Moral.
Frozen saurians are safer!
And it's bitterer than borax
To be gnawed about the thorax
One's humanity to pay for!"
[CHAPTER X
THE ALL-ALASKA SWEEPSTAKES]
NO story of Alaska would be complete unless it included reference to that most vital element of all the Northland, the Alaskan dog. I once heard a story of an old Southern planter who said:
"Whenevah Ah meet up with a man who says he don' like a niggah, Ah always set it down that he nevah owned one!"
I can truthfully say the same about a dog. Ever since the days when Ulysses roamed the seas man has loved his dog. Dearest (and most valuable) to the heart of an Alaskan is his "Malamut" or "Husky," as the Alaskan dog is usually designated. So intelligent that he is almost human, strong as a young ox, oblivious (apparently) to the cold,—he is a part of the land itself! His importance to the life of the North can not be over-estimated. He carries the mail into far regions which but for him would be closed to the outside world for many months of the year.
"An I should live a thousand years," as Shakespeare puts it, I could never forget a leader I once had. I called him "Paddie." During one long, cold winter we went to Andreafsky, distant a hundred and twenty miles from St. Michael, to take the mail. I can see him yet, at the head of the thirty-three dog team, pulling us swiftly over the hard, white snow. At night when I would wrap myself in my sleeping-bag and lie down to sleep, Paddie never failed to come and lie beside me, snuggling as closely as possible to keep me warm. I could not forget, if I tried, his faithfulness and affection, and I do not wish to. I think of him many times, often have dreamed of him and sometimes have talked to him in my sleep.
But laying aside all sentiment in regard to his dogs, a man would indeed be helpless in the north country without them. Into far and almost inaccessible regions which no other beast could penetrate and where neither man nor vehicle could enter unaided, the dogs run nimbly, pulling a sled behind them. Many and dramatic (and true!) are the stories of the arrival of a dog team in the nick of time with food and supplies for a distant, snowed-in camp the members of which would have starved but for their coming.
Reference will be made in another chapter to the wonderful part our dogs are now playing in the great World War. Alaskans have never failed to appreciate what they owe them, but it is only within comparatively recent years that they have realized their real value. Nothing in the history of the country has been of more value to Alaska than the Dog Derby, the "All-Alaska Sweepstakes," as the dog races are called.
Albert Fink, an attorney at Nome, one day overheard a bet between two men as to the speed of their respective dog teams. As he owned some fine dogs himself, he conceived the idea of having a real Derby, matching the teams for the love of the sport itself. Calling together all the dog lovers and dog owners of the community, he put the suggestion before them. The result was the organization of the Nome Kennel Club, a society the purpose of which was to foster the races. The latter were to be known as the "All-Alaska Sweepstakes," and as such the races have been known ever since. The club was organized and conducted just as jockey clubs are. Rules and regulations were drawn up, officers elected, and a purse of fifteen thousand dollars collected for the first race.
Some one has ventured the opinion that nothing on earth could ever have made the city of Nome except the very thing that did make it,—the discovery of gold in the sand on the beach! Be that as it may, it is safe to say that since that discovery nothing has ever equaled the interest it created until the first dog race was held in 1908.
Men talked of nothing else. On the day of the race the stores, banks and offices were deserted and it is a fact that the District Court was forced to adjourn. Witnesses, jurors and attorneys failed to appear. All went to the races. Thousands of dollars were wagered on the dogs, thousands more on the men who drove them. It was a day of great excitement and enthusiasm.
The course was from Nome, on Bering Sea, across Seward Peninsula to Candle and back,—a distance of four hundred and ten miles. The first race was a great event. One of the conditions was that the whole team must return to the starting-point. The weather was most severe and some of the dogs froze to death. It is no uncommon sight in Alaska to see an intrepid driver, in harness himself, helping to bring back in the sled the disabled dogs which have become incapacitated by accident or sickness. The man who loses a dog is out of the race, no matter what the cause of the loss may be. The rules provide, however, that after being certified at Candle, the turning-point, the dog does not necessarily have to be driven back. But the whole team must return.
The winning team of the first race were Malamuts owned by Albert Fink, driven by John Hegness. They made the distance in a hundred and nineteen hours, fifteen minutes and twenty-two seconds. The winning team was closely followed by one driven by the now-famous "Scotty" Allen and which made the course in a hundred and twenty hours, seven minutes and fifty-two seconds. Three hours elapsed before the third team came in.
The small margin of time between the first and second teams made the race, which took days to finish, of unusual interest. There was great uncertainty almost up to the last moment. But the race was regarded as a success and the event became a fixture. Heretofore, while there had been much discussion as to the breeding of racing dogs, it had been largely theoretical. Now men who owned dogs began to put their minds on it seriously.
The purse of fifteen thousand dollars collected for the first race was awarded in three prizes. Ten thousand went to the winner, three thousand to the second and two thousand to the third team. It was supposed when the amount was collected that it would be amply sufficient to tempt dog owners to become fanciers and to induce the importation and breeding of faster and better dogs. But the sum was found to be inadequate. The total purse fell far short of the amount necessary to assemble, feed, train and condition a team.
The following year there were numerous entries for the second race. And they were not confined to wealthy dog owners, by any means. Miners, fur traders, mail carriers, to say nothing of the first delegate to Congress, entered the contest. This time "Scotty" Allen came in for his own. He drove his team himself and lowered the time to eighty-two hours, two minutes and forty-two seconds,—thirty-seven hours less than the time the first race had consumed.
Perhaps the most interesting personage in connection with the early dog racing in Alaska is Fox Ramsey. He is an Englishman, the brother of Lord Dalhousie. He was what is commonly known as a Cheechaco,—in other words, a tenderfoot. He was unused to the ways of the trail, and what he did not know about handling dogs would fill a book. But he was a good sport. So he entered his team of Malamuts in the second race and drove them himself. He took any amount of chaff from the local drivers and the amusement of the latter was certainly justified. Several weeks after the race was over Ramsey drove up to the finishing post and with the utmost good humor notified the judges that his team had arrived!
The old saying, however, that "he who laughs last laughs best" is peculiarly applicable to Fox Ramsey. He chartered a schooner bound for Siberia. When he returned, as some one has already recorded, "Siberian huskies howled from every port hole." The crowd which had found so much merriment in his racing team of the previous year laughed louder than ever. They took not the slightest interest in the training of his dogs. Ramsey kept his own counsel. When the time came he entered the race. Then came Ramsey's turn to laugh. He took both first and second money! Not only that, he broke the record. The new one was astonishing. He covered the course in seventy-four hours, fourteen minutes and twenty-two seconds.
The good Alaskans, as always, showed the right spirit. Their amusement changed to admiration. All existing theories as to the best breeds for racing had been completely upset. Ramsey is now at the front "somewhere in France" fighting for his country—and ours! Here's to him!
It is the hope, of course, of every fancier to perfect a breed which will lower the record still more, and many hope to prove that the descendants of the wolf are best adapted to the needs of the country. There is a new breed which is now being watched with interest,—the stag-and fox-hound. It has proved excellent for speed in short races but has not yet been able to hold out over the long course of the Sweepstakes. Another experiment is with the Russian wolf-hound,—beautiful dogs these are, but with courage as yet untested.
There is great difference of opinion as to the relative merits of the various breeds, and since the third race the Derby has settled down to a contest between those who believe in the superiority of the fox-hound, bird dog and Malamut cross as pitted against the pure-blooded Siberians.
Those who have never trained or watched over the training and conditioning of a team of racing dogs would find it a most interesting experience. The food of the dogs, like that of a child, is carefully watched over. It consists at first of dog-salmon, corn and cornmeal mush, rice and bacon. Later this is changed to a more strengthening diet. They are fed chopped beef, mutton and eggs. Also, one who has never visited Alaska would open his eyes wide if he could see the kennels where the dogs are kept. In fact, one sometimes wonders whether the human inhabitants are as comfortable. To get a team in condition requires the combined efforts of a large retinue of trainers, drivers and helpers. The driver who is to pilot the first team of a kennel devotes his time and attention to the choice few of some twenty or thirty dogs. The helpers and second string drivers keep the remainder in fit condition so as to develop and gait those which must be ready to substitute in case any one of the first lot proves unequal to the qualifications for entry,—speed, soundness, courage.
It has often happened that dogs the fame of which has spread not only over Alaska but over all the world have developed from the second string. One such was Baldy of Nome, the hero of a book written by his owner, Mrs. C. E. Darling, commonly known as "The Darling of the Dogs." Baldy is old now,—a pensioner. He lives in ease and luxury at the California estate of his mistress. His story is interesting. He was rejected at first as being not of sufficient caliber for the first team. Whether the rejection spurred him to renewed effort I do not know. But he proceeded to prove his worth. He won his way from wheel of the second team to leader of the first team. Baldy occupies a warm spot in every Alaskan heart. He worked up from the ranks,—a "self-made" dog, so to speak, and proved his courage, his sagacity, his strength, and his endurance. One of the most interesting things about him is that he now possesses the largest service flag of any one of my acquaintance. Twenty-eight of his sons and grandsons went to the Vosges to "do their bit," and Baldy now wears the Croix de Guerre bestowed upon them by the French government!
Of the now-famous dogs of the Derby mention must be made of Dubby. He was the first "loose" leader ever developed in Alaska and the best. He was almost human in intelligence. He ran free from the tow line. He would take his place proudly at the head of his team, with no restraint of tow or leash, observing the spoken commands with instant obedience. From his position of authority at the head of the team, by incessant yelping and playful antics, he would encourage the others, and woe to any one of them that proved the laggard! Dubby promptly punished him. He would run back, bark and then nip him until the offender was only too glad to return to duty and resume gait. Other dogs which have won fame in the Derby are (1) Jack McMillan, a leader belonging to Albert Fink; (2) Rex, a pacer; (3) The Blatchford Blues, two thoroughbred Llewellyn setters, wonderful both as to speed and intelligence; (4) Kalma, a beautiful, white-eyed, black-coated Siberian who has proved the most lasting campaigner of them all.
Not to the dogs alone, however, much as we love them, is due the credit for the success of the Alaskan Derby. Too much can not be said for the trainers and drivers. All of them were men deeply versed in dog lore. They had made a study of many years' duration and were imbued with theories as to the training and conditioning of dogs,—theories as varied as were the breeds of the dogs themselves. These men were knights of the trail, inured to hardship, fleet and sure of foot, gifted both with physical endurance and courage to which no words can do justice. Mention has already been made of "Scotty" Allen. He is known to every man, woman and child on Seward Peninsula. He has been in every race except the last one, either with a team of his own or one owned jointly by himself and Mrs. Darling. He developed and owns the two famous leaders, Dubby and Buddy, and their reputation is world-wide.
