John Greenleaf Whittier - "Narrative and Legendary Poems: Pennsylvania Pilgrim and Others"

Vingie E. Roe - "The Maid of the Whispering Hills"

Brillat Savarin - "The Physiology of Taste"

William MacLeod Raine - "A Texas Ranger"

Travels in Alaska

J >> John Muir >> Travels in Alaska




"Just feel that," said the minister in the night, as he took my hand
and plunged it into a pool about three inches deep in which he was
lying.

"Never mind," I said, "it is only water. Everything is wet now. It
will soon be morning and we will dry at the fire."

Our Indian neighbors were, if possible, still wetter. Their hut had
been blown down several times during the night. Our tent leaked
badly, and we were lying in a mossy bog, but around the big camp-fire
we were soon warm and half dry. We had expected to reach Wrangell by
this time. Toyatte said the storm might last several days longer. We
were out of tea and coffee, much to Mr. Young's distress. On my
return from a walk I brought in a good big bunch of glandular ledum
and boiled it in the teapot. The result of this experiment was a
bright, clear amber-colored, rank-smelling liquor which I did not
taste, but my suffering companion drank the whole potful and praised
it. The rain was so heavy we decided not to attempt to leave camp
until the storm somewhat abated, as we were assured by Toyatte that
we would not be able to round Cape Fanshawe, a sheer, outjutting
headland, the nose as he called it, past which the wind sweeps with
great violence in these southeastern storms. With what grateful
enthusiasm the trees welcomed the life-giving rain! Strong, towering
spruces, hemlocks, and cedars tossed their arms, bowing, waving, in
every leap, quivering and rejoicing together in the gray, roaring
storm. John and Charley put on their gun-coats and went hunting for
another deer, but returned later in the afternoon with clean hands,
having fortunately failed to shed any more blood. The wind still held
in the south, and Toyatte, grimly trying to comfort us, told us that
we might be held here a week or more, which we should not have minded
much, for we had abundance of provisions. Mr. Young and I shifted our
tent and tried to dry blankets. The wind moderated considerably, and
at 7 A.M. we started but met a rough sea and so stiff a wind we
barely succeeded in rounding the cape by all hands pulling their
best. Thence we struggled down the coast, creeping close to the
shore and taking advantage of the shelter of protecting rocks, making
slow, hard-won progress until about the middle of the afternoon, when
the sky opened and the blessed sun shone out over the beautiful
waters and forests with rich amber light; and the high, glacier-laden
mountains, adorned with fresh snow, slowly came to view in all their
grandeur, the bluish-gray clouds crawling and lingering and
dissolving until every vestige of them vanished. The sunlight made
the upper snow-fields pale creamy yellow, like that seen on the
Chilcat mountains the first day of our return trip. Shortly after the
sky cleared, the wind abated and changed around to the north, so that
we ventured to hoist our sail, and then the weary Indians had rest.
It was interesting to note how speedily the heavy swell that had been
rolling for the last two or three days was subdued by the
comparatively light breeze from the opposite direction. In a few
minutes the sound was smooth and no trace of the storm was left, save
the fresh snow and the discoloration of the water. All the water of
the sound as far as I noticed was pale coffee-color like that of the
streams in boggy woods. How much of this color was due to the inflow
of the flooded streams many times increased in size and number by the
rain, and how much to the beating of the waves along the shore
stirring up vegetable matter in shallow bays, I cannot determine. The
effect, however, was very marked.

About four o'clock we saw smoke on the shore and ran in for news. We
found a company of Taku Indians, who were on their way to Fort
Wrangell, some six men and about the same number of women. The men
were sitting in a bark hut, handsomely reinforced and embowered with
fresh spruce boughs. The women were out at the side of a stream,
washing their many bits of calico. A little girl, six or seven years
old, was sitting on the gravelly beach, building a playhouse of white
quartz pebbles, scarcely caring to stop her work to gaze at us.
Toyatte found a friend among the men, and wished to encamp beside
them for the night, assuring us that this was the only safe harbor to
be found within a good many miles. But we resolved to push on a
little farther and make use of the smooth weather after being
stormbound so long, much to Toyatte and his companion's disgust. We
rowed about a couple of miles and ran into a cozy cove where wood and
water were close at hand. How beautiful and homelike it was! plushy
moss for mattresses decked with red corner berries, noble spruce
standing guard about us and spreading kindly protecting arms. A few
ferns, aspidiums, polypodiums, with dewberry vines, coptis, pyrola,
leafless huckleberry bushes, and ledum grow beneath the trees. We
retired at eight o'clock, and just then Toyatte, who had been
attentively studying the sky, presaged rain and another southeaster
for the morrow.

