A NEW KLONDYKE
Two miners sat smoking in a small log cabin in Dawson. They were hardy
young fellows, and used the accent of born Canadians. They were
brothers, and the elder was speaking.
"What's the use of our hanging 'round here all winter doing nothing? The
best creeks are all staked, and there isn't the ghost of a show for us
to get any first class ground hereabouts. Let's light out, blaze a new
trail for ourselves, and prospect in the likeliest places during the
winter instead of idling away our time here, eating up high-priced grub
and hating ourselves. I'm sick of this camp. What do you say?"
"Which way shall we go?"
"Any old way. No, it would be better to have some definite idea of the
point we wish to reach, of course. We might make for the headwaters of
the Klondyke and then east into the unknown country where only a few
poor Indians live."
"They might prove ugly. What then?"
"We could manage them. We would take plenty of grub and ammunition, and
a couple of white men, at least, with us."
"What makes you think there's gold there? It wouldn't pay us to risk our
lives for nothing in such a wilderness. I would be willing to go if I
thought our time and efforts might turn up something good."
"I have been watching the Indians who come here for supplies from that
direction, and they are far from penniless. They carry good-sized pokes
of nuggets and dust which they use in trading. They must get these from
some of the creeks over east," said the elder of the two men.
"They are mum as oysters; one can't get any information from them."
"What'll you bet I can't?"
"A box of cigars," laughed the younger, whose name seemed appropriately
bestowed, for it was Thomas, and he often doubted.
With that George MacDougall drew on his fur coat and mittens and quitted
the cabin. He would find a certain long haired Indian he had seen that
day, and prove to his brother that he was not simply a boaster.
It was early in the evening; but for the matter of that, the hour made
little difference, for time slipped by unreckoned in the Klondyke in
winter. Night was more often than not turned into day by the restless
denizens of the mining camp, and belated breakfast sometime the
following afternoon was the sequel.
Just now the moon shown brightly above the camp, the deep frozen river
and the high hills. George MacDougall could plainly hear the loud
talking and shouts of those bent on dissipation while crossing the ice
by dog-team to West Dawson. Glancing in that direction he saw the
brilliantly lighted dance-house and saloon, whose blare of brassy
instruments reached his unwilling ears at that distance; the still, cold
air of an Arctic night being a perfect conductor of sound. Under the
sheltering, furry fringe of his cap his forehead gathered itself into a
scowl.
"What fools!" he muttered. "If one must carouse why come here? That sort
of thing can be done on the 'outside', but in here where grub is worth
its weight in gold, and none expect comforts, why waste time? We came
here for that we cannot obtain in the States--at least I did--for
gold,--gold, and I'll have it, too, by Gad!" Then pricking up his ears
again at the end of his soliloquy, he listened and laughed aloud.
"Hear those malamute cusses! How they do whoop it up, to be sure," as a
familiar canine chorus surged clearcut through the frosty air. "I'd
rather listen any time to the brutes zig-zagging up and down their
scales than to the giggling 'box rustlers' from the Monte Carlo crossing
yonder to the dance-house; but where's that blooming Indian, I wonder? I
must find him," and the stalwart Canadian moved on more quickly up the
main street.
An hour later he again smoked in his cabin with his brother. Opposite
them sat an Indian with long, black hair. The latter held in his hand a
whiskey glass, now almost drained, the contents of which had no doubt
called up the good-humored expression at the corners of the native's
habitually unsmiling mouth.
The Canadians smoked; their chair-backs tilted against the wall. There
was no hurry. The elder MacDougall re-filled the Indian's glass with
liquor, and leisurely and carefully knocking the ashes from his pipe,
placed it upon a shelf. He then took from an inside pocket a half dozen
cigars of reputable brand and placed one between his lips, by chance,
probably, glancing toward his visitor, whose fingers now twitched at
sight of the much relished tobacco stick.
"Plenty gold where you come from?" carelessly interrogated MacDougall,
his eyes on the lighted end of his cigar, and flirting away the match he
had been using.
"Yes," grunted the Indian in answer.
"Can we find it, too, Pete?" queried the white man, at the same moment
holding one of the cigars toward his visitor, who eagerly seized it.
"I tink."
"Will you show us a gold creek, Pete?" continued the patiently
questioning Canadian.
"How much you give?"
"I'll give you a gallon of whiskey and a box of good cigars if you will
take me with my brother here to your gold creek, or any gold creek that
is not taken up by white men already. Understand, Pete?"
