USA > Alaska > Alaska, the great country > Part 31
Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).
Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38
At White Pass City that was, the old Trail of Heartbreak leads up the canyon of the north fork of the Skaguay, di- rectly away from the railroad. The latter makes a loop of many miles and returns to the canyon hundreds of feet above its bed. The scenery is of constantly increasing grandeur. Cascades, snow-peaks, glaciers, and overhang- ing cliffs of stone make the way one of austere beauty. In two hours and a half we climb leisurely, with frequent stops, from the level of the sea to the summit of the pass ; and although skirting peaks from five to eight thousand feet in height, we pass through only one short tunnel.
It is a thrilling experience. The rocking train clings to the leaning wall of solid stone. A gulf of purple cther sinks sheer on the other side - so sheer, so deep, that one dare not look too long or too intently into its depth. Hundreds of feet below, the river roars through its narrow banks, and in many places the train overhangs it. In others, solid rock cliffs jut out boldly over the train.
After passing through the tunnel, the train creeps across the steel cantilever bridge which seems to have been flung, as a spider flings his glistening threads, from cliff to cliff, two hundred and fifteen feet above the river, foaming white over the immense boulders that here barricade its headlong race to the sea.
432
ALASKA: THE GREAT COUNTRY
Beautiful and impressive though this trip is in the green time and the bloom time of the year, it remains for the winter to make it sublime.
The mountains are covered deeply with snow, which drifts to a tremendous depth in canyons and cuts. Through these drifts the powerful rotary snow-plough eleaves a white and glistening tunnel, along which the train slowly makes its way. The fascinating element of momentary peril - of snow-slides burying the train- enters into the winter trip.
Near Clifton one looks down upon an immense block of stone, the size of a house but perfectly flat, beneath which three men were buried by a blast during the building of the road. The stone is covered with grass and flowers and is marked with a white cross.
At the summit, twenty miles from Skaguay, is a red station named White Pass. A monument marks the boundary between the United States and Yukon Terri- tory. The American flag floats on one side, the Canadian on the other. A cone of rocks on the erest of the hill leading away from the sea marks the direction the boun- dary takes.
The White Pass Railway has an average grade of three per cent, and it aseends with gradual, splendid sweeps around mountainsides and projecting cliffs.
The old trail is frequently called " Dead Horse Trail." Thousands of horses and mules were employed by the stampeders. The poor beasts were overloaded, over- worked, and, in many instanees, treated with unspeakable cruelty. It was one of the shames of the century, and no humane person ean ever remember it without horror.
At one time in 1897 more than five thousand dead horses were counted on the trail. Some had lost their footing and were dashed to death on the rocks below ; others had sunken under their ernel burdens in utter ex-
433
ALASKA: THE GREAT COUNTRY
haustion ; others had been shot ; and still others had been brutally abandoned and had slowly starved to death.
" What became of the horses," I asked an old stampeder, " when you reached Lake Bennett? Did you sell them ?"
" Lord, no, ma'am," returned he, politely; "there wa'n't nothing left of 'em to sell. You see, they was dead."
" But I mean the ones that did not die."
" There wa'n't any of that kind, ma'am."
" Do you mean," I asked, in dismay, " that they all died ? - that none survived that awful experience ?"
"That's about it, ma'am. When we got to Lake Ben- nett there wa'n't any more use for horses. Nobody was goin' the other way -and if they had been, the horses that reached Lake Bennett wa'n't fit to stand alone, let alone pack. The ones that wa'n't shot, died of starvation. Yes, ma'am, it made a man's soul sick."
Boundary lines are interesting in all parts of the world; but the one at the summit of the White Pass is of unusual historic interest. Side by side float the flags of America and Canada. They are about twenty yards from the little station, and every passenger left the train and walked to them, solely to experience a big patriotie American, or Canadian, thrill ; to strut, glow, and walk back to the train again. Myself, I gave thanks to God, silently and alone, that those two flags were floating side by side there on that mountain, beside the little sapphire lake, instead of at the head of Chil- koot Inlet.
There are Canadian and United States inspectors of customs at the summit ; also a railway agent. Their families live there with them, and there is no one else and nothing else, save the little sapphire lake lying in the bare hills.
2 F
434
ALASKA: THE GREAT COUNTRY
Its blue waves lipped the porch whereon sat the young, sweet-faced wife of the Canadian inspector, with her baby in its carriage at her side.
