USA > Alaska > Peerless Alaska, our cache near the pole > Part 18
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
197
THE SEALS OF PRIBYLOV.
dling, panting, gasping and shuffling along like so many fat men, in the most awkward manner conceivable. Some- times an old bull-seal, adipose and unwieldy, who can not travel with the younger ones, falls to the earth supinely, entirely exhausted, hot, and " clean done up." Another, too weary to travel any more, will stand up in his tracks and fight. These old recalcitrants are at once dismissed, abandoned and ignored, as of little value, their under-wool which gives price to the pelt, being much shorter, coarser, and scantier than that of the younger seals. When a halt is called and the men drop back from the line for a few moments, the march at once ceases, and every seal fans himself with his hind flippers, while his flanks heave with a subdued panting sound. It is a grievous sight to behold, but I have seen worse at a soldiers' parade on a 4th of July, when the sun stood at a hundred in the shade, and there was not lemonade enough to go round. When the seals have partially cooled off, the march to death is resumed. Finally the slaughter-ground is reached and the seals are told off in squads of one hundred and fifty, and at a given signal the executioners let go with clubs and lay them out right and left, after which they are knifed and skinned at the rate of one in every four minutes, although experts have done the job in a minute and a half. The clubs are six feet long, three inches in diameter at the but, made of hard wood, and manufactured in New London, Ct., expressly for this service. There is an excellent opportunity here to indulge in sentimentalism, but I forbear to speak of the languid eyes that plead before the uplifted club, and the heart-rending moans which come from those not dead. My real opinion is that there is little occasion to complain of needless cruelty.
After the skins are flayed off, they are salted and piled in kenches as high as a man can toss them, " hair to fat and salt between," and having been allowed two weeks in which to pickle, are tied up in bundles of two skins each, hair out- side, and shipped to London via New York or Panama, to be dyed ; for few natural skins are less attractive than the fur seals, the fur not being visible, but concealed by a coat of stiff hair, dull gray, brown and grizzled. The art of dying in its perfection is said to be possessed by only one concern in London, although there are many other dyers ; and there is at Albany, in the state of New York, a firm which does splendid work, but their dye color. is said to be lighter and not so rich as the Englishman's. The cost of a fur comes from a combination of causes and
198
PEERLESS ALASKA.
expenses which, it is affirmed, will keep the price up always to near its present figure. The Alaska Company has stations all over the Aleutian Islands west and north of Kodiak, and employs four steamers, and a dozen ships, barks and sloops, besides working boats. Its lease expires in 1890, but there is no doubt that it will be renewed.
Fur seals and sea otters are sometimes caught in large numbers off the Straits of Fuca and the west coast of Van- couver's Island, and in limited numbers by the Indians on the Alaskan coast. Last winter the fur seals seemed to be frequenting the waters of southeastern Alaska in increased numbers. Old residents along the shores say that the last large run was twenty years ago, and was fol- lowed immediately after by a run of sea otter, and they are hoping for a like result now. The Sitka paper says that a good many fur seal skins, both of pups and grown seals, have lately reached the Sitka market. In 1883 there were ten schooners engaged in British waters, employing forty sailors and 296 hunters, the latter chiefly Indians, who used 148 cedar canoes, and they took upward of 9,000 fur seals and 3,000 hair seals, valued at $93,000. The former are worth $10, and the latter fifty cents. Only ninety-six sea- otters were caught, marketable at $50 each.
This brief synopsis will suffice to convey an idca of an interesting industry and locality of which very little is known at large.
MIDSUMMER MIDNIGHT AT NOME
SEASONAL PHASES.
- -
As soon as the snow disappears in May the country springs into a wealth of verdure and glows with many varieties of pretty wild flowers. Strawberries ripen in June beside belated melting banks of snow. The snow never disappears entirely until late in June. From the first of May until the middle of August daylight is con- tinuous, and sunshine all pervading, accelerating the growths of all kinds of vegetables so that the transition from winter to summer, E. S. Harrison writes, is so sud- den as to seem almost magical. At Nome on the shortest day, he says, the sun is hidden less than three hours, but
it is so near the horizon that the land is flooded with a soft light by which one can see to read ordinary print. This continuous daylight lengthens the ordinary working season, as there is no cessation of work caused by night. At the mines the hum of machinery never ceases. Nurses roll their baby carriages about the streets, scanning the shop windows by daylight at eleven o'clock P. M., and saunterers view the firmament and the aurora borealis from the park benches at the midnight hour the same as they would watch the stars in lower latitudes from under the electric lights. It is warmer in Nome than it is in Winnipeg, excepting that they have less hours of sun- light. Quoting from his valuable work, "The Seward Peninsula," the text runs :
"The early part of the summer season is usually clear and dry, and a more beautiful and salubrious climate could not be desired. The latter part is filled with storms and almost constant rain, and it is hard to imagine a more tempestuous climate. There is no springtime, as indicated by the usual signs. We have but two seasons- a short summer and a long winter."
