USA > Alaska > Peerless Alaska, our cache near the pole > Part 5
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Notwithstanding the habitable and cultivable modicum is relatively but little, it is of far greater extent and im- portance than would be supposed by those who fail to appreciate the magnitude of the territory as a whole; and it must ever be borne in mind that the area of Alaska is greater than that of the original thirteen states, and poor indeed must be that plat of earth, so magnificent in
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sweep and superfices, which does not contain the value inherent of $7,500,000, the equivalent of the "Seward Purchase." What real or tangible foundation is there for the impression that it cannot decently support more than a handful of population, when other countries, which re- semble it in climate and character, support large num- bers? The contributory causes of a false impression have already been hinted at in chapter one of this volume, and will presently be made more clearly to appear.
In the latter years, with the discovery of the fertility of our illimitable prairies and their boundless capacity for grain, men's ideas of farm dimensions expanded in propor- tion, until an area of less than 10,000 acres came to be regarded as small. But the era of bonanza farms has now passed away ; the great wheat fields are being subdivided ; mixed industries are being introduced, and with constantly diminishing areas it will be possible presently to conceive of a farm no larger than those they have in Scotland or New England ; and a country may be considered agricul- tural that is not wholly an alluvial level destitute of trees and stones. Nay, it may even come within the grasp of thought to imagine acres tucked away in the folds of the Alaska mountains or spread out like blankets upon the waste ter- races of the upper Yukon. No lands were ever more fruit- ful than the hill counties of Judea, where the desert encroached very nearly upon the fertile tracts, and there are few countries where the climatic conditions are better adapted to diversified crops than the mountainous seaboard of Alaska. With regard to its local or indigenous products, let me recite the testimony of Captain Beardslee, of the U. S. Navy, given in 1879, soon after his arrival on the station, to wit : " We have been here three months, and during that period have been plentifully supplied with a variety of good vegetables, among which have been radishes, lettuce, car- rots, onions, cauliflower, cabbage, peas, turnips and pota- toes, and have a prospect during the coming month of beets, parsnips and celery, all of which look well in the gardens. The cauliflower and cabbage are as good as I ever ate ; the potatoes are just coming on, and are not quite ripe yet. I had this day (Sept. 17th) at my dinner, a potato grown here which was seven inches long, three inches thick, and weighed one pound five ounces, and it was one of many I have seen which would average from one-half to three-quarters of a pound in weight. Its flavor was good, and I shall, as do all other people here, depend upon this market for my winter's supply. There are many small gardens which return crops, as in all other countries, in proportion to the
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care and skill displayed in their cultivation. I have seen plenty of 'the watery walnuts dubbed potatoes,' but they came from gardens belonging to people so excessively pious that they trusted God for every thing, and put in no work themselves. Some of these gardens are over a single acre in extent, and have supplied good crops annually for quite a while. On Japonski and Biorka, and Survey and other islands there are hundreds of acres which could be culti- vated with profit, if the population were great enough to fur- nish customers. On Biorka, an island about twelve miles from here, there is now under cultivation a thriving vege- table garden of several acres, and these acres have been under annual cultivation for some years. So we eat and grow fat, when we thought to have had short commons."
