ON ALASKAN SOIL.
The acquaintance between the Boy Scouts and Swiftwater Jim, which had
begun with Rand's rescue of the old Klondiker, ripened before many days of
the voyage had elapsed into something like warm friendship and the miner
became a wellspring of joy to the young men in the wealth of adventure
narrative that fell from his lips and the quiet humor of his views of
life. His removal by Captain Huxley, to the saloon deck on which they were
berthed, gave them constant opportunity for meeting him, and as the
novelty of the scenery and surroundings gradually wore off, they turned
more and more to his companionship and plied him incessantly with
cross-examination as to the peculiarities of the new land which they were
about to enter.
At one time in command of a whaler in Bering Sea waters, his ship had been
one of six crushed in the ice of the Arctic sea, the crews of which had
been forced to winter at Point Barrow, the most northerly point of the
United States, where the government had established a whaling relief
station.
The enormous burden thrown upon this relief station by the influx of so
great a number of dependents coming from the whalers, who had no means of
getting away, threatened starvation for all and only by the greatest good
fortune did word reach the government at Washington, which at once took
steps for their relief. Lieut. Jarvis of the Revenue Marine Service, who
was in the east at the time on furlough, from his ship, a revenue cutter
engaged in patroling Bering Sea to protect the seal fisheries, volunteered
to make the effort to relieve the starving men, although he was leaving
the bedside of a sick wife whom he might never see again. Bering Sea and
the Arctic are frozen over six months at a time, and the relief expedition
must be made over the frozen tundra and uninhabited snow waste, eighteen
hundred miles in extent, from the Seward Peninsula to the "top of the
continent," as Swiftwater Jim termed it.
The problem as to how to transport the food for these men over this great
expanse of country, barren of trails and almost impassible in places, was
solved by Lieutenant Jarvis and his aides. By assembling from the various
reindeer stations which the government had established in the Far North, a
large herd of reindeer which they drove the entire distance to Point
Barrow, they arrived just in time to relieve the hundreds of men who were
on the verge of starvation.
"I tell ye," said Swiftwater Jim, in telling the story to the boys, "I
have never seen anything on earth since that looked so good as them deer.
There we was, a dirty, unsightly mob so near to death that we had lost
about all resemblance to humanity, and not a single human feelin' left for
each other. It was every man for himself and mighty little that he could
do, then.
"That feller Jarvis was the man for the job. That relief expedition was
received very much as I hear explorers are met by the savagest tribes of
Africa, and if it hadn't been for the nerve of those three officers at the
head of it, they would have lost their lives and the provision they had
brought would not have lasted three weeks. But those fellows took command
at once; headed off a mutiny, distributed the provisions daily and for
months ran that gang, made up of the off-scourings of the seas, by reg'lar
army discipline.
"For the months before the ice broke up, and vessels could come after us,
he governed with a mighty stiff hand, and every man who was fed by
government relief, and thay wan't nothin' else, was compelled to live up
to regulations of cleanliness and daily exercise, which is the only thing
that will save a man's health in that deadly Arctic climate where the bill
o' fare is only about one line long, and a healthy body is the only thing
that will save a man's mind from that deadly depression that ends in
insanity. When the ships come finally, that mob of whaler men was cleaner
and healthier than they ever were in their lives before and they had a
mighty lot of love and respect for Jarvis and the officers with him.
"It was about the biggest sacrifice a man ever made, that voluntary trip
of Jarvis, and I believe that Congress, after thinkin' a long time about
it finally acknowledged it by votin' him some kind of a medal. As for me I
hain't been able to look a poor little reindeer in the face since."
With his vessel a splintered derelict in the ice of the Arctic sea,
Swiftwater had taken to mining and had covered a good part of Alaska in
his wanderings.
Col. Snow had noticed with considerable interest the growing intimacy
between his young charges and the miner and had taken occasion himself to
have several talks with the ancient "sourdough" as Swiftwater insisted on
calling himself. The Colonel had found among the army officers returning
to their posts in the North several old friends of his army days and had
taken the opportunity to make some inquiries as to the miner with
evidently satisfactory results. These army officers Col. Snow took
occasion to introduce to the Boy Scouts and the element of courtesy that
is a strong feature of the West Pointers' character showed itself in the
consideration given the boys by these grizzled men, several of whom had
won their spurs during Indian outbreaks in the West and later learned the
stern demands of war in Cuba and the Philippines.
Their journey was enlivened by many a good story of camp and field and
incidentally the officers evinced a strong curiosity in the organization
of the Boy Scouts about which they asked many questions.
The day the "Queen" arrived at Ketchikan, the first port in Alaska, Col.
Snow, after starting the boys on a sightseeing trip through the town, put
in some time in company with Swiftwater Jim in the office of the United
States Commissioner, who is practically a local judge. When all had
returned to the steamer that night, Col. Snow called the boys together in
the big saloon of the vessel for a talk.
"You know," said the army officer, "that after I have seen you and the
machinery disembarked in Skagway, I must leave you to carry out my mission
to Controllers Bay and Valdez, and that I shall not be able to join you in
the Yukon Country until later in the summer. It has been my purpose, of
course, to place you in charge of a competent manager who will really
command the expedition the rest of the way until the machinery is
installed on the timber land that I intend to exploit. Of course you will
be furnished with sufficient expert Indian labor to assist in navigating
the streams over which this freight must be transported, for there are no
roads, and water at this season of the year is the only transportation
available. What do you think of Swiftwater Jim for commander-in-chief,
guide, philosopher and friend to this expedition?"
"B-b-bully," exclaimed Pepper, adopting the vernacular of an
ex-President.
"The very man for the place if I understand what we are to do," commented
Rand.
