Show IN ALASKA ino wo I 1 international press association associations 1 RI VERMay on may ma 7 1891 the pacific coast steamship Steams bi companas comp anys vessel city of topeka crossed dixon entrance and entered alaskan waters leaving behin I 1 thos of british columbia all of these waters for a stretch of over a thousand miles along the pacific coast are but deep inlets and channels channel huge salt water rivers so to speak that thai cutting in every direction make a vast vat network of islands picturesque in the th extreme and not even yet wholly explored the most freely navigable of thea many channels running parallel with the coast is aled called the inland passage to alaska and is yearly be 1 coming more popular with summer tourists seeking rest and recreation here one of the peculiar features of c this southwestern section of alaska and one that can only be appreciated by the t e explorer e lorer or hardy frontiersman to la the ease and pleasure with which one can travel the coast waters only to plunge into the roughest of roughing it as soon as these are leffand lef tand the alpine interior essayed on board the topeka w was the new york IA ledger 49 er alaskan expedition that had this prospect ahead of it the subscriber being be ingin in command one of our main objects was to cover as much unexplored une e lore country as possible in any direction ye yet ft a general plan had been formed to follow dow my old explorations of 1883 to or near the polly pelly and yukon river confluence and the the work into the unknown interior westward and southwestward we vve nad ou bwol LO caunce mis pius ra as as to cover more mo e unexplored country usual it came about by discus sing a new and unexplored route from T juneau eneau with citizens of that 3 1 1 y e ly metropolis of our distant cordley affy he largest ta i gest ditty in tie the largest barg esl territory in in the largest republic in the world as they used to patriotically put it it was to go over what was wan called the trail that led to a large lake in the interior and by its draining ri the yukon where I 1 joined my old trail of 1883 and could then carry out the program as previously ned it wp relieved an aval akailah ava ilah lal ja mercial t might be open way that wi neau as a basis could be made to supply the yukon valley even to behring sea better than by any known route while it would be no small feather in the cap of the new york ledger expedition to be able to do this preliminary pioneering this bell bellof f was founded on information obtained from the interior indians indiana when bringing out their furs and from prospectors who had search searched this general line for precious minerals it might be also that the present yukon traffic would not pay while the future might and it was well to be prepared with the information the many other reasons for or against this trail can be made clearer as we travel over it later when we arrived in juneau a corresponding interest was soon worked up by those on the steamer th the citizens pledging everything they coull could to make the enterprise a success and so we dis embarked here the first point we touched in alaska was Ton gass after Ton gass we meet nothing but salmon canneries for a few days d 18 a reaching juneau on the 9 ath of may where our freight is embarked disembarked dis and we continue on for this metropolis is of enough importance to be touched by the returning steamer thus making a sect round trip we wake up next day in glacier bay on the first of the season to essay it as it to is only visited in the interest of the slimmer summer tourists at sitha we were crowded with passengers of the spring court term at juneau there were ten prisoners only six of them being murderers mostly confined to half breeds and indians vie the naturally resulting conversation disclosed a statement that there had never been a simon pure lynching lunching lyn ching nor a legal execution in alaska at wrangell in early days a gambler yam bier was made chairman of a vigilance committee the chair was pulled out from under him and he croke broke this peaceful record al also so his nook but any one familiar with frontier justice knows there is a wide chasm existing between this and lynch ing in a somewhat similar action an indian murderer performed traction on f rope to the satisfaction of the vigilance vi lance faction and the greater dissatisfaction s of the lesser faction Killis noo is very agre agreeable eaffie to the eye ye but somewhat abominable to the nose due to a flourishing herring fishery and at guano factory the united states marshal attempted to arrest a native here for thyi trying to drown awn a squaw guilty of witchcraft it I 1 save ay never yet shen seen anything bewitching about an alaskan indian woman but I 1 suppose tastes vary this alaskan cotton mother mather had some inkling of the proceedings so he secreted himself in the alaskan woods where the proverbial needle in a haystack would be as conspicuous as a circus poster by co comparison there were re not eleven prisoners pa from lehere fillix Killis noo to juneau juneau reached preparations were begun at once the first obstacle le being the report that the river was not yet open A big canoe a two ton or three ton affair was easy enough to ket fand