USA > Alaska > Peerless Alaska, our cache near the pole > Part 3
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It is warmed by three great fires placed in the center of the building, and lighted by side lamps. The people dress very tastefully in modern garb, and I am not sure but they have the latest fashions. The women weave the cloth for all the garments, and there are gardens which afford vege- tables and fruit in abundance. It is as cleanly and orderly as the most punctilious Shaker settlement. A fine assort- ment of Hydah utensils, plaques, and carved work is on sale here. For exquisite beauty and quaint designs, there is nothing like Hydah ware to be found on the whole coast. A most beautiful table service of many pieces is on view at the U. S. National Museum in Washington, carved from black talcose slate. [This entire community soon after- wards moved bodily across the channel to Annette Island, started a new town with up-to-date improvements, and is now on Alaskan soil under jurisdiction of the U. S.]
From this point to American soil the distance is short and noteworthy. The transition from the neat and thrifty settlements left behind to the dilapidated and half- deserted line of buildings-formerly a Russian trading post of rank, but now the U. S. port of entry of Alaska, is not flattering to spread-eagle pride. When the weather- stained Custom House officer formally comes on deck, conscientious American citizens "go below." It was said that nothing remunerative to any body ever fol- lowed his official visits. Usually it was "too foggy " for him to discover the vessel, and this fog became so constitutionally prevalent in all that district that smug- gled goods were nowhere apparent until, one unpropitious day last February, Collector Beecher by some timely hint conveyed through the circumlocution office, was enabled to unearth at Tongass no less than $45,000 worth of opium packed in casks purporting to cover furs. However, the Territorial regime is full of irregularities, affecting other things than revenue, all of which will be speedily corrected whenever domestic order shall succeed official chaos. But I shall venture no reflections. I will hold no "mirror up to nature," for never did nature see herself to better ad- vantage than upon that early morn at Tongass. There was no fog then ; the early sun had scarcely risen ; and all the morning lights which painters find it so difficult to limn, filled the firmament with their transparency. Not only the * trees and rocks, and mountains, the moss, the kelp, the gulls on wing, the reek of the smoke-stack, and the rosy glow of morn, but even the fleecy films of vapor which, in voluptuous summer float high in the upper air-the lace-
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like canopy embroidered on the blue-were mirrored on the water ; and each individual wave upturned by the cleav- ing prow formed reduplicating mirrors, like the facets of a gem, reflecting a consummate picture in each one. It was a moment of perfect earthly peace. The impressionable young ladies on board declared that it was " just too lovely for any thing." These little maids from school all keep faithful diaries of the happenings aboard ship, nautical and social, the distances run each day, the places called at, what the steward laid for dinner, how many chickens there are left in coop, what the captain told them sub rosa, and all the special and private information to be picked up in the purser's state-room, and the "after-run." They make themselves " solid " with the officers, tip the steward and waiters, and even button-hole the first officer for best boats when little side excursions are afoot, for on those Alaska journeys frequent opportunities are offered to go ashore at the regular landings,of which there may be ten, besides spe- cial trips to places of universal interest ; after each visit the cabins and state-rooms are littered with ferns, mosses, wild flowers, clam shells, bits of mineral, slippery kelps, Indian curios and souvenirs of all sorts brought aboard. One of these little exploring parties once came across a member of the ship's crew digging a hole in the ground on a secluded point, and when he told them he was to get three dol- lars for burying a dead Chinaman who had been sent over from the steamer in the yawl, they were paralyzed. The body lay on the ground beside him, covered with a coat. In their view such a summary disposal of a corpse was not at all in accordance with civilized customs, but it seemed to be approved in Alaska. This incident was of course duly noticed in the diaries, with comments. So also was the ad- venture of the " rooster and the cook." The chicken coop, it seems, stood on the hurricane deck in the lee of one of the paddle-boxes, and passengers would often stop on their matutinal turns aloft to inspect or feed the feathered inmates, and speculate upon the uncertainties and vicissi- tudes of galley life. On these occasions the chickens were always inclined to be sociable and would scuffle with each other for donations ; but it was remembered that whenever the cook or his assistant, both of whom were Chinamen, ap- proached the coop, the apprehensive flock fled to the rear and bunched up in the corners. They knew the difference, and no wonder ! One by one the fatted victims were sum- marily withdrawn and served as soup or fricassee, until at last the cutest of them all, an old rooster who had hitherto
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evaded the intruded hand, was fairly cornered ; yet he did not succumb nor faint. Watching his chance, he slipped John's grip, and getting free on deck, at last he gave both the Chinamen a desperate chase around the texas and the smoke-stacks, this way, and that way, and back again, headed off at every turn, feathers flying, pig-tails streaming, all hands cackling and squawling, and every passenger look- ing on quite interested. At last, utterly exhausted, the rooster was neatly coraled in a bunch of life-preservers (which were nothing to him then), when he suddenly took wing, and with one defiant and despairing shriek, flew over- board and was drowned ! He deliberately committed sui- cide rather than go to pot ; so he escaped the ignominy, but the passengers lost their salad.
