The Trail of the Goldseekers Part 18

Here again I came upon other gaunt and rusty-coated men from the Long Trail. They could be recognized at a glance by reason of their sombre faces and their undecided action. They could scarcely bring themselves to such ignominious return from a fruitless trip on which they had started with so much elation, and yet they hesitated about attempting any further adventure to the north, mainly because their horses had sold for so little and their expenses had been so great.

Many of them were nearly broken. In the days that followed they discussed the matter in subdued voices, sitting in the sun on the great wharf, sombrely looking out upon the bay.

On the third day a steamer came in from the north, buzzing with the news of another great strike not far from Skagway. Juneau, Dyea, as well as Skagway itself, were said to be almost deserted. Men were leaving the White Pa.s.s Railway in hundreds, and a number of the hands on the steamer herself had deserted under the excitement. Mingling with the pa.s.sengers we eagerly extracted every drop of information possible. No one knew much about it, but they said all they knew and a good part of what they had heard, and when the boat swung round and disappeared in the moonlight, she left the goldseekers exultant and tremulous on the wharf.

They were now aflame with desire to take part in this new stampede, which seemed to be within their slender means, and I, being one of them and eager to see such a "stampede," took a final session with the customs collector, and prepared to board the next boat.

I arranged with Duncan McKinnon to have my old horse taken care of in his lot. I dug wells for him so that he should not lack for water, and treated him to a dish of salt, and just at sunset said good-by to him with another twinge of sadness and turned toward the wharf. He looked very lonely and sad standing there with drooping head in the midst of the stumps of his pasture lot. However, there was plenty of feed and half a dozen men volunteered to keep an eye on him.

"Don't worry, mon," said Donald McLane. "He'll be gettin' fat and strong on the juicy gra.s.s, whilst you're a-heavin' out the gold-dust."

There were about ten of us who lined up to the purser's window of the little steamer which came along that night and purchased second-cla.s.s pa.s.sage. The boat was very properly named the _Utopia_, and was so crowded with other goldseekers from down the coast, that we of the Long Trail were forced to put our beds on the floor of the little saloon in the stern of the boat which was called the "social room."

We were all second-cla.s.s, and we all lay down in rows on the carpet, covering every foot of s.p.a.ce. Each man rolled up in his own blankets, and I was the object of considerable remark by reason of my mattress, which gave me as good a bed as the vessel afforded.

There was a great deal of noise on the boat, and its pa.s.sengers, both men and women, were not of the highest type. There were several stowaways, and some of the women were not very nice as to their actions, and, rightly or wrongly, were treated with scant respect by the men, who were loud and vulgar for the most part. Sleep was difficult in the turmoil.

Though second-cla.s.s pa.s.sengers, strange to say, we came first at table and were very well fed. The boat ran entirely inside a long row of islands, and the water was smooth as a river. The mountains grew each moment more splendid as we neared Skagway, and the ride was most enjoyable. Whales and sharks interested us on the way. The women came to light next day, and on the whole were much better than I had inferred from the two or three who were the source of disturbance the night before. The men were not of much interest; they seemed petty and without character for the most part.

At Juneau we came into a still more mountainous country, and for the rest of the way the scenery was magnificent. Vast rivers of ice came curving down absolutely out of the clouds which hid the summits of the mountains--came curving in splendid lines down to the very water's edge. The sea was chill and gray, and as we entered the mouth of Lynn Ca.n.a.l a raw swift wind swept by, making us s.h.i.+ver with cold.

The grim bronze-green mountains' sides formed a most impressive but forbidding scene.

It was nine o'clock the next morning as we swung to and unloaded ourselves upon one of the long wharves which run out from the town of Skagway toward the deep water. We found the town exceedingly quiet.

Half the men had gone to the new strike. Stores were being tended by women, some small shops were closed entirely, and nearly every business firm had sent representatives into the new gold fields, which we now found to be on Atlin Lake.

It was difficult to believe that this wharf a few months before had been the scene of a b.l.o.o.d.y tragedy which involved the shooting of "Soapy Smith," the renowned robber and desperado. On the contrary, it seemed quite like any other town of its size in the States. The air was warm and delightful in midday, but toward night the piercing wind swept down from the high mountains, making an overcoat necessary.