This bit of liquid sapphire, scarcely larger than an arti- ficial pond in a park, is really one of the chief sources of the Yukon - which, had these clear waters turned tow- ard Lynn Canal, instead of away from it, might have never been. It seems so marvellous. The merest breath, in the beginning, might have toppled their liquid bulk over into the canyon through which we had so slowly and so enchantingly mounted, and in an hour or two they might have forced their foaming, furious way to the ocean. But some power turned the blue waters to the north and set them singing down through the beautiful chain of lakes - Lindeman, Bennett, Tagish, Marsh, Labarge - winding, widening, past ramparts and mountains, through canyons and plains, to Behring Sea, twenty-three hun- dred miles from this lonely spot.
This beginning of the Yukon is called the Lewes River. Far away, in the Pelly Mountains, the Pelly River rises and flows down to its confluence with the Lewes at old Fort Selkirk, and the Yukon is born of their union.
The Lewes has many tributaries, the most important of which is the Hootalinqua -or, as the Indians named it, Teslin -having its source in Teslin Lake, near the source of the Stikine River.
After leaving the summit the railway follows the shores of the river and the lakes, and the way is one of loveliness rather than grandeur. The saltish atmosphere is left behind, and the air tings with the sweetness of mountain and lake.
We had eaten an early breakfast, and we did not reach an eating station until we arrived at the head of Lake Bennett at half after one o'clock; and then we were given fifteen minutes in which to eat our lunch and get back to the train.
435
ALASKA: THE GREAT COUNTRY
I do not think I have ever been so hungry in my life- and fifteen minutes! The dining room was clean and attractive; two long, narrow tables, or counters, extended the entire length of the room. They were decorated with great bouquets of wild flowers ; the sweet air from the lake blew in through open windows and shook the white curtains out into the room.
The tables were provided with good food, all ready to be eaten. There were ham sandwiches made of lean ham. It was not edged with fat and embittered with mustard ; it must have been baked, too, because no boiled ham could be so sweet. There were big brown lima beans, also baked, not boiled, and dill-pickles - no insipid pin-moneys, but good, sour, delicious dills ! There were salads, home-made bread, "salt-rising " bread and butter, cakes and cookies and fruit - and huckleberry pie. Blueberries, they are called in Alaska, but they are our own mountain huekleberries.
No twelve-course luncheon, with a different wine for each course, could impress itself upon my memory as did that lunch-counter meal. We ate as children eat; with their pure, animal enjoyment and satisfaction. For fifteen minutes we had not a desire in the world save to gratify our appetites with plain, wholesome food. There was no crowding, no selfishness and rudeness, - as there had been in that wild scene on the excursion-boat, where the struggle had been for place rather than for food, - but a polite con- sideration for one another. And outside the sun shone, the blue waves sparkled and rippled along the shore, and their music came in through the open windows.
Here, in 1897, was a city of tents. Several thousand men and women camped here, waiting for the completion of boats and rafts to convey themselves and their outfits down the lakes and the river to the golden land of their dreams.
Standing between cars. clinging to a rattling brake, I
436
ALASKA: TIIE GREAT COUNTRY
made the acquaintance of Cyanide Bill, and he told me about it.
" Tents !" said he. "Did you say tents ? Hunh ! Why, lady, tents was as thick here in '97 and '98 as seeds on a strawberry. They was so thick it took a man an hour to find his own. Hunh ! You tripped up every other step on a tent-peg. I guess nobody knows anything about tents unless he was mushin' around Lake Bennett in the summer of '97. From five to ten thousand men and women was camped here off an' on. Fresh ones by the hundred come strugglin', sweatin', dyin', in over the trail every day, and every day hundreds got their rafts finished, bundled their things and theirselves on to 'em. and went tearin' and yellin' down the lake, gloatin' over the poor tired-out wretches that just got in. Often as not they come sneakin' back afoot without any raft and without any outfit and worked their way back to the states to get another. Them that went slow, went sure, and got in ahead of the rushers.