To "Scotty" Allen the French Government entrusted the responsibility of choosing and transporting to France more than a hundred of the Sweepstake dogs. Further reference will be made to their noble work on the war-swept fields of Europe where, with a courage and daring equaled only by their human brothers, they carry ammunition and supplies far into the mountains,—often to remote and seemingly inaccessible spots where the soldiery could not penetrate without them. It was because of this mission that Allen was unable to enter the last race and as he has recently been elected to the Alaskan Legislature he will also be deprived of the privilege of entering this year. The session is held at the same time as the Derby. In any other country the latter might be postponed. Here it is not possible. It is a matter of much regret that the Derby can not be made a territorial affair. This was the original intention, as the name, All-Alaska Sweepstakes, indicates. But it proved impossible. The race could not be held after the spring break-up. It must have the hard spring trail and the cold weather, and the trainers must have the whole of the winter for the training and conditioning of the dogs. Therefore, April must be the month and, regrettable as the fact is, this prevents teams from Fairbanks, Iditarod and other Alaskan towns from entering. The men from these sections could not well take chances on the disappearance of the trail by an early thaw before they could return home again for the spring clean-ups. But almost every Alaskan town now has its own Kennel Club, small or large as the case may be, and all are actively alive to the sport. Moreover, the "Outside" is by no means indifferent. Many contributions to the purse come each year to the Nome Kennel Club.
Trophies for the different races, usually cups, are, almost without exception, the gifts of men in the United States who are devotees of the sport. Unable to participate themselves, they like to aid and encourage the event. The latest trophy, and the one which unquestionably will be most sought after this year, is the cup presented by John Borden, Chicago sportsman and millionaire, who joined the Club last summer while in Nome. This cup is for a new contest,—extreme speed being the object. The course is to cover twenty-six miles, three hundred yards. It must be run under perfect conditions, it being the object and the desire of both donor and Club to learn how fast a dog team can actually travel without obstacles. The winner each year will be given a small cup, and the big trophy must be won three times in succession before it becomes the property of the winner.
In addition to Allen and Ramsey, other drivers have made substantial but less spectacular winnings. Two of these are the Johnson brothers and another is Leonard Sepalla. Their dogs were Siberians, driven in a long string, fifteen to twenty-six to a team. These men have marvelous records for endurance, as has also Peter Berg, a mail carrier. The latter did a hundred and thirty miles without a stop for food or rest. The last thirty miles was made in harness, and in snow shoes, with what was left of his badly used-up team. Then, after hauling a large part of his frost-bitten and exhausted dogs to the finishing post he found that he had been beaten to second money by a man who had ridden four hundred miles behind his untiring and seemingly inexhaustible Siberians.
If the Alaskan Derby had had but one result,—that of developing a superior race of dogs—it would have been invaluable to Alaska. But it has done one other thing in which every dog lover rejoices. It has not only benefited the racing dog. It has materially benefited the condition of the working dog. The old rule of feeding an exhausted and over-worked team "buckskin soup" no longer goes in Alaska. Very few drivers now have the temerity to abuse a dog. It has been proved beyond doubt that better results come from kindness and care than can possibly be obtained by neglect or brutal treatment.
So, after many years' sojourn in the country, I paraphrase the saying of the old Southern planter. I affirm that he who does not love a dog never owned one! Here's to them,—dumb heroes of the trackless wilderness and the gigantic snow fields! Over the frozen wastes they cheerfully pull both driver and load for thousands of miles and come up smiling when the end of the long journey is reached. Into their masters' deepest affections they unconsciously walk and "stay put." They become his most sympathetic companions, comrades and friends. And the news which from time to time reaches us from "over there" where our canine heroes are doing their "bit" in a manner little short of miraculous goes straight to our hearts. Yes. The dog has come into his own. And all Alaska rejoices that it is so. Over a kingdom of devoted subjects he reigns supreme!
[CHAPTER XI
BURIED WEALTH]
IT is not the purpose of such a book as this to go into detail in regard to the gold and the other minerals which lie hidden in the heart of Alaska. There are many volumes dealing with the gold fields and with mines and mining which contain such definite information along those lines as the student may seek. But to those who knew Alaska both before and after the great stampede of 1898 the change of scene in the locality offers food for thought. In the great Interior, where once man alone, with only his pick and shovel, coaxed from Mother Earth in small quantities the precious yellow metal, huge monsters with an endless chain of buckets now swoop down, dig up sand and gravel by the ton and search every ounce of it for gold. One may now take a motor car and ride out to the spots where in the early days bewildering fortunes were made in a short space of time,—fortunes which in many cases were spent as fast as they were made. A well-known missionary of the Episcopal Church relates that one day during his travels he met a man freighting with dogs along the Koyakuk River. He learned while stopping at the camp that night that in the palmy days of the gold rush this man had offered a dance-hall girl her weight in gold dust if she would marry him. She refused. But she told him she would get his dust anyway. And she did!
Twenty years have gone by since the madness at Dawson, Nome, and the other gold centers was at its height. The true story of the stampede to Klondike has never been written. Perhaps it never will be. It was unique,—not so much in the number who flocked to the gold fields. Of those who went between 1897 and 1900 thirty thousand is an elastic estimate. Far greater was the multitude which flooded California during the wild rush of '49. Eighty thousand in one year! Five thousand ships, deserted by both owners and crews, tossed idly in San Francisco Bay. Three years later there was a much larger migration to Australia. A hundred thousand gold seekers entered the port of Melbourne in 1852! But the Klondike stampede is without a parallel in history because of the conditions to be confronted. Never before had a gold region been so inaccessible, so remote. Never before had such masses of men flung themselves against an Arctic wilderness, determined to do or die! The result was only what was to be expected. The physically unfit perished. Only the hardy survived. Hundreds of men, fresh from offices and shops, came, bringing their city-bred habits and customs. They found them of no value in this land where Nature, in her fiercest and most savage mood, awaited them. They died,—died in almost every conceivable manner. They perished of exhaustion, of starvation, of disease. They were the victims of their own ignorance and lack of experience. They were drowned. They were smothered in snow-slides. Only the fittest held out. These, making long journeys up and down the frozen rivers, through dense forests and over rough mountains, ofttimes pulling their own sleds,—these have left no record of those tragic days for the world to read!
The Matanuska coal fields are the richest in the world, not excepting the rich mines of Virginia, Pennsylvania and Kentucky. They lie in ninety square miles of territory. The vein is fourteen feet and bears the highest grade of coking coal,—the only coal except that to be found in Virginia which is fit for the use of the Navy. It is estimated that this coal can be mined and shipped to San Francisco at a cost of four dollars a ton, that if it should be sold at retail at six dollars a ton, the price would be nine dollars cheaper than the present price of coal in Los Angeles! In my judgment this solves the coal question, both as to its use for domestic purposes and in time of war as well. The new government railroad leads directly into the Matanuska coal fields.
As far as the mineral deposits,—the gold, copper, tin, etc.,—are concerned one may truthfully say that they have not yet been touched, although the yearly output is more than thirty-two million dollars. The richest mines are not the gold mines. They are the copper mines. Last year (1917) the Kennicott copper mines produced the largest per cent of the thirty-two million. And the copper production doubles in value the entire production of gold. Since the purchase of Alaska the country has produced in excess of five hundred million dollars,—a country which was bought for seven million two hundred and fifty thousand! Alaska was Uncle Sam's best bargain.
Harry Olsen, a member of Stefanson's latest expedition, asserts that fabulous deposits of native copper were seen by them on Bank's Island, about six hundred miles north of Great Bear Lake. The Eskimos use copper for everything for which any kind of metal is used and because it is so plentiful and so easy to obtain they think it of no value.
In 1913 I was going from Nome to Siberia on the S. S. Victoria. Among the passengers were Dr. and Mrs. Anderson and several members of Stefanson's party. We put them off into their own boats in the Roadstead, outside of Nome. The expedition was wrecked just after leaving Diomede Islands and the party lost for a year. Amundsen, when he returned through the Northwest Passage, reported having seen a tribe of blond Eskimos. Stefanson was on his way to verify that report. Later a second expedition was fitted out and the report substantiated.
There are many famous placer gold mines,—at Nome, at Dawson, and at the other localities in the Yukon. Two of the largest quartz mines in the world are at Juneau,—the Alaska Juneau and the Alaska Gastineau. Each plant handles from eight to ten thousand tons of ore a day. The Juneau mines had produced sixty-two millions of dollars' worth of ore when the ocean broke through and flooded the works. Two-thirds of the property was ruined. But the remaining third, now enclosed by a huge concrete dam, is still producing. The famous Treadwell mines are on Douglas Island and have recently had a similar experience. About a year ago they also were flooded and sustained a serious loss.
I have already said that it is not my purpose to go into detail in regard to the mines and the other industries of the North. I wish only to reveal the opportunities which lie waiting for him who is alert for business chances. When the new railroad is completed any able-bodied man who has energy, initiative and ambition can get into the interior of this rich country at little expense. And if it were generally known how many hundred prospectors are laying their plans to be there during this present year (1918) the laggard would bestir himself! It can not be long until all the industries of Alaska will be opened up upon a large scale. The climate, while severe at times, need not deter any well man or woman from going. People here dress for the weather. Real suffering from cold is seldom known. Nobody has "bad colds" in Alaska. The cold is dry and invigorating. Nowhere on earth will one find men and women of such perfect health. Nowhere will one see sturdier, healthier, more rosy-cheeked children. Moreover, novelists and playwrights to the contrary, the living and working conditions here are governed by the very same principles and laws as those of other lands. Any man or woman can get on in Alaska just as long as he or she is "on the square." Otherwise either of them, in my judgment, will, in time, come to grief anywhere.
As was the case with the railroads, the government was up against the proposition of government ownership or private monopoly in regard to the rich coal fields of Alaska. When their value was discovered, capitalists and entry men with speculative tendencies swooped down upon the coal treasures of the country, horse, foot and dragoon. For a time it seemed that the entire potential wealth of the land was to have the usual fate,—that of being brought under monopolistic control.
The United States Government has ill repaid Theodore Roosevelt for much that he has done. But Alaskans will not forget and the United States will one day realize what he did for them in this particular instance. When he saw what was about to happen, with his characteristic method of doing things first and asking permission afterward, he withdrew every acre of coal-bearing land in Alaska from entry! This was nearly fifteen years ago. Alaska sat helpless and gnashed her teeth while legislation fought with politics and speculation wrestled with finance.
Being able to see the absurdity which never fails to appear in such crises and to laugh at it has saved many a man from losing his chances of going to Heaven! One day in 1913 I chanced to be at Dutch Harbor where the battleship Maryland was coaling. Had the Maryland carried a gun such as the German one which fired on Paris on Good Friday of the present year she might have fired a volley which could have landed squarely in the Matanuska coal fields! There was nothing funny in the situation to an Alaskan, of course, but I was moved to unseemly mirth when I saw that Pocahontas coal from Virginia going into her bunkers! We in Alaska (miserere!) were importing coal for our own use from Washington, California and—Australia!
Now, however, Alaska has her reward. The Secretary of the Interior has re-opened the coal fields for entry. But permission is given only to lease the coal tracts. Before this book appears the first Alaskan coal will be helping to fill the bunkers, not only of Alaska herself but of the Pacific coast as well.