I am quite sure, if I desired a complete epitome of the voyage, with no details omitted, I could find it in one of these same records; but as I am not likely to meet any of these " Vassar Girls Abroad," it only remains for me to re- cite the bare fact of our due arrival at Wrangell, which was fifteen years earlier of considerable importance, where large parties fitted out daily for the Stickeen mines located nearly three hundred miles inland across the country in British Columbia. There the whole region is even now filled with deserted cabins. There was a temporary glim- mer of brightness for Alaskan prospects, in the first dawn of the new " purchase," when no less than 3,000 people congregated here to " outfit." Then there were many shops and stores, and warehouses on the wharf, and all sorts of rude places of amusement, and a motly and unruly crowd such as always gathers at a frontier town. Even old hulks were improvised as boarding-houses. But the prospects " petered out," not for lack of mineral so much as lack of suitable mechanical appliances, and so both the mines and the town are now almost dead. There is a picturesque block-house on a convenient hill, and a grassy plaza with barracks where troops were quartered then, and a couple of small churches, Catholic and Protestant, on the crest of a ridge, with plank walks leading to them, but the barracks are now occupied by the Indian Mission of Mr. Young, and the bethels and brothels are boarded up. Every thing is dilap- idated and worn of paint, aud spacious hostelries where board was once $3.00 per day, have already tumbled into ruins, with the walls collapsed and the roofs fallen in. There are about 500 people left, chiefly Indians, whose better houses, many of them painted, occupy a picturesque curve of the shore and a point of land which projects into the harbor. A foot
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bridge also leads across an estuary to what is an island when the tide is full, and here are some of the best built houses and elaborate totem-poles. This part of the town has at least the charm of supreme novelty, and I dare say there is nothing like it to be seen in all Alaska; a hint of which visitors should take due note and govern themselves accordingly. I suppose that there will be a better civiliza- tion ere many years have passed, but this peculiar architec- ture and ornamentation stand to-day, not only as striking illustrations of the idiosyncracies of a peculiar people, but of their native capabilities, made more creditable and more conspicuous from lack of superior tools with which to cut, hew, carve and smooth. When it is borne in mind that their boards are split from hemlocks, riven with an ax, and planed with adzes, and that shaping and finishing is done with rude knives, it is apparent that the impartial judge will allow them many points for ingenuity and skill. [ Since these notes were taken Wrangell has been re- vised.]
Wrangell lies at the mouth of the Stickeen. One of these days not distant, a steamboat excursion up the Stickeen River through the great cañon which it has cut for its passage through the mountains, will be one of the most popular and exciting of all the experiences on this continent. There is steamboat navigation for one hundred and sixty miles from its mouth to Glenora, up to which point the river is usually clear of ice by the middle of April. There the Dominion custom- house is located on the supposed boundary line, and the scenery is of the most romantic character all the way, the wonderful creations of nature being diversified by trading posts, stores, and mining stations along the banks. Several fine glaciers are to be seen en route, and a number of tributary streams or branches flow into the main river. From the head of navigation there are canoe routes and overland trails for pack trains which lead to the gold mines at Deese Lake, eighty miles further, and to the noted quartz lodes and placers of Cariboo and Cassiar in British Colum- bia. The strip of territory owned by the United States and lying along the coast is only ten leagues wide by the Rus- sian Treaty of 1828 with Great Britain ; and the continual difficulties which arise between customs officials along an indeterminate boundary line, makes its speedy official estab- lishment in every respect very desirable.
