 worker, who seek their relax- 
 ation and recreation amidst 
 the grandeurs and beauties of 
 nature. Nowhere can the work 
 of ice be seen to greater advantage. Heavy magnifi- 
 cent designs or exquisitely fine patterns of cob-web 
 texture are wrought by the wind and spread out over 
 bright shades of metallic porphyry, and rich draperies 
 of this delicate icy lace winds itself artistically over 
 the metallic colored rocks, varied with fantastic group- 
 ings of basalt and porphyry and heightened by soft 
 shades cf yellow green and bronze lichens. To such 
 the claims of Alaska appeal directly. The thousands
 
 146 THE VARIOUS ROUTES 
 
 who, during the two seasons past, have visited this 
 remote corner, attest the popularity of the excursion 
 and warrant the belief that Alaska, for seasons to come, 
 will rival any of those numerous sections of the globe 
 which have heretofore held undisputed sway in the 
 affections and admiration of the lover and the student ; 
 the two classes who seek nature in nature's strong- 
 holds. It is with the idea and the hope of assisting 
 some few of those who may be 'about to take this 
 northern flight, that I open this chapter with a few 
 suggestions of " How to get there." 
 
 During the winter and early spring months, several 
 steamers ply between Puget Sound, Sitka and way 
 ports, and as they take nearly a month to make the 
 round trip, though it is not the best season for viewing^ 
 these wild stormy regions, many take this time to see 
 Alaska. The excursion season always opens on the 
 ist of June. 
 
 From San Francisco two routes are open to the 
 tourist as far as Tacoma, Washington, whence all 
 must proceed one way. The first of these is by 
 water up the coast to Port Townsend, there to con- 
 nect with the Alaska steamer which is to bear you on 
 your winding way to the north. The other route lies 
 over the California and Oregon railroad through the 
 beautiful scenery of the Shasta region and Oregon, 
 to Portland, thence by steamer via the Columbia 
 River to Victoria and Port Townsend, or from Portland 
 by rail to Tacoma. For overland passengers via the 
 Northern Pacific, connection is made with the Alaska 
 steamers at Tacoma, and when coming overland by 
 the Canadian Pacific, the steamer is met at Victoria. 
 Connection is made at Port Townsend with all the 
 Alaska steamers by those from San Francisco, after
 
 WHAT TO TAKE. 
 
 147 
 
 the latter have touched at Victoria, B. C. Advan- 
 tage of the latter arrangement is often taken to visit 
 Victoria while the steamer proceeds to Port Town- 
 send, her passengers joining her when she returns 
 on the way north. 
 
 One should be provided with warm clothing and all 
 such as he is not afraid to spoil. Gossamers and 
 Mackintoshes and such other protection from the 
 rain as individual taste may dictate should be pro- 
 vided, but umbrellas are inconvenient on shipboard. 
 Heavy rubber shoes will be a comfort, and with a 
 strong Alpenstock for climbing, for ladies and gentle- 
 men, you have about all you require for a trip to 
 Alaska.
 
 ADDENDUM 
 
 Since the publication of the first and second editions 
 of the "Wonders of Alaska" the Special Census 
 Agent of the Government of the United States, Ivan 
 Petroff, has issued his report, in which he deals with 
 the four principal sources of wealth of this region, 
 and presents some almost startling figures as the 
 result of the investigation. The value of fur sealskins 
 shipped and sold in the London market since the Ter- 
 ritory came into the possession of the United States is 
 given as nearly $33,000,000, and of other furs as 
 $16,000,000. The value of the product of salmon 
 canneries alone from 1884 to 1890 is reported at 
 nearly $7,000,000, and of salmon salted at $500,000. 
 The herring fishery at Killisnoo yields annually over 
 150,000 gallons of oil and nearly 1,000 tons of ferti- 
 lizing material, and the value of the codfish catch in 
 Alaskan waters since 1868 is stated to be fully $3,- 
 000,000. The total value of precious metals exported 
 from Alaska up to the present time, approaches $4,- 
 000,000. This amount was sent by the Express com- 
 pany. 
 
 The annual production of gold dust and bullion is 
 increasing. Mr. Petroff states that it is difficult to 
 ascertain the quantity of merchantable timber in the 
 Territory, but he is very confident that the amount 
 has been greatly overestimated. The report concludes 
 with an expression of regret that the development of
 
 ADDENDUM. 149 
 
 the vast resources of Alaska is impoverishing instead of 
 enriching the country, the principal industries being 
 carried on by imported labor and no equivalent being 
 left in the Territory for the valuable products annually 
 exported. Shipping is carried on wholly by non-resi- 
 dents of the Territory, chiefly from California, Oregon 
 and Washington, and this state of affairs extends even 
 to important tourist travel to the southeastern district 
 of Alaska. Not only the passage money but the whole 
 cost of subsistence of these tourists during their stay 
 in Alaska goes to California owners of steamship lines. 
 To give an idea of the magnitude of this traffic it is 
 only necessary to state that the number of tourist 
 tickets sold each season exceeds 5,000, each ticket 
 representing an expenditure of not less than $100, 
 making a total of $500,000.
 