There is one noticeable thing about the conditions imposed upon the lessees of the coal fields by Secretary Lane and it is a point upon which both the prospective lessee and employee should be informed. These conditions provide for the safeguarding of the lives and welfare of the miners. No operator may mine coal at minimum cost without regard for the safety of his men. The rules are explicit. The lease requires him to "leave ample support for the roof of the drifts and stopes, to provide adequate ventilation, special exits, to guard against explosion, flooding, 'squeezes' and fire." The protection of the workman goes even further than this. No firm, or individual, operating in government land, may work the miners longer than eight hours a day. They must agree to pay them twice a month in cash. The forced buying at stores owned by the company is strictly prohibited. The operators, at the request of a majority of the miners, must grant one of their number, chosen by vote, permission to check and weigh the coal in cases where the miners' pay is based upon their output.
Wise provisions these! The stormy and bloody history of the Colorado fields is to have no repetition here if the foresight and the good judgment of the Department of the Interior can prevent it. All these things lend to the desirability of employment in Alaska. There are only two spots in the country where the coal lands are in possession of individuals or of private companies. Every other inch of it belongs to the government. And it will keep on belonging to it! The Secretary of the Interior, Mr. Franklin K. Lane, is the largest operating landlord in the world. While you may not buy coal land in Alaska you may lease it—for not more than fifty years. For each ton mined you pay a royalty to the government. You may then ship your coal in a government coal-car! One can see how easy it will be for a lessee to make money in coal in Alaska. All he has to do is to dig! No speculating in coal lands! No shifting and juggling of stocks and bonds of coal-carrying railroads! So far as the coal fields and mining in Alaska are concerned neither money, politics nor influence will avail to change the situation one jot or one tittle! Amen! Hallelujah!! Waltz me around again, Willie!!!
With farm and mineral lands, however, it is different. These may pass into the hands of private companies or individuals just as soon as the latter can qualify to meet the conditions. We who know the country can realize as outsiders can not what the railroad will mean to Alaska. One may take a boat at the mouth of the Yukon, traveling westward to southward, thence up the Tanana until he reaches Fairbanks which is within a hundred miles of the Arctic Circle. Here the new railroad will have its northern terminus. One may then take the train back to Seward, riding through the great gold country—a section the wealth of which is uncomputed—then on through the enormous coal fields, past farms laden with crops, finding himself, when the end of the journey is reached, at Seward, the terminus on the Peninsula, after a journey (not including the water voyage) of four hundred and fifty miles.
In proportion as commerce and industry grow opportunities for labor will increase. The omnipresent automobile will bring with it the necessity for the garage, the repair shop, the chauffeur, the mechanician. The railroad terminals mean new towns and new towns mean business houses. Wherever there is a road in process of construction there is always a chance for women. The workmen must be fed and provided with sleeping quarters. Boarding houses, laundries, etc., are indispensable. But——. I should not be honest either with myself or with my readers if I did not here utter one word of warning. No woman need be afraid to go to Alaska, but both men and women should go wisely and in full understanding of conditions there. Both must be equipped to meet those conditions. The first is the promise, oral or written, of a job before going! The other is the means to return home at any time. No one should go to Alaska without having first provided for one or both of these conditions.
[CHAPTER XII
THE HAUNT OF THE SALMON]
THE greatest industry in Alaska is unquestionably the salmon fishing. More than two hundred and fifty kinds of edible fish abound in Alaskan waters and this does not include trout and grayling in the streams where only the latter are to be found. Most of the halibut eaten in the United States comes from Alaska. These fish often weigh as high as two hundred pounds. Large numbers of whales are caught and prepared for market annually. The fish products of the country have already netted more than two hundred million dollars.
Nothing in the history of all Nature is more wonderful (or more tragic) than the story of the salmon. So wonderful is it that it is almost beyond the power of the human brain to comprehend it. Until the advent of the motion picture—one of the greatest educators of our day and generation—few knew that the salmon returns to the very spot where it was spawned to die. After thirty months at sea, during which time nothing is known of them, they are drawn by some mysterious instinct back to the very spot of their birth. Sometimes the return necessitates a journey of fifteen hundred miles and during that journey nothing is eaten. Fishermen, both white and native, have told me repeatedly that they have never yet found anything in the stomach of a salmon. They leave the ocean and enter the rivers early in the spring. As soon as they enter fresh water they cease eating. Their stomachs shrink as their appetites fail and they have therefore no desire to return to the salt-water feeding-grounds. When they reach their destination they reproduce, which is the object of the long journey. Shortly afterward they die. Life, seemingly, is complete for them when they have reached the waters which gave them birth and have transmitted life to others. This done, they drop down the river with the current and are seen no more. From three to four hundred eggs to each pound of the parent fish is the average spawn. And yet——. The artificial propagation of the salmon goes on ceaselessly. It is compared to the sowing of seed by the farmer. The culture of the eggs in a hatchery and the distribution of fingerlings lay the foundation for an increased harvest year by year.
To me the return of the salmon to the spawning grounds is the most marvelous thing in the world. From its source in the snow-capped mountains of the interior to the spot where it flows, bell-toned and majestic, into the sea, the Yukon with its various tributaries is more than twenty-five hundred miles long! And the water is muddy. The fish wheels, useless in clear water, are in constant motion. How, then, does the salmon determine the exact spot at which to leave the river and enter the particular tributary from which, originally, it came? Only once has it been in it before,—the time when as a fingerling of two or three inches it made its first swift journey out to sea! What man, even if he had all manner of landmarks to guide him, would undertake to return to the spot he left in childhood if in order to do so he had to leave the broad ocean and follow twenty-five hundred miles of water which is first river, then tributary, then creek, then brook and finally a lake? It is not worth while to try to reduce the thing to intelligible terms. It is incomprehensible. No human intelligence can explain the spawning migration of the salmon. Yet long-continued and careful investigation and observation in every stream of the Pacific coast have established these facts beyond question.
He who has never seen a "run" of salmon has something yet to live for! I know of no other event which equals it. The heaviest runs are in May, June, and July, the catch being largest in the latter month. The largest fish are caught in May. The "royal family" of salmon is the King. These are best in June. Often they weigh from fifty to eighty pounds. The king salmon never rises to the fly. The canneries take them by the wheel.
I shall never forget my first view of a fish wheel and a cannery. I thought the wheel the nearest approach to an infernal machine that I had ever seen—until I got into the cannery! The wheels are fashioned of wire-gauze compartments and are built in places near high-water mark where salmon are known to run in greatest numbers, usually at the head of natural or artificial channels in the river bed. "Like a cradle endless rocking" the wheel revolves, scooping up the unsuspecting and beautiful creatures literally by thousands. It is the blackest and bloodiest of murder. Nothing else! But——. In the "Outside" they insist on eating salmon and the canneries can not supply the demand without the wheel.
Kipling, in his American Notes, says that he saw a ton of salmon taken on the Columbia River as one night's catch from the revolving cups of a giant wheel. My own first sight of a fish wheel in operation beats the story of this renowned writer all to pieces. The proprietor announced that the catch of this night was five tons, an amount which taxes the credulity of any man in his right mind. With a fascination which no words can describe I watched those fish being unloaded. Huge fifty-pounders, hardly dead, scores weighing from twenty to thirty pounds and myriads of smaller ones! The warehouse, built on piles in the bend of the river, was not far away, and as I was there for the purpose of seeing the process from first to last, I went aboard the barge onto which the salmon had been tossed. Presently we drew up alongside the warehouse and unloaded the fish. Like a man hypnotized I followed my guide up the scale-strewn, fishy incline which led into the cannery.
None but natives worked in this particular cannery. The building shook and shivered with every chug of the machinery. I watched them cross and re-cross the slippery floor and I could think of nothing but the Devil and a blood-bespattered Devil at that!
My experience up to this moment, however, was not a circumstance to what happened next! When the boxes containing the fish were thrown down under a jet of water they broke of their own accord and the salmon burst into a stream of silver. A native jerked one up, a twenty-pounder, deftly beheaded and detailed it in two swift strokes of a knife. With equal deftness he relieved it of its internal arrangements by a third stroke. Then he tossed it into a bloody-dyed tank. The headless, tailless, insideless fish fairly leaped from his hands—just as though it were once more taking the rapids. But not so. The next man caught him up short. What the first man had left undone the second one polished off to a fine degree. He proceeded to commit additional murder of the most damnable sort. He thrust the fish under a machine resembling a chaff-cutter which hewed and hacked it into unseemly red pieces ready for the can and the poor mutilated remains were ready for the third man.
With long, bony, crooked fingers he jammed the pieces into cans which, sliding down a marvelous machine, forthwith proceeded to solder their own tops as they passed! The fourth man tested the can for flaws and then it was sunk (with hundreds of others) into a vat of boiling water to be cooked for a few minutes. The cans bulged slightly after this operation and were slidden along on trolleys to the fifth man who with a needle and soldering iron vented them and then soldered the little aperture. The process was finished—all except the label. This attached, the "finest salmon on the market" was ready for shipment.
In Alaska we get used to almost everything in time, but I confess that it took me some time to pull myself together after this experience. Never had I been so conscious of the grim contrasts of life as when I stepped outside that cannery! In that rude factory, the floor of which was but forty by ninety feet, I had seen the most civilized and the most murderous machinery! Outside, only a few feet away, before my eyes lay the most beautiful of God's country,—the immense solitude of the hills! I fairly fled down to the launch by which I was to journey back down the river, trying to get as far away as possible from the slippery, scale-spangled, oily floors and the blood-bespattered Eskimos. But it was like a doctor's first surgical operation. I got over it, and after several years' residence in the country became so accustomed to the sights of a cannery that they now make little or no impression. The canneries are Alaska's greatest asset.
To state how many cans of salmon go out yearly would be an impossible task. All we know is that the value of the Alaskan salmon fisheries can not be computed. It is true that Alaska derives much of her wealth from the copper, gold and silver mines and her practically untouched coal deposits. But her fisheries are the most important of her industries. Mines have a way of giving out suddenly, for no apparent reason. But the fish reproduce themselves each year. The fisheries of Alaska can not fail.
Next to the fisheries the fur business is perhaps the most important industry. Here again is a business opening for him who seeks it. As very warm clothing is necessary, tanners ought to find the land full of opportunities. The fur business is perhaps the easiest way to affluence which presents itself in Alaska. Native hunters and trappers follow the old rule and hunt their prey from Nature's supply. But many have already gone into the raising of fur-bearing animals as a business, just as the farmer raises sheep for the wool.
Fox farming is the most popular and a great industry is being developed. Many who began this business in Alaska have since transported it to the States. In the west are some twelve or fifteen such institutions and the eastern States also contain a few. The value of the fox fur is known to all and, as has been said, from four to seven hundred dollars is not an unusual price for the black and silver fox skins.
Judge Martin F. Moran, of the Kobuk district, is experimenting in angora goat-raising in which he thinks there is a great future. Judge Moran lives twenty miles north of the Arctic Circle. Since the breaking out of the war angora ranchers in the west have netted large fortunes by supplying mohair, and conditions for raising the goats are less favorable there than in Alaska. Judge Moran is planning (and has perhaps already carried out his plan) to import a herd of angoras which shall graze upon the rich reindeer moss which grows so abundantly in the tundra of western and northern Alaska.