"I wisht you could of seen the tent town! - young fellows right out of college flauntin' around as if they knew somethin'; old men, stooped and gray-headed ; gamblers, tin horns, cut-throats, and thieves ; honest women, workin' their way in with their husbands or sons, their noses bent to the earth, with heavy packs on their backs, like men ; and gay, painted dance-hall girls, sailin' past 'em on horse- back and dressed to kill and livin' on the fat of the land. I bet more good women went to the bad on this here lay- out than you could shake a stick at. It seemed to get on to their nerves to struggle along, week after week, packin' like animals, sufferin' like dogs, et up by mosqui- toes and gnats, pushed and crowded out by men -and then to see them gay girls go singin' by, livin' on luxu- ries, men fallin' all over theirselves to wait on 'em, champagne to drink - it sure did get on to their nerves!
Copyright by F. 11. Nowell, Seattle
COUNCIL CITY AND SOLOMON RIVER RAILROAD - A CHARACTERISTIC LANDSCAPE OF SEWARD PENINSULA
437
ALASKA: THE GREAT COUNTRY
" You see, somehow, up here, in them days, things didn't seem the way they do down below. Nature kind of gets in her work ahead of custom up here. Wrong don't look so terrible different from right to a woman a thousand miles from civilization. When she sees women all around her walkin' on flowers, and her own feet blistered and bleedin' on stones and thorns, she's pretty apt to ask her- self whether bein' good and workin' like a horse pays. And up here on the trail in '97 the minute a woman begun to ask herself that question, it was all up with her. The end was in plain sight, like the nose on a man's face. The dance hall on in Dawson answered the question practical.
" Of course, lots of 'em went in straight and stayed straight ; and they're the ones that made Dawson and saved Dawson. You get a handful of good women located in a minin'-camp and you can build up a town, and you can't do it before, mounted police or no mounted police."
I had heard these hard truths of the Trail of Heartbreak before ; but having been worded more vaguely, they had not impressed me as they did now, spoken with the plain, honest directness of the old trail days.
" If you want straight facts about '97," the collector had said to me, " I'll introduce you to Cyanide Bill, out there. He was all through here time and again. He will tell you everything you want to know. But be careful what you ask him ; he'll answer anything - and he doesn't talk parlor."
" The hardships such women went through," continued Cyanide Bill, " the insults and humiliations they faced and lived down, ought to of set 'em on a pe-des-tal when all was said and done and decency had the upper hand. The time come when the other'ns got their come-upin's ; when they found out whether it paid to live straight.
" The world'll never see such a rush for gold again," went on Cyanide Bill, after a pause. "I tell you it takes
438
ALASKA: THE GREAT COUNTRY
a lot to make any impress on me, I've been toughenin' up in this country so many years ; but when I arrives and sees the orgy goin' on along this trail, my heart up and stood still a spell. The strong ones was all a-trompin' the weak ones down. The weak ones went down and out, and the strong ones never looked behind. Men just went crazy. Men that had always been kind-hearted went plumb locoed and 'u'd trample down their best friend, to get ahead of him. They got just like brutes and didn't know their own selves. It's no wonder the best women give up. Did you ever hear the story of Lady Belle ?"
I remembered Lady Belle, probably because of the name, but I had never heard the details of her tragic story, and I frankly confessed that I would like to hear them - " parlor " language or " trail," it mattered not.
" Well," - he half closed his eyes and stared down the blue lake, -" she come along this trail the first of July, the prettiest woman you ever laid eyes on. Her husband
was with her. He seemed to be kind to her at first, but the horrors of the trail worked on him, and he went kind of locoed. He took to abusin' her and blamin' her for everything. She worked like a dog and he treated her about like one ; but she never lost her beauty nor her sweetness. She had the sweetest smile I ever saw on any human bein's face; and she was the only one that thought about others.
""" Don't crowd !' she used to cry, with that smile of her'n. 'We're all havin' a hard time together.'
" Well, they lost their outfit in White Horse Rapids ; her husband cursed her and said it wouldn't of happened if she hadn't been hell-bent to come along ; he took to drinkin' and up and left her there at the rapids. He went back to the states, sayin' he didn't ever want to see her again.
"She was left there without an ounce of grub or a cent
439
ALASKA: THE GREAT COUNTRY
of money. Yakataga Pete had been workin' along the trail with a big outfit, and had gone on in ahead. He'd fell in love with her before he knew she was married. He went on up into the cricks, and when he come down to Dawson six months later, she was in a dance hall. Dawson was wild about her. They called her Lady Belle because she was always such a lady.
