The Kowak Breaking Up.
May 24.—The Kowak is breaking up and it is a tremendous sight. The water has risen until it is on a level with the bank on this side, and on the opposite side it is spreading out over the tundras. It is covered completely from side to side with a crunching, grinding mass of ice from three to five feet thick. Yesterday there was a jam on a sand-bar below and the ice course was stopped. Then that from above came down with force, crushing and piling into great ridges of blue and green blocks from ten to fifteen feet in height. There must be a tremendous momentum in a moving field of ice. In one place a field many yards in diameter was forced up a steep bank until it toppled over on itself. The banks are plowed by the resistless stream and trees are broken off like threads.
Indian Charley borrowed our kyak, which belongs to Rivers, three days ago to go up and look after a birch canoe which he wanted to carry out of reach of the ice. He was only going as far as the Guardian Camp, and there was plenty of water along the edges there. He was expected back the same day, but has not returned yet. We fear he has lost his life. His father, an old, withered man, who smoked himself last winter when Charley was sick, walks the river bank all day watching, and yesterday afternoon cried and howled a long time, mourning "Kayuruk" who, he said, was surely "mucky" (dead). I saw a birch canoe yesterday crushed and lying on a passing cake of ice.
If this was Charley's he must have met with misfortune. One would think that a native, who has experienced many such occurrences, would know enough to keep out of harm's way. Night before last a couple of the Iowa boys spent two or three hours tramping through the swamp looking for ducks which they kept hearing. But they were not able to catch sight of the authors of the numerous "quacks," which always lured them to greater distance. To-day, after telling everyone of the strange birds, the boys are being "joshed" in true camp fashion. The bullfrogs are appearing in every pond and to-day one has begun his warble in a pool a few feet from the door. We did not expect to see frogs so far north. I fail to see how they resemble the quacking of ducks, but some imagine the sound to be the same. The first mosquitoes are abroad, just a few, a sort of "foretaste," according to Scripture. The birds are arriving in large numbers, like a stampede, and the woods are full of the songs of robins, thrushes, sparrows and warblers. I am working hard, too.
May 31.—Oh, but spring is lovely! I am sure I never spent three such happy weeks, and I have been happy all my life. Yet I have been working hard, some days until I was tired enough to drop. Last week I went up to the mountains and was gone forty-three hours, with only about one hour's sleep. We tramped fifteen miles across the tundra with heavy rubber boots on, sinking into the moss and among the "nigger heads" every step. And then through streams, and snow, and tangles of brush. The second day it rained heavily and we started home at 7 p. m., tramping until midnight, when we reached a point where we had left our boat in a slough about two miles below on the opposite side of the Kowak. While we had been gone the river had fallen and the heavy boat was high and dry. We had to drag it through a narrow channel over mud and grass a hundred yards to the river. And then there was a stiff east wind and a swift current to cross the river against, and we finally had to tow up to the Landing. There were four of us, including Dr. Coffin, who has been my companion in many of these bird hunts, so soon, alas! to be over. I was so tired when I got in that I fell asleep half undressed and without supper. But I obtained what I went for, and it was worth the hardships—white-winged crossbill's nests. Young, an Iowa man who was with us, fell to his chest in a narrow stream of ice water, and we were all soaked from the rain and dripping under-brush.
The river is entirely free of ice now and people are starting down. Many are passing every day, but they will be unable to go farther than the delta, for the Sound doesn't clear earlier than July 1.
We have heard that the "Helen" is all right and is expected down in a day or two. She may get stuck on a sand-bar. If so I shall have a week longer for the birds. We have been packing all day. I have a good deal of stuff in bulk, though not heavy. I wouldn't blame the boys if they "kicked." We may have to make two trips from here down. We learned that our barge, which we left last fall on the bank of the Squirrel River eighty miles below us, was burned last winter, so our carrying capacity is limited. The steamer "Riley" has been repaired. She came up as far as the Hanson Camp yesterday. Indian Charley has turned up all safe. He has been down to a village below, gambling for another wife.
According to the Eskimos I am to die before the snow is all melted off, because I robbed that jay's nest. Grass is springing up, and last night, while I was strolling through the woods, I found a patch of crocuses. The woods were beautiful, the long, deep shadows contrasting with the yellow sunlight. The silence was intense, and yet there were many sounds—the quavering song of the thrush, breaking out and then dying back; the chorus of frogs from a distant pond, and the occasional demoniacal laugh of a loon. Yet it was silence broken in pieces. The scene from the sand-dunes north across the river was most beautiful. I wish I were able to depict the scene as I perceived it and the indescribable sensations it awakened. I wonder if I were the same age as Uncle Jimmy if I would be impressed the same way. It is something for me to remember all my life, this wonderful winter on the mighty Kowak. And I must bid it "Good-by."
We had a regular thunder storm to-day, with a heavy shower which set the roof to leaking, in spite of the tents stretched over it. Dr. Coffin has inaugurated a new decoration. It denotes rank of vice-president of the L. B. A. M. & T. Co. A double row of safety pins up his shirt front. There are only three of illustrious company at present in the "Penelope" cabin, but all the more need of distinctive decorations.
B., the partially demented individual who might have died of scurvy last winter if we hadn't drawn up his "will" for him, is the source of amusement to us, with his various tricks. He spends most of his time on the river bank watching for passing boats. He hails everyone with a mixed set of questions; first, "Have you any white lead for sale?" second. "Did you have the scurvy?" third, "Where'd you come from?" etc., until the boat is out of hearing. B. has a skiff he is very proud of, and he threatens anyone who touches it. I am on very good terms with him and he tells me whenever he sees a goose on the river (usually it is a loon). He makes a noise in his throat like a chicken disturbed after it has gone to roost. I do not know what will become of him. He is perfectly harmless.