The sea-otter, the most valuable fur-bearing animal, may not now be hunted, according to a law enacted by Congress, until November first, 1920. These were formerly numerous, but they are now threatened with extinction and are to be found only on some of the Aleutian Islands. It has been estimated that during the Russian occupation two hundred and sixty thousand sea-otter skins were taken, valued at twenty-six million dollars. Since the United States took over the country in 1867 about ninety thousand have been marketed. Now, however, the output is only about twenty skins a year. A good otter skin is very valuable, ranging in price from eight hundred to eighteen hundred dollars.
The seal-fur industry, although developed by the Russians, reached its height after the territory was acquired by the United States. From 1867 to 1902 seal skins to the value of thirty-five million dollars were exported. The fur seal, although widely distributed throughout the country, has but one breeding place,—the Pribilof Islands. Here most of the skins are taken. The seals were slaughtered in the most ruthless fashion and the government at last awoke to the knowledge that the seal was in a fair way to follow the sea-otter unless protected. In 1870 the capture of seals on these islands was prohibited by law. The United States took charge of the islands and the fisheries. Natives may kill annually only enough seals to provide themselves with food and clothing. The destruction of the herds was thus halted by the government and in 1912 the census revealed two hundred and fifteen thousand, nine hundred and forty seals.
From the sale of fox furs and seal skins the government has derived during the last twenty-five years a direct revenue almost covering the total purchase price of Alaska. There are approximately twenty thousand white people in the territory. In China there are four hundred million. Yet in 1915 the United States trade with Alaska was five million dollars in excess of the total United States trade with China!
[CHAPTER XIII
THE EIGHTH WONDER OF THE WORLD]
ALASKA is a land of scenic splendor. She has scenery as beautiful as that of Switzerland or New Zealand. From my own cottage doorway I have seen sunsets which equaled those of Mont Blanc, famed in song and story, and I have traveled through valleys which in summer rivaled the celebrated Vale of Chamounix. Whoever it was who selected the Seven Wonders of the World of which we learned in our school days would have had to add to the list if he had ever dwelt for any length of time "north of fifty-three."
The country boasts some of the greatest wonders of Nature. The Calico Bluffs on the Yukon are as high as the Washington monument and their strata look much like agate formations. She has five thousand glaciers which are giants in comparison with those of the Alps. The Childs Glacier is as tall as the dome of the capital at Washington. Of the hundreds of others there are many that are known as "first class" glaciers. By this is meant that they discharge their contents into the sea direct. Among them are the LeConte, Dawes, Brown, Sawyer and Taku. It is the latter which furnishes the bergs that surround the ships which carry travelers northward through the "Inside" route. From the deck of the vessel, near Taku Inlet, forty-five glaciers may be counted. Of these, as you face Taku, Norris glacier stands to the left. It is unique in that it sends out two seemingly full-grown rivers, one flowing to north and one to south. Flowers may be seen growing in the forest glades nearby, and remnants of tree stumps two feet in diameter reveal that the glacier must once have withdrawn long enough at least to permit them to grow. Then a change of climate or other natural action must have pushed the ice forward again to cut them off and grind them into fragments,—making them a part of the glacial débris.
Mendenhall Glacier is near Juneau. It is easily reached by automobile and a delightful experience it is to ride along the highway leading to it. The road is fringed with masses of wild flowers. Imagine, if you can, sitting in the shade of a gigantic cottonwood, or spruce, and eating ice cream made from the milk of cows which now pasture upon the grass where once the ice stood a thousand feet deep! Mendenhall, according to the best authorities, is at least twenty-five miles long,—almost twice the length of the largest glacier the Alps affords.
The highest mountain peak in Alaska was known to the Russians as Bulshaia and to the natives of Cook Inlet as Traleyka. Both words signify the "great" or the "high" mountain. The natives of the interior called it Denali, but in 1895 it was named Mt. McKinley. It is twenty thousand three hundred feet high, exceeded in height only by Aconcogua of South America and Mt. Everest in Indo-China. It was named by W. A. Dickey, who saw it from the Susitna River. Later its position and altitude were determined. Many have attempted to ascend it. In 1912 Prof. Herschel Parker of Columbia University and Mr. Belmore Browne of Tacoma, Washington, got within three hundred feet of the summit, and in 1913, Rev. Hudson Stuck, Archdeacon of the Yukon and author of Ten Thousand Miles with a Dog Sled and Voyages on the Yukon, together with three companions, reached the top.
Above the recently-created National Park Mt. McKinley towers in majestic sublimity, the everlasting sentinel, the guardian, as it were, of the last and loveliest spot on earth which remains as Nature fashioned it, still untouched by human hands.
Mt. St. Elias is better known and has been much written about. Its height is eighteen thousand and twenty-four feet. Mt. Logan is nineteen thousand five hundred and forty feet. Of the two now-celebrated passes in the mountains of the Yukon, the Chilkoot and White Pass, the former is at a height of three thousand one hundred feet and the latter at a height of twenty-eight hundred feet. It was over these passes that the gold-seekers of 1898 stampeded into Klondike.
But the mountains of Alaska, glorious, majestic and awe-inspiring as they are, are the losers when compared with the greatest of Alaskan wonders, the volcanoes. Of these, Mt. Katmai, opposite the Island of Kodiak, the terrific eruption of which in June, 1912, is well remembered, is most celebrated. At that time a mass of ash and pummice, the volume of which is estimated at five cubic miles, was thrown into the air. It buried an area about the size of the State of Connecticut to a depth varying from ten inches to ten feet and smaller amounts of the ash fell as far as nine hundred miles away. Unquestionably, the notoriously cold, wet summer which followed the eruption was due to the fine dust which was thrown into the higher regions of the atmosphere to such an extent as to have a profound effect upon the weather. At the time of the eruption I was at sea, on my way from St. Michael to the States. It was not long until the ash began falling over us, filling the air and seemingly trying to cover the face of the waters. It got into our lungs and made them ache. It was not until some time later that I heard that it was Mt. Katmai which had exploded and that the eruption was one which would go down in history. There was not, of course, the enormous loss of life which followed the eruptions of Vesuvius, Stromboli and Mt. Pélee. But in other respects the explosion of Mt. Katmai was unique. Kodiak, the town which was buried, was a hundred miles away. Ash fell as far away as Juneau, Ketchikan and the Yukon valley, distant respectively six hundred, seven hundred and fifty and nine hundred miles.
In the report of the leader of the National Geographic Society's Mt. Katmai Expedition of 1915-'16, Robert F. Griggs, of the Ohio State University, is the following paragraph which gives concisely a good idea of the magnitude of the explosion:
"Such an eruption of Vesuvius would bury Naples under fifteen feet of ash. Rome would be covered a foot deep. The sound would be heard at Paris. Dust from the crater would fall in Brussels and Berlin and the fumes would be noticeable far beyond Christiana, Norway."
Yet it was only a little over a year after this eruption that I myself saw those ash-laden hills covered again with green verdure! The native blue-top hay was growing right through the ash which had been washed off the hills and was then covering the land a foot and a half deep. I was deeply interested in the native method of harvesting this hay. In the pursuit of agriculture as I understood it I had never encountered this practice elsewhere. The hay was cut high up on the mountain. It was done into bundles in fish nets and was then sent tumbling down the mountain-side to the bottom. There it was picked up and carried off homeward or else loaded on boats to be shipped elsewhere.
At the time of the eruption the natives, fortunately for them, were all away fishing. They were never permitted to return to their mountain. The government built them a new town and conveyed them thither in a body, thus establishing them in it. The village was not near the crater. It was about twenty-five miles away. This is five times as far distant from the volcano as Pompeii was from Vesuvius or St. Pièrre from Mt. Pélee.
As has been said, the verdure has returned. Around Kodiak it is vividly, beautifully green. But the Katmai Valley, once fertile and now a barren waste, contains what the writer firmly believes to be the most wonderful and awe-inspiring sight in the whole world. On the second visit of the Expedition of the National Geographic Society, the following year, Prof. Griggs explored and named it. He called it "The Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes"—than which there could be no better name!
There are no words in the language capable of giving any definite impression of the scene. Stretching away as far as the eye can see, until the valley is lost in the far-distant mountains, lie literally thousands of small volcanos, replicas in miniature of Katmai, the Great! From almost every one of them shoots a slender column of steam which rises steadily and gracefully, sometimes to a height of a thousand feet before it breaks or even wavers! Words become futile. One could not exaggerate it if he tried. There would not be an adjective left in the language when he finished!
My own view of the valley was hasty, superficial and from a respectful distance! I can well appreciate, however, what the Expedition endured in order to give to the world knowledge of this wondrous spot. I heartily commend to the readers of this volume the report of Prof. Griggs in the National Geographic Magazine for May, 1917, in which he relates the experience of himself and his party as they made their way back and forth, plunging through suffocating vapors, trapping gases for chemical analysis, making soundings, mapping the course of the valley and studying the geology of what he calls "the most amazing example of her processes which Nature has yet revealed to twentieth century man,—one of Vulcan's melting pots from which the earth was created." In a tent less than two miles from one of the huge clouds of steam he slept at night and on one of the large flat stones outside, so hot that it was a natural stove, the members of the Expedition cooked their food.
One gets the best idea of the magnitude of the valley by comparing it with our Yellowstone Park. The Katmai valley is thirty-two miles long, about two miles wide and seventy square miles in area. In the Yellowstone are four thousand hot springs and a hundred geysers scattered over three thousand square miles. The geysers occur in isolated basins the total area of which is hardly twenty miles. The largest one, and it plays but seldom, shoots up a column about three hundred feet high. Old Faithful, which is the only one the tourist can ever be sure of seeing in action, is only a hundred feet high. In the Alaskan valley, however, observe the contrast. There are thousands of vents in constant action. Some of these ascend more than five thousand feet into the air when conditions are good and when the valley is wind-swept they creep along the ground for two or three miles! These vents are not geysers. They are hot springs. Geysers can exist only when the rock through which they break is sufficiently cool to permit water to form. It is unlikely therefore that there will ever be geysers here,—at least not for many centuries. The valley may gradually cool so as to permit their formation. But it will be ages hence.
Prof. Griggs is emphatic in his belief that there is nothing known to mankind with which "The Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes" can be compared. I agree with him. Would that it were more accessible to the traveler and that no tourist would return from a sojourn in Alaska without seeing it! I shall never cease to be grateful that a fortunate circumstance permitted me to obtain even so small a peep at it. Surely nothing approaching it has been seen by man upon this earth. The Expedition report states, among other interesting things, that the water is so hot that the thermometer would not register it and that the heat from the stones would char a piece of wood instantly!
Kilauea, in Hawaii, has always borne the reputation of being king of volcanoes. It is now dethroned. Mention has already been made of Mt. Shishaldin, on Unimak Island. As no geographer has ever visited it, little is known about it. Katmai, however, is unquestionably the monarch. Not so much in diameter, circumference or area does it exceed Kilauea. It is in depth. Kilauea's greatest depth is five hundred feet. Katmai's is thirty-seven hundred feet!