The sky was a little cloudy next morning, but the air was still and
the water smooth. We all hoped that Toyatte, the old weather prophet,
had misread the sky signs. But before reaching Point Vanderpeut the
rain began to fall and the dreaded southeast wind to blow, which soon
increased to a stiff breeze, next thing to a gale, that lashed the
sound into ragged white caps. Cape Vanderpeut is part of the terminal
of an ancient glacier that once extended six or eight miles out from
the base of the mountains. Three large glaciers that once were
tributaries still descend nearly to the sea-level, though their
fronts are back in narrow fiords, eight or ten miles from the sound.
A similar point juts out into the sound five or six miles to the
south, while the missing portion is submerged and forms a shoal.

All the cape is forested save a narrow strip about a mile long,
composed of large boulders against which the waves beat with loud
roaring. A bar of foam a mile or so farther out showed where the
waves were breaking on a submerged part of the moraine, and I
supposed that we would be compelled to pass around it in deep water,
but Toyatte, usually so cautious, determined to cross it, and after
giving particular directions, with an encouraging shout every oar and
paddle was strained to shoot through a narrow gap. Just at the most
critical point a big wave heaved us aloft and dropped us between two
huge rounded boulders, where, had the canoe been a foot or two closer
to either of them, it must have been smashed. Though I had offered no
objection to our experienced pilot's plan, it looked dangerous, and I
took the precaution to untie my shoes so they could be quickly shaken
off for swimming. But after crossing the bar we were not yet out of
danger, for we had to struggle hard to keep from being driven ashore
while the waves were beating us broadside on. At length we
discovered a little inlet, into which we gladly escaped. A pure-white
iceberg, weathered to the form of a cross, stood amid drifts of kelp
and the black rocks of the wave-beaten shore in sign of safety and
welcome. A good fire soon warmed and dried us into common comfort.
Our narrow escape was the burden of conversation as we sat around the
fire. Captain Toyatte told us of two similar adventures while he was
a strong young man. In both of them his canoe was smashed and he swam
ashore out of the surge with a gun in his teeth. He says that if we
had struck the rocks he and Mr. Young would have been drowned, all
the rest of us probably would have been saved. Then, turning to me,
he asked me if I could have made a fire in such a case without
matches, and found a way to Wrangell without canoe or food.

We started about daybreak from our blessed white cross harbor, and,
after rounding a bluff cape opposite the mouth of Wrangell Narrows, a
fleet of icebergs came in sight, and of course I was eager to trace
them to their source. Toyatte naturally enough was greatly excited
about the safety of his canoe and begged that we should not venture
to force a way through the bergs, risking the loss of the canoe and
our lives now that we were so near the end of our long voyage.

"Oh, never fear, Toyatte," I replied. "You know we are always
lucky--the weather is good. I only want to see the Thunder Glacier
for a few minutes, and should the bergs be packed dangerously close,
I promise to turn back and wait until next summer."

Thus assured, he pushed rapidly on until we entered the fiord, where
we had to go cautiously slow. The bergs were close packed almost
throughout the whole extent of the fiord, but we managed to reach a
point about two miles from the head--commanding a good view of the
down-plunging lower end of the glacier and blue, jagged ice-wall.
This was one of the most imposing of the first-class glaciers I had
as yet seen, and with its magnificent fiord formed a fine triumphant
close for our season's ice work. I made a few notes and sketches and
turned back in time to escape from the thickest packs of bergs before
dark. Then Kadachan was stationed in the bow to guide through the
open portion of the mouth of the fiord and across Soutchoi Strait. It
was not until several hours after dark that we were finally free from
ice. We occasionally encountered stranded packs on the delta, which
in the starlight seemed to extend indefinitely in every direction.
Our danger lay in breaking the canoe on small bergs hard to see and
in getting too near the larger ones that might split or roll over.

"Oh, when will we escape from this ice?" moaned much-enduring old
Toyatte.