 INDEX. 
 
 ADORNMENT, native, 59. 
 
 ALASKA, discovery and progress, 1, 
 2, 3, 4; company formed to pur- 
 chase, 4; project defeated by 
 treachery, 4 ; purchase by the TJ. 
 S., 4, 5, 124; wealth, 5; deriva- 
 tion of name, 5; extent, 5, 6; 
 boundary, 6, 26; shore line, 7; 
 natural divisions, 7; animal life, 
 97-108; ornithology, 108, amphi- 
 bia, 109; industries, 30, 58, 61, 
 76, 77, 125, 126, 127. 
 
 Alaska Commercial Co., 97, 98. 
 
 Alexander Archipelago, 26. 
 
 Aleuts, 58, 62, 63. 
 
 Anain Passage, 1, 22. 
 
 Ancon, loss of, 26. 
 
 Animals, 97-108. 
 
 Annette Island, 95, 96. 
 
 BARANOFF, Gov., 31, 32; hunters 
 poisoned, 31 ; castle, 31, 32. 
 
 Bear, 100-102. 
 
 Beaver, 104. 
 
 Behring, Vitus, 2; first expedition 
 of, 2 ; second expedition of, 2 ; 
 conclusions of, 2 ; wreck and death 
 of, 3. 
 
 Bella Bella, 25. 
 
 Briggs, Prof. Horace, 44. 
 
 Buffalo, 103. 
 
 Burial customs and places, 60, 66, 
 68, 69, 70, 76, 78. 
 
 CANNERIES at Chilkat, 29. 
 
 Canning industry, 126, 127. 
 
 Canoes, 77, 78. 
 
 Carving, 76, 77. 
 
 Castes and clans, 60, 75, 76. 
 
 Cave burial, 68-70. 
 
 Chatham Strait, 31 ; Sound, 26. 
 
 Chiefs, choice of, 60. 
 
 Chilkat, 29. 
 
 Chinook jargon, 141-144. 
 
 Christianity, progress of, 76. 
 
 Clarence Strait, 26, 27. 
 
 Coal. 115. 
 
 Cook, Captain, first appearance of, 
 3 ; in Behring Strait, 3. 
 
 Crillon, Mt., 30, 48. 
 
 DAVIDSON Glacier, 29, 39, 40. 
 
 Deer, 102, 103. 
 
 Discovery Passage, 23. 
 
 Distances, table of, 34. 
 
 Dixon Entrance, 26. 
 
 Douglas Island, 29, 113, 114. 
 
 Duncan, William, 92; at Port Simp- 
 son, 92 ; methods of, 93 ; teachings 
 of, 93, 94 ; persecution of, 94, 95 ; 
 visits Washington, 95; success of, 
 95, 96. 
 
 Dundas Island, 26. 
 
 EARLY schools, 88-90. 
 
 Edgeeumbe, Mt., 31. 
 
 Education, 87 ; under the Russians, 
 88, 89 ; after the transfer, 89, 90. 
 
 Educational Bureau established, 89. 
 
 Elk, 102, 103. 
 
 Kml .aiming, 68, 69. 
 
 Ermine, 107. 
 
 Eskimo, 58, 62, 64. 
 
 Etolin, 88. 
 
 Explorations, Vitus Behring, 1-3; 
 Capt. Cook, 3; John Muir, 37, 4'J,
 
 152 
 
 INDKX. 
 
 43; Russian, 50; Spanish, 2, I! ; 
 Vancouver, 20, 21, 42; Interior, 
 129. 
 
 Extortion of shamans, 81. 
 
 FAIRWKATHKK, Mt., 30,48. 
 
 Field, Kate, 49. 
 
 Finlayson Channel, 25. 
 
 Fish, 125, 126. 
 
 Fisheries at Killisnoo, 30; at Chil- 
 kat, 29. 
 
 Fishing grounds, 60, 61. 
 
 Fort Wrangell, 27, 28. 
 
 Fuca, Juan de, 1 ; exploits of, 22 ; 
 Straits of, 19. 
 
 GENEALOGY, 76. 
 