"Faith, now we will see Alaska; and what we don't see, Swiftwater is the
man to tell us about," cried the enthusiastic Gerald.
"Well, if we can get him," said the cautious Don, "there's nobody we'd
like so well."
"I might as well tell you that it's all arranged," said the Colonel. "He
was the best man I could find for the work I want done, and I took the
first opportunity to arrange with him; but at the same time I am glad that
you are all so well satisfied.
"I must have you understand that Swiftwater will be the leader of the
party and in all things you will be under his direction. I do not think it
will be necessary for me to tell you that the discipline will be perhaps a
little more strict than it has been in the ranks of the patrol at home,
and while it will not be on an unrestricted army basis, there will be some
resemblance and I shall trust to your experience as Scouts to induce in
you cheerful acquiescence."
"It will be something like a campaign then," suggested Dick.
"It will be a good deal like a campaign," smilingly replied the Colonel,
"and while there will be much that is enjoyable and novel, there won't be
much peaches and cream about it. Plunging into a wilderness as you must,
you leave behind all the comforts and most of the sanitary safeguards of
civilization, and it is absolutely necessary for the preservation of your
health that you adopt certain rules of diet and comfort."
"Do we have to diet?" inquired Pepper, doubtfully, whose mind reverted to
certain milk and porridge days, imposed after an orgy of green fruit and
its consequent painful disturbances.
"I didn't use the word in the sense that you mean, Pepper," said Col.
Snow. "There will be plenty to eat and I hope well prepared, but you must
govern yourself as to how you deal with it. Food in most parts of Alaska
is a costly proposition, but I guess we shall have enough to go round
unless the wild life increases your already healthy appetites."
"I hae ma doots," said Don, falling into his Gaelic-accented English, as
he often did when he seemed to be wrestling with a problem, "if yon
appetite of Pepper's can increase much wi'out straining the capacity."
"Look after your own appetite," said Pepper, growing red, "I read once in
a book that four thousand years of oatmeal porridge, three times a day,
had wiped out every appetite and spoiled every stomach in Scotland."
"There, there," admonished Jack, "that'll be about all of that. You
fellows are about even now. The smallest sort of an appetite may prove to
be an inconvenience before we get out of Alaska."
"I want to say, Colonel," said Rand, rising and facing the army officer at
"attention," "that I think I speak for the whole patrol when I promise in
their names the most earnest fidelity and strict attention to rules and
regulations until our mission up here is finished."
"Yes, yes," echoed the Scouts, springing to their feet and saluting the
Colonel, who also rose and returned it with a smile of acknowledgment. At
the same moment Swiftwater Jim entered the saloon.
"Young men, your commander," said Colonel Snow, waving a hand toward the
miner. With one accord the patrol turned toward the grizzled Alaskan and
saluted. Jim turned red with pleasure and waved a knotted hand in
recognition.
"Glad to see ye, boys, but salutin' won't be necessary ev'ry time we meet.
I used ter be satisfied on shipboard if a man jumped about a foot high
every time I spoke real serious, but I guess we can get through this job
without much loud bossin'. I simply want ter sejest that I ain't very good
at argying, so I hope we shan't have much of that."
One by one, the boys shook hands with the miner in token of fealty, and
from that time until the steamer reached Skagway spent several hours a day
with him in what he called his "first class in gettin' on the job." The
most of this work included thorough instruction in the geography of
Southeastern Alaska and Southern Yukon territory, the Colonel's land being
located in the Canadian dominions. Especially was their attention drawn to
numerous waterways as shown on the maps, which must form the highways for
all transportation during the summer time, and knowledge of whose
location, size and tributaries formed a man's best safeguard in this
almost pathless wilderness.
A visit was paid to the hold, this time with the captain's permission, to
enable Swiftwater to estimate the amount of freight that was to be handled
and the best way of distributing it among the transports. The boys went
with him to learn something of their new duties in this connection.
"I move," said Rand, "that that earnest young sleuth, Mr. Jack Blake, be
appointed guide to this expedition to the dark and creepy hold. He knows
where everything is, for he has fallen over it all, I hear."
"He might meet Monkey Rae," said Dick with a mock shudder, "then think of
the carnage."
Dublin and the Raes, fearing Captain Huxley's possible report to the
authorities at Skagway, had "jumped the ship" as the commander of the
"Queen" expressed it at Ketchikan, the first port of call in Alaska, and
Dick's fears were therefore groundless, but Jack, who had learned the
lesson of taking a joke goodnaturedly grinned feebly, and readily dived
into the hatchway and down the ladder. The electric lights had been turned
on, and the hitherto Egyptian darkness of the hold had vanished. They
readily found their consignment, and the miner went over it carefully.
"What ye got here?" he asked, kicking the heavy case before referred to,
which the boys had brought along on their own initiative. "Pianny? Don't
believe we need any pianny, up Yukon way. There's plenty piannys in
Alaska, now, but I remember the first one that was brought in. It's up in
Dawson yet. It was brought in on the first rush in '98. Cost four hundred
dollars in the States and two thousand dollars to haul up from Skagway.
The last time I heard it, it was being mauled by a feenominon, who had a
patent pianny-playin' wooden arm on one side, and it sounded like a day's
work in a boiler factory at one end and a bad smash in a glass pantry at
the other. I heard some o' them educated Cheechakos talkin' about art, but
I didn't care for it much."
"It isn't a piano," said Gerald as the laugh subsided. "It's a little
enterprise of our own, and is to be put in storage in Skagway until we're
through with our work."
"Wa'al," replied the guide, as he tested its weight, "we don't have to
handle it then, and that's something of a load off my mind."
The next day when the boy Scouts awoke they found the vessel anchored in
the picturesque harbor of Skagway, the end of the "Inside Passage."