With Sack and Stock in Alaska

by Horatio George Broke

Saturday, the 25th.—Ned called us at five o’clock, and, after a hearty breakfast of fried salmon and corn-meal mush, of which latter we cooked a good quantity so as to be able to eat it cold in the canoe during the day, we got off at 7.30 with some difficulty, as the tide was ebbing, and the canoe kept sticking as we piled the stuff into her, and having to be moved down a little further. I did not envy Frank, who had to hold on to the stern of the canoe, which was bow on to the shore, for about half-an-hour, sometimes up to his shoulders in the icy surf, in order to keep her straight, and we were all more or less wet by the time we got off. Our frying-pan, which had long lost its handle, still had the remains of the salmon in it, and, while Shorty was trying to wash it in the sea, it slipped from his fingers and vanished for ever. This was a terrible blow, as all our bread was baked in it.

As we pulled to Cape Fairweather, clearing the point at half-past eight, I was able to do a little more to a sketch of Mount Fairweather, begun the night before. It bears a curious resemblance to Mount St. Elias, not only in its own shape, but also in that of the mountains immediately adjacent, having the same black ridge on the left, rising first into a Hump and then into a Huxley, but without the teeth on the left of the top of the latter, while on the right is a mountain wonderfully like Cook. A possible route from our last night’s camp for the ascent of Mount Fairweather would be through the bush to the glacier behind, along the course of the stream running into the sea close to the camping-place; then up the glacier for two easy days, or even one fair one, according to the state of the ice, and then right up the west arête; but the snow looked bad, and the rocks, though nowhere very steep, seemed ominously smooth.

A fine wind, increasing every moment, now sent us along at a grand pace, the water every now and then surging through the oar-holes, which we stopped as best we could by covering them with paddles. About seven to ten miles north of our camp is a very large glacier (the Grand Plateau?), of which the centre, covered with moraine, comes almost, if not quite, to the sea, while on either side is a stream of pure white ice. St. Elias was visible just over the point to the north of it, but we afterwards kept too close to the land to ever see it again, though it has been observed as far south as the entrance to Salisbury Sound, a distance of two hundred and eighty miles. As we got more to the south we could see that Fairweather’s ‘Hump’ was double-headed, while ‘Huxley’ looked very like the Rothhorn as seen from the Riffel. The west arête of Fairweather now seemed worse, there being a level jagged piece like the ‘Crête du Coq’ on the Matterhorn just before joining the main mass of the mountain. The upper part of the easternmost of the three southern arêtes looked feasible enough, but the bottom was of precipitous dark-brown rock, to all appearance very little broken. This arête would be reached by the glacier which runs into the northern arm of Lituya Bay.

The Indians now shouted out, ‘Schooner, schooner!’ and we were much excited, intending, if it should prove to be the ‘Alpha,’ to get some tinned luxuries and our mails from her, but we soon decided that it was only a canoe. We then lost sight of it for a bit, but came suddenly on it again, when it turned out to be only a floating spruce, to the huge amusement of my crew.

With a real good wind we went flying along finely, and passed the mouth of Lituya Bay at eleven o’clock. The narrow entrance was quite smooth, and we could easily have gone in. We reached the Great Pacific Glacier at 2.30; this has a sea-front of white ice a mile and a half long, but, though great pieces are constantly breaking off, there are no bergs, as the surf pounds them up directly. The wind now began to slacken, and we did not reach Astrolabe Point, near which are some hot springs frequented by the Indians, till half-past six, while at sunset the breeze disappeared altogether. Ned, with whom we, as passengers, never interfered in the management of his vessel, seemed undecided whether to go on all night or not, but the sunset had rather foreboded stormy weather, and he eventually headed for land. We pulled and paddled till ten o’clock, by which time it was quite dark, but the Indians found a little harbour known as Murphy’s Cove in a mysterious manner, and we tumbled out over sharp rocks to a tiny sandbeach, where we made a fire and had some coffee. Ned pitched his tent, Frank and Jack sleeping in the canoe, which was moored, while the rest of us lay about anywhere in the long rough grass. By the fire we found some porcupine quills, and there were other signs of Indians having been there recently.

