After passing Johnny's village in descending the stream, and more perceptibly after leaving Charley's village, the country opens rapidly, and another day's drift of forty-two and a half geographical miles brought us to what an old trader on the lower river calls the "Yukon flat-lands," an expression so appropriate that I have adopted it, although I have never heard any other authority for its use.

While descending the stream on the 24th, late in the forenoon, we saw a large buck moose swim from one of the many islands to the mainland just back of us, having probably, as the hunter would say, "gotten our scent." I never comprehended what immense noses these animals have until I got a good profile view of this big fellow, and although over half a mile away, his nose looked as if he had been rooting the island and was trying to carry away the greater part of it on the end of his snout. The great palmated horns above, the broad "throat-latch" before, combined with the huge nose and powerful shoulders, make one think that this animal might tilt forward on his head from sheer gravity, so little is there apparently at the other end to counterbalance these masses. When the Russians were on the lower river these moose-noses were dried by them and considered great delicacies. A few winters ago the cold was so intense, and the snow covered the ground for so great a depth throughout the season, that sad havoc was played with the unfortunate animals, and a moose is now a rare sight below the upper ramparts of the river, as I was informed by the traders of that district. It is certainly to be hoped that the destruction has only been partial, so that this noble game may again flourish in its home, where it will be secure from the inroads of firearms for many decades to come. Not long since the little river steamer that plies on this stream for trading purposes, owned by the Alaska Commercial Company, could hardly make a voyage to old Fort Yukon and back without encountering a few herds of these animals swimming across the stream, and exciting were the bouts with them, often ending in a victory for the moose with the "Yukon" run aground on a bar of sand or gravel; but for some years not an animal has been seen by them. Formerly the meat they secured in this way, with what they procured from the Indians along the river, assured them of fresh food during the month or so they were absent from St. Michael's; but their entire dependence for this kind of fare has been thrown upon the salmon furnished by the natives, which is much more difficult to keep fresh during the short hot summer of the river.

This river steamer, the "Yukon," was daily expected by "Jo" Ladue, and upon it he intended to return to Nuklakayet, his winter station. I also hoped to fall in with it during the next week, as our civilized provisions were at a very low ebb and I wished to replenish them. During a great part of our drift on the 24th, we were accompanied by Jo and his three Indian allies, in their scow, who said they would keep us company until we met the "Yukon" steamer. While we were leisurely floating along, "Jo" saw a "short cut" in the river's bend, into which we could not row our ponderous craft, and down this he quickly disappeared, remarking that he would pick out a good camping place for us for the night.

Although we were well out of the high mountainous country, we could see the chain through which we had passed still bearing off to the left, the summits in many places covered with snow, long fingers of which extended down such mountain gullies as had a northern exposure. As we emerged from the hilly country the soil, for the first time, seemed to be thick and black wherever it was exposed to our eye by the caving in of the banks; and grass, always good, now became really luxuriant for any climate. In many places we saw grass ready to mow, were it not for the fact that even the largest prairies have an undergrowth of stunted brush which one might not observe at a distance in the high grass, but which is very perceptible in walking through it. The greatest obstacle to cattle raising in the Yukon valley would be the dense swarms of mosquitoes, although I understand that a couple of head of cattle were kept at old Fort Yukon for one or two summers. By burning off all timber and brush from large districts and a little judicious drainage it might be possible to encourage this industry with the hardier breeds of cattle, but at present the case is too remote to speculate upon.

I now remarked in many places along the flat river-bottoms—which had high banks, however—that the ground was covered, especially in little open prairies, with a tough sponge-like moss or peat. If the bank was at all gravelly, so as to give good drainage, and to allow of the river excavating it gradually, as is usual in temperate climes, this thick moss was so interwoven and compacted that it would not break or separate in falling with the river banks, but remained attached to the crest, forming great blankets of moss that overhung the shores a foot thick, as I have endeavored to represent on this page, a. b. representing the moss. Some of these banks were from fifteen to eighteen feet in height, and this overhanging moss would even then reach to the water, keeping the shores neatly sodded to the water's edge on the inclined banks, and hanging perpendicularly from those that projected over. Great jagged rents and patches were torn out of the hem of this carpet by the limbs and roots of drifting logs, thus destroying its picturesque uniformity. I suppose the reason why it was more noticeable in open spaces was that the trees and underbrush, and especially their roots, would, from the effect of undermining, carry the moss into the water with their heavy weight as they fell.