The Indian nodded. He loved liquor better than gold, but Yukon
authorities had prohibited the sale of the stuff to Indians, and
strictly enforced the law, so, though he had attempted in various ways
to purchase it in Dawson he had not been successful. Here was the offer
of a whole gallon in exchange for gold so far away that the white man
would probably die before he reached it, even if he attempted to cover
the distance; and the Indian acquiesced in the bargain.
Thomas MacDougall wanted to be shown some of Pete's gold, and so
remarked; whereupon the latter thrust his hand into his trouser's
pockets, well hidden by the fur parkie he wore, took out a poke and
threw it upon the table. When Thomas had untied the string and held the
moose-hide sack by its two lower corners bottom upwards there clattered
out upon the boards enough of good-sized golden nuggets to cause the
eyes of the doubter to sparkle with interest.
"Are you sure you did not steal these from some white man's cabin on
Bonanza or Eldorado, Pete?" queried the skeptic Thomas.
"No steal 'um,--catch 'um big crik,--plent' gold,--heap. You sabee?"
Thomas understood, but only partly believed. His brother argued that it
was a case of "nothing venture, nothing have" and he would take the risk
and follow Pete into the wintry wilderness.
If indecision is a sign of weak minds then there are but few
feeble-minded men in an Alaskan gold camp. Here men decide matters
quickly. It is touch and go with them. This trip might mean the end of
all things earthly to the two MacDougalls, but they determined to make
the venture. They might fail of finding gold in quantities, but that was
their fate if they remained in Dawson. They could die but once. Having
risked so much, and come so far already, it was small effort to stake
still more of time, effort and money, and they decided to follow Pete.
A week later the two brothers, (their company augmented by two white men
and as many Indians, besides long-haired Pete, the guide) might have
been seen slowly but carefully making their way through the snowy hill
region of the headwaters of the Klondyke River. Mapped carelessly, as it
often is, this appears a small and unpretending stream; but to the
Indian or prospector who has tracked its length from a small creeklet at
starting to a wide and rushing mouth emptying its pure waters into the
muddy Yukon, it has a good length of several hundred miles, and must not
be lightly mentioned. On its "left limit" were Bonanza and Eldorado
Creeks where men with underground fires burning both night and day tried
with puny strength to checkmate the stubborn ice king in order to add to
the dumps to be hopefully washed out in the springtime. Though they
burned their eyes from their sockets in these pestilential smoke holes,
and though from badly cooked and scanty meals their blackened limbs made
declaration that the dreaded scurvy was upon them; still there were
always men eager to fill the places of those who succumbed, and the work
went on.
There were creeks called Bear, Rock, Benson, Wolf, Gnat and Fox, which
with Nello, Arizona, and many more, went to make up the far-famed
Klondyke River.
Now all were fast frozen. Snow lay deep upon the ice. No babbling of
hurrying waters over pebbly creek beds was heard, but instead, the axe
of the solitary miner at wood chopping on the banks of silent streams.
As the short days passed, and the small caravan forged on, the smoke of
white men's cabins was more seldom seen; until finally the last one was
pointed out by Indian Pete, and it was soon left far behind.
Shorter grew the daylight hours. Proceeding they were forced to break
trails, although their guide appeared familiar with the region and was
heading toward the best and easiest pass in the Rockies. This tedious
snow waste once crossed, their way to the great lakes was comparatively
clear.
They soon learned to travel as well in the dusky snow-light as by
daylight, and enjoyed it better, for there was no glare of the sun on
the white mantled earth. Their dog-teams were good ones, and a source of
comfort to the travelers whose experience with this mode of migration
was limited. While the weary men slept in their little tents by night
the malamutes howled and rested at intervals. If one happened to be
startled by a bad dream he immediately communicated the fact to his
neighbors, of whom there were more than thirty, and they, either from
sympathetic interest in a brother, or because they resented being waked
thus unceremoniously in the midst of enjoyable naps, began echoing their
sentiments in the most lugubrious manner. To all sorts of notes in the
musical scale the voices of these dogs ranged, they seeming to spare no
pains to give varied entertainment. How these creatures work so hard,
eat and sleep so little, howl so much, and keep in good condition, is
ever an unsolvable riddle; but they are usually docile, pleasant of
disposition, and ready for any task.
The MacDougall party treated their animals kindly. Men must reasonably
do this in self defense. That a brow-beaten dog gives up and drops from
the race through sheer discouragement often happens; but well fed and
with considerate treatment a malamute will bravely work to the last
moment.