In an attempt to give some idea of the magnitude of Katmai, I quote once more from Prof. Griggs' report:
"If every single structure in New York, Brooklyn, the Bronx and the other boroughs of Greater New York were gathered together and deposited in the crater of Mt. Katmai," he says, "the hole that remained would still be more than twice as large as that of Kilauea." The king is dead. Long live the king—of volcanoes!
From the glaciers and the mountains of Alaska to the rivers is but a natural turn. One of the most important factors in the life and commercial development of a country is, of course, her river navigation. Alaska has two great gateways to Bering Strait,—the Yukon and Kuskokwim rivers. Until recently only the Yukon was available for commercial purposes, but the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey has announced that at last a channel has been charted through the delta of the Kuskokwim. This means much. It means that a River of Doubt has become a River of Promise!
Because of the latitude at which they enter Bering Sea the Yukon is navigable for three and a half and the Kuskokwim for four months only. The entrance of the Yukon is shallow, that of the Kuskokwim tortuous and not well known. But once inside, an ordinary river boat can navigate the Yukon to White Horse, in Canada, a distance of twenty-two hundred miles. In spite of the short seasons the possibilities of using the river in the development of the valley are apparent and will suffice for some time to come. Navigation is also fairly good on the lower Copper River, the Kobuk, and smaller streams. When it comes to the most winding and tortuous watercourse I have ever encountered, however,—respectfully I salute the Iditarod! One's supply of adjectives, however ample under ordinary circumstances, fails him completely when he attempts to do justice to the crookedness of this river. It writhes and twists and turns like some huge serpent, and when it can think of nothing else to do it doubles back on its own track! To try to follow it would give a man delirium tremens, and like Tennyson's brook it "goes on forever!"
The Pacific coast line, including the Aleutian Islands, has many excellent harbors. With the exception of Cook Inlet, these are open to navigation from November until June, but the ice pack does not extend far south of St. Lawrence Island. This part of the coast is almost without harbors. The Arctic Ocean is open from July to September, permitting navigation to Alaskan ports.
There is cable communication between Seattle and certain parts of southeastern Alaska,—Cordova, Valdez and Seward. Telegraph lines run from Valdez to Fairbanks and down the Yukon to St. Michael from which point there is wireless communication with Nome. These are all military lines. The Navy Department maintains wireless stations at Kodiak and Unalaska. The War Department has wireless stations at Sitka, Cordova, Fairbanks, Circle, Eagle and Nulato. There are also private wireless stations at Iditarod and on Bristol Bay and many of the mining districts are now provided with telephone lines.
The United States Government is thoroughly awake to the necessity of making safe the now-dangerous waters of southern Alaska. They are now being charted and soon the old title "The Graveyard of the Pacific" will no longer apply to them. Within the past sixty years three hundred ships have gone down upon the rocks. Valuable cargoes amounting to eight million dollars and lives to the number of five hundred have here been lost. Both to southeast and southwest of Alaska lie many mountainous islands, and ofttimes the lower half of the mountain will be lost in the water. Like the submerged lower half of the iceberg which wrecked the Titanic, they lie in wait, seemingly, for the ignorant or the unwary and rip open the hulls of the ships that venture too near.
The light-house service of Alaska leaves much to be desired. The first buoy was floated in 1884. The first light was put up ten years later. There are three hundred and twenty-nine aids to navigation now on the whole Alaskan coast line. These include a hundred and forty lights of which twenty-eight were placed in 1915. On the much-traveled route from Icy Strait to Nome, a distance equal to that between New York and London, there are but three lighthouses!
There are indications of improvement along this line, however. A first class light is to be placed on Cape St. Elias. New vessels are being built for light-house work and for the Coast Survey, but like all great enterprises, things progress slowly. About one-half of the main channels of southeastern Alaska have been explored by a wire drag and as rapidly as the appropriations by Congress will permit the work will be pushed forward.
[CHAPTER XIV
THE CITIES OF THE FAR NORTH]
OF the cities of Alaska the most interesting historically is Sitka. No one will regret the time spent in visiting this, the former seat of the Russian territorial government and the stronghold of the Greek Catholic Church. After the passing of the Russians it became the first capital of Alaska. It is situate on Baranof Island, facing Sitka Sound. The climate is mild and out-door life delightful.
Sitka is beautifully picturesque. The island-laden ocean sweeps to west of it while on the east the frothing Indian River surges down from its birthplace in the group of snow-capped mountains known as the Seven Sisters. In 1799 the Russians established a trading post here and occupied it until 1804. The old Greek church dating from 1816 still stands, alongside of a new one called St. Peter's-by-the-Sea, erected in 1899. The city contains much that is of interest,—a Museum named in honor of Sheldon Jackson of the Presbyterian Mission. To the influence of this man Alaska is indebted for her now-thriving reindeer industry. During the rush to the gold fields in 1898 word was borne to Washington that the gold-seekers were dying by thousands for lack of food and proper clothing to protect them from the bitter climate into which, in their inexperience, they had entered inadequately equipped. In the effort to aid them the government attempted to send supplies to the starving camps by reindeer. The plan was not a success and the government was left with the reindeer on its hands. Dr. Jackson used his influence with the result that the reindeer were secured for the Eskimos.
Sitka has United States Public Schools. It has also a Presbyterian Industrial Training School for natives. It is the headquarters of the Agricultural Experiment stations, the Coast Survey Magnetic Base Station, and is the residence of both the Russian and Episcopal Bishops of Alaska.
Juneau, the present capital, is also most picturesquely located. From the water it seems to be lying on a shelf,—the cliffs of Mt. Juneau to the rear and the sea in front of it. It is about a hundred miles north by east of Sitka, on Gastineau Channel, opposite Douglas Island on which are situate the celebrated Treadwell mines. Juneau is thoroughly modern as to churches, schools, newspapers, hospitals. It has drainage, police and fire protection, telephone and telegraph service and electric light. A small town of sixteen hundred inhabitants in 1910, it has increased to a thriving city. The ever-increasing population is fast dotting the lower heights with beautiful and comfortable homes and down below them the ever-advancing tunnels of the gold-seekers keep honey-combing the rock-ribbed earth. As one journeys northward he can see the stamp house of the Treadwell mines, built right into the side of the precipitous face of the mountain down which a railroad track has been laid to carry the ore from the tunnels that bore into the heart of the cliff.
Ketchikan is a city of commercial importance because of the fishing industry. It is typical of the settlements along the coast and of the fishing settlements in particular. It also is located on an island which gives it many advantages. On one side it has deep water. On the other side it has mountain, river and lake. Ketchikan is one of the best places for the visitor to see a "run" during which the salmon crowd up the river in a struggle so fierce that many of them are killed in the effort to reach the spawning-grounds.
The most attractive city of this part of the country is Wrangell, named for the Russian explorer and naval officer, Baron Ferdinand Wrangell, wise administrator of affairs connected with the Alaskan colonies of Russia between 1831 and 1836. During his administration an observatory was established at Sitka. He it was who exposed the shameful abuses of the Russian-American Company and prevented the extension of their charter in 1862. He was an astute and far-sighted statesman, and realizing the value of Alaska, he bitterly opposed the sale of the territory to the United States.
Wrangell, the city named after him, lies on an island of the same name a hundred and fifty miles southeast of Juneau. The seeker after the unusual in his travels will find here much to interest and divert him. To Wrangell the traders still bring the trophies of the chase, making their journey down the rapidly-flowing Stikine river from the wonderful Cassiar hunting grounds, famed for their big game. To these grounds every year flock hunters from all parts of the world to shoot the mountain sheep, the moose, the bear and the caribou. In Wrangell, also, one may see the best of what remains of the magnificent totem poles of Alaska.
No lover of history, and particularly the history of the native peoples of the world, can help cherishing a feeling of deep regret when he sees the approaching decay of these expressions of their inner lives. As is the case in our own great west, the steam roller of civilization is passing over what is left of the primitive people, crushing out the spirit of all that once was and in some cases still is revered by them, flattening out that which is picturesque and distinctive in them. Who can look upon the massive-timbered communal houses of the natives of Alaska, before which were placed the totem poles, bold with their blazonry of animals, grotesquely carved and gaudily painted,—eagle and whale, bear, wolf and beaver—without a sigh that soon they, too, will sail into the past with the caravels of Columbus or ride out of the plains with the buffalo to return no more?
Through the long ages the American Indian has worshiped—not the sun, but the great, creative spirit behind the sun! And he has expressed that worship in the celebrated Sun Dance, a truly religious ceremony in which he is now forbidden to indulge by the United States government! In like manner the natives of the Far North expressed themselves in totems. To a certain extent they are ancestor worshipers, as are the Chinese. The totem poles are their expression of their primitive heraldry. They erected them in front of their rude dwellings, with a pageantry uncouth, it is true, but in a spirit of sincerity.
I am not one of those who would decry the influence and the splendid service of the missionary. But it is an influence which often works both ways. Many of the latter can see in these expressions of pride of ancestry nothing but the most arrant heathenism, so the totem poles of Alaska are rotting away. And no more are being built. The young natives are being "educated" out of any respect which hitherto they may justly have entertained for their forefathers. There is no scorn known to the human race which is quite so withering as that which the man who does not know who his grandfather was entertains for the man who does!
It can not be long until the totem pole will be a thing of the past. Therefore he who would see them in all their glory must not linger. All will soon be gone. Here at Wrangell are still some splendid specimens, perhaps the best the north country now has to offer.
Skagway may be called the city of romance. Time was when it held the key which unlocked the gateway of the Promised Land,—that golden kingdom of the North. It is now a thriving commercial center. The White Pass railroad begins here, forming a sort of portage by means of which the two extremes of the country may shake hands with each other. The railroad itself is short. But it touches the headwaters of the Yukon with its twenty-five hundred miles of navigation, bearing on its broad bosom the commerce and the traffic of Klondike, Dawson, and Fairbanks, to the outlet in Bering Sea.
But this is not the reason the history of Skagway is romantic. When the gold rush began in 1896 the landing had to be made at Dyea at the other end of the Lynn Canal. From here it was necessary to cross the dangerous Chilkoot Pass, a most hazardous undertaking. One day the word was passed along that another pass (now known as White Pass) had been discovered. With a rush like a flock of frightened sheep the gold seekers turned and went the other way. In one day fifteen thousand people left Dyea for Dawson and Skagway and in that same length of time what had formerly been a swamp became a city!
Abler pens than mine have recorded in novel, poem and play the story of those eventful days. All know now of the famous (or infamous) gambling hells with which these places were infested. The spot in Skagway to-day which most attracts the tourist is the cemetery where lies the body of "Soapy" Smith. "Soapy" was half-outlaw, half-politician, the "Boss" of the town, in fact. Skagway was without doubt the wildest and wickedest place in the world during the reign of "Soapy" Smith. The decent and sober citizens stood it as long as they could. When they felt, however, that Skagway had suffered from her evil reputation long enough they held a meeting and came to a decision! The Sylvester Wharf, now a half-ruin, has been left standing to mark the spot where the fathers of the town ran "Soapy" to cover and shot him.
Dawson, in the Canadian Yukon, had a somewhat similar experience. But the Northwest Mounted Police came to her assistance and brought order out of chaos. The fame of Dawson during the gold rush is world-wide. Her affairs are now in the charge of the Canadian government. There is also a United States Consulate there.
