Inland sea travel is the perfection of steamboating, but the rapidly-changing landscape of these wild Alaskan shores, rimmed with sharp volcanic peaks, at last wearies the senses, and one is forced to seek a brief intermission by finding rest in sleep, only, however, to again renew the charm with greater zest on the morrow.
CHAPTER VIII.
Steamship Corona and her Passengers.—The New Eldorado.—The Greed for Gold.—Alaska the Synonym of Glacier Fields.—Vegetation of the Islands.—Aleutian Islands.—Attoo our most Westerly Possession.—Native Whalers.—Life on the Island of Attoo.—Unalaska.—Kodiak, former Capital of Russian America.—The Greek Church.—Whence the Natives originally came.
Our journey through that portion of Alaska known as the Inland Sea was made in the steamship Corona, Captain Carroll, a commander who has had long experience in these waters. His pleasure seemed to lie in the degree of enjoyment which he could afford his passengers, and the amount of information which he was enabled to impart to them. There were on board the Corona the members of a large excursion party conducted by Raymond & Whitcomb of Boston, numbering some eighty persons. We have rarely seen together a large party of ladies and gentlemen embracing so many cultured and agreeable persons. They had already occupied some weeks in a tour of Mexico and southern California. It was exceedingly pleasant to see the courtesy and consideration exercised among them towards each other,—amenities which go so far to lighten the inevitable inconveniences of travel, and to enhance its enjoyments. Oftentimes friendships are formed under such circumstances which continue through every exigency to the very end of life.
Having reached latitude 54° 40′ (the fifty-four forty or fight of 1862), we come to the boundary line between British Columbia and the United States, Dixon Entrance being on the left and Fort Tongas on the right. Here the far-reaching Portland Canal, or more properly channel, penetrates the mainland for a great distance, precisely like the Norwegian fjords, presenting, with its various arms, stupendous watery cañons, whence arise mountain precipices thousands of feet high on either side of the deep narrow course, their heads shrouded in perpetual snow. This channel, or fjord, runs nearly due north, and forms a boundary line to its head between the English and United States possessions.
Opposite and just south of Fort Tongas lies Fort Simpson, on British soil, and close at hand is Metla-katla, where that self-sacrificing missionary, Mr. Duncan, gathered and established a village of a thousand Christian residents from the various savage tribes of the vicinity. By his individual effort, with almost miraculous success, he raised from the lowest depths of barbarous life a law-abiding, religious, industrious, and self-supporting community, who justly considered him their moral and physical savior. Official persecution drove Mr. Duncan from Metla-katla to the nearest available American island, namely, Annetta, lying some sixty miles northward. Eight hundred of these aborigines whom he had reclaimed from savage life and its terrible practices have followed him with their families, freely abandoning all their property and improvements at Metla-katla, and are now struggling to create for themselves a new and permanent home under the United States.
The Senate committee, whose members lately visited Alaska, made a call at Annetta, and “found,” as one of its members writes to the press, “the Indians living in an apparent condition of contentment, and engaged in almost all the pursuits of the whites. Their execution of artistic designs upon silver wrought by themselves into bracelets, rings, and all kinds of jewelry is marvelous. Baskets made in brilliant colors from stripped reeds constitute a beautiful and artistic employment of most of the women of the tribe. Their particular ambition is their anxiety to possess lands in severalty, or to have certain parcels set aside for them, that they may cultivate and hold in individual right. They ask that the whole of Gravine Island be given to their tribe. They found the state of the morals of the Indian women at Annetta, or, as they call it, New Metla-katla, far above the average of Indian women of this Territory. At Sitka the committee visited the habitations of the Indians, and learned much from personal intercourse as to their habits and needs. It was found that the companionship and virtue of the women is a matter of simply dollars and cents, and not difficult to negotiate for.”
“The committee were surprised to observe such an apparent freedom from rowdyism, quarrels, and disturbances of any character in any portion of the Territory, and remarked the entire absence of six-shooters about the person of a single individual, a feature always so prominent in the mining camps of the West.”
Until Alaska—The New Eldorado—came into our possession, it was from the persistent and adventurous fur-traders that our knowledge of the country was almost solely obtained. To most of the public it was (and is still to many) scarcely more than a geographical expression, occupying an insignificant space on the extreme northwest portion of the maps of North America, without any regard being paid to the scale on which the other States and Territories of the country are delineated. The fact nevertheless stares us in the face, that Alaska is nearly as large as the whole of the United States lying east of the Mississippi River, or three times as large as France. Within the last twenty years greater intelligence has been shown, in part through missionaries,—self-sacrificing and devout men,—who have sought by their teachings to abolish the wild superstitions of the natives, together with their cruel rites of Shamanism. Organized companies of explorers, as well as enterprising miners and prospectors, have also liberally furnished us with general information relating to this great outlying province, which has been found to be so full of mineral wealth and future promise. But so vast is the Territory, so varied the climate, and so undeveloped are the means of access to its several parts, that our information as regards detail is still very meagre. There are not ten miles of roadway in all of Alaska outside of the island of Kodiak; or rather, we should say, the island just opposite Kodiak, namely, Wood Island, which has a road constructed completely round it, covering a dozen miles or thereabouts. The only road at Sitka is not over a mile and a half in length, and these two are the only ones in this vast Territory. Two objects of commercial gain, the profitable fur-trade and seeking for gold, have been the great agents of progress and development thus far in Alaska. In a like manner it was the greed for gold that first sent the Spaniards to Mexico and Peru; in pursuit of the lucrative fur-traffic the French and Britons opened the way for civilization in Canada. Here in Alaska it will not be philanthropy,—some of whose noblest exponents are upon the ground,—but self-interest; not government enterprise, but the seeking for precious metals, which will gradually unfold the great wealth and resources of this extensive province, whose area is greater than the thirteen original States of this Union. The hope of commercial gain has doubtless done nearly as much for the cause of truth and progress as the love of truth itself. The course of multitudes, guided by the natural instinct of selfishness, will be overruled by a higher power for the general good.