At half-past five o'clock we sighted a steamer down the river which we thought might be the Alaska Commercial Company's "Yukon" coming up around a low island of sand, but it proved to be a beached boat called the St. Michael's, lying high and dry, about ten or twelve feet above the present water level, on a long, low island of sand and gravel.

Some years before, a rival corporation to the Alaska Company, called, I believe, The Northern Trading Company, tried to establish itself on the Yukon River, (and elsewhere in Alaska, but the Yukon district only concerns us here), and trading houses were built in many places along the stream, most of them within a short distance, perhaps a mile or two, of those established by the Alaska Commercial Company. Fierce competition ensued, and I was told that the Indians got goods at wholesale prices in San Francisco, i.e., at almost infinitesimal prices compared with those they were accustomed to pay. The Alaska Company was finally victorious, but found matters considerably changed when the struggle was over. When they attempted to restore the prices of the old rÉgime, and to ask immediate payment—for both companies had given the Indians unlimited credit—such a hornet's nest was stirred up that ultimately the company was obliged to abandon nearly a half-dozen posts, all above Nuklakayet, for fear of the Indians, who required a Krupp steam-hammer to pound into their thick heads the reason why a man might sell them a pound of tobacco for ten cents to-day and to-morrow charge them ten dollars an ounce; especially when they have to pay for the latter from the products of the trap, and the former is put down in the account book in an accommodating way. The Northern Trading Company also put on the Yukon River this boat, the St. Michael's, a clumsily-built stern-wheeler that had wintered at Belle Isle, and on going down with the spring freshet had struck this bar, then under water, and as the river was falling she was soon left high in the air.

We camped for the night on the same bar, which I called St. Michael's Island, and about an hour afterward "Jo" and his scow came along and pulled up to camp on the opposite shore. He explained his delay—for I really thought he had passed us and was camping further down—by saying that he and his Indians had been hunting, and he produced two or three ducks, in the very prime of their toughness, as corroborative testimony, but I surmised that the true story was that "all hands and the cook" had gone to sleep, whereupon the scow had likewise rested on the soft bottom of some friendly sandspit. The remainder of the journey confirmed this suspicion.

Starting from Camp No. 38, on St. Michael's Island, the river, as the map shows, becomes one vast and wide network of islands, the whole country being as level as the great plains of the West, and we were fairly launched into the "Yukon flat-lands." As we entered this floor-like country our Chilkat Indians seemed seriously to think that we had arrived at the river's mouth and were now going out to sea; and I can readily imagine that even a white person, having no knowledge of the country, might well think so. There was an almost irresistible impression that beyond the low flat islands in front one must come in sight of the ocean.

As we started out into this broad, level tract, the mountains to the left, or west, still continued in a broken range that was thrown back at an angle from the river's general course, and projected into a sort of spur formed of a series of isolated peaks, rising squarely out of the flat land, and diminishing in size until they disappeared toward the north-west in a few sharp-pointed hillocks just visible over the high spruce trees of the islands. I called them the Ratzel range, or peaks, after Professor Frederick Ratzel, of Munich.

This flat character of the country continues for about three hundred miles further, and the river, unconfined by resisting banks, cuts numerous wide channels in the soft alluvial shores, dividing and subdividing and spreading, until its width is simply beyond reasonable estimation. At Fort Yukon, about a thousand miles from the mouth, its width has been closely estimated at seven miles, and at other points above and below it is believed to be twice or thrice that width. This breadth is measured from the right bank to the left across shallow channels and flat islands, whose ratio to each other is, on the whole, tolerably equal. Some of these islands are merely wide wastes, consisting of low stretches of sand and gravel, with desolate-looking ridges of whitened drift-timber, all of which must be under water in the spring floods, when the river in this region must resemble a great inland sea. In no place does this wide congeries of channels seem to abate its former swiftness a single jot, but the constant dividing and subdividing occasionally brought us to lanes so narrow and shallow that it seemed as though we could not get through with our raft, and more than once we feared we should have to abandon our old companion. For nearly three weeks we were drifting through these terribly monotonous flat-lands, never knowing at night whether or not we were camping on the main bank, and by far the most frequently camping on some island with nothing but islands in sight as far as the eye could see.