The most important and the largest city in Alaska is Fairbanks. It lies on the Tanana River, practically at the head of navigation. It is the site of the Fourth Judicial District and of government activities in the interior of Alaska. Fairbanks is a city of which any country might be proud, heated by a central steam plant, with schools, churches, hospitals, newspapers, long-distance telephone and wireless stations. The electric plant which lights the city also serves the adjacent mining camps. Fairbanks may be reached all during the year by a stage service three hundred and fifty-four miles from Valdez and during five months in summer steamboat service westward to St. Michael, eastward to Dawson and White Horse, Yukon Territory, is maintained. Reference has already been made to the progress of this delightful city, its social life and the kindly spirit of the people.
As one nears the western coast the cities become few and far between. Anchorage, on Cook Inlet, Iditarod and Nome are the most important. The interesting story of Nome is well known. Prospectors were working the streams for gold when suddenly the yellow dust was found in huge quantities in the sand along the beach! The first settlement was called Anvil City and was the usual mushroom affair. Nowhere else in Alaska was the struggle of the gold-seekers to be compared with those of Nome. Its exposed position on Norton Sound made it subject to the violent coast storms. The conditions were unsanitary, the food and fuel supply a subject of great anxiety, the water supply scanty and the climate cruel. In the face of all these discouragements, however, the hardy pioneers fought and conquered. Nome is now a city of some three thousand, the commercial, judicial and educational center of Seward Peninsula. It is a fine, courageous little city, compactly built, with modern improvements and prosperous business houses. A railroad eighty-five miles long runs to Shelton, but Nome and the adjacent regions are reached direct only between June and October, the open season of Bering Sea.
I always learn with regret of any tourist who takes a trip up the "Inside" passage and returns by the same route. What can he possibly know of Alaska? The broad expanse of country which sweeps away to the north and the west, guarded by the mountains, watered by one of the mightiest rivers in the world,—of this he knows nothing, for it is a country which can not be described. It must be seen to be appreciated. It is this part of Alaska that is Nature's gigantic workshop with a job in it for any man who asks! Here new cities are yet to be born, new business enterprises to be established, new farms to be tilled. Here any man who chooses may have that most prized of all possessions,—a home of his own! There is room for all!
[CHAPTER XV
THE NATIVE RACES]
IN speaking of the native races of Alaska it is not my purpose to enter into the subject except in so far as it belongs to a book of this character. As was said of the mines, the real student of such subjects will find (in the journals devoted to ethnology) what definite information he seeks. Strangely enough, however, a diligent search has revealed that there is not to be found in any library a book or in any magazine an article dealing with that most unusual custom which prevails among the Eskimos,—the trial marriage. Whether this custom exists among any other natives of the world I do not know. But I think not.
The natives of Alaska are of four groups. First, the Eskimos, who dwell in the northern part of the territory in the area near the Arctic Ocean and Bering Sea. Second, the Aleut, a people closely related to the Eskimos, who are to be found only in the Aleutian Islands and the mainland adjacent thereto. Third, the Thlinkits, who are Indians and confined to the southeastern section of the country known as the Panhandle. Fourth, the Athabaskans, of the same stock as the American Indian, who occupy the interior and touch the coast only at Cook Inlet.
The Thlinkits were once the most civilized and at the same time the most warlike of the native tribes. When the Russians came they found them living in well-built log houses and with an organized tribal system. They are to-day of greater intelligence than any of the other native tribes and are skilled craftsmen. The Athabaskans, on the other hand, with the exception of some of the most isolated Eskimo tribes, are the least civilized. Only those on the coast have any kind of tribal organization and this is not countenanced by the United States Government. Like the clansmen of Scotland, they seem to group themselves in families. The Aleuts were once quite prosperous, expert in the taking of the sea-otter, a very difficult animal to catch. The ravages of the Russian fur-traders almost annihilated the native population. They enslaved them and compelled them to capture the sea-otters for them. But the latter are now almost extinct and the Aleuts eke out a precarious existence by fishing and trapping foxes. They call their habitations barábaras and they resemble the igloos of the Eskimos.
It is the latter people that I know best and of whom I would speak most. There are no Indians in St. Michael. The native people here are wholly Eskimos, and one has to live among them to realize the moral descent of a once-fine native race. One must know them in order to comprehend the height from which they have fallen! In winter they live in their igloos. And an igloo is a place so unspeakably filthy that one can scarcely entertain a thought (much less a sight) of it. In summer they live in tents. Yet——. In spite of their uncleanliness, in spite of every other argument which may be urged against them, one always finds himself at the end of his ruminations admitting to himself that, after all, they are a fine native race! It is a conclusion at which he never fails to arrive even in the face of appalling evidence. The conviction will not be downed.
I have often walked about their summer camps at St. Michael, Nome and other localities. Always I have found the scene practically the same. One cannot help being struck with the industry which the Eskimos display. Every inmate of the tent will be at work! And each is at work upon something useful! Not one of them will be caught idle. The father usually will be seen carving a piece of ivory, or wood. The Eskimos are skilled carvers. While President Taft was in office a magnificent piece was sent him for his desk. It was carved from the tusk of a walrus by a native. In the tent the mother will be making mukluks, or fur boots, while the older daughter beats out and twists the caribou sinew into that strong thread with which the furs and boots are sewed. Let me add that they never come unsewed! The smaller children will each be engaged in some light task, such as making curios, or smoothing the first roughness off of the ivory from which the father, later, will carve something. Every member of the family will be engaged in producing something of value. Wherever one goes among the Eskimos he will be struck by this admirable trait.
They are a light-hearted, good-natured people, easily amused. They have a ready smile for you as you pass them by. Compared with the white man they are undersized. From my own six-feet-two they seem rather diminutive to me when I look down upon them, but they are by no means the dwarfs that people imagine them. The average height of the man is five-feet-four. Tall Eskimos are not unusual. They are well-built, graceful in movement and possessed of small hands and feet. The nose (in some of the tribes) is flat, but in others it is quite the opposite, and the mouth, although somewhat large, is always filled with beautiful teeth. Their smile is most attractive. I have seen many handsome Eskimos,—that is, they would be handsome if they were clean!
The centaur of old was no more a part of his horse than the Eskimo is a part of his boat. He is a born navigator,—as aquatic as a duck. He fashions for himself a small boat of skin in which he practically encloses himself. These boats are of two kinds and in their construction the Eskimo reveals his ingenuity. They are cunningly contrived and cleverly managed. With this primitive craft he performs all sorts of unbelievable stunts. An expert and daring fisherman is he. The smaller boat (called a kayak) is a sealskin canoe and is a rather tiny affair. It has circular hatches for one man. The bidarka (or bidocky) will hold two men. But the baidará is made of walrus hide and will hold from twenty to thirty persons. It will live in a heavy sea and is taken on long sea voyages. The stranger who travels even a short distance in one, however, usually does so with his heart in his mouth most of the time. The fabric belies its looks. It appears so flimsy as to be dangerous and the water is plainly visible underneath. But the natives walk boldly about in them. Every step depresses the skin for two or three inches, but long experience has taught them that the spot on which they stand will sustain the weight of a ton! I have actually seen them turn a summersault in the water with one of these home-made craft and come up smiling! Yet, strange to say, while they are, apparently, more at home on the water than on the land, few of them swim. Perhaps it is that the water is too cold.
Who that has seen these diminutive people venture forth into a treacherous and perilous sea with naught between them and death but this tiny home-made boat to do battle with the huge monsters of the ice-encumbered deep—the whale, the walrus and the seal—can question their courage? Not I! The Eskimo has made no effort to conquer his environment. More wisely he has adapted himself to it and constrained it to his needs. The land of his birth is inhospitable. His environment is savage. He wrings his sustenance from the land only by powerful effort, and human nature takes on a new dignity in the life of such people. Only the sturdiest of creatures, set naked in an Arctic world, could rise superior to such an environment.
As for the Eskimo woman,—in youth she is not unattractive, often quite good-looking, in fact. But I hereby testify that of all the hideously unattractive and ugly creatures known to the human race the full-blooded, middle-aged Eskimo woman carries off the palm. As it was in the beginning, before God said "Let there be light"—she is without form and void! She ages rapidly. She dresses as do the men, in the parka, a long, loose garment reaching to the knee, made of muskrat and reindeer skin in winter and of drill in summer, fur-seal boots and breeches. As the men are nearly always smooth-faced it is often difficult to tell them apart. They both use tobacco. And they are nothing if not economical! They chew it until every particle of flavor has vanished. Then they dry and smoke it!
A friend of mine, a well-known woman writer who once served the American Minister to China as personal secretary, one day confided to me that since the day she left the celestial empire (some fifteen years ago) she had never seen any dirt worth mentioning! Obviously, she has never glimpsed the interior of an igloo! With an American Army Officer of the Medical Corps I once visited one. We were told that it was one of the cleanest Eskimo villages in Alaska. The saints preserve me from a visit to the dirtiest one! An igloo is a windowless hut, shut tight against the air. It is usually crowded with a large family, grossly clad in skins which are poorly tanned, partly decayed. They are unspeakably fed, greasy of skin. Refuse of every kind was piled about the igloo and a recent thaw made the place a mass of liquid filth.
Of course, the reason for all this is apparent, and in a way unavoidable. Fuel is scarce and hard to obtain. Therefore, ventilation, with its waste of heat, would be fatally extravagant. Food is gathered in summer and stored for winter. When it comes out of storage much of it is decayed. Crowding is unavoidable and this means filth and infection. Water is scanty, cleanliness impossible. All this leads to the prevalence of disease and the disease most prevalent is tuberculosis. Moreover, this village which we visited has no doctor. The nearest one is seven miles away.
Conditions in Alaska, so far as medical relief for the natives is concerned, are distressing and inexcusable. Year after year, with persistent regularity, the Sundry Civil Appropriation Committee of the House strikes out the modest sum of seventy-five thousand dollars petitioned for by the Board of Education for medical relief work among the natives of Alaska. In all southeastern Alaska there is but one hospital for natives,—a Presbyterian institution at Haines. Dr. Romig, a former Moravian Medical Missionary in the Bristol Bay district in Bering Sea, gave as an estimate that forty per cent of the Eskimo population of this district, numbering some seventeen hundred people, were afflicted with transmissible diseases—chiefly tuberculosis, syphilis and trachoma. The physical condition of these people is pitiable in the extreme. Yet the government provides one physician and a small inadequate infirmary without proper equipment and maintained in an abandoned schoolhouse!
Contrast this with what is being done for the Indians of the United States. For the three hundred thousand there are now employed two hundred doctors, eighty nurses, seven dentists, seventy field matrons, and seventy-seven miscellaneous hospital attendants. Also, the government maintains for the Indians forty-nine hospitals, four tuberculosis sanitaria with a capacity for caring for a thousand four hundred and ninety-nine patients! The reason for the striking contrast between this and the shameful neglect of the Alaskan natives ought to be found and removed. The present condition is a reproach to us as a nation. Not only this, it is a menace to the health and safety of the white people already there and an argument against the coming of others.
