After passing the lighthouse on the eastern end of Vancouver Island,
Alaskan steamers continue on a northerly course and enter the Gulf of
Georgia through Active Pass, between Mayne and Galiana islands. This
pass is guarded by a light on Mayne Island, to the steamer's starboard,
going north.
The Gulf of Georgia is a bold and sweeping body of water. It is usually
of a deep violet or a warm purplish gray in tone. At its widest, it is
fully sixty miles--although its average width is from twenty to thirty
miles--and it rolls between the mainland and Vancouver Island for more
than one hundred miles.
The real sea lover will find an indescribable charm in this gulf, and
will not miss an hour of it. It has the boldness and the sweep of the
ocean, but the setting, the coloring, and the fragrance of the
forest-bordered, snow-peaked sea. A few miles above the boundary, the
Fraser River pours its turbulent waters into the gulf, upon whose dark
surface they wind and float for many miles, at sunrise and at sunset
resembling broad ribbons of palest old rose crinkled over waves of
silvery amber silk. At times these narrow streaks widen into still pools
of color that seem to float suspended over the heavier waters of the
gulf. Other times they draw lines of different color everywhere, or
drift solid banks of smoky pink out to meet others of clear blue, with
only the faintest thread of pearl to separate them. These islands of
color constitute one of the charms of this part of the voyage to
Alaska; along with the velvety pressure of the winds; the picturesque
shores, high and wooded in places, and in others sloping down into the
cool shadowy bays where the shingle is splashed by spent waves; and the
snow-peaks linked above the clouds on either side of the steamer.
Splendid phosphorescent displays are sometimes witnessed in the gulf,
but are more likely to occur farther north, in Grenville, or one of the
other narrow channels, where their brilliancy is remarkable.
Tourists to whom a whale is a novelty will be gratified, without fail,
in this vicinity. They are always seen sporting about the
ships,--sometimes in deadly conflict with one another,--and now and then
uncomfortably near.
In December, 1907, an exciting battle between a whale and a large buck
was witnessed by the passengers and crew of the steamer _Cassiar_, in
one of the bays north of Vancouver, on the vessel's regular run from
that city to northern ports.
When the _Cassiar_ appeared upon the scene, the whale was making furious
and frequent attacks upon the buck. Racing through the water, which was
lashed into foam on all sides by its efforts, it would approach close to
its steadily swimming prey and then disappear, only to come to the
surface almost under the deer. This was repeated a number of times,
strangely enough without apparent injury to the deer. Again, the whale
would make its appearance at the side of the deer and repeatedly
endeavor to strike it with its enormous tail; but the deer was
sufficiently wise to keep so close to the whale that this could not be
accomplished, notwithstanding the crushing blows dealt by the monster.
The humane passengers entreated the captain to go to the rescue of the
exhausted buck and save it from inevitable death. The captain ordered
full speed ahead, and at the approach of the steamer the whale curved
up out of the water and dived gracefully into the sea, as though making
a farewell, apologetic bow on its final disappearance.
Whereupon the humane passengers shot the helpless and worn-out buck at
the side of the steamer, and he was hauled aboard.
It may not be out of place to devote a few pages to the average tourist.
To the one who loves Alaska and the divinely blue, wooded, and
snow-pearled ways that lead to its final and sublime beauty, it is an
enduring mystery why certain persons--usually women--should make this
voyage. Their minds and their desires never rise above a whale or an
Indian basket; and unless the one is to be seen and the other to be
priced, they spend their time in the cabin, reading, playing cards, or
telling one another what they have at home.
"Do you know," said one of these women, yawning into the full glory of a
sunset, "we have sailed this whole day past Vancouver Island. Not a
thing to be seen but it and this water you call the Gulf of Georgia! I
even missed the whales, because I went to sleep, and I'd rather have
seen them than anything. If they don't hurry up some towns and
totem-poles, I'll be wishing I'd stayed at home. Do you play five
hundred?"
The full length of the _Jefferson_ was not enough to put between this
woman and the woman who had enjoyed every one of those purple
water-miles; every pearly cloud that had drifted across the pale blue
sky; every bay and fiord indenting the shore of the largest island on
the Pacific Coast; every humming-bird that had throbbed about us,
seeking a rose at sea; every thrilling scent that had blown down the
northern water-ways, bearing the far, sweet call of Alaska to senses
awake and trembling to receive it; who had felt her pulses beating full
to the throb of the steamer that was bearing her on to the land of her
dreams--to the land of Far Delight.
If only the players of bridge and the drinkers of pink tea would stay at
home, and leave this enchanted voyage for those who understand! There be
enough of the elect in the world who possess the usual five senses, as
well as that sixth sense which is of the soul, to fill every steamer
that sails for Alaska.
Or, the steamship companies might divide their excursions into
classes--some for those who love beauty, and some for those who love
bridge.
For the sea lover, it is enough only to stand in the bow of a steamer
headed for Alaska and hear the kiss and the rippling murmur of the waves
as they break apart when the sharp cut-water pierces them, and then
their long, musical rush along the steamer's sides, ere they reunite in
one broad wake of bowing silver that leads across the purple toward
home.
The mere vibration of a ship in these still inland seas is a physical
pleasure by day and a sensuous lullaby at night; while, in summer, the
winds are so soft that their touches seem like caresses.