The captain is writing at Sitka, two hundred and forty miles up the coast from the southernmost boundary of the territory, where the climate may be supposed to be less favorable to perfect maturity of esculents. There are some good vegetable gardens at Wrangell and Tongass. Mr. and Mrs. Young, who have charge of the mission at Wran- gell, have a ranch of 1,600 acres at the mouth of the Stickeen River, on which they have successfully raised bar- ley and oats, but that is ninety-five miles southeast of Sitka. At the village of Haines, further up the Stickeen, there is another good ranch. Red raspberries are cultivated at Tongass. In the stores at Wrangell, I have seen fine pota- toes on sale in the month of August ; but these were not raised on the coast, but up the Stickeen River, one hundred and fifty miles back in the interior. As a matter of fact, the whole coast region is so like a vapor-bath or hot-house, that vegetation grows too exuberantly. There is no room for it, and indigenous plants crowd the economic products. If you fence a garden, or a grave-plot, the fence disappears from view the second year among the overgrowth. The same vegetable phenomena pertain to the interior, but there the summer temperature is inordinately higher, the skies are cloudless, and the supply of moisture derived from the reeking sub-soils and underlying strata of ice, abundantly sufficient. Wild hops, wild onions and wild berries grow in profusion; crab-apples, gooseberries, currants, black and red whortleberries, raspberries, cranberries, strawberries, red and white salmon berries (like raspberries, only four times the size), checker berries, pigeon berries, and angelica, fur- nich the native fruit supply. At berries we have to draw the line between Alaska and Southern British Columbia, which can supply the Dominion with choicest apples, pears,
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plums, peaches, grapes, cherries, etc. One curious feature of Alaska vegetation is that nearly every flower is succeeded by a berry. In the same latitude of Labrador on the Atlantic side, the only solitary fruit is a little yellow berry, locally known as " baked apple," which grows among the grass and lichens ; and spruce sticks, no more than eight inches in diameter, illustrate the best forest growth. Why don't the Canadian Government move its three thousand pinched and starving population from Labrador to Brit- ish Columbia at the public expense? They would earn their transportation in a year.
As stock raising is the remunerative complement of every well constituted farm, it is being prosecuted by the Alas- kan granger with marked advantage. Certainly the climate is vastly more propitious than in Northern Minnesota and Dakota, where the grazing of fine sheep and the best blooded cattle is now prosecuted with signal profit. Like the bonanza wheat fields of the Northwest, so the illimitable cattle ranges of the further west are being sub-divided. Diversity of industry has become a necessity and a watch- word. Gradually the wheat fields and the cattle ranges are over-lapping and dove-tailing into each other. Very rapidly the farmer of the West is driving the desert before him. The developments of each succeeding year make it more and more obvious that the encroachment of the home- steader upon the grazing lands can not be checked. The Denver Tribune says :- " Men have stood in line a hundred deep at the Land Offices waiting their turns to enter land upon which as little rain falls as in the most arid spot east of the Rocky Mountains. If this move can be made to pay them it simply means that all the plains will be home- steaded within a few years. It means that the large herds will disappear and that the lands will be fenced by their real owners. In short, it forebodes another change in the evolution of the arid cattle-grazing business greater than any that has gone before."
Finally when all the land is homesteaded, men will look to Alaska. And why not ? Says Bancroft :- " Grasses thrive almost everywhere on the low-lands. Kodiak is a good grazing country, capable of sustaining large droves of cattle. On the Aleutian Islands trees do not grow, but the grasses are luxuriant." Lieutenant Schwatka in his report of the interior, speaks enthusiastically of the upland meadows and the grass-grown bluffs. Capt. Beardslee says :- " I am not sufficiently posted in the mysteries of a granger's pro- fession to undertake to speak very positively as to the num-
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ber of stock of any kind which any given amount of land would support, but that there is land here which will sup- port some stock, I will also prove by facts. *
* * While the army was here Japonski Island was used as a stock ranch. There has been kept on it as many as sixty head of cattle, over one hundred of sheep, and over three hundred of hogs ; all of which obtained their own food for a much greater portion of the year than they could have done in any state north of Alabama; and there was no difficulty in getting good hay. Twelve miles north of here are the Katliansky and Nesquasarisky bays and plains, which, having been planted with timothy some years ago by a settler named Doyle, furnished to the troops an aver- age of sixty tons of good hay, cured during the heated spell of July, when the temperature goes up into the nineties ; and this year those who cut a little for their own supply es- timate that there was at least one hundred tons. In the immediate vicinity of Sitka there are three thousand acres of arable land, much of which is now well grassed and covered with white clover. And on the summits of some of the foot-hills there are plateaus now covered with wild grasses, where innumerable deer obtain pasturage and where goats and mountain sheep would thrive."
These references are to limited areas which have come within a circumscribed scope of observation. They illus- trate the coast region, just as arable places illustrate Switz- erland ; and Switzerland is a good country, if not strictly agricultural. With regard to the Yukon River country, Captain Wm. H. Dall, of the United States Coast Survey, says, in his report made to the Commissioner of Agriculture in 1867 :- " Among the more valuable grasses, of which some thirty species are known to exist in the Yukon terri- tory, is the well-known Kentucky" blue grass, which grows luxuriantly as far north as Kotzebue Sound, and perhaps to Point Barrow.