We ran aground in several places in crossing the Stickeen delta, but
finally succeeded in groping our way over muddy shallows before the
tide fell, and encamped on the boggy shore of a small island, where
we discovered a spot dry enough to sleep on, after tumbling about in
a tangle of bushes and mossy logs.

We left our last camp November 21 at daybreak. The weather was calm
and bright. Wrangell Island came into view beneath a lovely rosy sky,
all the forest down to the water's edge silvery gray with a dusting
of snow. John and Charley seemed to be seriously distressed to find
themselves at the end of their journey while a portion of the stock
of provisions remained uneaten. "What is to be done about it?" they
asked, more than half in earnest. The fine, strong, and specious
deliberation of Indians was well illustrated on this eventful trip.
It was fresh every morning. They all behaved well, however, exerted
themselves under tedious hardships without flinching for days or
weeks at a time; never seemed in the least nonplussed; were prompt to
act in every exigency; good as servants, fellow travelers, and even
friends.

We landed on an island in sight of Wrangell and built a big smoky
signal fire for friends in town, then set sail, unfurled our flag,
and about noon completed our long journey of seven or eight hundred
miles. As we approached the town, a large canoeful of friendly
Indians came flying out to meet us, cheering and handshaking in lusty
Boston fashion. The friends of Mr. Young had intended to come out in
a body to welcome him back, but had not had time to complete their
arrangements before we landed. Mr. Young was eager for news. I told
him there could be no news of importance about a town. We only had
real news, drawn from the wilderness. The mail steamer had left
Wrangell eight days before, and Mr. Vanderbilt and family had sailed
on her to Portland. I had to wait a month for the next steamer, and
though I would have liked to go again to Nature, the mountains were
locked for the winter and canoe excursions no longer safe.

So I shut myself up in a good garret alone to wait and work. I was
invited to live with Mr. Young but concluded to prepare my own food
and enjoy quiet work. How grandly long the nights were and short the
days! At noon the sun seemed to be about an hour high, the clouds
colored like sunset. The weather was rather stormy. North winds
prevailed for a week at a time, sending down the temperature to near
zero and chilling the vapor of the bay into white reek, presenting a
curious appearance as it streamed forward on the wind, like combed
wool. At Sitka the minimum was eight degrees plus; at Wrangell, near
the storm-throat of the Stickeen, zero. This is said to be the
coldest weather ever experienced in southeastern Alaska.



Chapter XIII

Alaska Indians


Looking back on my Alaska travels, I have always been glad that good
luck gave me Mr. Young as a companion, for he brought me into
confiding contact with the Thlinkit tribes, so that I learned their
customs, what manner of men they were, how they lived and loved,
fought and played, their morals, religion, hopes and fears, and
superstitions, how they resembled and differed in their
characteristics from our own and other races. It was easy to see that
they differed greatly from the typical American Indian of the
interior of this continent. They were doubtless derived from the
Mongol stock. Their down-slanting oval eyes, wide cheek-bones, and
rather thick, outstanding upper lips at once suggest their connection
with the Chinese or Japanese. I have not seen a single specimen that
looks in the least like the best of the Sioux, or indeed of any of
the tribes to the east of the Rocky Mountains. They also differ from
other North American Indians in being willing to work, when free from
the contamination of bad whites. They manage to feed themselves well,
build good substantial houses, bravely fight their enemies, love
their wives and children and friends, and cherish a quick sense of
honor. The best of them prefer death to dishonor, and sympathize with
their neighbors in their misfortunes and sorrows. Thus when a family
loses a child by death, neighbors visit them to cheer and console.
They gather around the fire and smoke, talk kindly and naturally,
telling the sorrowing parents not to grieve too much, reminding them
of the better lot of their child in another world and of the troubles
and trials the little ones escape by dying young, all this in a
perfectly natural, straightforward way, wholly unlike the vacant,
silent, hesitating behavior of most civilized friends, who oftentimes
in such cases seem nonplussed, awkward, and afraid to speak, however
sympathetic.

The Thlinkits are fond and indulgent parents. In all my travels I
never heard a cross, fault-finding word, or anything like scolding
inflicted on an Indian child, or ever witnessed a single case of
spanking, so common in civilized communities. They consider the want
of a son to bear their name and keep it alive the saddest and most
deplorable ill-fortune imaginable.