The inlets and fiords extending for many miles into the mainland in this
vicinity are of great beauty and grandeur, many winding for forty or
fifty miles through walls of forestation and snow that rise sheer to a
height of eight or ten thousand feet. These inlets are very narrow,
sometimes mere clefts, through which the waters slip, clear, still, and
of deepest green. They are of unknown depth; the mountains are covered
with forests, over which rise peaks of snow. Cascades are numerous, and
their musical fall is increased in these narrow fastnesses to a roar
that may be heard for miles.
Passing Burrard Inlet, on which the city of Vancouver is situated, the
more important inlets are Howe, Jervis, from which Sechelt Arm leads
southward and is distinguished by the wild thunder of its rapids; Homery
Channel, Price Channel, which, with Lewis Channel on the west, forms
Redonda Island; Bute Inlet, which is the most beautiful and the most
important; Knight, Seymour, Kingcome, and Belize inlets.
The wild and picturesque beauty of these inlets has been praised by
tourists for many years. The Marquis of Lorne was charmed by the scenery
along Bute Inlet, which he extolled. It is about fifty miles in length
and narrows in places to a width of a half-mile. The shores rise in
sheer mountain walls, heavily forestated, to a height of seven and eight
thousand feet, their snowy crests overhanging the clear, green-black
waters of the narrow fiord. Many glaciers stream down from these peaks.
The Gulf of Georgia continues for a distance of one hundred miles in a
northwesterly direction between the mainland and Vancouver Island.
Texada, Redonda, and Valdes are the more important islands in the gulf.
Texada appears on the starboard, opposite Comox; the narrow strait
separating it from the mainland is named Malaspina, for the Italian
explorer. The largest glacier in the world, streaming into the sea from
Mount St. Elias, more than a thousand miles to the northwestward from
this strait, bears the same name.
Texada Island is twenty-eight miles long, with an average width of three
miles. It is wooded and mountainous, the leading peak--Mount
Shepard--rising to a height of three thousand feet. The lighthouse on
its shore is known as "Three Sisters Light."
Along the shores of Vancouver Island and the mainland are many ranches
owned and occupied by "remittance men." In these beautiful, lonely
solitudes they dwell with all the comforts of "old England," forming new
ties, but holding fast to old memories.
It is said that the woman who should have one day been the Queen of
England, lived near the city of Vancouver a few years ago. Before the
death of his elder brother, the present Prince of Wales passionately
loved the young and beautiful daughter of Admiral Seymour. His
infatuation was returned, and so desperately did the young couple plead
with the present King and the Admiral, that at last the prince was
permitted to contract a morganatic marriage.
The understanding and agreement were that, should the prince ever become
the heir to the throne of England, neither he nor his wife would oppose
the annulment of the marriage.
There was only one brief year of happiness, when the elder brother of
the prince died, and the latter's marriage to the Princess May was
demanded.
No murmur of complaint was ever heard from the unhappy morganatic wife,
nor from the royal husband; and when the latter's marriage was
solemnized, it was boldly announced that no bar to the union existed.
Here, in the western solitude, lived for several years--the veriest
remittance woman--the girl who should now, by the right of love and
honor, be the Princess of Wales; and whose infant daughter should have
been the heir to the throne.
To Vancouver, a few years ago, came, with his princess, the Prince of
Wales. The city was gay with flags and flowers, throbbing with music,
and filled with joyous and welcoming people. Somewhere, hidden among
those swaying throngs, did a pale young woman holding a child by the
hand, gaze for the last time upon the man she loved and upon the woman
who had taken her place? And did her long-tortured heart in that hour
finally break? It is said that she died within a twelvemonth.
Passing Cape Mudge lighthouse, Discovery Passage, sometimes called
Valdes Narrows, is entered. It is a narrow pass, twenty-four miles long,
between Vancouver and Valdes islands. Halfway through it is Seymour
Narrows, one of the most famous features of the "inside route," or
passage, to Alaska. Passengers are awakened, if they desire, that they
may be on deck while passing through these difficult narrows.
The Indian name of this pass is Yaculta.
"Yaculta is a wicked spirit," said the pilot, pacing the bridge at four
o'clock of a primrose dawn. "She lives down in the clear depths of these
waters and is supposed to entice guileless sailors to their doom.
Yaculta sleeps only at slack-tide, and then boats, or ships, may slip
through in safety, provided they do not make sufficient noise to awaken
her. If they try to go through at any other stage of the tide, Yaculta
stirs the whole pass into action, trying to get hold of them. Many's the
time I've had to back out and wait for Yaculta to quiet down."
If the steamer attempts the pass at an unfavorable hour, fearful seas
are found racing through at a fourteen-knot speed; the steamer is flung
from side to side of the rocky pass or sucked down into the boiling
whirlpools by Yaculta. The brown, shining strands of kelp floating upon
Ripple Reef, which carries a sharp edge down the centre of the pass, are
the wild locks of Yaculta's luxuriant hair.
Pilots figure, upon leaving Seattle, to reach the narrows during the
quarter-hour before or after slack-tide, when the water is found as
still and smooth as satin stretched from shore to shore, and not even
Yaculta's breathing disturbs her liquid coverlet.
Many vessels were wrecked here before the dangers of the narrows had
become fully known: the steamer _Saranac_, in 1875, without loss of
life; the _Wachusett_, in 1875; the _Grappler_, in 1883, which burned in
the narrows with a very large loss of life, including that of the
captain; and several less appalling disasters have occurred in these
deceptive waters.