The distance between Victoria and Wrangell is a little less than eight hundred miles, the whole route so land- locked that not a qualm of sea-sickness is permitted to come
CHIEF'S HOUSE AND TOTEM-POLES AT WRANGELL.
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aboard, and all the emissaries of Neptune lie low among the grottoes of the deep. The further northward one goes the grander the scenery becomes, the higher and more rugged grow the mountains, the whiter their caps of snow, the denser the surrounding forests, and the more numerous the streams which leap from the lips of the crags. There are fjords deeper and blacker than the Saguenay, open chan- nels greener than Niagara. Peaks are piled on peaks in most tumultuous forms. Outlines serrated and sharp cut the upper sky. Black ravines and dazzling patches of snow alternate. Scars seam the entire sides of lofty moun- tains, where the spring avalanches have scathed them of every vestige of soil and vegetation. The inlets are often enveloped in fogs, but when they lift, the surprises are bewildering. Sometimes it is the bases of the mountains which are revealed, and sometimes the peaks, with a filmy drapery floating athwart their sides, or a golden fleece hung gracefully over their broad shoulders. At Kasaan there is a wharf and cannery with an annex of Indian cabins like an old time negro quarter. There is a fleet of splendid canoes employed in the fishery, drawn high and dry upon the beach ready for use, but now tenderly covered with sails and mats to protect them from the alternate damp and sunshine. The hulk of an old sloop long since past usefulness, lies on the shore cracked, seamed, dismantled and keeled over. She has a history, for once she smuggled goods for the old Russian magnate, Carl V. Baronovick, and carried many a goodly cargo through the intricate water-ways which it did not pay to watch. Out in the stream the U. S. sur- veying steamer lies at anchor, with every thing taut and trim and her brass aglow with polish, like the " knocker of a big front door." She has done lots of work on the coast, and marked out the intricate and dangerous channels with tripods and can-buoys. Some twelve miles off is a Hydah village-one of the few to be found in Alaska-which excursionists sometimes visit for the collection of curios. Its head chief, " Scowl," who was quite a celebrity in his day, died two years ago, leaving a good house and an hon- orable pedigree, vouched for by no less than four totem- poles set up inside, and a tall one in front, outside, made of yellow cedar, which grows abundantly in the vicinity, and is exceedingly beautiful, taking a finish like satin wood, with an odor as distinctive as that of sandal-wood. At Salmon Bay the steamer stopped at another cannery to receive some three hundred barrels of salted salmon, and again at Naha Bay, near which there is a beautiful lake
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connecting with the ocean by a tidal passage, into which the salmon were crowding to spawn. There is a double fall at the outlet of this lake ; the fresh water pouring out when the tide is low, and the salt water flowing in when the tide is high. Here the salmon were wedged so tightly for the whole length of two miles that they could not move at times. The rise of the tide is some eighteen feet and the entire channel, from the surface to the bottom, was jammed and packed solid, so that if a plank were laid upon the liv- ing mass, a person might have walked dry shod across it. This is hard to believe, but easy to understand when it is known that during the salmon "run," from early spring to August, the vast schools which swarm along the shores and fill the bays and inlets, swim in compacted masses six feet thick, so that it is impossible to thrust a spear or lift a boat- hook without impaling a fish. In rivers of Oregon the salmon often obstruct a ford so that horses can not pass, but in Alaska the astounding aggregate is infinitely greater, and large rivers being few, they crowd into available inlets as frightened sheep were never known to block a gangway.