A few men had returned from this new district, and were full of enthusiasm concerning the prospects. Their reports increased the almost universal desire to have a part in the stampede. The Iowa boys from the Long Trail wasted no time, but set about their own plans for getting in. They expected to reach the creek by sheer force and awkwardness.

They had determined to try the "cut-off," which left the wagon road and took off up the east fork of the Skagway River. Nearly three hundred people had already set out on this trail, and the boys felt sure of "making it all right--all right," though it led over a great glacier and into an unmapped region of swift streams. "After the Telegraph Trail," said Doc, "we're not easily scared."

It seemed to me a desperate chance, and I was not ready to enter upon such a trip with only such grub and clothing as could be carried upon my back; but it was the last throw of the dice for these young fellows. They had very little money left, and could not afford to hire pack trains; but by making a swift dash into the country, each hoped to get a claim. How they expected to hold it or use it after they got it, they were unable to say; but as they were out for gold, and here was a chance (even though it were but the slightest chance in the world) to secure a location, they accepted it with the sublime audacity of youth and ignorance. They saddled themselves with their packs, and with a cheery wave of the hand said "Good-by and good luck" and marched away in single file.

Just a week later I went round to see if any news of them had returned to their bunk house. I found their names on the register.

They had failed. One of them set forth their condition of purse and mind by writing: "Dave Walters, Boone, Iowa. Busted and going home."

THE GOLDSEEKERS

I saw these dreamers of dreams go by, I trod in their footsteps a s.p.a.ce; Each marched with his eyes on the sky, Each pa.s.sed with a light on his face.

They came from the hopeless and sad, They faced the future and gold; Some the tooth of want's wolf had made mad, And some at the forge had grown old.

Behind them these serfs of the tool The rags of their service had flung; No longer of fortune the fool, This word from each bearded lip rung:

"Once more I'm a man, I am free!

No man is my master, I say; To-morrow I fail, it may be-- No matter, I'm freeman to-day."

They go to a toil that is sure, To despair and hunger and cold; Their sickness no warning can cure, They are mad with a longing for gold.

The light will fade from each eye, The smile from each face; They will curse the impa.s.sible sky, And the earth when the snow torrents race.

Some will sink by the way and be laid In the frost of the desolate earth; And some will return to a maid, Empty of hand as at birth.

_But this out of all will remain,_ _They have lived and have tossed;_ _So much in the game will be gain,_ _Though the gold of the dice has been lost._

CHAPTER XXI

THE RUSH TO ATLIN LAKE

It took me longer to get under way, for I had determined to take at least thirty days' provisions for myself and a newspaper man who joined me here. Our supplies, together with tent, tools, and clothing, made a considerable outfit. However, in a few days we were ready to move, and when I again took my place at the head of a little pack train it seemed quite in the natural order of things.

We left late in the day with intent to camp at the little village of White Pa.s.s, which was the end of the wagon road and some twelve miles away. We moved out of town along a road lined with refuse, camp-bottoms, ruined cabins, tin cans, and broken bottles,--all the unsightly debris of the rush of May and June. A part of the way had been corduroyed, for which I was exceedingly grateful, for the Skagway River roared savagely under our feet, while on either side of the roadway at other points I could see abysses of mud which, in the growing darkness, were sufficiently menacing.

Our course was a northerly one. We were ascending the ever narrowing canon of the river at a gentle grade, with snowy mountains in vista.

We arrived at White Pa.s.s at about ten o'clock at night. A little town is springing up there, confident of being an important station on the railroad which was already built to that point.

Thus far the journey had been easy and simple, but immediately after leaving White Pa.s.s we entered upon an exceedingly stony road, filled with sharp rock which had been blasted from the railway above us.

Upon reaching the end of the wagon road, and entering upon the trail, we came upon the Way of Death. The waters reeked with carrion. The breeze was the breath of carrion, and all nature was made indecent and disgusting by the presence of carca.s.ses. Within the distance of fifteen miles we pa.s.sed more than two thousand dead horses. It was a cruel land, a land filled with the record of men's merciless greed.

Nature herself was cold, majestic, and grand. The trail rough, hard, and rocky. The horses labored hard under their heavy burdens, though the floor they trod was always firm.