Three miles below Cape Mudge the tides from Juan de Fuca meet those from
Queen Charlotte Sound, and force a fourteen-knot current through the
narrows. The most powerful steamers are frequently overcome and carried
back by this current.
Discovery Passage merges at Chatham Point into Johnstone Strait. Here
the first Indian village, Alert Bay, is seen to starboard on the
southern side of Cormorant Island. These are the Kwakiutl Indians, who
did not at first respond to the advances of civilization so readily as
most northern tribes. They came from their original village at the mouth
of the Nimpkish River, to work in the canneries on the bay, but did not
take kindly to the ways of the white man. A white child, said to have
been stolen from Vancouver, was taken from these Indians a few years
ago.
Some fine totem-poles have been erected here, and the graveyard has
houses built over the graves. From the steamer the little village
presents an attractive appearance, situated on a curving beach, with
wooded slopes rising behind it.
Gorgeous potlatches are held here; and until the spring of 1908 these
orgies were rendered more repulsive by the sale of young girls.
[Illustration: Copyright by E. A. Hegg, Juneau
HOWKAN]
Dr. Franz Boas, in his "Kwakiutl Texts," describes a game formerly
played with stone disks by the Kwakiutls. They also had a myth that a
game was played with these disks between the birds of the upper world
and the myth-people, that is, "all the animals and all the birds." The
four disks were called the "mist-covered gambling stone," the "rainbow
gambling stone," the "cloud-covered gambling stone," and the "carrier of
the world." The woodpecker and the other myth-birds played on one side;
the Thunder-bird and the birds of the upper air on the other. The
contestants were ranged in two rows; the gambling stones were thrown
along the middle between them, and they speared them with their beaks.
The Thunder-bird and the birds of the upper air were beaten. This myth
is given as an explanation of the reason for playing the game with the
gambling stones, which are called laelae.
The Kwakiutls still play many of their ancient and picturesque gambling
games at their potlatches.
Johnstone Strait is fifty-five miles long, and is continued by Broughton
Strait, fifteen miles long, which enters Queen Charlotte Sound.
Here is a second, and smaller, Galiana Island, and on its western end is
a spired rock which, some historians assert, may be "the great headland
or island with an exceeding high pinnacle or spired rock thereon," which
Juan de Fuca claimed to discover, and which won for him the charge of
being an "audacious guesser" and an "unscrupulous liar." His believers,
however, affirm that, having sailed for twenty days in the inland sea,
he discovered this pinnacle at the entrance to what he supposed to be
the Atlantic Ocean; and so sailed back the course he had come, believing
himself to have been successful in discovering the famed strait of
Anian. Why Vancouver's mistakes, failures, and faults should all be
condoned, and Juan de Fuca's most uncompromisingly condemned, is
difficult to understand.
Fort Rupert, on the northern end of Vancouver Island, beyond Broughton
Strait, is an old Hudson's Bay post, situated on Beaver Harbor. The fort
was built in 1849, and was strongly defended, troubles frequently
arising from the attacks of Kwakiutl and Haidah Indians. Great
potlatches were held there, and the chief's lodge was as notable as was
the "Old-Man House" of Chief Seattle. It was one hundred feet long and
eighty feet wide, and rested on carved corner posts. There was an
immense wooden potlatch dish that held food for one hundred people.
Queen Charlotte Sound is a splendid sweep of purple water; but tourists
do not, usually, spend much time enjoying its beauty. Their berths
possess charms that endure until shelter of the islands is once more
assured, after the forty miles of open exposure to the swell of the
ocean which is not always mild, notwithstanding its name. Those who miss
it, miss one of the most beautiful features of the inland voyage. The
warm breath of the Kuro Siwo, penetrating all these inland seas and
passages, is converted by the great white peaks of the horizon into
pearl-like mist that drifts in clouds and fragments upon the blue
waters. Nowhere are these mists more frequent, nor more elusive, than in
Queen Charlotte Sound. They roll upon the sparkling surface like
thistle-down along a country lane--here one instant, vanished the next.
At sunrise they take on the delicate tones of the primrose or the
pinkish star-flower; at sunset, all the royal rose and purple blendings;
all the warm flushes of amber, orange, and gold. Through a maze of pale
yellow, whose fine cool needles sting one's face and set one's hair with
seed-pearls, one passes into a little open water-world where a blue sky
sparkles above a bluer sea, and the air is like clear, washed gold. But
a mile ahead a solid wall of amethyst closes in this brilliant sea; and
presently the steamer glides into it, shattering it into particles that
set the hair with amethysts, instead of pearls. Sometimes these clear
spaces resemble rooms walled in different colors, but ceiled and floored
in blue. Other times, the whole sound is clear, blue, shining; while
exquisite gossamers of changeful tints wrap and cling about the islands,
wind scarfs around the green hills, or set upon the brows of majestic
snow-monarchs crowns as jewelled and as evanescent as those worn by the
real kings of the earth. Now and then a lofty fir or cedar may be seen
draped with slender mist-veils as a maiden might wind a scarf of
cobwebby lace about her form and head and arms--so lightly and so
gracefully, and with such art, do the delicate folds trail in and out
among the emerald-green branches of the tree.
It is this warm and excessive moisture--this daily mist-shower--that
bequeaths to British Columbia and Alaska their marvellous and luxuriant
growth of vegetation, their spiced sweetness of atmosphere, their
fairness and freshness of complexion--blending and constituting that
indescribable charm which inspires one, standing on the deck of a
steamer at early dawn, to give thanks to God that he is alive and
sailing the blue water-ways of this sublime country.