What follows is interesting :-
"Evidences of the approach of winter are seen late in September, sometimes in the latter part of August. The
200
PEERLESS ALASKA.
first frost changes the hue of the landscape. In October ice forms on the streams, a passing cloud brings a snow squall. Miners begin to have difficulty with frozen water in their sluice boxes, and by the 15th or the 20th of the month mining operations are pretty generally suspended. After this the snow usually comes to stay. Nights are cold and the days generally shorten, so that the sun does not have an opportunity to undo the work that King Frost docs during the night. The waters of Bering Sea become mushy from partial congealation, and great floes, which are formed farther north and have been detached by winds and currents, flow down the sea in front of Nome. They may attach themselves to the shore to be broken again by winds and waves and float away. Be- fore this occurs, however, the last steamer has sailed from Nome, small crafts have been brought into the mouth of the Snake River to their winter quarters, and numerous lighters used for transferring freight and pas- sengers from steamers to the land have been brought to the shore and beached. The roadstead, in which there were steamers all summer long, and which during this time was a scene of great activity, is deserted. On a morning usually in November, but sometimes as late as December, the inhabitants of Nome awaken and look out from their homes over a sea of ice. Winter has begun in earnest, and the community realizes that for the next seven months it is sequestered, isolated, and shut off from the balance of the world by barriers of ice and snow. From this time until the ice goes out, the only means of communication with the outside world are dog and rein- deer teams and the telegraph.
"The winters are not as severe as one would imagine. In a few years a person becomes acclimated, and all dread of the cold disappears. At Nome the thermometer sometimes falls to forty degrees below zero. Inland, a distance of fifty miles or more, the thermometer drops much lower, sometimes indicating fifty-eight degrees or
sixty below zero. This temperature is endurable by adopting the native dress of fur parka and using felt shoes, or mukluks, the native skin boot, and protecting the hands with fur mittens. People travel from one part of the peninsula to another. Commerce between the camps of the peninsula is interrupted only by blizzards. It is when the wind blows that there is danger on the trail.
20I
SEASONAL PHASES.
Between Nome and Council City hot air stages run pretty regularly, the schedule being interrupted only when a blizzard blows. A low temperature does not cause great inconvenience to the man who is properly clothed if the air be still, but the cutting blast of the bliz- zard in zero weather cannot be withstood for any great length of time. Blizzards are of frequent occurrence, and they often come suddenly with little or no warning. The men who have lost their lives in the blizzards of Northwestern Alaska generally were people who did not understand the lore of the land or else exercised poor judgment in attempting to travel at a perilous time. Since the settlement of the country and the establishment of road-houses along the trails the danger of freezing is not serious. The miner prepares a cache for his meats and such stores as will not be injured by freezing, as the Northland in winter is a very successful cold storage plant.
"As there is almost continuous day in June, so there is almost continuous night in December. In the shortest day the sun describes an arc in the southern heavens of about one-eighth of his circle. He rises in the south and sets in the south, and is so far away that there is scarcely a trace of coronal rays. He looks like a big disk of bur- nished gold, and his rays furnish a weak light, but no perceptible heat. In the winter there is an absence of almost all color except white, save in the mornings and evenings. Before sunrise and at sunset frequently the southern skies are flooded with the most gorgeous colors. If one has not seen a sunrise or a sunset in high latitudes, one cannot imagine the intensity of the colors. With the exception of these color interludes, the perspective in every direction, landward or seaward, is an unbroken white. The white level tundra reaches back to the white hills, the white hills to the white mountains, and over all 'That inverted Bowl they call the Sky' is gray and cold.