On the 25th we got under way quite early, and at 8:30 A. M. passed an Indian encampment of four very fine-looking tents, situated on an island, and here "Jo" Ladue told us he would stop and await the arrival of the Alaska Company's new steamer. I had suspicions that "Jo" did not like the pace we kept up, or rather that he did not relish being awakened whenever his scow sought the quiet of an island shore.

But a few minutes afterward there was a junction of several channels of the river, and we floated out into the lake-like expanse ahead with a vague feeling that so much water could hardly possess any current, but nevertheless we sped along at our old pace. This sheet of water was wider than the majority of the lakes at the head of the stream, and it was hard not to revert to them in thought, and imagine ourselves unable to move without a sail and a good wind abaft. Very soon an ominous line of drift timber appeared in our front, seeming to stretch from shore to shore as we approached it, and the great channel broke up into half a dozen smaller ones that went winding through sand-spits and log-locked dÉbris, down one of which we shot and were just breathing more freely when the same occurrence was repeated, and we slipped down a shallow branch that was not over fifty yards in width, only to bring up on a bar in the swift current, with less than a foot of water ahead over the spit that ran from the bar to the shore. Near the other shore was a channel so deep that we might have floated with ease, but to reach it again we should have to pry our vessel up stream against water so swift as almost to take us off our feet. Through this deep channel every thing was carried on our backs to the shore, and then commenced a struggle that lasted from ten o'clock in the morning until well past two in the afternoon; our longest and most trying delay on the trip, and which limited our day's travel to thirty-six miles in fourteen hours' work. Half as much would have satisfied us, however, for I think it was the only time on the trip when we made serious calculations regarding the abandonment of the raft and the building of another. There were other occasions when such an event seemed probable, but in some way we had managed to escape this necessity.

Our camp that evening was on a bank so high and solid that we conjectured it must be the main bank (of the eastern side). So steep was it that steps had to be cut in it in order to reach the top with our camping and cooking effects.

At this camp—39—and a few of the preceding ones we found rosebuds large and sweet enough to eat, and really a palatable change from the salt and canned provisions of our larder. They were very much larger than those we are accustomed to see in the United States proper and somewhat elongated or pear shaped; the increase in size being entirely in the fleshy capsule which was crisp and tender, while even the seeds seemed to be less dry and "downy," or full of "cotton," than those of temperate climes.

The mosquitoes were a little less numerous in the flat-lands, but, at first, the little black gnats seemed to grow even worse. Mr. Homan, who was especially troubled by these latter pests, had his hands so swollen by their constant attacks that he could hardly draw his fingers together to grasp the pencil with which he recorded his topographical notes. Dr. Wilson and I experimented with some oil of pennyroyal taken from the medicine chest, which is extensively used as an important ingredient of the mosquito cures advertised in more southern climes. It is very volatile and evaporates so rapidly that it was only efficacious with the pests of the Yukon for two or three minutes, when they would attack the spot where it had been spread with their old vigor. Mixed with grease it held its properties a little longer, but would never do to depend upon in this mosquito infested country.

I noticed that evening that banked or cumulus clouds, lying low along the horizon, invariably indicated mountains or hills stretching under them if all the other parts of the sky were clear. At that time we recognized the Romantzoff range by this means, bearing north-west, a discovery we easily verified the next morning when the air was clear in every direction. At no time while we were drifting through the flat-lands, when the weather and our position were favorable, were hills or mountains out of view, although at times so distant as to resemble light blue clouds on the horizon.

Although we were at the most northern part of our journey while in this level tract, actually passing within the Arctic regions for a short distance at old Fort Yukon, yet there was no part of the journey where we suffered so much from the down-pouring heat of the sun, whenever the weather was clear; and exasperatingly enough our greatest share of clear weather was while we were floating between the upper and lower ramparts.

All day on the 26th the current seemed to set to the westward, and we left island after island upon our right in spite of all our efforts, for we wanted to keep the extreme eastern channels so as to make old Fort Yukon, where we had learned that an Indian, acting as a trader for the Alaska Company might have some flour to sell. Our most strenuous efforts in the hot sun were rewarded by our stranding a number of times on the innumerable shoals in the shallow river, delaying us altogether nearly three hours, and allowing us to make but thirty-three miles, our course bringing us almost in proximity to the western bank. I knew that we must be but a short distance from old Fort Yukon, at which point I intended to await the river steamer's arrival so as to procure provisions, for I had only two days' rations left; but this day had been so unfavorable that I almost gave up all hope of making the Fort, expecting to drift by next day far out of sight of it. About eleven o'clock that night "Alexy," the half-breed Russian interpreter for Ladue, came into our camp in his canoe, saying that Ladue had gone on down to Fort Yukon that day, keeping the main right-hand channel which we had missed, and that we were now so far to the west and so near Fort Yukon that we might pass it to-morrow among the islands without seeing it unless we kept more to the right. After receiving this doleful information, which coincided so exactly with our own conclusions, we went to sleep, and "Alexy" paddled away down stream, keeping a strong course to the east, but it would have required Great Eastern's engines on board of our cumbersome raft in order for us to make it.