"I don't know what it is that keeps pulling me back to this country,"
said a man in the garb of a laborer, one day. He stood down in the bow
of the steamer, his hands were in his pockets, his throat was bared to
the wind; his blue eyes--sunken, but burning with that fire which never
dies in the eyes of one who loves nature--were gazing up the pale-green
narrow avenue named Grenville Channel. "It's something that you can't
exactly put into words. You don't know that it's got hold of you while
you're up here, but before you've been 'outside' a month, all at once
you find it pulling at you--and after it begins, it never lets up. You
try to think what it is up here that you want so; what it is keeps
begging at you to come back. Maybe there ain't a darn soul up here you
care particular about! Maybe you ain't got an interest in a claim worth
hens' teeth! Maybe you're broke and know you'll have to work like a
go-devil when you get here! It don't make any difference. It's just
Alaska. It calls you and calls you and calls you. Maybe you can't come,
so you keep pretending you don't hear--but Lord, you do hear! Maybe
somebody shakes hands as if he liked you--and there's Alaska up and
calling right through you, till you feel your heart shake! Maybe a
phonograph sets up a tune they used to deal out at Magnuson's roadhouse
on the trail--and you hear that blame lonesome waterfall up in Keystone
Canyon calling you as plain as you hear the phonograph! Maybe you smell
something like the sun shining on snow, all mixed up with tundra and
salt air--and there's double quick action on your eyes and a lump in
your throat that won't be swallowed down! Maybe you see a white
mountain, or a green valley, or a big river, or a blue strait, or a
waterfall--and like a flash your heart opens, and shuts in an ache for
Alaska that stays!... No, I don't know _what_ it is, but I do know _how_
it is; and so does every other poor devil that ever heard that something
calling him that's just Alaska. It wakes you up in the middle of the
night, just as plain as if somebody had said your name out loud, and you
just lay there the rest of the night aching to go. I tell you what, if
ever a country had a spirit, it's Alaska; and when it once gets hold of
you and gets to calling you to come, you might just as well get up and
start, for it calls you and follows you, and haunts you till you do."
It is the pleading of the mountains and the pleading of the sea woven
into one call and sent floating down laden with the sweetness of the
splendid spaces. No mountaineer can say why he goes back to the
mountains; no sailor why he cannot leave the sea. No one has yet seen
the spirit that dwells in the waterfall, but all have heard it calling
and have known its spell.
[Illustration: Copyright by E. A. Hegg, Juneau
Courtesy of Webster & Stevens, Seattle
DISTANT VIEW OF DAVIDSON GLACIER]
"If you love the sea, you've got to follow it," said a sea-rover, "and
that's all there is to it. A man can get along without the woman he
loves best on earth if he has to, but he can't get along without the sea
if he once gets to loving it. It gets so it seems like a thing alive to
him, and it makes up for everything else that he don't have. And it's
just like that with Alaska. When a man has made two-three trips to
Alaska, you can't get him off on a southern run again, as long as he can
help himself."
It is an unimaginative person who can wind through these intricate and
difficult sounds, channels, and passes without a strange, quickened
feeling, as of the presence of those dauntless navigators who discovered
and charted these waters centuries ago. From Juan de Fuca northward they
seem to be sailing with us, those grim, brave spectres of the
past--Perez, Meares, Cuadra, Valdes, Malaspina, Duncan, Vancouver,
Whidbey--and all the others who came and went through these beautiful
ways, leaving their names, or the names of their monarchs, friends, or
sweethearts, to endure in blue stretches of water or glistening domes of
snow.
We sail in safety, ease, luxury, over courses along which they felt
their perilous way, never knowing whether Life or Death waited at the
turn of the prow. Nearly a century and a quarter ago Vancouver, working
his way cautiously into Queen Charlotte Sound, soon came to disaster,
both the _Discovery_ and her consort, the _Chatham_, striking upon the
rocks that border the entrance. Fortunately the return of the tide in a
few hours released them from their perilous positions, before they had
sustained any serious damage.
But what days of mingled indecision, hope, and despair--what nights of
anxious watching and waiting--must have been spent in these places
through which we glide so easily now; and the silent spirits of the
grim-peopled past take hold of our heedless hands and lead us on. Does a
pilot sail these seas who has never on wild nights felt beside him on
the bridge the presence of those early ones who, staring ever ahead
under stern brows, drove their vessels on, not knowing what perils lay
beyond? Who, asked, "What shall we do when hope be gone?" made answer,
"Why, sail on, and on, and on."
* * * * *
From Queen Charlotte Sound the steamer passes into Fitzhugh Sound around
Cape Calvert, on Calvert Island. Off the southern point of this island
are two dangerous clusters of rocks, to which, in 1776, by Mr. James
Hanna, were given the interesting names of "Virgin" and "Pearl." In this
poetic vicinage, and nearer the island than either, is another cluster
of rocks, upon which some bold and sacrilegious navigator has bestowed
the name of "Devil."
"It don't sound so pretty and ladylike," said the pilot who pointed them
out, "but it's a whole lot more appropriate. Rocks _are_ devils--and
that's no joke; and what anybody should go and name them 'virgins' and
'pearls' for, is more than a man can see, when he's standing at a wheel,
hell-bent on putting as many leagues between him and them as he can. It
does seem as if some men didn't have any sense at all about naming
things. Now, if I were going to name anything 'virgin'"--his blue eyes
narrowed as they stared into the distance ahead--"it would be a mountain
that's always white; or a bay that gets the first sunshine in the
morning; or one of those little islands down in Puget Sound that's just
_covered_ with flowers."
