So important was it to make the entire length of the river (over 2000 miles) within the short interval between the date of our starting and the probable date of departure of the last vessel from St. Michaels, near the mouth of the river, that but little time was left for rambles through the country, and much as I desired to take a hunt inland, and still more to make an examination of the country at various points along the great river, I constantly feared that by so doing I might be compromising our chances of getting out of the country before winter should effectually forbid it. Therefore, from the very start it was one constant fight against time to avoid such an unwished for contingency, and thus we could avail ourselves of but few opportunities for exploring the interior.
On the 28th of June a fair breeze on Lake Marsh continuing past sunset (an unusual occurrence), we kept on our way until well after midnight before the wind died out. At midnight it was light enough to read common print and I spent some time about then in working out certain astronomical observations. Venus was the only star that was dimly visible in the unclouded sky. Lake Marsh was the first water that we could trust in which to take a bath, and even there—and for that matter it was the same along the entire river—bathing was only possible on still, warm, sunny days.
Below old Fort Selkirk on the Yukon, at the mouth of the White River (so-called on account of its white muddy water), bathing is almost undesirable on account of the large amount of sediment contained in the water; its swift current allowing it to hold much more than any river of the western slope known to me, while its muddy banks furnish a ready base of supplies. Its temperature also seldom reaches the point that will allow one to plunge in all over with any degree of comfort. One annoyance in bathing in Lake Marsh during the warmer hours of the day was the presence of a large fly, somewhat resembling the "horse-fly," but much larger and inflicting a bite that was proportionately more severe. These flies made it necessary to keep constantly swinging a towel in the air, and a momentary cessation of this exertion might be punished by having a piece bitten out of one that a few days later would look like an incipient boil. One of the party so bitten was completely disabled for a week, and at the moment of infliction it was hard to believe that one was not disabled for life. With these "horse" flies, gnats and mosquitoes in such dense profusion, the Yukon Valley is not held up as a paradise to future tourists.
The southern winds which had been blowing almost continuously since we first spread our sail on Lake Lindeman, and which had been our salvation while on the lakes, must prevail chiefly in this region, as witness the manner in which the spruce and pine trees invariably lean to the northward, especially where their isolated condition and exposure on flat level tracts give the winds full play, to influence their position. Near Lake Lindeman a dwarfed, contorted pine was noticed, the fibers of which were not only twisted around its heart two or three times, in a height of fifteen or twenty feet, but the heart itself was twisted in a spiral like a corkscrew that made two or three turns in its length, after which, as if to add confusion to disorder, it was bent in a graceful sweep to the north to conform to the general leaning of all the trees similarly exposed to the action of the winds. There was a general brash condition of all the wood which was very apparent when we started to make pins for binding the raft, while it was seldom that a log was found large enough for cutting timber. The little cove into which we put on the 19th of June, when chased by a gale, by a singular freak of good fortune had just the logs we needed, both as to length and size, to repair our raft, and I do not think we saw a good chance again on the upper waters of the Yukon. Further down, every island—and the Yukon has probably as many islands as any half-dozen rivers of the same size in the world put together—has its upper end covered with enough timber to build all the rafts a lively party could construct in a summer.
Lake Marsh also had a few terraces visible on the eastern hillsides, but they were nearer together and not so well marked as those we observed on some of the lakes further back. Along these, however, were pretty open prairies, covered with the dried, yellow grass of last year, this summer's growth having evidently not yet forced its way through the dense mass. More than one of us compared these prairies, irregular as they seemed, with the stubble fields of wheat or oats in more civilized climes. I have no doubt that they furnish good grazing to mountain goats, caribou and moose, and would be sufficient for cattle if they could keep on friendly terms with the mosquitoes. According to the general terms of the survival of the fittest and the growth of muscles the most used to the detriment of others, a band of cattle inhabiting this district in the far future would be all tail and no body unless the mosquitoes should experience a change of numbers.
TYPICAL TAHK-HEESH OR "STICK" INDIANS.
From sketches by Sergeant Gloster.
At Marsh a few miserable "Stick" Indians put in an appearance, but not a single thing could be obtained from them by our curiosity hunters. A rough-looking pair of shell ear-rings in a small boy's possession he instantly refused to exchange for the great consideration of a jack-knife offered by a member of the party, who supposed the ornaments to be purely local in character and of savage manufacture. Another trinket was added to the jack-knife and still refused, and additions were made to the original offer, until just to see if there was any limit to the acquisitiveness of these people, a final offer was made, I believe, of a double-barreled shot-gun with a thousand rounds of ammunition, a gold watch, two sacks of flour and a camp stove, and in refusing this the boy generously added the information that its value to him was based on the fact that it had been received from the Chilkats, who, in turn, had obtained it from the white traders.
A few scraggy half-starved dogs accompanied the party. An unconquerable pugnacity was the principal characteristic of these animals, two of them fighting until they were so exhausted that they had to lean up against each other to rest. A dirty group of children of assorted sizes completed the picture of one of the most dejected races of people on the face of the earth. They visited their fish lines at the mouth of the incoming river at the head of Lake Marsh, and caught enough fish to keep body and soul together after a fashion. This method of fishing is quite common in this part of the country, and at the mouth of a number of streams, or where the main stream debouches into a lake, long willow poles driven far enough into the mud to prevent their washing away are often seen projecting upward and swayed back and forth by the force of the current. On closer examination they reveal a sinew string tied to them at about the water-line or a little above. They occasionally did us good service as buoys, indicating the mud flats, which we could thereby avoid, but the number of fish we ever saw taken off them was not alarming. The majority of those caught are secured by means of the double-pronged fish-spears, which were described on page [76]. I never observed any nets in the possession of the Tahk-heesh or "Sticks," but my investigations in this respect were so slight that I might easily have overlooked them. Among my trading material to be used for hiring native help, fish-hooks were eagerly sought by all of the Indians, until after White River was passed, at which point the Yukon becomes too muddy for any kind of fishing with hook and line. Lines they were not so eager to obtain, the common ones of sinew sufficiently serving the purpose. No good bows or arrows were seen among them, their only weapons being the stereotyped Hudson Bay Company flintlock smooth-bore musket, the only kind of gun, I believe, throwing a ball that this great trading company has ever issued since its foundation. They also sell a cheap variety of double-barreled percussion-capped shot-gun, which the natives buy, and loading them with ball—being about No. 12 or 14 gauge—find them superior to the muskets. Singular as it may appear, these Indians, like the Eskimo I found around the northern part of Hudson's Bay, prefer the flintlock to the percussion-cap gun, probably for the reason that the latter depends on three articles of trade—caps, powder and lead—while the former depends on but two of these, and the chances of running short of ammunition when perhaps at a distance of many weeks' journey from these supplies, are thereby lessened. These old muskets are tolerably good at sixty to seventy yards, and even reasonably dangerous at twice that distance. In all their huntings these Indians contrive by that tact peculiar to savages to get within this distance of moose, black bear and caribou, and thus to earn a pretty fair subsistence the year round, having for summer a diet of salmon with a few berries and roots.