"Yakataga went straight to her and asked her to marry him. She burst out into the most terrible cryin' you ever hear. 'As if I could ever marry anybody !' she cries out ; and that's all the answer he ever got. We found out she had a little blind sister down in the states. She had to send money to keep her in a blind school. She danced and acted cheerful ; but her face was as white as chalk, and her big dark eyes looked like a fawn's eyes when you've shot it and not quite killed it, so's it can't get away from you, nor die, nor anything ; but she was always just as sweet as ever.
"Two months after that she -she - killed herself. Yakataga was up in the cricks. He come down and buried her."
It was told, the simple and tragic tale of Lady Belle, and presently Cyanide Bill went away and left me.
The breeze grew cooler ; it crested the waves with silver. Pearly clouds floated slowly overhead and were reflected in the depths below.
The mountains surrounding Lake Bennett are of an unusual color. It is a soft old-rose in the distance. The color is not caused by light and shade; nor by the sun ; nor by flowers. It is the color of the mountains then- selves. They are said to be almost solid mountains of iron, which gives them their name of " Iron-Crowned," I believe ; but to me they will always be the Rose-colored Mountains. They soften and enrich the sparkling, al- most dazzling, blue atmosphere, and give the horizon a
440
ALASKA : THE GREAT COUNTRY
look of sunset even at midday. The color reminded me of the dull old-rose of Columbia Glacier.
Lake Bennett dashes its foam-crested blue waves along the pebbly beaches and stone terraces for a distance of twenty-seven miles. At its widest it is not more than two miles, and it narrows in places to less than half a mile. It winds and curves like a river.
The railway runs along the eastern shore of the lake, and mountains slope abruptly from the opposite shore to a height of five thousand feet. The scenery is never monotonous. It charms constantly, and the air keeps the traveller as fresh and sparkling in spirit as champagne.
For many miles a solid road-bed, four or five feet above the water, is hewn out of the base of the moun- tains ; the terrace from the railway to the water is a solid blaze of bloom ; white sails, blown full, drift up and down the blue water avenue ; cloud-fragments move silently over the nearer rose-colored mountains ; while in the distance, in every direction that the eye may turn, the enchanted traveller is saluted by some lonely and beauti- ful peak of snow. It is an exquisitely lovely lake.
We had passed Lake Lindeman - named by Lieutenant Schwatka for Dr. Lindeman of the Breman Geographical Society - before reaching Bennett.
Lake Lindeman is a clear and lovely lake seven miles long, half a mile wide, and of a good depth for any navi- gation required here. A mountain stream pours tumul- tuously into it, adding to its picturesque beauty.
Sea birds haunt these lakes, drift on to the Yukon, and follow the voyager until they meet their silvery fellows coming up from Behring Sea.
Between Lakes Lindeman and Bennett the river con- necting link is only three quarters of a mile long, about thirty yards wide, and only two or three feet deep. It is filled with shoals, rapids, cascades, boulders, and bars ;
441
ALASKA: THE GREAT COUNTRY
and navigation is rendered so difficult and so dangerous that in the old "raft " days outfits were usually portaged to Lake Bennett.
During the rush to the Klondike a saw-mill was estab- lished at the head of Lake Bennett, and lumber for boat building was sold for one hundred dollars a thousand feet.
The air in these lake valleys on a warm day is indescrib- ably soft and balmy. It is scented with pine, balm, cot- tonwood, and flowers. The lower slopes are covered with fireweed, lark-spur, dandelions, monk's-hood, purple as- ters, marguerites, wild roses, dwarf goldenrod, and many other varieties of wild flowers. The fireweed is of special beauty. Its blooms are larger and of a richer red than along the coast. Blooms covering acres of hillside seem to float like a rosy mist suspended in the atmosphere. The grasses are also very beautiful, some having the rich, changeable tints of a humming-bird.
The short stream a couple of hundred yards in width connecting Lake Bennett with the next lake-a very small, but pretty one which Schwatka named Nares - was called by the natives "the place where the caribou cross," and now bears the name of Caribou Crossing. At certain seasons the caribou were supposed to cross this part of the river in vast herds on their way to different feeding-grounds, the current being very shallow at this point.
There is a small settlement here now, and boats were waiting to carry passengers to the Atlin mining district. The caribou have now found less populous territories in which to range. In the winter of 1907-1908 they ranged in droves of many thousands - some reports said hun- dreds of thousands - through the hills and valleys of the Stewart, Klondike, and Sixty-Mile rivers, in the Upper Yukon country.