Just inside Fitzhugh Sound, on the island, is Safety Cove, or Oatsoalis,
which was named by Mr. Duncan in 1788, and which has ever since been
known as a safe anchorage and refuge for ships in storm. Vancouver,
anchoring there in 1792, found the shores to be bold and steep, the
water from twenty-three to thirty fathoms, with a soft, muddy bottom.
Their ships were steadied with hawsers to the trees. They found a small
beach, near which was a stream of excellent water and an abundance of
wood. Vessels lie here at anchor when storms or fogs render the passage
across Queen Charlotte Sound too perilous to be undertaken.
Fitzhugh Sound is but a slender, serene water-way running directly
northward thirty miles. On its west, lying parallel with the mainland,
are the islands of Calvert, Hecate, Nalau, and Hunter, separated by the
passages of Kwakshua, Hakai, and Nalau, which connect Fitzhugh with the
wide sweep of Hecate Strait.
Burke Channel, the second link in the exquisite water chain that winds
and loops in a northwesterly course between the islands of the Columbian
and the Alexander archipelagoes and the mainland of British Columbia and
Alaska, is scarcely entered by the Alaskan steamer ere it turns again
into Fisher Channel, and from this, westward, into the short, very
narrow, but most beautiful Lama Pass.
From Burke Channel several ribbonlike passages form King Island.
Lama Pass is more luxuriantly wooded than many of the others, and is so
still and narrow that the reflections of the trees, growing to the
water's edge, are especially attractive. Very effective is the graveyard
of the Bella Bella Indians, in its dark forest setting, many totems and
curious architectures of the dead showing plainly from the steamer when
an obliging captain passes under slow bell. Near by, on Campbell Island,
is the village of the Bella Bellas, who, with the Tsimpsians and the
Alert Bay Indians, were formerly regarded as the most treacherous and
murderous Indians of the Northwest Coast. Now, however, they are
gathered into a model village, whose houses, church, school, and stores
shine white and peaceful against a dark background.
Lama Pass is one of the most poetic of Alaskan water-ways.
Seaforth Channel is the dangerous reach leading into Millbank Sound. It
is broken by rocks and reefs, on one of which, Rejetta Reef, the
_Willapa_ was stranded ten years ago. Running off Seaforth and Millbank
are some of the finest fiords of the inland passage--Spiller, Johnston,
Dean, Ellerslie, and Portlock channels, Cousins and Cascades inlets, and
many others. Dean and Cascades channels are noted for many waterfalls of
wonderful beauty. The former is ten miles long and half a mile wide.
Cascades Inlet extends for the same distance in a northeasterly
direction, opening into Dean. Innumerable cataracts fall sheer and
foaming down their great precipices; the narrow canyons are filled with
their musical, liquid thunder, and the prevailing color seems to be
palest green, reflected from the color of the water underneath the
beaded foam. Vancouver visited these canals and named them in 1793, and
although, seemingly, but seldom moved by beauty, was deeply impressed by
it here. He considered the cascades "extremely grand, and by much the
largest and most tremendous we had ever beheld, their impetuosity
sending currents of air across the canal."
These fiords are walled to a great height, and are of magnificent
beauty. Some are so narrow and so deep that the sunlight penetrates only
for a few hours each day, and eternal mist and twilight fill the spaces.
In others, not disturbed by cascades, the waters are as clear and smooth
as glass, and the stillness is so profound that one can hear a cone fall
upon the water at a distance of many yards. Covered with constant
moisture, the vegetation is of almost tropic luxuriance. In the shade,
the huge leaves of the devil's-club seem to float, suspended, upon the
air, drooping slightly at the edges when touched by the sun. Raspberries
and salmon-berries grow to enormous size, but are so fragile and
evanescent that they are gone at a breath, and the most delicate care
must be exercised in securing them. They tremble for an instant between
the tongue and the palate, and are gone, leaving a sensation as of
dewdrops flavored with wine; a memory as haunting and elusive as an
exquisite desire known once and never known again.
In Dean Canal, Vancouver found the water almost fresh at low tide, on
account of the streams and cascades pouring into it.
There he found, also, a remarkable Indian habitation; a square, large
platform built in a clearing, thirty feet above the ground. It was
supported by several uprights and had no covering, but a fire was
burning upon one end of it.
In Cascade Canal he visited an Indian village, and found the
construction of the houses there very curious. They apparently backed
straight into a high, perpendicular rock cliff, which supported their
rears; while the fronts and sides were sustained by slender poles about
eighteen feet in height.
Vancouver leaves the method of reaching the entrances to these houses to
the reader's imagination.
It was in this vicinity that Vancouver first encountered "split-lipped"
ladies. Although he had grown accustomed to distortions and mutilations
among the various tribes he had visited, he was quite unprepared for the
repulsive style which now confronted him.
A horizontal incision was made about three-tenths of an inch below the
upper part of the lower lip, extending from one corner of the mouth to
the other, entirely through the flesh; this orifice was then by degrees
stretched sufficiently to admit an ornament made of wood, which was
confined close to the gums of the lower jaws, and whose external surface
projected horizontally.
These wooden ornaments were oval, and resembled a small platter, or
dish, made concave on both sides; they were of various lengths, the
smallest about two inches and a half; the largest more than three inches
long, and an inch and a half broad.