 Glaciers, 28, 29, 35-55 ; Auk, 29, 42 ; 
 Davidson, 29, 39, 40 ; Patterson, 28 ; 
 Eagle, 29 ; Muir, 30, 38 ; Takou, 41 ; 
 Rainbow, 41 ; of Greenland, 36, 37, 
 39, 50; formation of, 36; move- 
 ment of, 36, 41 ; theories of, 35, 3G ; 
 in the Yosemite, 50 ; on Mt. Shasta. 
 50 ; traces of, 37, 49, 51. 
 
 Glacial evidences on the Pacific Slopo 
 37, 49. 
 
 Glacier Bay, 30, 38, 130, 131, 134, 135 
 
 Government, 8,9,10; Russian, 31, 
 32, Co ; native, 60, 61. 
 
 Greenland, 36. 37, 39, 50, 51. 
 
 Graves, 70, 76, 78. 
 
 HOSTILITY of natives, 29. 
 
 Hudson Bay Co., 21, 41. 
 
 Hunting, 104. 
 
 Hyperboreans, the, 56-74; divisions 
 of, 57, 58, 75; characteristics, 62, 
 63; food, living, etc., 64. 
 
 ICE from Alaska, 40. 
 
 Icy baths, 65. 
 
 Indian beliefs, 67. 
 
 Industries, native manufacture, 53, 
 61; art, 58; carving, 76, 77; can- 
 ning, 29, 125, 127; fishing, 30, 125. 
 126. 
 
 Infant treatment, 65. 
 
 Inland Passage, 19-34. 
 
 Intermarriage, 75, 76. 
 
 international quarrels, 3, 4. 
 
 JACKSON, Dr. Sheldon, 88, 90. 
 
 .Jar.L'oii, 141-144 
 
 Johnstone Strait, 23, 24. 
 
 Juneau, 28, 90, 114; convention at, 
 9 ; gold at, 28 ; named, 28 ; news- 
 papers, 29. 
 
 KAGAMIL, legend of, 70 74 ; caves of, 
 68, 69, 70. 
 
 Kane, Dr., experiments and theories 
 of, 36, 37. 
 
 Kershon, Geo., 136; on a perilous 
 trip, 137, 138; discovers a large 
 city, 138, 139. 
 
 Killisnoo, 30, 31, 90. 
 
 King's experiments, 37. 
 
 Koniagas, 58, 62, 63. 
 
 LAMA Pass, 25. 
 
 Land claims, 9. 
 
 La Perouse, Mt., 30. 
 
 Laws needed, 8-10. 
 
 Lease of Seal Fisheries, 8, 117-120. 
 
 Legend of Kagamil, 70-74. 
 
 Loring, 26. 
 
 Lynn Channel, 29, 30, 39-42. 
 
 MAMMOTHS, 97-100; remains of, 99, 
 100. 
 
 Manual training, 90, 91. 
 
 Marriage customs, 59, 60, 64, 75, 76. 
 
 Medicine-men, 80, 64. 
 
 Metlakatla Mission, 26, 92-94. 
 
 Metlakatla, New, 26, 90, 95, 96. 
 
 Minerals, 113-116. 
 
 Mining at Douglas Is., 113; Baranoff 
 Is., 113; Juneau, 114; Silver Bow 
 Basin, 114; Sheep Creek, 114; 
 Treadwell, 113; Kenai Peninsula, 
 115; Admiralty Is., 115; Cook's 
 Inlet, 115. 
 
 Mirages, 130-140. 
 
 Missionaries and mission societies, 
 89, 92-96. 
 
 Moose, 102, 103. 
 
 Moraines, 52-55 ; definition of, 52 ; 
 on the Pacific Slope, 52, 53 ; origin 
 of, 53 ; in New England, 54. 
 
 Morrow's speech, 7. 
 
 Mountains, principal peaks, 8.
 
 INDEX. 
 
 153 
 
 Muir, Prof. John, 37, 42, 43 ; experi- 
 ments of, 40, 41, 43; theories of 
 99, 116. 
 
 Muir Glacier, 30, 38, 43 ; description 
 of, 43-48 ; extent, 48 ; discharge 
 of, 49. 
 
 NATIVE RACES, 56-74. 
 
 NEW METLAKATLA, 26, 27 ; founding 
 of, 95. 
 
 Nootka, surrender of, 20. 
 
 Nordenskiold's theories, 50, 51. 
 
 O'DELL, Jas., in search of the Phan- 
 tom City, 134, 135. 
 
 Ornithology, 108. 
 
 PATTERSON Glacier, 28. 
 
 Peril Strait, 31. 
 
 Phantom City, the, 134, 135. 
 
 Polygamy, 60, 64. 
 