"At Nome a winter day sees a city partially covered with snow. Smoke from a thousand chimneys curls through the crisp air. A door of a store or a saloon is opened, and the warm air rushing from the interior of the building makes a fog as it rushes out. The water vendors, some of them still using the primitive coaloil- can as a receptacle for the water which they have taken from holes made through the ice of the river, may be
202
PEERLESS ALASKA.
seen driving their frost-covered teams through the streets. Men with dog teams are hurrying along the trails, up or down the beach, or across the tundra. Out on the ice of Bering Sca may be seen a dozen or a hundred fisher- men bobbing through holes in the ice for tom cod."
Residents of Nome devote a great deal of time to so- cial entertainments. Out of door sports are varied, and there is a Ski Club which gives tournaments. Sleighing behind dog teams is a favorite pastime. Ladies snugly wrapped in their furs, sitting in a sled behind a team of huskies, the driver running behind, holding on to the handle-bars, jumping upon the runners, and riding whenever it is convenient, is a very common sight. People winter through comfortably. Many residences and store buildings are provided with heaters or base- burner stoves in which anthracite coal is burned. Even those who live in cabins keep warm. No hardship or inconvenience is experienced by those who have no occa- sion to travel. The temperature is not always low. There are many days when the thermometer registers above zero, and once in a while there is a thaw. All sup- plies required for winter use are shipped in and stored before the close of navigation. Coal and provisions are in good supply. There is a hot-house where winter vege- tables are furnished to such as can afford to pay the price. When spring approaches people begin to look anxiously and longingly for the first steamer. On some bright day, or in the dimmer light of the night early in June, a keen-eyed Eskimo raises the shout ;
"OOMIAKPUK!"
This is his native language for steamboat.
Then everybody rushes to the harbor front, no matter what the hour ; bells ring and whistles blow. Its arrival marks the renewal of business activity.
S
20
MIDWINTER NOON
THE SAMOVAR.
'AN ALASKAN MINETOSCOPE.
I remember it well, although the incidents are some- what confused in respect to their procession and sequence. Some are vivid, and others shadowy as the clouds which rest on Edgecombe and Vostovia. It was shortly after the Treaty Cession, just at the gathering of dusk, near the end of one of those brief winter days when the sun describes but a low arc above the Alaskan horizon ; hardly three o'clock of the afternoon by standard time. The de- serted castle of the Baranovs stood stark and gaunt upon the rocky eminence which overlooks the Bay of Sitka. One could hardly trace its blurred outlines in the gloam- ing. The staircase which led up the stoop to its portals was already rickety. Its great chambers were empty, and dust had gathered thickly in the court apartments and throne-room since the evacuation. The retiring Musco- vites had left absolutely nothing but the empty echo of their long-continued occupation, and that was well-nigh hushed. Impelled by a sentimental curiosity, I had pene- trated with aimless quest where footsteps seldom fell in those vacuous days, and in an isolated suite of rooms I fancied I had found the boudoir of "my lady of the castle," for there was just perceptible the faintest sus- picion of an agreeable perfume, with traces here and there of faded frescoes, bits of crimson glass from a broken window, and other intimations, familiar and en- trancing, of a blessed feminine occupancy in days past. The situation was suggestive and full of sentiment. It inspired reveries and stimulated fancies ; and just here, I remember, my strange experiences began. I stood, una- wares, upon the very threshold of my vision.
While I lingered there floated through a door ajar a decided and unmistakable aroma of steeping tea, as if blent with fragrance of sweet blossoms. Startled first,
204
PEERLESS 'ALASKA.
and then sensibly assured of the proximity of an actual presence, I ventured further, by no means cautious of intrusion, and peering into the adjoining room, forth- with discovered two priests of the Greco-Russian Church, in sombre garb. These, I made no doubt, were a part of the clerical contingent left by the abdicating Bishop to take charge of the sacred properties, for which a special fund is provided by the Russian Government to this day .* One of the priests was seated on a rude cedar chest ; the other stood beside a cylindrical stove of sheet-iron, such as are still seen in some Russian dwellings in Sitka, upon the top of which was steaming an old brass samovar of antique pattern.