They were about one-fifth of an inch thick, and had a groove along the
middle of the outside edge to receive the lip.
These hideous things were made of fir, and were highly polished. Ladies
of the greatest distinction wore the largest labrets. The size also
increased with age. They have been described by Vancouver, Cook,
Lisiansky, La Perouse, Dall, Schwatka, Emmans, and too many others to
name here; but no description can quite picture them to the liveliest
imagination. When the "wooden trough" was removed, the incision gave the
appearance of two mouths.
All chroniclers unite as to the hideousness and repulsiveness of the
practice.
Of the Indians in the vicinity of Fisher Channel, Vancouver remarks,
without a glimmer of humor himself, that the vivacity of their
countenance indicated a lively genius; and that, from their frequent
bursts of laughter, it would appear that they were great humorists, for
their mirth was not confined to their own people, but was frequently at
the expense of his party. They seemed a happy, cheerful people. This is
an inimitable English touch; a thing that no American would have
written, save with a laugh at himself.
Poison Cove in Mussel Canal, or Portlock Canal, was so named by
Vancouver, whose men ate roasted mussels there. Several were soon seized
with numbness of the faces and extremities. In spite of all that was
done to relieve their sufferings, one--John Carter--died and was buried
in a quiet bay which was named for him.
Millbank Sound, named by Mr. Duncan before Vancouver's arrival, is open
to the ocean, but there is only an hour's run before the shelter of the
islands is regained; so that, even when the weather is rough, but slight
discomfort is experienced by the most susceptible passengers. The finest
scenery on the regular steamer route, until the great snow fields and
glaciers are reached, is considered by many well acquainted with the
route, to lie from Millbank on to Dixon Entrance. The days are not long
enough now for all the beauty that weighs upon the senses like caresses.
At evening, the sunset, blooming like a rose upon these splendid
reaches, seems to drop perfumed petals of color, until the still air is
pink with them, and the steamer pushes them aside as it glides through
with faint throbbings that one feels rather than hears.
Through Finlayson Channel, Heikish Narrows, Graham, Fraser, and McKay
reaches, Grenville Channel,--through all these enchanting water avenues
one drifts for two hundred miles, passing from one reach to another
without suspecting the change, unless familiar with the route, and so
close to the wooded shores that one is tormented with the desire to
reach out one's hand and strip the cool green spruce and cedar needles
from the drooping branches.
Each water-way has its own distinctive features. In Finlayson Channel
the forestation is a solid mountain of green on each side, growing down
to the water and extending over it in feathery, flat sprays. Here the
reflections are so brilliant and so true on clear days, that the
dividing line is not perceptible to the vision. The mountains rise sheer
from the water to a great height, with snow upon their crests and
occasional cataracts foaming musically down their fissures. Helmet
Mountain stands on the port side of the channel, at the entrance.
There's something about "Sarah" Island! I don't know what it is, and
none of the mariners with whom I discussed this famous island seems to
know; but the fact remains that they are all attached to "Sarah."
Down in Lama Pass, or possibly in Fitzhugh Sound, one hears casual
mention of "Sarah" in the pilot-house or chart-room. Questioned, they do
not seem to be able to name any particular feature that sets her apart
from the other islands of this run.
"Well, there she is!" exclaimed the captain, at last. "Now, you'll see
for yourself what there is about Sarah."
It is a long, narrow island, lying in the northern end of Finlayson
Channel. Tolmie Channel lies between it and Princess Royal Island;
Heikish Narrows--a quarter of a mile wide--between it and Roderick
Island. Through Heikish the steamer passes into the increasing beauty of
Graham Reach.
"Now, there!" said the captain. "If you can tell me what there is about
that island, you can do more than any skipper _I_ know can do; but just
the same, there isn't one of us that doesn't look forward to passing
Sarah, that doesn't give her particular attention while we are passing,
and look back at her after we're in Graham Reach. She isn't so little
... nor so big.... The Lord knows she isn't so pretty!" He was silent
for a moment. Then he burst out suddenly: "I'm blamed if _I_ know what
it is! But it's just so with some women. There's something about a
woman, now and then, and a man can't tell, to save his soul, what it is;
only, he doesn't forget her. You see, a captain meets hundreds of women;
and he has to be nice to every one. If he is smart, he can make every
woman think she is just running the ship--but Lord! he wouldn't know one
of them if he met her next week on the street ... only now and then ...
in years and years ... _one!_ And that one he can't forget. He doesn't
know what there is about her, any more than he knows what there is about
'Sarah.' Maybe he doesn't know the color of her eyes nor the color of
her hair. Maybe she's married, and maybe she's single--for that isn't
it. He isn't in love with her--at least I guess he isn't. It's just that
she has a way of coming back to him. Say he sees the Northern Lights
along about midnight--and that woman comes like a flash and stands there
with him. After a while it gets to be a habit with him when he gets into
a port, to kind of look over the crowds for some one. For a minute or
two he feels almost as if he _expected_ some one to meet him; then he
knows he's disappointed about somebody not being there. He asks himself
right out who it is. And all at once he remembers. Then he calls himself
an ass. If she was the kind of woman that runs to docks to see boats
come in, he'd laugh and gas with her--but he wouldn't be thinking of her
till she pushed herself on him again."
The captain sighed unconsciously, and taking down a chart from the
ceiling, spread it out upon a shelf and bent over it. I looked at Sarah,
with her two lacy cascades falling like veils from her crown of snow.