A few hundred miles farther east and these dogs would be exchanged for
"Hudson Bay huskies", or sent back over the trail to Dawson to be sold.
In case the MacDougalls "struck it rich" in the Indian country it was
imperative that they be provided with huskies, but for the present the
"malamute made much music", as Tom MacDougall laughingly remarked.
One day the party came upon the fresh tracks of a caribou. Made by
good-sized hoofs, the animal had gone toward the south apparently in
great haste. In a moment Pete was off with his rifle to the nearest
hill-top, stealthily but rapidly treading the soft, deep snow. The elder
MacDougall shouldered his gun and followed the trail of the animal whose
flesh he coveted as a feasting dish after living so long upon dried fish
and bacon.
For more than an hour the Canadian tracked his game. Pete, from the
hill-top, had sighted a tiny thread of blue smoke rising from the valley
on the other side, and knew that Indians, probably Peel River men, were
also upon the track of the animal, when instantly his enthusiasm in the
chase cooled.
He decided to follow MacDougall. If these were the Peel River Indians
they were far from their own hunting grounds, and must have driven big
game into this vicinity which they were loath to abandon. In case that
MacDougall should bring down the caribou he might get into trouble, and
Pete hastened on.
The cold, crisp air was intensely still. As he proceeded, with alert
ears, he heard a shot, angry voices in altercation, and a second shot,
when the now thoroughly awakened Indian hurried on in the footprints of
the Canadian.
One of the hunters would probably hunt no more; but which one was it?
He was not long in doubt. Coming suddenly upon them he discovered that
his fears were realized.
MacDougall stood sternly regarding a fur-dressed Indian lying dead upon
the snow. He and Pete exchanged glances.
"What's the matter?" asked Pete.
"He jumped upon me and declared the caribou was his. I told him it was
mine, when he pulled his gun and I shot him--that's all," said
MacDougall.
"That's plent'," tersely from Pete. Then casting his eye over the sky he
said: "Snow cum quick,--hide um. We cut caribou," whereupon he whipped
out a big hunting knife, after placing his rifle in the crotch of a
tree, and began slashing the still warm body of the big caribou.
MacDougall followed suit. It was not long before the two had selected
and cut away the choice parts of the carcass, and with as much of the
meat as they could handle, made their way back to camp. Pete and his
Indians, with dog-teams, were dispatched to the scene of the double
tragedy for the remainder.
The dead Indian was left as he fell, and falling snow soon covered him.
That night the Canadians pushed on without resting, laden with as much
meat as they could carry. It was thought safest not to remain long in
the vicinity, as some of the Peel River Indians might track the murderer
of their brother.
The dogs had feasted on caribou as well as the men, and all could return
to the long trail with redoubled energy. More large game was seen, and
from this on there was no lack of venison.
Ptarmigan, too, made a variety of eating. The snow-white beauties were
never tired of, but furnished food equally as good as the caribou. The
miners were given a pleasant surprise one evening when George
MacDougall cleaned the birds for his breakfast. Three or four peculiar
looking pebbles rolled out of the craw of the bird he was handling and
fell upon the ground. Stooping, he picked them up.
"Gad! What's this?"
"He then made an examination.
"Here you, Indian! Get some ice and melt it. I want to wash these
stones. If they are stones, I'll eat 'em. I believe they're gold
nuggets," he added to his brother, at which the latter crawled out of
his fur sleeping bag to investigate.
They were now in a gold-bearing country. Of this MacDougall felt
assured. The nuggets found in the craw of the ptarmigan, though not
large, were of pure gold, and once clean of filth looked good to the
eyes of the patient prospectors. They had certainly come from the bars
of some stream, which, in an exposed place, had been wind-swept,
furnishing the grouse a late feeding ground when tundra berries were
covered with snow. To be sure, not much nourishment could have been
gotten from the nuggets, but the latter had answered the purpose of
pebbles in mastication processes.
After this MacDougall kept more hopefully on. Each bird shot was
examined, and many carried their own savings bank with them. No better
indications were wanted of the contents of the creeks of the region.
The gold was surely there.
Finally, after six cold and weary weeks, during which time much of hope
and fear had constantly alternated in the breasts of the two Canadians
and their men, notwithstanding the reiterated affirmative statements of
the Indians; Pete grunted with satisfaction and pointed to a nearby
forest.