With the exception of a lighted chandelier swung from the lofty ceiling, there was no other furniture in the apartment. Some other impulse than volition carried me past the door, and as I watched, apparently without being observed, it seemed as if such volumes of vapor never emanated from so small a vessel before. They fairly rolled out of the urn, filling the apartment, rendering ob- jects indistinct, and creating unstable outlines. Even the figures of the priests became clouded in the obscurity. The penetrating quality of the exhalations at once con- vinced my nerves that the decoction was something more than mere tea. Its fumes set my brain in a whirl, and my consciousness assumed altogether a nebulous character. I could not have articulated if I had tried. Had I succeeded in speaking, the whole phantasm would have undoubtedly passed off at once. It is always so, I believe, in nightmares. Whenever the victim can give ut- terance, he wakes. However, this was a different sort of a trance. I fancied I heard the priest who supervised the samovar distinctly inquire of his companion, "Has my lady set the lights in the cupola ?" t
"She has, comrade; and so has she done for fifty years."
"Correct. By my faith! were it not for my lady, poor ghost ! I don't know what our beacon would do for light, since our supplies of oil are no longer forthcoming. Alack! the navies of the Czar may never sail into this harbor more; yet it is befitting the Christianity which we profess, and I hope observe, that a beacon should be ever lighted for such anxious and benighted voyagers as may chance this way."
205
THE SAMOVAR.
"Methinks, brother Andreas, the lady will hardly keep her vigils after the premises are occupied by these Yankee new-comers. Yet, I make no doubt there is more of self- interest than philanthropy in her method. Has the citizen arrived ?"
"He is here."
So? I was expected, then, if not announced! The thought naturally presented itself, yet the priests had shown no sign. Unwittingly I had become particeps in the play. Without more ado, the officiating priest turned to me in a perfunctory way, while the nimbus of vapor grew luminous about his features.
"I may tell you," he said, as he mechanically stirred the contents of the samovar, "that we are brewing here a sort of exegetical punch, the basis of which is tea-tea brought to Russia from the Steppes of Chinese Tartary on the backs of dromedaries, and bartered in this country for the furs of Alaska. In a manner it is a symposium of history. You perceive that we have here the essence of three great empires presented at once. We have already infused some flavor of Japan and Mexico, to say nothing of a soupcon of France and Great Britain, which you will perceive illustrated on the ethnological profile of the coast. All that is needed to make a combination worthy of record is to stir in a little of the dust of an- tiquity. And if we add a modicum of piety, such as the Greek Church affords and dispenses, and [he nodded sig- nificantly ] a spice of American politics, we shall have a concoction that will not shame the ingredients."
The purport of his words was not altogether clear to my mind, a fact which the expression of my face no doubt disclosed, for, after a scrutinizing glance, he said amiably : "I will be more explicit." But instead of fur- ther discourse, he simply agitated the samovar gently, and forthwith a column of steam rose to the ceiling in fleecy convolutions, clinging to the walls in a drapery of clouds. Then from the nucleus of each misty fold came out, one by one, the portraits of old explorers, priests, and traders who had been identified with the history of Alaska since nearly a century and a half ago. Bering, Valdez, La Perouse, Cook, Vancouver, Lisianski, Quodra, Juan de Fuca, Veniaminoff, Wrangell, Shellikov, Bara- nov, and, conspicuous among all the rest, with features fresher and outlines more distinct, the familiar likeness
206
PEERLESS ALASKA.
of William H. Seward! Then the priest gave a compre- hensive sweep of his arm, and lo! the misty canopy be- came diaphanous, and transparent, and luminous, with undulating scintillations like the aurora borealis, and from coruscating plaques vivid reminiscences came to view, like the ethereal refractions of a mirage, and I seemed to see the fleets of Russia swarming in the Aleutian Archi- pelago and dominating all the waters from the Gulf of California to the gateway of the Arctic Sea, entrepots and trading posts at all commercial points, missionary stations scattered throughout the land, agricultural areas tenanted with flocks and herds, and teeming with garden vegetables, shipyards where fleets were built and fitted out, foundries where bells were cast for all the churches and chapels hence to Mexico, factories of woolen fabrics, woodenware and farm implements, mines of lead and iron and coal, supplying steamers which plied to Russian ports ; great walrus and sea-otter camps, with substantial warehouses and dwellings, and whaling vessels by the score cruising northward to the land's end. The hardships of the early discoverers, the struggles of Russians, English, French, and Spaniards for possession; the conflicts with the natives, the cruel orgies of the aborigines; the introduction of Christianity among them by the missionaries as long ago as 1759; their laborious instruction in grammar and the ruder arts, all culminating in the pomp of the old court at Sitka, passed in successive phantasmagoria. Incidentally there came to view a panorama of volcanic eruptions, earth- quakes, upheavals, cleavages, mountain floods, and tidal waves, some recent, destroying whole towns and obliter- ating entire populations and races of men; and back of all these were penumbra of prehistoric peoples-referred to in ancient literature as "dwellers in Cimmerian dark- ness beyond the sea"-whose race characteristics have been transmitted through all the generations to Innuit, Thlinkit, Haida, Ingaleek, and Aleut-typical enigmas even now to all ethnologists.