Juneau, or Harrisburg, is the metropolis of Alaska-a town of several streets and shops, stores and restaurants, with a trading-post, a dance-house, a brewery, a barber-shop, and a dramatic company. It is the depot for the rich placer mines behind the mountains back of it, and the live center from which radiates whatever of excitement there is in the territory, outside of " government circles " at Sitka. Gold ore was first discovered on Douglas Island, opposite, where there is to-day in operation the largest stamp mill in the world ; but it has since been found to exist in paying quan- tities on the main-land in the mountains back of Juneau. An Indian revealed the secret, for a consideration, to two prospectors named Harris and Juneau, who at once staked out claims and began to pan out pay dirt and nug- gets of free gold handsomely. The town is named for each of them respectively, though the post-office is now called Harrisburg. It is growing rapidly and is orderly. The miners themselves are temperate, industrious, and well- behaved, and are gradually gathering around them a com- munity of good citizens. One of the best of the miners, Michael Powers, with two others, was unfortunately killed last winter by an accidental cave in the " basin " where the placers are being worked. The population of Juneau in winter, when the mines are idle, is fully 1,500. The laborers employed are chiefly Indians, with a few Chinese. There are two villages of Indian huts built along the shore, one
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on either side of the town. They belong to different tribes who are traditional enemies-the Auks and the Takus-but they live amicably enough with the white settlement sand- wiched in between them. Fleets of canoes ornament the sloping shores in front of the cabins, and wolfish dogs, brindled and yellow, with bushy tails and pricked ears, doze and loll in front of every door. As a general rule their bark is not dangerous. Beyond these dusky suburbs there are burying grounds, with strips of white and colored mus- lin tied to the tips of poles to indicate the graves, which would otherwise be lost in the teeming undergrowth that overruns them in a single season. It is a motley throng which crowds the wharf on " steamer day," but not alto- gether so savage as might be imagined. It is purely cos- mopolitan, and one may land and move about the throng or through the streets of the town and not be stared at as he would be in any equal village of New England. It may be accepted for granted that there is not a white man in all the lot as " fresh " and " tender " as the tourist who supremely con- templates him with his eye-glasses, quite aloof. All of them have " traveled." Some of the stores are branches run by leading merchants of Oregon and San Francisco, and I doubt not one could find the latest cut of trowsers at the tailor's shop. Baths there are, hot and cold, and shaving- parlors with veritable black men behind the chairs, quite comfortable and luxurious to observe and enjoy. There were no less than five negroes in Juneau last year. Verily, the African is as widely scattered as the Israelite ! Here the tide falls twenty-five feet, and when it is dead low water all the piles of the wharf stand out in stark alignment, crusted with barnacles hung with sea-weed and bored by teredos. So destructive is this well-known sea-worm that piles have to be renewed every two years at a great deal of labor and inconvenience, and it is not unusual to find them actually eaten in two below the water-line. A ferry boat runs half hourly from Juneau to Douglas Island, where there is a saw-mill and a considerable settlement connected with the stamp-mill and ore-beds. In the center of the harbor is a pretty island, with a point stretching out from the main- land half the distance to meet it, on which there is an arti- ficial marble monument. Back of the point is a ravine with a goodly stream tumbling out of it in a series of cascades, discolored with the tailings of the sluices back in the moun- tains which have contributed to swell its volume. Up the timbered slope which skirts it a precarious foot-path leads to the "basin," along the edges of steep precipices and
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through thickets of "devil's club " and luscious salmon- berry bushes.
From Juneau to Chilkat and Pyramid Harbor, so called from a wedge-shaped island in the center of the channel, it is a twelve hours' run. Here are the two largest salmon canneries in the territory, together employing over one hundred hands. From this place a novel excursion may be made in canoes or boats to the Chilkat village, where the famous blankets are made. This tribe numbers a thousand souls at least. The women are expert manufacturers of baskets and mats, as well as blankets. The first are made from grass and the dried fiber of sea-kelps; the blankets from the wool of the mountain sheep and goats, woven by hand and dyed with native dyes in strangely wrought designs of blue, black and yellow. These are chiefly used in dances and on fete days. From Chilkat to Kilisnoo is the next stage. Here there is a cannery and phosphate works-phosphate made from the scraps of herring after the oil is extracted.
With a run through Lynn Channel to Glacier Bay, where a day is passed in viewing the greatest wonder of the coast, and thence through Cross Sound, we finally reach Sitka, which is usually the terminal objective point of the long voyage, but is really a considerable distance on the home stretch, accomplished by a long detour to the northward, for Sitka lies in latitude fifty-seven degrees, while Chilkat is in latitude fifty-nine degrees, thirty minutes. In the gray of the early morn we can faintly discern the spectral summit of Mount Edgecumb right before us, and trace the dusky out- lines of the rambling town, the outlying islands, and the hull of the Pinta, U. S. man-of-war lying restfully at anchor a few cables length from the government pier.