" The wood meadow-grass is abundant. The blue joint- grass (Calamagrostis canadensis) also reaches the latitude of Kotzebue Sound, and grows on the coast of Norton Sound with a truly surprising luxuriance, reaching in very favorable localities four or even five feet in height, and averaging at least three. Many other grasses enumerated in the list of useful plants grow abundantly, and con- tribute largely to the whole amount of herbage. Two species of Elymus almost deceive the traveler with the aspect of grain-fields, maturing a perceptible kernel which the field-mice lay up in store.
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" The grasses are woven into mats, dishes, articles of clothing for summer use, such as socks, mittens, and a sort of hats, by all the Indians, and more especially by the Esquimaux.
" In winter the dry grasses, collected in the summer for the purpose, and neatly tied in bunches, are shaped to cor- respond with the foot, and placed between the foot and the seal-skin sole of the winter boots worn in that country. There they serve as a non-conductor, keeping the foot dry and warm, and protecting it from contusion.
" Grain has never been sown on a large scale in the Yukon territory. Barley, I was informed, had once or twice been tried at Fort Yukon, in small patches, and the grain had matured, though the straw was very short. The experi- ments were never carried any further, however, the traders being obliged to devote all their energies to the collection of furs."
Respecting the Aleutian islands, he states that " The climate is better adapted for haying than that of the coast of Oregon. The cattle were remarkably fat, and the beef very tender and delicate ; rarely surpassed by any well-fed stock. Milk was abundant. The good and available arable land lies chiefly near the coast, formed by the meeting and mingling of the detritus from mountain and valley with the sea sand, which formed a remarkably rich and genial soil, well suited for garden and root-crop culture. It occurs to us that many choice sunny hillsides here would produce good crops under the thrifty hand of enterprise. They are already cleared for the plow. Where grain-like grasses grow and mature well, it seems fair to infer that oats and barley would thrive, provided they were fall-sown, like the native grasses. This is abundantly verified by reference to the collections. Several of these grasses had already (September) matured and cast their seed before we arrived, showing sufficient length of season. Indeed no grain will yield more than half a crop of poor quality (on the Pacific slope), when spring-sown, whether north or south.
" The Russians affirm, with confirmation by later visitors, that potatoes are cultivated in almost every Aleutian village ; and Veniaminof states that at the village in Isanotsky Strait they have raised them and preserved the seed for planting since the begining of this century.
" Wild pease grow in great luxuriance near Unalaska Bay, and as far north as latitude sixty-four degrees."
There is no trouble about wintering cattle and sheep in Alaska. Old traders have declared to me that the
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musk-ox exists in considerable numbers in the northern part of the territory, especially near the British boundary line, on the other side of which, in the vicinity of the Mackenzie River, Northwest Territory, they are quite numerous ; and although some naturalists strenuously in- sist that it does not, and never did, exist in Alaska, there seems no reason why the Rocky Mountain range should constitute an insuperable obstacle to their transit. There are several fine specimens of the musk-ox in the United States National Museum, all of which were obtained in the Mackenzie River country, but there are none from Alaska; so that bodily proof is wanting. On the other hand we read in Lieutenant Schwatka's article printed in the Century Magazine in 1883, that the range of the musk-ox is from latitude 60 degrees to 79 degrees, and from the Rocky Mountain di- vide, westward, almost to the Behring Sea. The native mountain sheep and goats of Alaska weather through the inclement winters without sheds or cotes, or any shelter but the dense undergrowth which chokes every gully and ravine. Domestic utensils and ornaments are made by the natives from the horns of each, and the latter animals are in such abundance as to furnish wool for quite an extensive manu- facture of blankets and clothing. Wool-growing should be- come an important industry in Alaska, as it is in Oregon ; and better, for the atmosphere there is not so damp. Last summer a single train of twenty cars loaded with 438,000 pounds of wool was made up at Portland for Philadelphia, and this was only a fraction of the product of the State. So fine is the texture of the fleece of the Alaskan Mountain goat, that the meanest homespun Chilkoot blanket fetches twenty dollars. There is not the shadow of a doubt that these animals can be easily domesticated, and the wool product made immensely profitable. The very fact of their preference of location by the wild goats and sheep show that there is no portion of America more favorable for ovi- culture than the ridges of Alaska, while the numerous herds of cariboo, moose, and deer, away up on the plateau of the Yukon, testify with equal favor of the moors and inoss- barrens of the interior. What subsists one class of animals should subsist its kin.