What I saw was a veritable stereopticon of Alaskan history from its beginning, covered chiefly by the epoch of Russian occupation. I was impressed with the mar- velous resources of the country, and especially with the wonderful achievements of the Slavonic régime, of which I had formed no adequate conception ; but the true signi-
207
THE SAMOVAR.
ficance of the allegory did not immediately present itself. There was an insinuating touch of diplomacy in the method and manner of the priest which I could not fully comprehend. The suggestions compassed some hidden contingency which I could not fathom.
I would fain have contemplated the strange phenomena, but even while I looked they melted into thin air, and only a diminutive spiral was seen to issue from the samo- var; nay, I would have bespoken a literal interpretation had I not been cautioned by an uplifted finger of the priest. Then, simultaneously a puff of vapor mounted from the rim, whiter than before, spreading itself abroad and enfolding with its translucent fleecy drapery the be- atific figure of the Genius of Liberty! It lingered for an instant only and then vanished, and in the fading I fan- cied I detected the evanescent semblance of an Imperial Presence supporting it behind, massive and august, but god-like and benignant. A moment later the room was as clear of vapor as the outdoor atmosphere after a sum- mer shower.
I leaned forward with feverish interest.
"Ask me no questions," the priest interposed. "The tab- leaux which you have seen must convince you of the in- domitable power of Russia and the energy which vitalizes her remotest extremities. For a century and a half she has possessed this Alaskan land. She subdued it, she de- veloped it, and she has converted it. It is yours now to cherish and enlighten. Her whole future is fraught with political and economic possibilities of most momentous character. In the old days the hand of the Muscovite has lain heavily upon his subjects, but the world pro- gresses and the prerogatives of serfs enlarge. Let the spirit of intellectual liberty and republicanism now illu- mine and pervade the land, and the result will be remu- nerative beyond calculation. The welfare of Russia and the great republic are intimately involved with each other. When your country was wrenched with the throes of threatened dissolution, the Muscovite stood ready to aid in a last extremity, and her whole armada was at your service. It may happen again in the com- plications of international politics that the United States will welcome the grip of a helping hand, and that the hand of the greatest Power on earth. The intermediate position of Alaska binds the two countries in close affinity,
208
PEERLESS 'ALASKA.
and toward her former ward Russia will always stand in the light of a foster parent."
A jarring of a window here momentarily drew my at- tention, and when I turned again the priestly occupants of the room were gone.
But the impressions left by that ghostly séance will never be effaced. I believe the day is not far distant when, prompted by common sense and wise counsel, a naval station will be located on the northwest coast, and an overland railroad and telegraph wire stretch across Alaska to Bering Strait, joining the two contiguous con- tinents by marine cable across the narrow ocean gap which intervenes. Then our long-neglected province will not only resound with busy industry, but vie with her active British neighbor for commercial supremacy on the Western seas.
1
:
S
ENTRANCE TO COPPER BLOCK
ED.S. OF Valdez-Fairba
R & CO.
FAI BANKS VALDES STAGE
WINTER MAIL SERVICE BY STAGE.
ALASKA OF TO-DAY.
When the last of the miners came out from the upper Yukon gold region on October 15, 1896, they made the time from Forty-Mile Creek to Juneau in twenty-five days, travelling by steamboat, bateau, and pack-horses, and those who made the trip allowed that the time could be materially shortened. Previously the journey had re- quired several months and great hardship in poling up the chain of lakes and against an eight-mile river current, a distance of 700 miles, to the Dyea Pass, over which an Indian trail led to Chilkat at the liead of tide-water ; from which point the remainder of the trip was easy. Everything had to be packed on the backs of native porters at a cost of fifty to seventy-five cents a pound, grub included, from Skagway over the summit and vice versa. Between the Chilcoot Pass and the Dyea Pass it was "Hobson's choice." Two years later, when George A. Brackett's wagon road over the ridge was finished and open for use at a cost of some $200,000, the rate dropped to twelve cents. Now over the busy Yukon railroad it is two cents, with a corresponding reduction of time in transit.
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.