From the moment of our casting loose the raft, on the morning of the 27th, we commenced our struggle with the current to gain ground, or rather, water, to the eastward, often with double and treble complements of men at both oars. Point after point we successfully essayed, working like pirates after their prey; and fully a half dozen of these, I believe, were so closely passed across their upper ends that a score less of strokes would have allowed us to float down the western channel. Almost at the last minute we got such a straight away course to the right bank that looking backward it seemed as if we had ferried our way directly across the river, and as we rounded the last island Fort Yukon's old dilapidated buildings burst into view, in the very nick of time, too, for that particular island extended well below the site of the old fort, and we passed around it hardly a good hop, skip and a jump from its upper point. We could not suppress a cheer as the hard earned victory was won, for to verify the old adage that "it never rains but it pours" good luck, there at the bank was the river steamer "Yukon" and from her decks came a rattling volley of shots to welcome us and to which we replied almost gun for gun. A little more hard pulling and we landed the raft just above the buildings and about three or four hundred yards above the steamer, which we at once prepared to visit. The "Yukon" is quite a small affair compared with the river boats of the United States, but quite well built and well modeled. They spoke of it as a ten-ton boat, although I took it to be one of double or treble that capacity, its machinery being powerful enough to drive a vessel of five or six times that tonnage against any ordinary current, but very necessary for a boat of even the smallest size on such a swift stream as the Yukon. The machinery took up the greater portion of her interior and were it not for the upper decks, it would have been difficult to find room for her large crew. The moment I caught sight of the crew they seemed so like old acquaintances that I was on the point of probing my memory for the circumstances of our former meeting, when a second thought convinced me that it was only my familiarity with the Eskimo face that had produced the effect of a recognition. These Eskimos had been hired on the Lower Yukon, and but for their being a little more stolid and homely than those of north Hudson's Bay, I should have thought myself back among the tribes of that region. They make better and more tractable workmen than any of the Indians along the river, and in many other ways are superior to the latter for the white men's purposes, being more honest, ingenious and clever in the use of tools, while treachery is an unknown element in their character. The master of the "Yukon" was Captain Petersen, and the Alaska Company's trader was Mr. McQuestion, both of whom had been for many years in the employ of that company on the river. From the former I ascertained through information which he volunteered, that he had a large ten or twelve ton river schooner at the trading station of Nuklakayet, some three hundred miles further down the river to which I was welcome when I reached that point with the raft. After the "Yukon" had ascended the river as far as Belle Isle, he would return and would pick us up wherever found and tow the schooner or barka as it was called in the local language of the country, a sort of hybrid Russian vernacular. From long experience on the river, Captain Petersen estimated its current at about five miles an hour above old Fort Yukon for the short distance which he had ascended with the steamer; but probably four from there to Nuklakayet; three and a half to Nulato; and three below that until the influence of the low tides from Bering's Sea is felt. Of course this rate of speed varies somewhat with the season, but is the average during the period of navigation in July and August. He expected to overtake me about the 15th of August somewhere near Nulato, as he had orders to pull the St. Michael's off the gravel bar where she was lying, the Alaska Commercial Company having bought out all the effects of the rival concern after the latter had expended between half a million and a million of dollars without any reasonable remuneration for the outlay. This the captain thought would detain him a week or ten days, and if I could get as far as Nulato, or Anvik, it would save him towing the "barka" that far on its way to St. Michael's or "the redoubt," as they all call it on the river. Thus we should be doing each other a mutual favor. The "barka," however, had none of its sails, except a jib, and this circumstance, coupled with the head winds that we should be sure to encounter on the lower river at this reason, reduced us to find our motive power still in the current. Provisions were purchased in sufficient quantity to last as far as Nuklakayet, where we could select from a much more varied stock.