Already she was fading in the distance--yet how distinguished was she!
How set apart from all others!
Then I fell to thinking of the women. What kind are they--_the ones that
stay!_ The one that comes at midnight and stands silent beside a man
when he sees the Northern Lights, even though he is not in love with
her--what kind of woman is she?
"Captain," I said, a little later, "I want to add something to Sarah's
name."
"What is it?" said he, scowling over the chart.
"I want to name her '_Sarah, the Remembered_.'"
He smiled.
"All right," said he, promptly. "I'll write that on the chart."
And what an epitaph that would be for a woman--"The Remembered!" If one
only knew upon whose bit of marble to grave it.
Fraser and McKay reaches follow Graham, and then is entered Wright
Sound, a body of water of great, and practically unknown, depth. This
small sound feeds six channels leading in different directions, one of
which--Verney Pass--leads through Boxer Reach into the famed
magnificence and splendor of Gardner Canal, whose waters push for fifty
miles through dark and towering walls. An immense, glaciered mountain
extends across the end of the canal.
Gardner Canal--named by Vancouver for Admiral Sir Alan Gardner, to whose
friendship and recommendation he was indebted for the command of the
expedition to Nootka and the Northwest Coast--is doubtless the grandest
of British Columbian inlets or fiords. At last, the favorite two
adjectives of the Vancouver expedition--"tremendous" and
"stupendous"--seem to have been most appropriately applied. Lieutenant
Whidbey, exploring it in the summer of 1793, found that it "presented to
the eye one rude mass of almost naked rocks, rising into rugged
mountains, more lofty than he had before seen, whose towering summits,
seeming to overhang their bases, gave them a _tremendous_ appearance.
The whole was covered with perpetual ice and snow that reached, in the
gullies formed between the mountains, close down to the high-water mark;
and many waterfalls of various dimensions were seen to descend in every
direction."
This description is quoted in full because it is an excellent example of
the descriptions given out by Vancouver and his associates, who, if they
ever felt a quickening of the pulses in contemplation of these majestic
scenes, were certainly successful in concealing such human emotions from
the world. True, they did occasionally chronicle a "pleasant" breeze, a
"pleasing" landscape which "reminded them of England;" and even, in the
vicinity of Port Townsend, they were moved to enthusiasm over a
"landscape almost as enchantingly beautiful as the most elegantly
finished pleasure-grounds in Europe," which called to their remembrance
"certain delightful and beloved situations in Old England."
But apparently, having been familiar only with pleasing pastoral scenes,
they were not able to rise to an appreciation of the sublime in nature.
"Elegant" is the mincing and amusing adjective applied frequently to
snow mountains by Vancouver; he mentions, also, "spacious meadows,
elegantly adorned with trees;" but when they arrive at the noble beauty
which arouses in most beholders a feeling of exaltation and an
appreciation of the marvellous handiwork of God, Vancouver and his
associates, having never seen anything of the kind in England, find it
only "tremendous," or "stupendous," or a "rude mass." They would have
probably described the chaste, exquisite cone of Shishaldin on Unimak
Island--as peerless and apart in its delicate beauty among mountains as
Venice is among cities--as "a mountain covered with snow to the very sea
and having a most elegant point."
There are many mountains more than twice the height of Shishaldin, but
there is nowhere one so beautiful.
Great though our veneration must be for those brave mariners of early
years, their apparent lack of appreciation of the scenery of Alaska is
to be deplored. It has fastened upon the land an undeserved reputation
for being "rugged" and "gloomy"--two more of their adjectives; of being
"ice-locked, ice-bound, and ice-bounded." We may pardon them much, but
scarcely the adjective "grotesque," as applied to snow mountains.
Grenville Channel is a narrow, lovely reach, extending in a
northwestward direction from Wright Sound for forty-five miles, when it
merges into Arthur Passage. In its slender course it curves neither to
the right nor to the left.
In this reach, at one o'clock one June day, the thrilling cry of "man
overboard" ran over the decks of the _Santa Ana_. There were more than
two hundred passengers aboard, and instantly an excited and dangerous
stampede to starboard and stern occurred; but the captain, cool and
stern on the bridge, was equal to the perilous situation. A life-boat
was ordered lowered, and the steerage passengers were quietly forced to
their quarters forward. Life-buoys, life-preservers, chairs, ropes, and
other articles were flung overboard, until the water resembled a
junk-shop. Through them all, the man's dark, closely shaven head could
be seen, his face turned from the steamer, as he swam fiercely toward
the shore against a strong current. The channel was too narrow for the
steamer to turn, but a boat was soon in hot pursuit of the man who was
struggling fearfully for the shore, and who was supposed to be too
bewildered to realize that he was headed in the wrong direction. What
was our amazement, when the boat finally reached him, to discover, by
the aid of glasses, that he was resisting his rescuers. There was a long
struggle in the water before he was overcome and dragged into the boat.
He was a pitiable sight when the boat came level with the hurricane
deck; wild-eyed, gray-faced, shuddering like a dog; his shirt torn open
at the throat and exposing its tragic emaciation; his glance flashing
wildly from one face to another, as though in search of one to be
trusted--he was an object to command the pity of the coldest heart. In
his hand was still gripped his soft hat which he had taken from his head
before jumping overboard.
"What is it, my man?" asked the captain, kindly, approaching him.
The man's wild gaze steadied upon the captain and seemed to recognize
him as one in authority.