The Thlinkit tribes give a hearty welcome to Christian missionaries.
In particular they are quick to accept the doctrine of the atonement,
because they themselves practice it, although to many of the
civilized whites it is a stumbling-block and rock of offense. As an
example of their own doctrine of atonement they told Mr. Young and me
one evening that twenty or thirty years ago there was a bitter war
between their own and the Sitka tribe, great fighters, and pretty
evenly matched. After fighting all summer in a desultory, squabbling
way, fighting now under cover, now in the open, watching for every
chance for a shot, none of the women dared venture to the
salmon-streams or berry-fields to procure their winter stock of
food. At this crisis one of the Stickeen chiefs came out of his
block-house fort into an open space midway between their fortified
camps, and shouted that he wished to speak to the leader of the
Sitkas.

When the Sitka chief appeared he said:--

"My people are hungry. They dare not go to the salmon-streams or
berry-fields for winter supplies, and if this war goes on much longer
most of my people will die of hunger. We have fought long enough; let
us make peace. You brave Sitka warriors go home, and we will go home,
and we will all set out to dry salmon and berries before it is too
late."

The Sitka chief replied:--

"You may well say let us stop fighting, when you have had the best of
it. You have killed ten more of my tribe than we have killed of
yours. Give us ten Stickeen men to balance our blood-account; then,
and not till then, will we make peace and go home."

"Very well," replied the Stickeen chief, "you know my rank. You know
that I am worth ten common men and more. Take me and make peace."

This noble offer was promptly accepted; the Stickeen chief stepped
forward and was shot down in sight of the fighting bands. Peace was
thus established, and all made haste to their homes and ordinary
work. That chief literally gave himself a sacrifice for his people.
He died that they might live. Therefore, when missionaries preached
the doctrine of atonement, explaining that when all mankind had gone
astray, had broken God's laws and deserved to die, God's son came
forward, and, like the Stickeen chief, offered himself as a sacrifice
to heal the cause of God's wrath and set all the people of the world
free, the doctrine was readily accepted.

"Yes, your words are good," they said. "The Son of God, the Chief of
chiefs, the Maker of all the world, must be worth more than all
mankind put together; therefore, when His blood was shed, the
salvation of the world was made sure."

A telling illustration of the ready acceptance of this doctrine was
displayed by Shakes, head chief of the Stickeens at Fort Wrangell. A
few years before my first visit to the Territory, when the first
missionary arrived, he requested Shakes to call his people together
to hear the good word he had brought them. Shakes accordingly sent
out messengers throughout the village, telling his people to wash
their faces, put on their best clothing, and come to his block-house
to hear what their visitor had to say. When all were assembled, the
missionary preached a Christian sermon on the fall of man and the
atonement whereby Christ, the Son of God, the Chief of chiefs, had
redeemed all mankind, provided that this redemption was voluntarily
accepted with repentance of their sins and the keeping of his
commandments.

When the missionary had finished his sermon, Chief Shakes slowly
arose, and, after thanking the missionary for coming so far to bring
them good tidings and taking so much unselfish interest in the
welfare of his tribe, he advised his people to accept the new
religion, for he felt satisfied that because the white man knew so
much more than the Indian, the white man's religion was likely to be
better than theirs.

"The white man," said he, "makes great ships. We, like children, can
only make canoes. He makes his big ships go with the wind, and he
also makes them go with fire. We chop down trees with stone axes; the
Boston man with iron axes, which are far better. In everything the
ways of the white man seem to be better than ours. Compared with the
white man we are only blind children, knowing not how best to live
either here or in the country we go to after we die. So I wish you to
learn this new religion and teach it to your children, that you may
all go when you die into that good heaven country of the white man
and be happy. But I am too old to learn a new religion, and besides,
many of my people who have died were bad and foolish people, and if
this word the missionary has brought us is true, and I think it is,
many of my people must be in that bad country the missionary calls
'Hell,' and I must go there also, for a Stickeen chief never deserts
his people in time of trouble. To that bad country, therefore, I will
go, and try to cheer my people and help them as best I can to endure
their misery."

Toyatte was a famous orator. I was present at the meeting at Fort
Wrangell at which he was examined and admitted as a member of the
Presbyterian Church. When called upon to answer the questions as to
his ideas of God, and the principal doctrines of Christianity, he
slowly arose in the crowded audience, while the missionary said,
"Toyatte, you do not need to rise. You can answer the questions
seated."