Our dead reckoning, as checked by the astronomical observations, showed the distance from the site of old Fort Selkirk to Fort Yukon to be four hundred and ninety miles, and two-tenths, (490.2); and the entire distance of the latter place from Crater Lake, at the head of the river, nine hundred and eighty-nine (989) miles; the raft journey having been twelve miles less. In running from Pyramid (Island) Harbor of Chilkat Inlet, the last point we had left which had been determined by astronomical instruments of precision, to Fort Yukon, the next such point, a distance of over a thousand miles, Mr. Homan's dead reckoning, unchecked the whole distance, was in error less than ten miles; and from Fort Selkirk, determined by sextant and chronometer—the latter regulated between the above two places—to Fort Yukon, the error was less than six miles. At this point we connected our surveys with the excellent one given to the lower river by Captain Raymond in 1869; although we continued our own as far as the Aphoon, or northern, mouth of the Yukon River.

When Russian America became Alaska, or to be precise, in 1867, that date found the Russians established as traders only on the lower river a considerable distance below the flat-lands, while in 1848 the Hudson Bay Company had established Fort Yukon within their territory, a port which they were still maintaining. Upon our accession, it was determined to fix the position of Fort Yukon astronomically, and if it should prove to be on Alaskan soil—west of the 141st meridian—the Hudson Bay Company employes would be notified to vacate the premises. This was done by Captain Raymond in 1869. In the course of this occupation a good map of the Yukon River was made from its mouth to Fort Yukon, which was published by the War Department, accompanied by a report. With this it may be said that the results of the expedition ceased, as that department of the government does not publish and sell maps made under its direction, and they therefore are practically deprived of circulation. When I asked Captain Petersen if he used maps in navigating the river, he said that he seldom did, as there were no good ones in existence for the permanent channels of the river, while the temporary channels were so variable that his old maps were of little service. He had never heard of the Raymond map being published, and on being shown one, seemed astonished that so good a map was in existence, and asked me to send him a copy, which I was unable to do, as I could not procure one at the proper department in Washington. The maps he had were those made by the Russians when they were in possession of the country, which are still the best of such as can be procured.

The Indians in and around old Fort Yukon are known to the traders as the Fort Yukon Indians, which is probably as good a name as any, as they are not entitled to be regarded as a distinct tribe (or even as part of one), in the ordinary acceptation of the word. The country of the flat-lands is not well stocked with game of the kind that would support any great number of Indians at all seasons, and as the river spreads over so wide an extent, the chances of catching fish are proportionately decreased, and altogether the flat-lands would be rejected by the natives for other locations. I was told by those who ought to know, and whose assertions seem to be borne out by other evidence, that there were no Indians who made this country their home until Fort Yukon was established in 1848, an event which attracted the usual number of Indians around the post who are always seen about a frontier trading station, many of whom made it their home. They came up the river, down the main stream, and down the great tributary, the Rat or Porcupine River which empties itself near the fort, so that the settlement was recruited by stragglers from several tribes, and it was for this reason that I spoke of them as not being a distinct tribe. The Indian who assumed the rÔle of chief, Senati, as he is called by the white people, a savage of more than ordinary authority and determination, came from the lower ramparts where there exists a village bearing his name, which he still visits. Since the abandonment of the post by the Alaska Company, his force of character has done much to hold together the handful of natives that still cling to the old spot; but with his death and the desertion of the place by white traders this part of the river will soon return to its former wildness. When the Hudson Bay Company came upon the river at the point where they built this fort, they felt safe from the encroachments of the Russians, although trespassing upon Russian soil, as the Yukon was supposed to flow northward, and, like the Mackenzie, to pour its waters into the polar sea. Old maps may still be found bearing out this idea,[2] the Colville being pressed into service as the conjectural continuation of the Yukon into the Arctic portion of Alaska.