Much has been said and written of the origin of the Eskimos. There is a difference of opinion as to whence, originally, they came. My own belief is that they are of Mongolian origin. A similarity of language would tend to strengthen this belief. When it comes to a native tongue I confess that the Eskimo has a peculiarity which is unique and baffling, more so than I have ever encountered in any other language. I once got up against this in a manner which took some time to untangle. As United States Commissioner at St. Michael it was part of my duty to try offenders against the law. The first time the offender chanced to be an Eskimo I suddenly discovered that I had troubles of my own. Apparently his no meant yes, and vice versa. I could not understand it at first, but at last it dawned upon me that although he spoke brokenly in English he was thinking in his own tongue. For instance, I would say to him:
"You did so-and-so, didn't you?"
"Yes!" he would reply, when I knew very well that he meant to deny it.
I called in a priest, a man who spoke the native language, from whom I learned that my surmise was correct. The Eskimo, when he says yes means "Yes, I did not!" When he says no he means "No, I did!" There you are! One has to be mentally cross-eyed in order to get him!
The Eskimos are very peaceable people except when (in violation of the law) the white man sells them whisky. It must be acknowledged that the latter has done little to encourage their uplift. In fact, he is largely to blame for the demoralized condition of the Eskimo to-day. One may no longer sell liquor in Alaska, but the mischief, so far as the natives is concerned, is already done. For a long time there seemed no way to prevent the furnishing of whisky to the Eskimos. A law might cover it, it is true. But experience has taught me that if a man is clever enough and unscrupulous enough he can drive a horse and wagon through the best law that was ever made! Where there was no saloon the liquor was furnished the natives in the guise of pay or bribe, and every man who has lived in Alaska knows how little regard the white man has had for the sanctity of the native home. Wives and daughters were constantly dishonored. If the husband or father protested or put up a fight he was overcome by threats or bribes and given liquor to drink until what natural good qualities he once possessed disappeared forever.
If one would see the native races at their best he must see them as far as possible from the haunts of the white men. There he will find them by no means an inferior people. I know of one cannery where every employee except the superintendent and the bookkeeper is a native, and one has but to observe their work to be convinced of their capability. But it seems impossible for them to live near the white people without both whites and natives starting down hill. From the acquaintance to the debauchery of the native woman by a certain type of white man is but a step. It has not been a great many years since the whalers used to come up from San Francisco to winter in the Arctic and catch whales. Their first act on arriving was to carry off the native women, take them aboard the vessels and keep them all winter. In the spring when they got ready to return they would throw them ashore unceremoniously. This went on many years but has now been stopped by the government. Sometimes the white men marry the native women and when they do they quickly sink to their level. The native man, always imitative of the white man, in time forsakes the hunting and fishing which once furnished him an honest living and sooner or later he is to be seen hanging around the villages, picking up odd jobs.
Some of the customs of the natives of Alaska (and elsewhere) are both quaint and startling. When a native guest enters a house neither host nor guest take notice of each other. The host goes on with his work and the visitor either assists him or produces some of his own. When he departs, however, the host says to him:
"Inûvdluaritse!" (Live well!)
But they greet the white visitor in smiling friendliness and when he leaves the host usually says to him:
"Aporniakinatit!" (Do not hurt thy head!) Presumably this is a warning against the upper part of the low doorway.
The Eskimo's idea of hospitality sometimes extends to lengths which are somewhat appalling and occasionally it requires not a little diplomacy to refuse them without giving offense. When one gets caught in an Eskimo village and has to spend the night there it is the commonest of occurrences for the man of the house to offer him not only the freedom of his home but his wife as well! Among the natives the interchange of wives is common.
And this brings us to that most discussed of all questions,—the morality (or the lack of it) of the native peoples of the earth. No matter to what far corner of the world one may journey he will find this problem the same in all of them. The Eskimo is no exception. Before the coming of the white man he was utterly godless. He had no religion, no form of worship, no imagery, no idea of any "happy hunting ground" hereafter. In many sections this is still true, although they have been brought under the influence of the church in some localities.
In St. Michael the natives are not permitted to live in the village, but their tents dot the hillsides around and during the summer months the streets are alive with them. Often they come from great distances with their furs, carved ivory, etc., which they have for sale. Their winter dwelling, the igloo, is a pit in the ground, roofed over with logs and sometimes, not always, a window made of fish skin or the entrail of a walrus. The hut is entered by a kind of ante-chamber in the top of which is a hole large enough to admit a man. If he chances to be a large man he sometimes has difficulty in getting through! He must descend a ladder to a narrow passage or tunnel which leads to the principal room, often fifteen or twenty feet from the entrance. The sole furniture of a native residence is a seal-oil lamp which is used for both heating and cooking. It is lighted in the autumn and burns incessantly until spring.
The igloo is usually from six to eight feet high and about thirty feet in circumference. Often it houses from ten to twenty persons. During the cold and stormy weather every aperture is closed. How they endure the odor and the vitiated air is something no white man can understand. The summer dwellings were formerly constructed above ground and consisted of light poles roofed over with skins. Now, however, these have given way to the ordinary tent which is not only cheaper but preferable for many reasons.
In almost every village, or native settlement, the visitor will find the council-house, a much larger hut than the others. It is called a kashga, and is used also as a sort of club where the youths and the unmarried men of the village congregate. Here matters of importance are discussed and guests from a distance lodged. The hut is usually about twenty feet square and ten feet high.
It was in one of these kashgas that I had what was perhaps the most interesting experience in connection with the native races that I have had during the years that I have lived in Alaska. I have come in touch with the ceremonies of the natives of many corners of the earth, but this one was unique,—even more so than the celebrated Snake Dance of the Hopi, of Arizona. I had once been able to befriend a young Eskimo. In gratitude for the favor he invited me to attend a native festival to which (he gave me to understand) no white man had ever been admitted. Whether this meant that no white man had ever been admitted or that none had seen the ceremony as indulged in by this particular tribe I am unable to say. Nevertheless I understood that he was attempting to honor me. I confess that it was with some misgivings that I went, but I have never been sorry.
This particular ceremony was known as The Ten Year Festival. Some tribe from another locality is asked to visit the home tribe and the ceremony is held during the visit. The visitors this year came from Unalakleet, bringing large quantities of gifts and many of them going back empty-handed at the end of the festival. "Potlatching," or trading, is the favorite occupation of the Eskimos and many a time have I been a victim. But I usually hastened to "potlatch" whatever I happened to draw off onto some one else at the earliest possible opportunity!
In some respects the Ten Year Festival is not unlike the ceremonies of the American Indians. In the kashga, heated to suffocation, the natives and their visitors foregather. A square hole is cut in the floor and a sort of shelf, or bench, runs around the sides of the room. On this bench sit the principal personages of the tribe, their feet dangling and not infrequently kicking those below them in the face. The "orchestra" with their tom-toms begin their monotonous drumming. The medicine man is heard below chanting a weird tribal song and presently his head appears through the hole in the floor. He comes up, dancing and singing, both song and chant increasing in intensity as he appears. The other members of the tribe join the dance and the song. Their motions become more and more violent. A perspiration which is largely grease, due to the oil which exudes from their skin, rolls from their naked bodies as they writhe and lash themselves into a perfect frenzy. The women join the dance, cavorting about unclothed, just as the men do.
The final episode of the ceremony occurs when the medicine man breaks from the kashga and runs outside in the bitter cold. Of course, everything is frozen tight, but a hole is cut in the Bay and into the ice-cold water he plunges, returning to the kashga dripping wet. He then tells them that he has been in consultation with the Great Spirit, or whatever it is that they call their ruling power, and that he has been instructed to tell them that the crops will be good, the furs plentiful, that they will be successful in catching the walrus and the seal.
I have already spoken of the unusual custom of the trial marriage which exists among the natives of the Far North. So far as I know, it exists nowhere else,—at least under supervision of the church. But when the United States purchased Alaska there was a paragraph in the treaty which read as follows:
"The inhabitants of the ceded territory, according to their choice, reserving their natural allegiance, may return to Russia within three years, but if they should prefer to remain in the ceded territory they, with the exception of the uncivilized tribes, shall be admitted to the enjoyments and all the rights, advantages and immunities of citizens of the United States, and shall be maintained and protected in the full enjoyment of their liberty, property and religion. The uncivilized tribes will be subject to such laws and regulations as the United States may from time to time adopt in regard to aboriginal tribes of that country."
The supposition is that the "laws and regulations" were not immediately forthcoming and that gradually the natives came under the influence of the Greek Catholic Church. The trial marriage is a blending of the customs of both of these.
I presume that there is no other place in the world where the natives approach more nearly to living in a state of nature than here. This applies as much to their family life as to their out-door existence. In former times when the Eskimo man and woman decided that they would like to wage the war of life together, to combine against their implacable foes, the cold, the storm and the darkness, they just went ahead and did it. This was and in many cases still is the beginning and the end of the subject of marriage with them. The native custom in the olden days was a somewhat strenuous experience for the bride. It is still followed, but it has now become a mere ceremony, quaint and picturesque. The young Eskimo seldom "falls in love." He selects a wife, usually choosing her for her health and strength. In the olden days, having picked her out, he would lie in wait for her, seize her by the hair of her head and drag her off to his igloo, the whole family following and (apparently) attempting to rescue her. Strangely enough, his choice was not always the young girl. There was a lively competition for widows, especially if they were the mothers of sons who would be able to help bring in the whale and keep the wolf from the door.
Of Eskimo morality and civilization there are many degrees. Some of the tribes as yet untouched by the influence of the missionaries have moral laws of extreme refinement. And they live up to them! Do you know of another spot on earth where both man and woman who have proved guilty of unfaithfulness are meted out the same punishment? I do not. But the reindeer Koriaks, one of the tribes not far from Nome, place the greatest stress upon loyalty and chastity of both man and woman, and the punishment for both, when they transgress the law, is instant death!
As to many of the tribes, however, little can be said and that little is not to their credit. They have no higher conception of life than that which is wholly animalistic. Through all the long ages, with them a physical act has been merely a physical act. It has had no moral significance. And can the idea of untold ages be easily eradicated? And, after all, are they worse than other people? Comparisons are odious. But it must be remembered that these natives live out their lives thus thinking no evil! What, then, of the white man, born with the knowledge of the moral significance which is attached to the personal relationship and who has permitted himself to become degraded by the vices of civilization? The native man is unmoral. The white man is immoral. There is a difference! Moreover, the Scarlet Letter is not alone for the Hester Prynnes of Old Plymouth. From time immemorial among some of the tribes of the North the unchaste Eskimo woman has been forced to wear a sign of her degradation,—a green band in her hair. However, unlike Hester Prynne, she is given another chance, albeit an unfair one. If she gives birth to an able-bodied boy she becomes an object of unusual and sincere respect and her green band becomes, as it were, a crown.
