Shortly after noon we passed the mouth of the Tahk-heen'-a or Tahk River coming in from the west, which is about two-thirds the size of the Yukon. By following it to its head, where the Indians say is a large lake, the traveler arrives at the Chilkat portage, the relation of which with the Chilkoot trail has already been noticed. From this point on my Chilkat guide, Indianne, was much more familiar with the country, having been over the Chilkat trail many times, and over the Chilkoot portage but once when a small boy. From the cascades to the Tahk River, a distance of nearly twenty-five miles, the banks of the Yukon are quite high and often broken into perpendicular bluffs of white clay, whose rolling crescent-shaped crowns were densely covered with pine and spruce. While the Tahk-heen'-a is the smaller stream, its bed and valley apparently determine the general characteristics of the river beyond its confluence, the high bold bluffs of clay just mentioned being from this point succeeded by lower shores wooded to the water's edge.
The Tahk-heen'-a, like all streams not interspersed with lakes on its upper course, carries quite muddy water, and we all felt a little uneasy about our fine grayling fisheries, a foreboding well founded, for they diminished with an exasperating suddenness, our evenings seldom being rewarded with more than two or three.
The last of the chain of lakes was reached the same day at 5 P.M., and we were prevented from taking advantage of a good wind by a three hours' detention on a sand-bar that stretched almost entirely across the river's mouth. This bar had a deep channel on either side of it, and when our most strenuous efforts completely failed to get the raft off, there was nothing to be done but to put the load ashore, and as wading was impossible, the cottonwood canoe was brought into action, slow as the method was. Not having been used much lately its condition was unknown, and as soon as we launched it, the water came pouring in from a dozen cracks where the gum had scaled off. One very vicious looking hole was suddenly developed in the bow as the first load went ashore, and "Billy" undertook to overcome this difficulty by putting most of the load in the stern, taking his own place there so as to allow the bow to stand well out of the water. With every load the leak grew worse, and about the fourth or fifth trip there was a most desperate struggle between the canoeman and the leak to see which would conquer before they reached the shore, the result being a partial victory for both, the canoe's head going under water just as it reached the shore, upon which there was a hurried scramble to unload it without damage.
This lake was called by the Indians Kluk-tas'-si; and, as it was one of the very few pronounceable names of Indian derivation in this section of the country, I retained it, although it is possible that this may be the Lake Labarge of some books, the fact that it is the first lake above the site of old Fort Selkirk being the only geographical datum in its favor, while all its other relations to equal points of importance are opposed to the theory. In fact, it had evidently been mapped by the merest guesswork from vague Indian reports.
I hope I shall be excused for again reviving the subject of conjectural geography, so uncertain in its results and so prevalent in Alaskan charts, especially those relating to the interior, even when they are of an official character. If the self-satisfaction of these parlor map-makers has been gratified in following unknown rivers and mountains wherever their fancy and imagination led them, and no other harm resulted, one conversant with the facts might dismiss the manifold errors that occur in their charts with a contemptuous smile at the method pursued. But that harm of the most serious nature can result from these geographical conjectures is evident from the following true story told me by the person interested. A party of miners had crossed the Chilkoot trail and were on a "prospecting tour" down the river and lakes. Discouraged at the outlook as to finding gold or silver in paying quantities, there was considerable diversity of opinion in regard to the propriety of any further advance in such a wild unexplored country, the majority advocating a return. Among their number was a young lawyer, a graduate of an eastern college, I believe, who had joined the party in the hope of finding adventures and of repairing his health, which had suffered from too close an application to his professional studies. Having in his possession an official government chart which pretended to map the route over which he had come as well as that ahead of him, although he had received proof of its untrustworthiness in the past, he resolved to trust it once more. Numerous Indian villages and towns were shown upon the chart at convenient intervals along the remainder of the route. He thought the villages might not be just where they were marked, but believed that in the main their number and positions were at least approximately correct. Basing his expectations on the help to be obtained from these numerous Indian villages, he announced to the party his determination to continue his travels, whatever might be the conclusion to which the others should come, pointing out the hospitality which they had received from the Indians they had previously met, and expressing his expectation of meeting many others as friendly. Whether his reasoning influenced them or not I have forgotten, and it matters but little, but at any rate the party gave up the idea of returning and continued on drifting down the river and prospecting wherever the conditions seemed favorable, until old Fort Selkirk was reached, when they ascended the Pelly, upon the bars of which stream the prospect of finding gold was greatest. During all this long journey not a single Indian was seen by the party, and only one deserted house, with an occasional peeled spruce pole at long intervals that marked the temporary camps of the few wandering natives. Young C—— took the jokes of his companions upon his chart and its Indian towns good-naturedly enough, and the map was nailed to a big spruce tree and used for a target for rifle practice, but he often spoke to me in a far different strain as he recounted the chances of his taking the journey alone aided solely by this worthless map. In fact there is not an official or government map of Alaska, that, taken as a whole, is worth the ink with which it is printed. Limited explorations and surveys in this vast territory, such as those of Captain Raymond on the Yukon, Lieutenant Ray on the Arctic Coast, Lieutenant Stoney on the Putnam river, and many others, are undoubtedly excellent, second to none in the world made under similar circumstances, and confined strictly to the country actually traversed by each, with broken line delineations in surrounding districts, indicating conjectures; but as soon as these or such portions of them as the Washington compiler may see fit to take, are dumped into a great map of Alaska, they are so mixed with conjectural topography and map work that one must know the history of Alaskan exploration about as well as the history of his own life to be able to discriminate between the good and the worthless.