The 27th and 28th were occupied in taking observations to rate and correct the chronometer, much of the first day being spent in company with the officers of the boat, who recounted their interesting adventures on the river and its adjacent regions, in which their lives had been spent. I recall an episode of Mr. McQuestion's early life which so well illustrates the extraordinary vigor of the voyageurs of the Hudson Bay Company in the British north-west territory that I shall briefly repeat it. His boyhood was spent in the northern peninsula of Michigan and the states and territories to the westward, until finally he found himself at old Fort Garry, then an important post of the Hudson Bay Company. Here he was brought into constant contact with the restless voyageurs, and from them he imbibed much of their adventurous spirit, and was imbued with a longing to visit the far north land of which they spoke. He heard of Athabasca as other lads might hear of California and Mexico and Peru, while the Mackenzie and Yukon resembled to his imagination some fabled El Dorado or Aladdin's dream. He longed to see these lands for himself, but he knew the hard work the voyageurs were compelled to endure. He had seen the bundles and bags and boxes of a hundred pounds that they were to carry on their backs around rapids too swift to pole or "track," and over the many portages and exchanges on their long journeys. He knew he was not equal to the work required, but with the enthusiasm of youth he determined to make himself equal to it by a course of physical training, and after several months presented himself to an agent of the company as a full-fledged voyageur. To his delight he was accepted and entered on their books at a monthly salary, that probably being the least important part to him at the time. The first party which started northward in the spring included young McQuestion in its number, the most enthusiastic of all. Days wore on and much of his enthusiasm was repressed by the hard experiences of the journey, but it was by no means destroyed. In a few days the other voyageurs began talking of the great portage, where every thing, canoes included, had to be carried on their backs around the swift rapids, and wishing that their task, the hardest they had to encounter in the northern regions, was well over. McQuestion rather regarded it in the light of variety, as a break from the monotony of weary paddling over still and "tracking" through swift water. At last the lower end of the great portage was reached at a small cascade, and as the great canoe in which the young voyageur was paddling was nearly at the lower end of the line, he could plainly see the indications ahead. The canoes came up and landed at the little rocky ledge, their one hundred pound bundles were thrown out on the bank, high and dry, and the canoe itself was dragged from the water to make room for the next. McQuestion saw the chief of the canoe throw a bundle on the first comer's back, and expected to see him start off over the trail to the upper end of the portage, said to be ten or twelve miles across, and running through a tanglewood with all kinds of obstructions occurring the whole way. As the man did not start off, however, McQuestion watched eagerly for the reason, and was astonished to see the chief put a second bundle of a hundred pounds upon the other for the packer to carry, a load under which he expected to see the poor fellow stagger or fall. He did not fall, however, nor even stagger, but wheeled in his tracks and started off at a good sharp run, and disappeared over the hill. In a few minutes he reappeared on the crest of another hill, still maintaining his rapid gait, and with half a dozen others following him on the trail, with each carrying the same weight, and proceeding at the same gait. His heart sank within him, and as he climbed the ledge of rock he felt almost like a criminal on the way to execution. He received his two bundles, started off, and managed to keep up his gait over the crest of the nearest hill, when he fell, spread out at full length over the first log he attempted to cross. He returned to the factor in charge of the expedition, and a compromise was made by which he paid to that functionary the amount per month he was to have received in order to accompany the party as a passenger. At one of the northern posts he obtained a situation more to his liking, and thus drifted into the company's employ, finally crossing over to the Yukon River, and transferring his allegiance to the Alaska Company when it succeeded his old masters.

On the forenoon of the 20th, the Yukon continued her voyage up the stream, having accomplished all the summer trading with the Fort Yukon Indians the day previous. I was present at an afternoon parley with them, and was greatly impressed at the patience exhibited and required by traders among these savages; a patience such as not one shopman in a thousand possesses, according to my experience, however great a haggler he may be. McQuestion had learned the art of patience from his old employers, probably the most successful bargainers with savages the world has ever seen. Indian No. 1 put in an appearance with a miserable lot of furs, and a more miserable story of poverty, the badness of the winter for trapping, the scarcity of animals and the inferiority of the pelts, his large family in need of support, his honesty with the company in the past, and a score of other pleas, the upshot of which was a request that he might be supplied with clothing and ammunition for another year in return for the pelts at his feet. The trader replies, setting a definite price in trading material for the amount of skins before him, and the "dickering" begins. After half an hour or an hour's talk of the most tiresome description, the discussion ends in the Indian accepting the exact amount the trader originally offered, or about one-tenth of his own demands. Indian No. 2, who has heard every word of the conversation, then comes forward with the same quality of furs and exactly the same story, the trade lasting exactly the same time, and with exactly the same result; and so on with all the others in turn. Even No. 12, of the dozen present, does not vary the stereotyped proceedings any more than an actor's interpretation of a part varies on the twelfth night of the piece. Then Indian No. 1 comes forward again with a package of furs of a better quality than the first he displayed, and solemnly affirms that these are the only ones he has left, and that if the trader will not give him enough clothing for himself and family, and enough ammunition to last through the winter in return for them, they must all go naked and perhaps starve for want of the means of procuring food. This story, with its continuation, lasts about half as long as the first, but ends in the same way, as the Indian's eloquence has about as much effect on the trader as it would on the proverbial row of stumps. The farce is repeated by all the Indians in turn, and is yet again repeated at least once before the entire transaction is over, during all of which time the white trader sits composedly on his stool, and gives a patient and unvarying answer to each in his turn, under provocation that would have put Job in a frenzy before the first circle was completed.