"Indian cabins over there," said he. "Two sleeps cum rich crik."
"I hope so, Pete," MacDougall had replied, being tired and hungry.
Only twice on their long trip had they come upon small Indian
settlements, and then a few hours' rest within the crowded and stifling
huts satisfied them to resume their march. The air outside, if cold, was
pure, sweet and invigorating, and these hardy, fur clad men were now
accustomed to it and enjoyed it.
A fresh surprise awaited them at Pete's house. A good, large, log cabin
of two rooms, lined from top to bottom with the furs of animals, and
ornamented with antlers and similar trophies of the chase, made a warm
and comfortable home compared to that which the white men had expected
to find. A pleasant-faced squaw and several small children retreated to
the inner room upon the entrance of the men from the trail. While Pete
greeted his family, the visitors made notes and discussed the surprising
situation.
"Gee Whiz! Who'd a thought it?"
"I thought Pete lived in an ice hut, or a teepee made of skins and
sticks," said one.
"A filthy hole in the ground was what I thought we'd find," declared
another.
"We're right in civilization!" exclaimed a fourth, slapping his knee in
delight.
"A music box, as I live!" eyeing an old accordian in a corner.
"Well, I snum!"
The men were all talking at once.
"I'd like to take a smoke, but don't dare," said Tom MacDougall,
demurely, with a wink.
"I fancy it might injure the lace curtains," laughed his brother, who
looked as well pleased as any of the group, while touching the bit of
calico draping at the tiny window.
But Pete was now going out of doors and they all trooped after him.
Surrounding the Indian they plied him with a hundred questions. They
wanted to know where he and his squaw had learned to make a home like
this,--where he got so much of civilization,--who had taught his squaw
to keep house,--who played the accordian,--where he got tools to work
with, and many other things; above all, where he bought certain
accessories to his cabin which they had never seen in Dawson.
Flinging, as they did, all these questions at the poor fellow in a
breath, MacDougall feared he would be stalled for replies, and finally
halted for him to make a beginning; but Pete only remarked quietly,
twitching his thumb toward the southeast:
"Fort by big lake. White man,--mission,--teach um Indian,"
unconcernedly, as though it was of every day occurrence, and there was
no further explanation necessary.
"Do they talk as we do?" asked MacDougall.
"No."
"What do you call them?"
"Father Petroff,--teach um. Indian sick,--fix um. Heap good man," and
Pete turned away, thinking this sufficient.
"Ask him how far it is to the Fort, Mac," said one of the men.
"Not now. He has had enough quizzing for this time. It is evidently a
Russian Mission on one of the big lakes,--which mission, and what lake,
I don't know. But we must pitch our tents, cook our supper, and feed the
dogs. Poor fellows! They shall have a good long rest soon for they've
well earned it," and George MacDougall patted the snow white head of the
nearest malamute looking up into his face for sympathy.
Next day the men had eaten, slept and rested. They had listened the
evening before to the old accordian in the hands of Pete's wife; they
had trotted the infant of the family on their knees; they had propounded
another hundred questions to their uncommunicative host and gotten
monosyllabic answers; but they had heard only that which was good to
hear, and that which confirmed the leader in his mind that he had made
a capital move in coming into this country with the Indians.
Pete had exhibited nuggets and gold dust of astonishing richness.
Kicking a bear skin from the center of the room, he disclosed a box
embedded in the earth, the sight of which, when uncovered, caused the
white men to feel repaid for coming. There were chunks and hunks of the
precious yellow metal larger than the thumbs of the brawny handed
miners; besides gold dust in moose-hide sacks tied tightly and placed
systematically side by side in rows.
The surprise of the white men was great. They did not imagine that Pete
mined gold to any extent, but thought he had secured enough in a
desultory way for his present use. The trusting native had no fear of
the men, having unreservedly laid bare his treasure house.
"I no lie. I tell um truf," said Pete, looking toward Thomas MacDougall,
remembering that the doubter had frequently called into question his
word.
"We see your gold, Pete, but you must show us a gold creek, too," was
Tom's answer to the Indian.
"I show you. Come!"
* * * * *
Three years passed. The great lakes south of the headwaters of the
Mackenzie River were again frozen. Darkness claimed the land except when
the brilliant low-swinging moon lighted the heavens and snowy earth
below, and the sun for a few brief hours consented to coldly shine upon
the denizens of the wilderness at midday.
A gang of miners worked like beavers in the bed of the stream. With
fires they thawed the ground, after having diverted the creek waters the
previous summer.