et t but packers themselves over the ind trail were hard to obtain until a sort of sub chief of the yash by name a local policeman poli cems stimulated by the citizens took a haut hand and recruits were slowly obtained even then I 1 could only obtain half enough at good stiff rates of course and had to double packs averaging pounds each over the trail of nearly miles as it proved the of may we got away seven indians indiana and three white men six of the j natives being packers and one robert the owner of the boat on the recommendation men dation of some citizens who believed lie vedin in the horror of the average indian for all legal papers I 1 had a huge contract drawn up resplendent with many colored seals and ribbons and this they signed by touch of pen while the united states district court interpreter read aloud its contents with a solemnity equal to that given a deth death warrant I 1 still retain that page of legal ludicrousness and while admitting it may have done me much good yet I 1 can only compare it with the verdict of the frontier coroners jury wherein sitting on a mans body dragged from the rivers bed and riddled with bullets they concluded that the deceased had come to his death from drowning caused by water pouring in through the bullet holes so about noon of the with the american flair flag hanging from the peak we got away in the beginning of a wind and drizzling rainstorm that tb at later made our first days trip one ot ol rhe he most uni pleasant of the whole journey an en thusia stio crowd of citizens lined the shore near the steamers dock and as we paddled away down the channel gave us many a hearty cheer and many warm wishes for our success let us now take a hasty look at the little expedition as it started the indians being sufficiently described to pass them over till events call them up in detail the commanding officer was the heaviest one of the party and made excellent ballast in the rear part of the canoe the scientist of the expedition was dr C willard hayes representing also the U S geological survey through the courtesy cour te 01 V of major J W powell the head of that tha government t bureau to dr hayes haye also fell the photographic work in the main as wll wall as the topographic or map making I 1 had hoped to get a professional photographer and felt sure of success when mr landerkin one from juneau made an application for the place he was caught on the grand jury having alread been sworn in but we both thong that a mere bagatelle as obstacle but the judge and district dist act attorney thought otherwise both were 0 willing enough but there was wads nothing in the law the oregon code prevails here by act of congress so far faras las it is practicable that would allow it the only excuse whatsoever was one of severe sickness attested under oath by a physician but suppose a grand juror dies I 1 asked the judge 1 I could not excuse him from duty on that ground he replied slowly shaking his head so mr landerkin remained and dr hayes did double duty mark C Q Zu was the oula oulx other while man in tee me party fis as we arteS st which I 1 organized on the basis of all Z in my previous expeditions or lust just as few okite white men as possible with natives to do about all the work of transportation ioor etc bac etc etca with which mey ore so ifo tn own country the indians w ery hilarious evidently stimulate sti mulat by the enthusiastic departure given us and they showed their appreciation by spurting ferociously every little while instead of tattling ettling do down to ste steady y wor work we e stopp stopped about 2 in the afternoon in a pretty little sheltered cove e for lunch and really enjoyed our selves elves for an half hour protected from the beating rain robert impressed me with the fact that the tide was then out and asked me to note that when it was in not a landing place was to be found anywhere along the shore for probably r 0 bably stretches of many miles in a gr bright i green prairie of a few acres in this thin timber border ing the shore was ely perched a town of ten h a ahk kwan by name it Is not often a graveyard i is the most cheerful part of a place but here the only enlivening thing in a view of dismal green rendered daubl doubly doleful by the rain was waa a bright re red flag biag that fluttered from a high staff at the corner of a grave I 1 was told it indicated that that particular native had just recently died about 4 e swung around into the inlet and our change of course now allowed us to set sails along we bowled wing and wing the tee ice cakes we had met at the mouth month of 44 IN IN CANON the inlet growing larger as we ascended it towards the glacier until they could well be dignified with the narue name of icebergs certainly so in comparison with ath those from the muir glacier lacier that are thus styled the ahw glacier ice is the bluest I 1 have ever seen either in or out of the arctic or alpine regions it was really a deep deeg bluish black in many places though thong clear as crystal it was quite dark when we got to the mouth of the river at a half completed salmon fishery the white men sleeping in in it and t the indians in the smokehouse smoke amok ef house ouse all of us mi tiff stiff a as jokers pokers N Y ledger expedition Expedit toiL |