Since the establishment of Europeans on this coast, an attempt has been made to introduce the nutritious grains and vegetables known to the civilized world, but without very brilliant success. Against wheat and rye and against orchard fruits are obstacles of climate, perhaps insuperable. These require summer heat; but here the summer is comparatively cold. The northern limit of wheat is several degrees below the southern limit of these possessions, so that this friendly grain is out of the question. Rye flourishes further north, as do oats also. The supposed northern boundary of these grains embraces Sitka and grazes the Aleutian Islands. But other climatic conditions are wanting, at least for rye. One of these is dry weather, which is required at the time of its bloom. Possibly the clearing of the forest may produce a modification of the weather. At present barley grows better, and there is reason to believe that it may be cultivated successfully very far to the north. It has ripened at Kadiak. Many garden vegetables have become domesticated. Lütke reports potatoes at Sitka, so that all have enough.[127] Langsdorff reports the same of Kadiak and Oonalaska.[128] There are also at Sitka radishes, cabbages, cauliflowers, peas, and carrots,—making a very respectable list. At Norton Sound I hear of radishes, beets, and cabbages. Even as far north as Fort Yukon, on the parallel of 67°, potatoes, peas, turnips, and even barley, have been grown; but the turnips were unfit for the table, being rotten at the heart. A recent resident reports that there are no fruit-trees, and not even a raspberry-bush, and that he lost all his potatoes during one season by a frost in the latter days of July; but do not forget that these potatoes were the wall-flowers of the Arctic Circle.
Thus it appears that the vegetable productions of the country are represented practically by trees. The forests, overshadowing the coast from Sitka to Cook’s Inlet, are all that can be shown under this head out of which a revenue can be derived, unless we add ginseng, so much prized by the Chinese, and perhaps also snakeroot. Other things may contribute to the scanty support of a household; but timber will, in all probability, be an article of commerce. It has been so already. Ships from the Sandwich Islands have come for it, and there is reason to believe that this trade may be extended indefinitely, so that Russian America will be on the Pacific like Maine on the Atlantic, and the lumbermen of Sitka vie with their hardy brethren of the East.
These forests, as described, seem to afford all that can be desired. The trees are abundant, and they are perfect in size, not unlike
“the tallest pine
Hewn on Norwegian hills to be the mast
Of some great ammiral.”
But a doubt has been raised as to their commercial value. Here we have the inconsistent testimony of Lütke. According to him, the pines and firs, which he calls “magnificent,” constitute an untried source of commercial wealth. Not only California, but other countries, poor in trees, like Mexico, the Sandwich Islands, and even Chili, will need them. And yet he does not conceal an unfavorable judgment of the timber, which, as seen in the houses of Sitka, suffering from constant moisture, did not seem durable.[129] Sir Edward Belcher differs from the Russian admiral, for he praises especially “the timber of the higher latitudes, either for spars or plank.”[130] Perhaps its durability may depend upon the climate where it is used; so that, though failing amidst the damps of Sitka, it may be lasting enough, when transported to another climate. In the rarity of trees on the islands and main-land of the Pacific, the natural supply is in Russian America. One of the early navigators even imagined that China must look this way, and he expected that “the woods would yield a handsome revenue, when the Russian commerce with China should be established.”[131] American commerce with China is established. Perhaps timber may become one of its staples.
A profitable commerce in timber has already begun at Puget Sound. By official returns of 1866 it appears that it was exported to a long list of foreign countries and places, in which I find Victoria, Honolulu, Callao, Tahiti, Canton, Valparaiso, Adelaide, Hong Kong, Sydney, Montevideo, London, Melbourne, Shanghae, Peru, Coquimbo, Calcutta, Hilo, Cape Town, Cork, Guaymas, and Siam; and in this commerce were employed no less than eighteen ships, thirty barks, four brigs, twenty-eight schooners, and ten steamers. The value of the lumber and spars exported abroad was over half a million dollars, while more than four times that amount was shipped coastwise. But the coasts of Russian America are darker with trees than those further south. Pines, in which they abound, do not flourish as low down as Puget Sound. Northward, they are numerous and easily accessible.
In our day the Flora of the coast has been explored with care. Kittlitz, who saw it as a naturalist, portrays it with the enthusiasm of an early navigator; but he speaks with knowledge. He, too, dwells on the “surprising power and luxuriance” of the pine forests, describing them with critical skill. The trees which he identifies are the Pinus Canadensis, distinguished for its delicate foliage; the Pinus Mertensiana, a new species, rival of the other in height; and the Pinus Palustris, growing on swampy declivities, and not attaining height. In the clearings or on the outskirts of thickets are shrubs, being chiefly a species of Rubus, with flowers of carmine and aromatic fruit. About and over all are mosses and lichens, invigorated by the constant moisture, while colossal trees, undermined or uprooted, crowd the surface, reminding the scientific observer of the accumulations of the coal measures. Two different prints in the London reproduction of the work of Kittlitz present pictures of these vegetable productions grouped for beauty and instruction. I refer to these, and also to the Essay of Hinds on “The Regions of Vegetation,” the latter to be found at the end of the volumes containing Belcher’s Voyage.