Just at the summit in the gray mist, where a bulbous granite ridge cut blackly and lonesomely against the sky, we overtook a flock of turkeys being driven by a one-armed man with a singularly appropriate Scotch cap on his head. The birds sat on the bleak gray rocks in the gathering dusk with the suggestion of being utterly at the end of the world. Their feathers were blown awry by the merciless wind and they looked weary, disconsolate, and bewildered. Their faint, sad gobbling was like the talk of sick people lost in a desert. They were on their way to Dawson City to their death and they seemed to know it.

We camped at the Halfway House, a big tent surrounded by the most diabolical landscape of high peaks lost in mist, with near-by slopes of gray rocks scantily covered with yellow-green gra.s.s. All was bare, wild, desolate, and drear. The wind continued to whirl down over the divide, carrying torn gray ma.s.ses of vapor which cast a gloomy half light across the gruesome little meadow covered with rotting carca.s.ses and crates of bones which filled the air with odor of disease and death.

Within the tent, which flopped and creaked in the wind, we huddled about the cook-stove in the light of a lantern, listening to the loud talk of a couple of packers who were discussing their business with enormous enthusiasm. Happily they grew sleepy at last and peace settled upon us. I unrolled my sleeping bag and slept dreamlessly until the "Russian n.o.bleman," who did the cooking, waked me.

Morning broke bleak and desolate. Mysterious clouds which hid the peaks were still streaming wildly down the canon. We got away at last, leaving behind us that sad little meadow and its gruesome lakes, and began the slow and toilsome descent over slippery ledges of rock, among endless rows of rotting carca.s.ses, over poisonous streams and through desolate, fire-marked, and ghastly forests of small pines. Everywhere were the traces of the furious flood of humankind that had broken over this height in the early spring.

Wreckage of sleighs, abandoned tackle, heaps of camp refuse, clothing, and most eloquent of all the pathway itself, worn into the pitiless iron ledges, made it possible for me to realize something of the scene.

Down there in the gully, on the sullen drift of snow, the winter trail could still be seen like an unclean ribbon and here, where the shrivelled hides of horses lay thick, wound the summer pathway. Up yonder summit, lock-stepped like a file of convicts, with tongues protruding and breath roaring from their distended throats, thousands of men had climbed with killing burdens on their backs, mad to reach the great inland river and the gold belt. Like the men of the Long Trail, they, too, had no time to find the gold under their feet.

It was terrible to see how on every slippery ledge the ranks of horses had broken like waves to fall in heaps like rows of seaweed, tumbled, contorted, and grinning. Their dried skins had taken on the color of the soil, so that I sometimes set foot upon them without realizing what they were. Many of them had saddles on and nearly all had lead-ropes. Some of them had even been tied to trees and left to starve.

In all this could be read the merciless greed and impracticability of these goldseekers. Men who had never driven a horse in their lives, and had no idea what an animal could do, or what he required to eat, loaded their outfits upon some poor patient beast and drove him without feed until, weakened and insecure of foot, he slipped and fell on some one of these cruel ledges of flinty rock.

The business of packing, however, had at last fallen into less cruel or at least more judicial hands, and though the trail was filled with long pack trains going and coming, they were for the most part well taken care of. We met many long trains of packhorses returning empty from Bennett Lake. They were followed by shouting drivers who clattered along on packhorses wherever the trail would permit.

One train carried four immense trunks--just behind the trunks, mounted astride of one of the best horses, rode a bold-faced, handsome white woman followed by a huge negress. The white woman had made her pile by dancing a shameless dance in the dissolute dens of Dawson City, and was on her way to Paris or New York for a "good time." The reports of the hotel keepers made her out to be unspeakably vile. The negress was quite decent by contrast.

At Log Cabin we came in sight of the British flag which marks the boundary line of United States territory, where a camp of mounted police and the British customs officer are located. It was a drear season even in midsummer, a land of naked ledges and cold white peaks. A few small pine trees furnished logs for the cabins and wood for their fires. The government offices were located in tents.

I found the officers most courteous, and the customs fair. The treatment given me at Log Cabin was in marked contrast with the exactions of my own government at Wrangell. All goods were unloaded before the inspector's tent and quickly examined. The miner suffered very little delay.