To this he paid no attention, but stood several minutes without
speaking a word, never for a moment thinking of sitting down like a
tired woman while making the most important of all the speeches of
his life. He then explained in detail what his mother had taught him
as to the character of God, the great Maker of the world; also what
the shamans had taught him; the thoughts that often came to his mind
when he was alone on hunting expeditions, and what he first thought
of the religion which the missionaries had brought them. In all his
gestures, and in the language in which he expressed himself, there
was a noble simplicity and earnestness and majestic bearing which
made the sermons and behavior of the three distinguished divinity
doctors present seem commonplace in comparison.

Soon after our return to Fort Wrangell this grand old man was killed
in a quarrel in which he had taken no other part than that of
peacemaker. A number of the Taku tribe came to Fort Wrangell, camped
near the Stickeen village, and made merry, manufacturing and drinking
hootchenoo, a vile liquor distilled from a mash made of flour, dried
apples, sugar, and molasses, and drunk hot from the still. The
manufacture of hootchenoo being illegal, and several of Toyatte's
tribe having been appointed deputy constables to prevent it, they
went to the Taku camp and destroyed as much of the liquor as they
could find. The Takus resisted, and during the quarrel one of the
Stickeens struck a Taku in the face--an unpardonable offense. The
next day messengers from the Taku camp gave notice to the Stickeens
that they must make atonement for that blow, or fight with guns. Mr.
Young, of course, was eager to stop the quarrel and so was Toyatte.
They advised the Stickeen who had struck the Taku to return to their
camp and submit to an equal blow in the face from the Taku. He did
so; went to the camp, said he was ready to make atonement, and
invited the person whom he had struck to strike him. This the Taku
did with so much force that the balance of justice was again
disturbed. The attention of the Takus was called to the fact that
this atoning blow was far harder than the one to be atoned for, and
immediately a sort of general free fist-fight began, and the quarrel
was thus increased in bitterness rather than diminished.

Next day the Takus sent word to the Stickeens to get their guns
ready, for to-morrow they would come up and fight them, thus boldly
declaring war. The Stickeens in great excitement assembled and loaded
their guns for the coming strife. Mr. Young ran hither and thither
amongst the men of his congregation, forbidding them to fight,
reminding them that Christ told them when they were struck to offer
the other cheek instead of giving a blow in return, doing everything
in his power to still the storm, but all in vain. Toyatte stood
outside one of the big blockhouses with his men about him, awaiting
the onset of the Takus. Mr. Young tried hard to get him away to a
place of safety, reminding him that he belonged to his church and no
longer had any right to fight. Toyatte calmly replied:--

"Mr. Young, Mr. Young, I am not going to fight. You see I have no gun
in my hand; but I cannot go inside of the fort to a place of safety
like women and children while my young men are exposed to the bullets
of their enemies. I must stay with them and share their dangers, but
I will not fight. But you, Mr. Young, you must go away; you are a
minister and you are an important man. It would not do for you to be
exposed to bullets. Go to your home in the fort; pretty soon 'hi yu
poogh'" (much shooting).

At the first fire Toyatte fell, shot through the breast. Thus died
for his people the noblest old Roman of them all.

On this first Alaska excursion I saw Toyatte under all
circumstances,--in rain and snow, landing at night in dark storms,
making fires, building shelters, exposed to all kinds of discomfort,
but never under any circumstances did I ever see him do anything, or
make a single gesture, that was not dignified, or hear him say a word
that might not be uttered anywhere. He often deplored the fact that
he had no son to take his name at his death, and expressed himself as
very grateful when I told him that his name would not be
forgotten,--that I had named one of the Stickeen glaciers for him.



Part II

The Trip of 1880



Chapter XIV

Sum Dum Bay


I arrived early on the morning of the eighth of August on the steamer
California to continue my explorations of the fiords to the northward
which were closed by winter the previous November. The noise of our
cannon and whistle was barely sufficient to awaken the sleepy town.
The morning shout of one good rooster was the only evidence of life
and health in all the place. Everything seemed kindly and
familiar--the glassy water; evergreen islands; the Indians with their
canoes and baskets and blankets and berries; the jet ravens, prying
and flying about the streets and spruce trees; and the bland, hushed
atmosphere brooding tenderly over all.

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