442
ALASKA: THE GREAT COUNTRY
Miners killed them by the hundreds, dressed them, and stored them in the shafts and tunnels of their mines, down in the eternally frozen caverns of the earth -thus supplying themselves with the most delicious meat for a year. The trek of caribou from the Tanana River valley to the head of White River consumed more than ninety days in passing the head of the Forty-Mile valley -at least a thousand a day passing during that period. They covered from one to five miles in width, and trod the snow down as solidly as it is trodden in a city street. A great wolf-pack clung to the flank of the herd. The wolves easily cut out the weak or tired-out caribou and devoured them.
Caribou Crossing is a lonely and desolate cluster of tents and cabins huddling in the sand on the water's edge. Considerable business is transacted here, and many pas- sengers transfer here in summer to Atlin. In winter they leave the train at Log-Cabin, which we passed during the forenoon, and make the journey overland in sleighs.
The voyage from Caribou Crossing to Atlin is by way of a chain of blue lakes, pearled by snow mountains. It is a popular round-trip tourist trip, which may be taken with but little extra expense from Skaguay.
Tagish Lake, as it was named by Dr. Dawson, - the distinguished British explorer and chief director of the natural history and geological survey of the Dominion of Canada, - was also known as Bove Lake. Ten miles from its head it is joined by Taku Arm - Tahk-o Lake, it was called by Schwatka.
The shores of Tagish Lake are terraced beautifully to the water, the terraces rising evenly one above another. They were probably formed by the regular movement of ice in other ages, when the waters in these valleys were deeper and wider. There are some striking points of
443
ALASKA: THE GREAT COUNTRY
limestone in this vicinity, their pearl-white shoulders gleaming brilliantly in the sunshine, with sparkling blue waves dashing against them.
Marsh Lake, and another with a name so distasteful that I will not write it, are further links in the brilliant sapphire water chain by which the courageous voyagers of the Heartbreak days used to drift hopefully, yet fearfully, down to the Klondike. The bed of a lake which was un- intentionally drained completely dry by the builders of the railroad is passed just before reaching Grand Canyon.
The train pauses at the canyon and again at White Horse Rapids, to give passengers a glimpse of these famed and dreaded places of navigation of a decade ago.
At six o'clock in the evening of the day we left Skaguay we reached White Horse.
CHAPTER XLII
THIS is a new, clean, wooden town, the first of any im- portance in Yukon Territory. It has about fifteen hun- dred inhabitants, is the terminus of the railroad, and is growing rapidly. The town is on the banks of Lewes River, or, as they call it here, the Yukon.
There is an air of tidiness, order, and thrift about this town which is never found in a frontier town in "the states." There are no old newspapers huddled into gutters, nor blowing up and down the street. Men do not stand on corners with their hands in their pockets, or whit- tling out toothpicks, and waiting for a railroad to be built or a mine to be discovered. They walk the streets with the manner of men who have work to do and who feel that life is worth while, even on the outposts of civiliza- tion.
All passengers, freight, and supplies for the interior now pass through White Horse. The river bank is lined with vast warehouses which, by the time the river opens in June, are piled to the roofs with freight. The ship- ments of heavy machinery are large. From the river one can see little besides these warehouses, the shipyards to the south, and the hills.
Passing through the depot one is confronted by the largest hotel, the White Pass, directly across the street. To this we walked; and from an upstairs window had a good view of the town. The streets are wide and level; the whole town site is as level as a
444
445
ALASKA: THIE GREAT COUNTRY
parade-ground. The buildings are frame and log ; merchandise is fair in quality and style, and in price, high. Mounted police strut stiffly and importantly up and down the streets to and from their picturesque log barracks. One unconsciously holds one's chin level and one's shoulders high the instant one enters a Yukon town. It is in the air.
Excellent grounds are provided for all outdoor sports ; and in the evening every man one meets has a tennis racket or a golf stick in his hand, and on his face that look of enthusiastic anticipation which is seen only on a British sportsman's face. No American, however enthu- siastic or "keen " he may be on outdoor sports, ever quite gets that look.
There was no key to our door. Furthermore, the door would not even close securely, but remained a few hair breadths ajar. There was no bell ; but on our way down to dinner, having left some valuables in our room, we re- ported the matter to a porter whom we met in the hall, and asked him to lock our door.
" It doesn't lock," he replied politely. "It doesn't even latch, and the key is lost."
Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.