Their camp was a large one. Fifty men worked in two shifts, one half in
the daytime, the others at night. At the beginning of each month they
were changed, and night men were placed on the day force; this
alternation being found best in all mining camps. Log cabins and bunk
houses were numerous, large, and comfortable, for forests of excellent
timber dotted the Mackenzie landscape, and men, as ever ambitious for
comfort, had felled, hewed, and crosscut the trees to their liking.
Much that was crude of construction was here in confirmation of the fact
that the camp was far removed from civilization, and men had, with great
ingenuity, supplied deficiencies whenever practicable.
As helpers who were ever faithful there were "Hudson Bay huskies" to the
number of four score who had become real beasts of burden, and vied with
each other as to which should carry the palm for leadership and favor in
their masters' eyes. They were mainly used for hauling wood and ice; the
latter in lieu of water at this season.
For carrying gravel and dirt to the dumps the miners had constructed
rude tramways with small flat cars, which being successfully operated by
gravity in all weather left the dogs free for other service.
No sluicing of dumps could now be done. When summer came again and the
creeks and rivers were full of water, this would be directed into
ditches conveying it to the well arranged heaps of dirt and gravel, and
then these dumps rapidly melted like snow before hot sunshine, leaving
in their wake a stream of yellow metal so coveted by these fearless and
daring miners.
For no small amount of gold had they risked their lives in this far away
corner of the earth. Only four of the miners had come on
uncertainty,--the four guided by Indian Pete three years before,--the
others had known why they came, how far the distance, how cold it grew,
and many other points of which it is well to be advised before
venturing; but they had come, and here they were.
Not a man regretted his coming. Not even old Charlie, after breaking his
leg and having to wait for days while two Indians "mushed" southward to
the Fort, four hundred miles away, for Father Petrof to come and set it
right again.
None heard him complain; though some of the "boys" tried to force him to
confess that he wished himself back in Dawson.
"Not by a jugful! I don't give in like a baby," said he, stoutly,
although the pain in his limb must have been considerable. "There aint
no whiskey in me system, either, to keep me leg from healin' when it's
once put right (though I'll admit there is some tobac), and I'll be in
trim again presently," declared the gritty old miner.
Having nothing better to do while in his bunk he talked on, addressing
the camp cook who had a few leisure moments from the kitchen.
"I've seed many a gold camp in me day, boy, and plenty as good as the
Klondyke before I ever struck that Canadian bird; but I never got into
ground so rich as this. I tell you, boy, it not only makes me eyes bug
out, but it makes me hair stand on end, fur it's a whale of a gold
creek! When I lay here studyin' the old tin cans and grub boxes full of
gold under these bunks, and get to computin' what's in 'em, I feel like
hollerin' for joy!"
"But its all Mac's gold, you know," said the cook regretfully.
"Yes, but you and me are gettin' the biggest wages we ever got in our
lives, and Mac never squirms at payin' either. Then we have a reasonable
hope that Sister Creek is as good as this one, and we boys have got it
all staked,--that's where we're comin' in at. See?"
"I hope to. How much do you calculate there is under the bunks in this
room, Charlie? I'd just like to know."
"There's about half a million dollars in this cabin and as much in the
dumps as they stand-now. By cleanin' up time next summer there'll be
half a million more at least; judgin' from indications. That aint half
bad, eh?" and Charlie's eyes shone as he talked.
"By George! It's great, and no mistake; but a fellow can't spend any of
it here," said the cook ruefully.
"All the better for us. We've got to save it. We can't do nothin' else.
Great box we're in, to be sure," and the man laughed heartily in spite
of his infirmity. Continuing, he said:
"It's the best place we could be in, I tell you; especially so for Bill
who can't buy a drop of whiskey for a thousand dollars, although he
would buy it sometimes at that price, I think, if he could."
"It don't hinder him playing that violin of his'n, does it? Do you mind
how he played last night?"
"You bet your life. I had nothin' else to do. He's a crackerjack, and
that's no josh, either. But here comes Mac. What in thunder's that?" The
question was put to the man entering with a heavy load in his hands.
MacDougall laughed.
"Only a nugget that Tom turned up. I brought it in to show you, and the
Canadian placed the mammoth chunk of gold on the floor near the bunk.
"What do you think of it?"
"Great Scott and little fishes! She's a bird! Why, man, this new
Klondyke will make the old one look like thirty cents!"
[Illustration]