In addition to the farming and herding, large supple- mentary revenues are now derived from the dairy, the poultry-yard and hog-pen. Indeed, butter, eggs, beef, pork and poultry are already staples.
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1) Riche
The timber forests of Alaska are a standing testimony to the value of the "Seward Purchase," which even the most obstreperous objectors could not deny. The visible wealth of Alaska lies in her forests. Alaska is the great timber reserve of the continent. Trees of such size and commercial value exist nowhere else on the globe in such numbers and extensive areas of growth. There is a supply here of five thousand seven hundred million feet at a low estimate, a very large part of which is at once acces- sible for shipment, as saw-mills and vessels can lie right alongside the timber at tide-water, all the way up the coast as far as it extends. Saw-mills at prominent points on the coast ought to pay well, for lumber is very highi. If prices were less, the Indians alone would purchase large quantities. On another page the size and dimen- sions of some of the largest yellow cedars and Douglas pines are given. They are equalled only on the Pacific coast States. Nothing like the red- woods, of course, but more like Puget Sound timber. We are approaching a time when the resources of the Union will be overtaxed, and timber will be scarce; but when all the states are drained of their product, there will
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remain in Alaska a virgin reserve of more than 300,000,000 acres of the noblest timber in the world-a source of wealth upon which the people may draw for generations to come. All the islands are clothed with it; the mountains of the adjacent main-land are covered with it; great areas of the interior plateau, which reaches to the verge of the Arctic sea, are untracked wildernesses of spruce. Only when peo- ple who are now strangers to the land and listeners to the story come to see the magnitude of these forests, and the stupendous individuality of their giant trees, will they be able to realize the truth of what is told them. The lumber- men of the old states, whose lives have been passed in logging camps, would stand appalled at the majesty of the Douglas pines, which tower heavenward, and whose diame- ter is nine feet at the base; or the famous red cedars, out of which the Indians make their dug-out canoes, some of them sixty feet in length with eight feet beam !
Alongside of some logs which one finds prone, the choicest cull of the Wisconsin and Minnesota drives, would look like fence posts. Beside standing trees, the tallest rampikes of the Maine forests resemble saplings. Here the alders grow to a diameter of sixteen inches, and an ordinary maple leaf has thirteen inches span. Rankness characterizes all the growth. But the trees are not all gigantic, or the forests all unscathed. The bulk of the forest trees are of ordinary height, say fifty feet or so, and the giants are distributed throughout at neighborly intervals, occupying the low- lands between the shoulders of the mountains; but many of the angular hill-sides along the coast fairly bristle with the skeletons of dead spruces, which have died from dearth of nourishment among the rocks; the survivors meanwhile drawing life from their decaying remains. As in all known forests frequented by man, fires have here run through vast areas of the wilderness, starting from carelessness of hunt- ers and trappers, causing conflagrations whose smoke obscures the sun for months together. It is sad to contem- plate the great destruction ; yet some of the forests of Alaska are over-populous. Time was, I ween, when the only smokes seen in the distant view were the signals of the tribes who wished to communicate with each other ; some for the purpose of barter, some to intimate the presence of intruders ; some to indicate the direction to be taken, or a point of rendezvous. Sometimes the signal was a big smoke, at others only a thin spiral ; again there were two or three adjacent, some large, others small, with many varia- tions adapted to the information to be conveyed. These
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Indian signals were almost as perfect as the crude symbols of our army at the beginning of the war, before they were formulated into a fixed code.
