If she chances to jump just at the right moment; if one sailor catches her just right and another catches him just right, she will know by the cheer that arises from hurricane and texas that all is well and she may open her eyes. Under other conditions, other situations arise; but let no woman be deterred by the possibility of the latter from descending a rope-ladder when she has an opportunity. The hair-crinkling moments in an ordinary life are few enough, heaven knows.
There are several business houses and dwellings at Kayak; and an Indian village. The Indian graveyard is very interesting. Tiny houses are built over the graves and surrounded by picket fences. Both are painted white. Through the windows may be seen some of the belongings of the dead. In dishes are different kinds of food and drink, that the deceased may not suffer of hunger or thirst in the bourne to which he may have journeyed. There are implements and weapons for the men; unfinished baskets for the women, with the long strands of warp and woof left ready for the idle hand; for the children, beads and rattles made of bear claws and shells. The houses are on posts a few feet above the graves.
For a number of years Kayak was the base of operation for oil companies. In 1898 the Alaska Development Company staked the country, but later leased their lands to the Alaska Oil and Coal Company—commonly known as the "English" company—for a long term of years, with the privilege of taking up the lease in 1906. This company spent millions of dollars and drilled several wells.
The Alaska Petroleum and Coal Company—known as the Lippy Company—put down two holes, one seventeen hundred feet deep. The cost of drilling is about five thousand dollars a hole of two thousand feet; the rig, laid down, six thousand five hundred dollars.
These wells are situated at Katalla, sixteen miles from Kayak, at the mouth of the Copper River. The oil lands extend from the coast to the Malaspina and Behring glaciers.
Since the recent upspringing of a new town at Katalla, the centre of trade has been transferred from Kayak to this point. Katalla was founded in 1904 by the Alaska Petroleum and Coal Company; but not until the actual commencement of work on the Bruner Railway Company's road, in 1907, from Katalla into the heart of the coal and oil fields, did the place rise to the importance of a northern town.
It has attained a wide fame within a few months on account of the remarkable discoveries of high-grade petroleum and coal in the vicinity.
For many years these two products of Alaska were considered of inferior quality; but it has recently been discovered that they rival the finest of Pennsylvania.
The town has grown as only a new Alaskan, or Puget Sound, town can grow. At night, perhaps, there will be a dozen shacks and as many tents on a town site; the next morning a steamer will anchor in the bay bearing government offices, stores, hotels, saloons, dance-halls, banks, offices for several large companies, electric light plants, gas works, telephones—and before another day dawns, business is in full swing.
For fifteen miles along the Comptroller Bay water front oil wells may be seen, some of the largest oil seepages existing close to the shore. The coal and oil lands of this vicinity, however, are about a hundred miles in length and from twenty to thirty in width.