On the 29th of July we took an early departure, and about noon passed an Indian village of five or six tents and ten or a dozen canoes, which might have appeared uninhabited but for the dogs that surrounded the tents, nearly a score to every one, proving that their owners were either asleep or only temporarily absent. The dogs flocked down the beach and up the bank, and emitted such a chorus of unearthly howls that we were grateful to the current for hurrying us away. That day we drifted 50.5 (geographical) miles in a trifle over thirteen hours, showing but little diminution in the river's rate of speed. It was an exceedingly hot blistering day on the river, almost unbearable, and the heat, coupled with the clouds of mosquitoes, impelled the doctor to remark that it was clear to the casual observer that we were in the Arctic regions. About seven o'clock in the evening, the thermometer marking 80° Fahrenheit in the shade, we saw "sun-dogs," or parhelia, very plainly marked on either side of the western sun, a phenomenon I had so often observed in the Arctic winter and in Arctic weather elsewhere, as to seem incongruous during such tropical heat. A heavy rain shower came up about ten o'clock at night and continued at intervals until late the next morning.

"It is an ill wind that blows no one any good," and if the gnats and mosquitoes did keep us awake all night they allowed us to start two hours earlier than usual, and in spite of a gale in the afternoon that made it very difficult to steer well and to keep off the lee banks, we camped reasonably early and had forty-four miles to our credit in addition. This wind was very cold and disagreeable, with heavy black clouds overhead; a most decided change in the weather since the day before, but for the better, as the strong wind kept down the mosquitoes and gave us all a good night's rest.

The 31st was uneventful, and in fact it was only in the casual incidents of our voyage that we found any thing to interest us while floating through this region, a flat desert clothed with spruce trees, all of a uniform size, and monotonous in the extreme. We scored forty-five geographical miles and retired at night in a rain shower, which continued with such unabated fury next day that we remained in camp. A stroll that evening disclosed the distal extremity of a mastodon's femur on the gravel beach near camp, Mr. Homan finding a tooth of the same animal near by. For many years the scattered bones of this extinct animal have been found along the Yukon, showing that this region was once its home. When at Fort Yukon an Indian brought the tooth of a mastodon to a member of my party, and receiving something for it, probably more than he expected, told the white man that the entire skeleton was protruding from the banks of one of the islands, about a day's journey up the river. Our limited time and transportation forbade investigating it further. In a few years, I suppose, the bank will be excavated by the undermining river, and the bones swept away and scattered over many bars and beaches, for it is in such places that the greatest numbers are found, while a complete skeleton in situ is a rarity.

In spite of slight showers and a general "bad outlook," we started early next morning, and were very soon driven into a slough on the left (southern) bank by a strong north-west wind. Through this spot the current was so stagnant that we were over two hours in making a little less than two miles. At one time the head wind threatened to bring us completely to a standstill, so slight was our motive power. Nor was this our only episode of the same character. Several times the exasperating wind played us this trick, and when we camped for the night after twelve hours spent on the water, we could only reckon twenty-six miles to our credit. The event thoroughly established the fact that the central channels of the many which penetrate this flat district contain the swiftest currents, while along the main banks there are numerous water-ways open at both ends with almost stagnant water in them. About three in the afternoon we passed a double log house on the right bank with two or three small log caches mounted high in the air on the corner posts, and two graves, all of which seemed new in construction, although the place was entirely deserted. Indian signs of all kinds now began to appear as we approached the lower ramparts, although no Indians were seen. By noon the blue hills of the ramparts were seen to our left, and by the middle of the afternoon, we could make out individual trees upon them, and at half-past seven o'clock we camped on the last island in the great group of from two to ten thousand through which we had been threading our way so long, with the upper gates of the lower ramparts in full sight, about a mile or two distant.