Like Lake Marsh, Kluk-tas-si is full of mudbanks along its shores; its issuing waters being clear as a mountain stream, while its incoming tributaries are loaded with earthy deposits. So full of these is Kluk-tas-si, and so much more contracted is the waterway through them, that we thought we could detect a slight current when making our way along in the blue water. This was especially noticeable when the wind died down to a calm. In spite of all this, Kluk-tas-si offered fewer difficulties in the way of making landings than Lake Marsh. It seemed to me that but a brief geological period must elapse before these lakes are filled with deposits, their new shores covered with timber, and their beds contracted to the dimensions of the river. Such ancient lakes appear to occur in the course of the stream further on.
We started at seven in the morning and were occupied until eight in rowing and sailing through the tortuous channel which led to blue water in the deep portion of the lake. To keep this channel readily we sent the Indians ahead in the canoe, who sounded with their long paddles, and by signals indicated the deepest parts. In spite of their exertions we stuck a couple of times, and had to lower sail and jump overboard. The wind kept slowly increasing and by the time we set the full spread of our sail in bold water, we were forging along at such a rate that we put out a trolling spoon, but nothing was caught, the huge craft probably frightening every thing away. The wind died down and sprang up again several times during the day, but every time it arose it was in our favor. That evening by the time we reached Camp 21, on the eastern shore of the lake, we had scored about thirteen miles, a very good reckoning for lake travel any time.
The west bank of this lake is very picturesque about fourteen or fifteen miles from its southern entrance, large towers and bastion-like projections of red rock upheaving their huge flanks upon what seems to be a well-marked island, but which is in reality a part of the mainland, as our Indians assured us. According to the same authorities a river comes in here at this point, having shores of the same formation, and called by them the Red River. The frequency of this name in American geographical nomenclature was to me sufficient reason for abandoning it; and I gave the name of Richthofen to the rocks and river (the latter, however, not having been seen by us), after Freiherr von Richthofen of Leipsic, well known in geographical science. The next evening was a still and beautiful one, with the lake's surface like a mirror, and the reflection of the red rocks in the quiet water made the most striking scene on our trip; two warm pictures of rosy red in the sinking sun joined base to base by a thread of silver, at the edge of the other shore. The eastern shores of the lake seem to be formed of high rounded hills of light gray limestone, picturesquely striped with the foliage of the dark evergreen growing in the ravines. From the lake the contrast was very pretty, and showed a regularity that scarcely seemed the work of nature. I named them the Hancock Hills after General Hancock of the army. A number of salmon-trout were caught in this lake (the first one was caught in Lake Nares), the largest of which weighed over eight pounds, that being the limit of the pocket scales of the doctor. Saturday the 7th gave us the most conflicting winds, and although we were upon the waters of Kluk-tas-si, for twelve hours we made but nine miles, a head wind driving us into Camp 22.
We did not allow the 8th to tempt us on the lake so readily, and the day was employed in taking astronomical observations, arranging our photographic apparatus and similar work, until early afternoon. At 1.30 P.M. a favorable breeze from the south sprang up, and by 2 o'clock was raging in a gale, blowing over the tent where we were eating our midday meal, filling the coffee and eatables with sand and gravel, and causing a general scampering and chasing after the lighter articles of our equipment, which took flight in the furious wind. Most exasperating of all, it quickly determined us to break camp, and in less than half an hour we had all of our effects stored on the vessel, and were pulling off the beach, when just as our sail was spread the wind died down to a zephyr hardly sufficient to keep away the mosquitoes. At 7 o'clock the lake was as quiet as can be imagined, and after remaining almost motionless for another hour we pulled into the steep bank, made our beds on the slanting declivity at a place where it was impossible to pitch a tent, and went to sleep only to be awakened at night by showers of rain falling upon our upturned faces. We congratulated ourselves that we were in a place where the drainage was good.
In the shallow water near the shores of Lake Kluk-tas-si, especially where a little bar of pretty white sand put out into the banks of glacier mud, one could always find innumerable shoals of small graylings not over an inch in length, and our Indians immediately improvised a mosquito bar into a fish net, catching hundreds of the little fellows, which were used so successfully as bait with the larger fish of the lake that we finally thought the end justified the means.