 Portland, Or., 11, 12. 
 
 Port Townsend, Wash., 15, 16. 
 
 Potlach, 85, 86. 
 
 Prince Frederick Sound, 28. 
 
 Punishments, 61, 67. 
 
 QUEEN Charlotte Islands, 22 ; Sound, 
 22, 23, 24. 
 
 REFORMS needed, 8-TO. 
 
 Religion, 79, 80, 88, 91. 92, 95, 96. 
 
 Religious schools and training, 89, 91, 
 92, 96. 
 
 Rights of the people, 8-10. 
 
 Resources Census 1890, 148. 
 
 Russians, the, progress, 1, 2; con- 
 quests, 2; avarice, 3; at Oona- 
 laska, 3 ; despotism, 3, 63 ; explor- 
 ations, 50. 
 
 Russian schools, 88, 89. 
 
 Russian- American Fur Co., 3, 92; 
 protest against, 4. 
 
 SAGINAW, Jake, 30. 
 
 Salmon, 125, 126 ; pack, 127, 128. 
 
 San Juan Islands, 19. 
 
 Saranac, loss of the, 23. 
 
 Schlikoff, Gov., 88. 
 
 Schools, 88-<)0. 
 
 Schwatka, Lieut., 39. 
 
 Seals, 108, 109. 
 
 Seal lease, 8, 117-120. 
 
 Seattle, Wash., 14, 15. 
 
 Sectarianism, 95, 96. 
 
 Seward, Secretary, 4. 
 
 Seymour Narrows, 23. 
 
 Shamans and Shamanism, 66, 79, 
 80-85. 
 
 Shaman jugglery, 66. 
 
 Shamanism elsewhere, 82-84. 
 
 Silent City, the, 131-132. 
 
 Silver Bow Basin, the, 114. 
 
 Sitka, 31-34, 90, 92; Greek Church, 
 31-33; Thousand Islands, 31; 
 Russians at, 31, 32; ruins of, 32; 
 publications at, 33 ; castle at, 31, 
 32. 
 
 Slave murder, 67. 
 
 Spanish explorers, progress north, 
 1; at Queen Charlotte Is., 3. 
 
 Spanish names, origin, 21 ; corrup- 
 tion of, 22. 
 
 St. Elias Range, 38, 50. 
 
 Stoicism, 65. 
 
 Students sent to Russia, 89. 
 
 Submerged City, the, 134, 135. 
 
 Superstition, 65, 66. 
 
 TABLE of Distances, 34. 
 
 Tacoma, 12-14. 
 
 Theological schools, 89. 
 
 Theories, glacial, 35, 36 ; of moraines, 
 54, 55 ; Dr. Kane's 36, 37 ; John 
 Muir's, 40, 41, 43, 99, 116; Nor- 
 denskiold, 50, 51 ; on the origin of 
 the Alaskans, 56, 57. 
 
 Thlinkets, physical development, 
 58; nature, 58, 61; adornment, 
 59 ; marriage customs, 59, 60 ; vil- 
 lages, 62. 
 
 Timber product, 116 ; laws, 9. 
 
 Tongass Narrows, 26. 
 
 Totem poles, description, 75, 76; 
 significance, 75, 76; value, 7t>. 
 
 Training, 90 ; manual, 90, 91 ; moral, 
 91, 92. 
 
 Treadwell mine, 29, 113. 
 
 VANCOUVER, Geo., 20; surveys and 
 explorations, 20, 21 ; charts of, 42. 
 
 Vancouver Islands, 21-23; posses-
 
 154 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 sion, 20; U. S. claim, 21; named, 
 
 21 ; harbors, 21 ; area, 21. 
 Vegetation, 39. 
 Verstova, Mt., 31. 
 Vices, 61, 65. 
 Victoria, B. C., 16-18. 
 Vocabulary, a Chinook, 141-142. 
 Voyage of Vitus Behring, 2, 3 ; Capt. 
 
 Cook, 3; Juan de Fuca, 1; Geo. 
 
 Vancouver, 20. 
 WESTERN Union Telegraph scheme, 
 
 5, 6. 
 
 Willoughby , Professor, 130-132 ; mir- 
 age, 131, 132. 
 
 Witchcraft, 79. 
 
 Wolf, the, 105. 
 
 Wraiigell, Baron, 27, 32; Fort, 27, 
 28, 90; Narrows, 28; Mt., 38. 
 
 Wright, Prof. F. G., 49, 53, 64. 
 
 YAAS Bay, 26. 
 
 Yakatat Bay, 38. 
 
 Yukon River, 7, 29.
 
 7
 
 fck. 
 
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