Thus hastily touching at points of interest, I have attempted to give the tourist a general idea of what he is to see. In a general way also, he will like to know what to take for the voyage. Presumably he will not require an evening dress, even should a ball be given at the "Castle of the Governor." Indispensible, however, are great-coats and gossamers, heavy shoes, warm underclothing, and short skirts for ladies, as well as light wraps and thin garments of all sorts, traveling caps, and stout canes for glacier-climb- ing. Those who are fond of fishing and hunting may carry shot-guns and tackle for both salt and fresh water use. A blue-fish outfit, with heavy sinker, and a black-bass rod, with reel and line, will be sufficient. Steamer chairs may be bought at any port before leaving Victoria, and a half-
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dozen books will afford exceptionable pastime. Finally, if the officers of the line would only provide a steam launch, forty feet long, with a compound engine, to burn both wood and coal, and half a dozen skiffs for trolling, the service would be quite complete, and the passengers correspond- ingly happy.
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KLOOTCHMAN'S.
AS EXCURSIONISTS SEE IT.
There is undoubtedly a tendency on the part of enthused and susceptible visitors to turn the bright side of Alaska always toward the light, for surely there was never scenery more grand, or climate more delectable. From the first of June to the end of September, throughout the whole excursion season, the temperature is equable. One needs not perspire without exercise. He is always cool and needs never be cold. Morning fogs burn off by ten o'clock ; rain seldom falls ; there is scarcely wind enough to fill a sail ; and the headway of the steamer makes a grateful breeze. On shore there are few insects or flies, no reptiles, and scarcely a butterfly or beetle. The whole excursion of fully 2,000 miles is one long blithesome holiday without a blemish. The thermometer ranges imperturbably and conscientiously between sixty degrees and seventy degrees.
Looking back over my past sojourn on the North Pacific, and my saunterings along its extended coast, I am at first bewildered by the retrospect. Remote from other men, and from evidences of the very existence of men, except when intermittent glimpses are vouchsafed, I seem to have been adrift in a new creation, such as is sometimes outlined in our dreamland. I am lost in the height of the mountains, the depth of the sea, and the immensity of space. Every thing is on so enlarged a scale that there is no familiar standard of comparative measurement. When I stand in the heart of the Rockies I am impressed by the environ- ment of mountain chains and snow-clad peaks. I am appalled by the rugged grandeur of their height, and the interminable depth of their cañons and chasms. The senses are crushed and oppressed by their overwhelming weight. But in this archipelago of mountains and land- locked seas, objects individually so magnificent in them- selves as to startle the senses are multiplied and reduplicated until they paralyze one's comprehension ! Looking forward from the deck of the steamer, through a long vista of head- lands, whose clear-cut outlines are set against the sky in graduated shades of blue, I see a chevaux de frise of snow-
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capped peaks so high that Mount Washington or White Top would seem like hills beside them. Astern, or on either side abeam, the same stupendous view looms up in wondrous counterpart. Between the wave-washed foot-hills in the foreground close at hand, the sea is placid like a mirror, and all the gigantic firs which clothe the mountain side, the scores which the avalanche has made on the rocks, and the waterfalls which fall from perpendicular heights, higher than Yosemite, are pictured there in sublime reflec- tions. At night the glory of the stars and constellations is repeated from infinite heights to infinite depths, and the round, full moon seems regent of the whole universe. In land-locked basins, so small that the ship could scarcely turn, great whales disport, and all the battles of the brine are fought, like combats in a prize ring. It is funny to see whales playing in what seems to be a mountain lake, and, of course, all the sea lions rear up on the adjacent rocks and smile. Occasionally there are nights when the crests of all the waves are luminous, and the lustrous phosphoresence piles up under the prow in lumps of liquid light, and streams off in the receding wake of the vessel. Looking over the bow, a watchful eye will detect large fish darting aside to avoid the advance of the vessel, flashing up scintillations and curves of fire as they double and turn. The passengers watch these submarine pyrotechnics by the hour.
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