Commercially considered, the trees of Alaska rank as fol- lows : Yellow cedar, spruce, hemlock, alder and a species of fir or black pine. The Douglas pine, which is so abund- ant in British Columbia and possesses the chief commer- cial value there, is replaced in great part in Southern Alaska by the white cedar, a splendid finishing wood, out of which the Indians carve their totem poles or heraldic columns. The red cedar grows in special abundance on the lower coasts, and extends inland to the Rocky Moun- tains. It is in great demand because of its durability. Of it the Indians make their canoes, roofing their houses with the bark and weaving the fiber into blankets. The cypress or yellow cedar is found in southern Alaska. It is suscepti- ble of taking a very fine polish, and considered valuable for boat-building and finishing purposes. It sells for $80 per thousand in San Francisco. It possesses a delightful odor, which like camphor wood it retains for a long time ; and, manufactured into boxes and chests, is very valuable for packing furs and other goods, as it is said to be a moth preventive. It is also extremely tough, and proof against the teredo sea-worm, and for this reason is in demand for piling and all submarine purposes. Samuel's West Shore Magazine supplies the following list of the principal trees of British Columbia, nearly all of which I believe are common to some portion of Alaska, but not all of equal perfection in the higher latitude : -
" Juniper, or pencil cedar, found on the east coast of Vancouver Island, and on the shores of lakes in the inte- rior. The Weymouth, or white pine, (Pinus strobus) found on the Lower Fraser, where it attains great size and beauty. The balsam pine attains a vigorous growth, but is of little value as timber. Yellow pine, (Pinus ponderosa) flourishes in the interior. The wood is close-grained and durable, though very heavy. Scotch fir, (Pinus Bankskiana) is found in the interior ; also on Vancouver Island, though of a smaller growth. Throughout the lower coast the hem- lock, (Abies sitkensis) grows to large proportions, its bark being exceedingly valuable for tanning purposes. The western larch, (Larix occidentalis) grows to immense size in the bottoms along the international line. The yew, ( Taxus brevi-folia) is found on the coast and as far up the Fraser as Yale. It does not attain the size of English yew. The natives utilize it for bows. Oak, (Q Garryana) grows
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abundantly on Vancouver Islands. It is tough and service- able. Alder grows along the streams of the coast, and attains great size. It is useful for furniture. Maple is abundant on the islands and coast up to latitude 55 degrees. The wood is very useful for cabinet making. Vine maple, a very strong white wood, is confined to the coast. Crab- apple grows along the coast. Dogwood is found on Van- couver Island and opposite coast. The aspen poplar is found throughout the interior. Another variety of poplar abounds along the water courses near the coast, and is the kind so much in demand on Puget Sound for barrel staves. Two other kinds of poplar-all known as "cottonwood,"-as well as the mountain ash, are found in the interior valleys."
The white spruce is the most widely distributed of Alaska trees, covering the country inland to the Rocky Mountains and up to the very shores of the Arctic Ocean on the north. The white birch is also abundant in the interior, and is used for canoes by some tribes. The cottonwood is found on the upper Yukon, where it is used for navigating its rough waters. Manifestly, there is in Alaska a great variety of merchantable woods which are available for new uses, and new woods which may be substituted for others nearly used up commercially. I am fully convinced of the great value of what is there unrecognized and unappreciated, but which we can not afford to ignore or overlook any longer.
Some of the mosses of Alaska are of special economic value. They have long been utilized by the natives in various ways. Within twenty years the tree-mosses of Florida, Texas, and Louisiana have become important articles of commerce, chiefly as substitutes for curled horse hair in the manufacture of mattresses, cushions, etc., and the mosses of Alaska are equally desirable and available for like purposes. The supply is practically inexhaustible, and when it is contiguous to the coast it may be gathered without great labor.
The impenetrable jungle of the Alaskan forest, with its windfalls of timber and profusion of wild fruit and succu- lent mosses, constitutes an incomparable nursery and pro- tection for its fauna, while the open ridges above the timber line are no less secure from man's intrusion by the natural obstacles interposed. Assuredly, there is no place on the continent where wild animals enjoy such perfect immunity from harm. It remains by its natural gifts the only great game and fur preserve left in the western world, and stands ready and wide open for the operations of intrepid hunters and trappers at the very time when other sources of supply
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