Sunday, the 26th.—I woke the others at five; the sky was grey and threatening, and the wind seemed to be from the east. All our stores were in a big rubber sack, the mouth of which had not been tied up, and Jack, in getting it from the canoe, managed to drop into the sea the bags which contained the rice and oatmeal. We promptly made porridge with the wet portion of the latter, and put the rice near the fire to dry; it swelled rather, but there was not much of it, and it all got eaten before it went wrong. Ned’s big water-breaker had apparently once contained seal-oil, and the taste consequently imparted to the water was most loathsome, so that we were always careful to empty it out and fill it afresh before starting. For this purpose I went to a little stream only a yard or two wide, which ran into the corner of the harbour, and found it perfectly choked with salmon; in the first pool, which was about as big as a large hip-bath, were between twenty and thirty, varying from ten to twenty-five pounds in weight. In the stream and on the edges were so many dead and dying ones, that the water did not look tempting, but it was the best that could be had.

We got off at 7.30, passing out by the canoe entrance, where we had tried to come in the night before, but had found the tide too low. We only just cleared the bar now by those of the men who had gum-boots on getting into the water and shoving. We pulled out through small islets of rock, but as we got to sea a strong squally east wind came on, and we had to take shelter at the Indians’ usual landing-place at Cape Spencer itself, after going about five miles. The cape is rather like a four-or five-pronged fork, long promontories of rock running out, with very narrow bays between. We tried the most sheltered of these, but found too little water at the entrance, and had to go on to the next, which was a good deal more exposed.

We got ashore at half-past nine, and as it was beginning to rain, we pitched our tent on the shingle, after which I went with Ned to the river, which was about a quarter of a mile off and ran into the bay that we had first tried to enter. It was a nice clear stream from ten to twenty yards wide, and full of salmon which fled before us, raising a great wave in the water. He speared ten in about twenty minutes, but they were all dogs but two. A great argument is at present raging in America as to whether these dogs, which have white flesh, are spent salmon or not; personally, I do not think they are, as at the mouth of this river there was a considerable fall at low water, and I saw there the doggiest of dogs waiting for the tide to come up so that they might ascend the river. When I returned Shorty and Lyons were asleep, but Finn cooked me some lunch. He told me that the Tlinkits make hoolachan oil by stacking the fish in a canoe till they are rotten, they then add a little water to keep the canoe from burning, and pile heated rocks on the mass, drawing off the oil through a plug-hole at the bottom.

In the afternoon it rained off and on, and the wind rather went down, but it would have been very bad in Cross Sound, and, though I think we might have got over, it would have been very risky to try, as we might so easily have been blown out to sea. We now made the discovery that our bacon had gone rancid and was quite uneatable, though the grease could be used for cooking. Though nothing would induce the white men to touch it, I had found that boiled salmon-roe, if well cleaned, was most excellent, so I prepared a piece and laid it on a stone, but, when I turned round a few minutes later, I saw a great raven flying off with it. I got some more later, as Finn and the Indians went to the river and speared and shot a lot of fish, only bringing back the good ones. They speared a salmon-trout of five or six pounds, but they threw each fish on the bank as they got it, to be picked up on the way down, and somehow missed this one, so I never saw it. About four o’clock the sun came out; we seemed to be on the edge of the bad weather, as to the north and west it was fine and clear, but thick and grey to the south, towards which quarter our cove faced. In the evening it turned grey again and began to rain, so, after a supper of rice soup and boiled fish, we turned in early.

Monday, the 27th.—There was a lot of rain in the night, and more wind, so that the Indians had to unload and pull up the canoe, in which Ned was sleeping. In the morning there was plenty of blue sky to the north, but the same strong east wind kept us prisoners. At breakfast our scanty store of sugar came to an end. This didn’t affect me much, but the men were grieved at having to eat their porridge plain. The Siwashes now discovered frogs in the vegetation where they had pitched their tent. They are very superstitious about these reptiles, whose image often appears on their totem-poles, and accordingly moved their tent down to ours, though at the same time they seemed to consider it rather a good joke. I borrowed Finn’s gum-boots and went up the river with the spear, which had no barb, so that it was not very easy to secure the fish when struck. The Indians used to flip them out on to the bank, but my wrists were not strong enough for that with a thick twelve-foot pole, and I had to hold my captive down till I could shorten the spear, so sundry escaped, but I got eight or ten, following the river up for about a mile to where it got wider and shallower, and some Indians had at one time constructed a barrier and trap, now very dilapidated, with twigs and branches.