Humanity itself, in the Far North, sometimes becomes quite as cold and frozen as the land itself. But there is one thing which never fails to thaw it,—children. And any one who lives long in the north country can not but realize that children are of vital necessity in any sparsely-settled land. The Reverend Hudson Stuck, to whose admirable volume, Voyages on the Yukon, reference has already been made, relates a good story bearing on this point. Long residence in Alaska has taught him much that has never yet been writ in books and has made of him, although a man of the strictest religious convictions, kindly tolerant of the frailties of humankind. Above all else, he is impatient, as we all are, of the non-essentials in education which are being crammed down the throats of the natives by teachers, often due to youth and inexperience, while the essentials, the things of real value to them as individuals and to the country as a whole, are neglected. The Archdeacon relates that once he visited a Mission where the man in charge, a youth, with misguided enthusiasm, boasted that there was neither a half-breed nor an illegitimate child in the village! The Archdeacon received the information in silence, but after a tour of inspection he returned to the subject.
"I see no children at all," he remarked. "Aren't there any?"
The young man proudly admitted that there were none,—whereupon the Archdeacon proceeded to shock him.
"I much prefer half-breed children or even illegitimate children to no children at all!" he said. "By the grace of God, much may be done with the half-breed or even the illegitimate child. But in the name of all that is hopeless and preposterous," he finished, "what can ever be accomplished in a country where there are no children at all?"
It has always been a matter of real regret to me that the Archdeacon did not record the answer to his question!
Just when the custom of the trial marriage in its present form originated I do not know. That it must have entered with or at least followed closely in the wake of the Greek Catholic Church is undeniable. As was the case with the native ceremonies of the American Indians,—the Sun Dance, the Ghost Dance, the Flute Dance and the Snake Dance—religious ceremonies, every one of them, exaggerated and highly-colored reports of which were carried to the government by over-enthusiastic and sometimes fanatical missionaries and agents with the result that the government took steps to suppress them, the trial marriage of the natives of Alaska, while not yet suppressed, now rests under official displeasure. A part of my duty was to investigate this subject. I did so—with a result more astonishing to myself than it could possibly have been to any one else. Like the man of old who went to the temple to scoff and remained to pray, I issued forth from this investigation with most of my preconceived theories on the subject knocked galley-west. Some of my hitherto staunchest principles, if not quite broken, were so badly bent that I have never yet been able to hammer them out quite straight again!
I had it out one day with Father B——, a priest of the Greek Church, a benevolent and kindly old man who in the early days of his mission among the Eskimos had cherished a dream of them as a separate people,—a race apart, who should work out their own salvation with the assistance (not the insistence) of a wisely directed form of religion. That dream for a while promised to be realized, at least to a certain extent. But with the coming of the first white men, most of whom were utterly lawless, he saw his vision fade and finally vanish. Nevertheless he worked on and the trial marriage is his solution of the problem. It is a sort of welding of the customs of both the native and the church.
There is one point in regard to the custom on which I wish to be plainly understood. In Alaska it is against the law for an unmarried man and woman to live together. To say that the custom exists with the consent of the Church is wholly unfair. Every one who has lived in such a country as this knows very well that many of the customs as well as the laws are born of necessity, and the custom of the trial marriage is unquestionably one of these. It certainly exists with the knowledge of the Church and its origin undoubtedly lies in this fact: The parishes over which one priest has jurisdiction lie far apart. A visit to each of them is possible only about once a year. Without the Church there would be no marriage, even a belated one. Not infrequently it happens that a young Eskimo who wishes a wife goes to the priest and asks his assistance in finding one. The girl may (and often does) live in one parish and the young man in another. He will either go to her home or she will go to his. But they can not be married until the next visit of the priest which is sometimes a whole year later.
Before the priest will consent to assist the youth in finding a suitable companion, however, he makes certain requirements which the young man must meet. He must build an igloo, furnish it and stock it with supplies. He must then construct his boat in order that he may fish and thus make a living for them both. This done he may have his girl. Score one in favor of the trial marriage! He may not have her unless he is prepared to house and support her. When his igloo and boat are complete the young people go to the new home and live together for one year. At the end of the year, however, they must be married by the ceremony of the Church. If they do not come to him to be married the priest seeks them out and forbids them to live together any longer.
While the idea itself rather sticks in one's throat, the thoughtful man can not deny that the trial marriage has much to recommend it. They who have come most closely in touch with it, the missionaries and priests, say that it is indeed seldom that the couple fail to return at the end of the year to be married. When they do, it is asserted, there is usually a reason, and when this reason exists, they claim, it is far better for them to separate. The year of trial has proved that they are not suited to each other. If a child has come to them, the mother takes it and goes back to her people, and both the man and woman may select another mate and enter into another compact if they desire. But this seldom happens.
I argued the question to a finish with Father B——. He could not be moved from his position and in the end I could but acquiesce in much that he said. How much better this system is than that which prevails under the stress of our present day civilization! In the rapid and feverish life of the cities of the world to-day,—what happens? The lover and his lass during the period of courtship put forth their whole stock of attractiveness. Seeing each other periodically it is quite simple to keep out of sight one's faults and weaknesses. No sooner are they married than the hitherto concealed frailties begin to appear. Then——. They realize that there exists a bond between them and more often than not, like a dog straining at his leash, they endeavor to find out just how elastic the tie is,—just how far they can strain or stretch it. First arguments, then differences, then quarrels. Before they know it the cord snaps. Life is never the same again. Lovers' quarrels may be made up. Family quarrels never! What then? Nine times out of ten, for social or economic reasons, they go on living together, ekeing out an unhappy and often tortured existence. What could be worse? That which (for lack of a better term to apply to it) we call the social evil is not confined to the scarlet woman of the streets. It often exists in the best families of the land!
Among these people of the Northland, however, it is different. Both the youth and the maiden know very well that at the end of the year there is a possibility of either leaving the other. The result of this knowledge is that from the very first they fall into the habit of trying to please each other! And it is a habit they seldom outgrow. If they find that they can not please each other they are privileged to separate,—in fact, are required to do so. They are not permitted to remain together quarreling all their lives and ruining the family life of the children who come to them. This, in my judgment, explains the light-heartedness of the Eskimos. They are a happy people and the parents never punish the children. Domesticity counts for much among them. Home is sanctuary from the elements. They have little else,—but they have each other! The manner in which they are forced to live for so many months of the year, so closely confined, draws them very closely together. I question whether what they lack, or what we imagine they lack, does not matter less than we think. To me it seems that they miss little of life's essential meaning. They do not have much, it is true. They are often ill-fed. They are not intellectual. They are not sentimental. They are just human! And although they may be for months shut in by the icy blasts of winter they do not complain. Why? Because no cold can penetrate the inner glow and warmth which is born of an adequate comradeship!
The trial marriage permits the indulgence in one of their quaintest of customs. No Eskimo maiden ever accepts a proposal of marriage. Indifference to the attention of her admirer is the acme of good form! I find that "keeping up appearances" is characteristic of humanity whether the latter dwell on Greenland's icy mountain or India's coral strand! And propinquity is and ever has been the most prolific parent of love—at either the North Pole or the Equator. The "force" with which the Eskimo youth of to-day seizes his bride by the hair to "drag" her off to his igloo is altogether counterfeit, as is also the attempt on the part of her family to "rescue" her. It is merely the indulgence in one of their most ancient customs.
I have been much among the natives,—especially those who abide on my island, and because of what I have seen of their family life I am almost a convert to the system. As a rule the Eskimo makes a good husband, willing to perform any labor, endure any hardship or suffer any deprivation in order to procure food for his wife and children. Many an Arctic man of my acquaintance has died for his family, and I am often reminded when I think of them of the familiar lines:
"All love that hath not friendship for its base
Is like a mansion built upon the sand!
Love, to endure life's sorrow and earth's woe,
Needs friendship's solid masonry below!"
It is said that some one once asked Diogynes this question:
"At what age is it best for a man to marry?"
With the classical brevity of the Greeks he replied:
"In youth it is too soon,—in age too late!"
I disclaim any intention of offering a treatise on the subject of marriage, but the investigation of this custom of the natives unquestionably gave me a huge jolt! It turned my thoughts into a channel which otherwise I might never have had occasion to explore. Would that I could chart it! If only we could bring ourselves to regard marriage as a profession and would set ourselves in a business-like way to excelling in it! Could it in any way detract from its dignity? Or its sacredness? Surely not. Medicine and surgery are professions. The Law is a profession, and the Church. Diplomacy, legislation and arms are professions. Marriage is the greatest of all professions,—and the most difficult of any to master! One may master to a degree which may be regarded as little short of perfection the other professions,—music, art, oratory, etc. What man of to-day has the conceit to regard himself as a well-nigh perfect husband?
That the rewards of marriage are incomparable is undeniable. Life's journey, at best, is lonely. No man can deny that even though his daily task may take him amidst the crowd he lives the greater part of his life alone! A dear and close companionship is all that makes life tolerable. Nothing else ever has, will or can. Fame is a delusion and a snare. Ambition is a disease. Affectionate companionship and a home are the only things worth having. Why not build a home instead of a house? Why not go about the process in a business-like way? Why not make honor and loyalty fashionable and permit faithlessness to go out of style?
One of America's foremost writers declares repeatedly throughout his excellent novels that judgment has never yet entered into the selection of a mate,—that sentiment and emotion alone decide the after life of every couple who are wed. This is, unfortunately, true except in rare cases. None would care to abolish wholly the electrical current which flashes between the sexes. And yet——. Marriage entered into from a sense of duty on both sides is not without its strong argument. He who undertakes marriage because he regards it as both a duty and a privilege, or solely from a sense of duty, who either actively or passively selects a mate for no other reason, is very likely because of that same sense of duty to fulfill his obligations faithfully and to behave well. Nothing in all the earth is quite so fine as an active conscience! For such a man life reserves some of her grandest hours. The Golden Apples do not grow so far above the heads of any of us that we can not reach out and gather them if we try! And he who follows the path of duty will find his own apple quite as luscious and sweet at the core as that of him who trod the flowery road of personal pleasure!
I am one of those who hope that with the end of the great World War a new spirit of tolerance may spread its white wings over all the world and that sooner or later some of the time-worn social rules and regulations, archaic because designed for a civilization two thousand years ago, may be abrogated or at least amended and modified. May the day come when life shall be individual, when creed and dogma shall be buried in a grave so deep that there shall be no possibility of a Resurrection! When that nameless and indefinite thing known as Public Opinion shall be forced to lower its threatening finger and lose its power! When all men and all women shall enjoy the privilege of working out, each for himself and herself, that most potent factor in the human experience, namely, the personal relationship, and when we shall all live saner, cleaner, healthier, happier and more moral lives in consequence!
Dr. William H. Dall, Paleontologist of the United States Geological Survey and Honorary Curator of Mollusks at the National Museum at Washington, D. C., has written the following charming verses about the natives of Alaska. "Innuit" is the name by which the Eskimo calls himself and his people from Greenland to Mt. St. Elias. The topek is the winter house of turf and walrus hide. In the igloo, or snow house, there is no wood. All Innuit believe in evil spirits which are supposed to dwell far inland, away from the shores. In times of starvation Innuit ethics permit a mother to put her baby, when she can no longer feed it, out in the snow to die. The child's mouth must be stuffed with mud or grass. Otherwise its spirit will return and be heard crying about the house at night.