"They've been trying to kill me, sir, all the way up."
"Who?"
The poor fellow shuddered hard.
"They," he said. "They're on the boat. I had to watch them night and
day. I didn't dast go to sleep. It got too much; I couldn't stand it. I
had to get ashore. I'd been waiting for this channel because it was so
narrow. I thought the current 'u'd help me get away. I'm a good
swimmer."
"A better one never breasted a wave! Take him below. Give him dry
clothes and some whiskey, and set a watch over him."
The poor wretch was led away; the crowd drifted after him. Pale and
quiet, the captain went back to the chart-room and resumed his slow
pacing forth and back.
"I wish tragedies of body and soul would not occur in such beautiful
lengths of water," he said at last. "I can never sail through Grenville
Channel again without seeing that poor fellow's haggard face and wild,
appealing eyes. And after Gardner Canal, there is not another on the
route more beautiful than this!"
Two inlets open into Grenville Channel on the starboard going north,
Lowe and Klewnuggit,--both affording safe anchorage to vessels in
trouble. Pitt Island forms almost the entire western shore--a
beautifully wooded one--of the channel. There is a salmon cannery in
Lowe Inlet, beside a clear stream which leaps down from a lake in the
mountains. The waters and shores of Grenville have a clear, washed
green, which is springlike. In many of the other narrow ways the waters
are blue, or purple, or a pale blue-gray; but here they suddenly lead
you along the palest of green, shimmering avenues, while mountains of
many-shaded green rise steeply on both sides, glimmering away into
drifts of snow, which drop threads of silver down the sheer heights.
This shaded green of the mountains is a feature of Alaskan landscapes.
Great landslides and windfalls cleave their way from summit to sea,
mowing down the forests in their path. In time the new growth springs up
and streaks the mountain side with lighter green.
Probably one-half of the trees in southeastern Alaska are the Menzies
spruce, or Sitka pine. Their needles are sharp and of a bluish green.
The Menzies spruce was named for the Scotch botanist who accompanied
Vancouver.
The Alaska cedar is yellowish and lacy in appearance, with a graceful
droop to the branches. It grows to an average height of one hundred and
fifty feet. Its wood is very valuable.
Arbor-vitae grows about the glaciers and in cool, dim fiords. Birch,
alder, maple, cottonwood, broom, and hemlock-spruce are plentiful, but
are of small value, save in the cause of beauty.
The Menzies spruce attains its largest growth in the Alexander
Archipelago, but ranges as far south as California. The Douglas fir is
not so abundant as it is farther south, nor does it grow to such great
size.
The Alaska cedar is the most prized of all the cedars. It is in great
demand for ship-building, interior finishing, cabinet-making, and other
fine work, because of its close texture, durable quality, and aromatic
odor, which somewhat resembles that of sandalwood. In early years it was
shipped to Japan, where it was made into fancy boxes and fans, which
were sold under guise of that scented Oriental wood. Its lasting
qualities are remarkable--sills having been found in perfect
preservation after sixty years' use in a wet climate. Its pleasant odor
is as enduring as the wood. The long, slender, pendulous fruits which
hang from the branches in season, give the tree a peculiarly graceful
and appealing appearance.
The western white pine is used for interior work. It is a magnificent
tree, as seen in the forest, having bluish green fronds and cones a foot
long.
The giant arbor-vitae attains its greatest size close to the coast. The
wood splits easily and makes durable shingles. It takes a brilliant
polish and is popular for interior finishing. Its beauty of growth is
well known.
Wherever there is sufficient rainfall, the fine-fronded hemlock may be
found tracing its lacelike outlines upon the atmosphere. There is no
evergreen so delicately lovely as the hemlock. It stands apart, with a
little air of its own, as a fastidious small maid might draw her skirts
about her when common ones pass by.
The spruces, firs, and cedars grow so closely together that at a
distance they appear as a solid wall of shaded green, varying from the
lightest beryl tints, on through bluish grays to the most vivid and
dazzling emerald tones. At a distance canyons and vast gulches are
filled so softly and so solidly that they can scarcely be detected, the
trees on the crests of the nearer hills blending into those above, and
concealing the deep spaces that sink between.
These forests have no tap-roots. Their roots spread widely upon a thin
layer of soil covering solid stone in many cases, and more likely than
not this soil is created in the first place by the accumulation of
parent needles. Trees spring up in crevices of stone where a bit of sand
has sifted, grow, fruit, and shed their needles, and thrive upon them.
The undergrowth is so solid that one must cut one's way through it, and
the progress of surveyors or prospectors is necessarily slow and
difficult.
These forests are constantly drenched in the warm mists precipitated by
the Kuro Siwo striking upon the snow, and in this quickening moisture
they reach a brilliancy of coloring that is remarkable. At sunset,
threading these narrow channels, one may see mountain upon mountain
climbing up to crests of snow, their lower wooded slopes covered with
mists in palest blue and old rose tones, through which the tips of the
trees, crowded close together, shine out in brilliant, many-shaded
greens.
After Arthur Passage is that of Malacca, which is dotted by several
islands. "Lawyer's," to starboard, bears a red light; "Lucy," to port,
farther north, a fixed white light. Directly opposite "Lucy"--who does
not rival "Sarah," or who in the pilot's words "has nothing about
her"--is old Metlakahtla.
[Illustration: Copyright by E. A. Hegg, Juneau
Courtesy of Webster & Stevens, Seattle
DAVIDSON GLACIER]