Back Aa

Wilderness; A Journal Of Quiet Adventure In Alaska

Close

<h2>CHAPTER VI EXCURSION</h2> <h3>Thursday, December fifth.</h3> November thirtieth we arose before daylight. It was a mild, still morning and the melting snow dripped from the trees. Without breakfast we set about at once to carry our things over to the boat. Olson was aroused and turned out to help. There’s always much to be carried on a trip to Seward; gasoline, oil, tools, my pack bag—containing clothes, heavy blankets, and spare boots,—and the grub box Olson had given me packed with mail, books, grub, and the flute. The engine was in good order and started promptly. So away we went out over the bay just as the day brightened. It was calm and beautiful. The sun from below the horizon shot shafts of light up into the clouds, gray became pink, and pink grew into gold until at last after an hour or more the sun’s rays lighted up the mountain peaks, and we knew that he had risen. It continued calm and mild all the way, but nevertheless I caught myself singing[Pg 103] “Erlkönig,” such is my anxiety at carrying Rockwell with me. Rockwell enjoyed the trip wrapped up in a sheepskin coat of Olson’s. We stopped at a fishing camp for a moment’s chat from the water. The man living there had just caught a good-sized wolverine. We declined breakfast and hurried on. In Seward we stored our things in Olson’s cabin, a little place about eight feet square, and started for the hotel. One of our friends met us with a shout, “Well, you’ve had good sense to stay away so long.” Influenza, I then learned, had raged in Seward, there having been over 350 cases; and smallpox had made a start. But the deaths had been few and it was now well in hand. However, I shunned the hotel. A little cottage was generously put at our disposal and we were soon comfortably settled there with our mail from home spread before us. I left everything of mine at the hotel untouched and we continued to wear our old clothes throughout the stay. At midnight I went with Otto Boehm to pull the dory up above the tide and overturn her, and then continued letter writing until three-thirty A.M. December first and every day of our stay at Seward was calm and fair. We kept house in our cottage, I continually busy writing and doing up Christmas presents, for a steamer had entered on the thirtieth and was due to leave Sunday night, the first. The people of Seward are friendly without being the slightest bit inquisitive, and they are extremely broad-minded for all that their country is remote from the greater world. I don’t believe that provincialism is an inevitable evil of far-off communities. The Alaskan is alert, enterprising, adventurous. Men stand on their own feet—and why not? The confusing intricacy of modern society is here lacking. The men’s own hands take the pure gold from the rocks; no one is another’s master. It’s a great land—the best by far I have ever known. [Pg 104] What a telltale of reaction from our lonely island life is this roseate vision of the little city of the far northwest! We came in time to see Seward quite differently and, with confidence in Alaska, to believe it to be in no way a typical and true Alaskan town. The “New York of the Pacific,” as it is gloriously acclaimed in the literature of its Chamber of Commerce, numbers its citizens perhaps at half a thousand—the tenacious remnant of the many more who years ago trusted our government to fulfill its promises to really build and operate a railroad into the interior. One’s indignation fires at the recital of the men of Seward’s wrongs,—until you recollect that Seward was built for speculation, not for industry, and that by the chance turn of the wheel many have merely reaped loss instead of profit. There are no resources at that spot to be developed and there is consequently no industry. Seward is planned for growth and equipped for commerce. Wide avenues and numbered blocks adorn the town-site maps where to the naked eye the land’s a wilderness of stumps and briars. The center of the built-up portion of the town, one street of two blocks’ length, is modern with electric lights and concrete pavements. The stores are wonderfully good; there are two banks and several small hotels, a baker from Ward’s bakery in New York and a French barber from the Hotel Buckingham. There’s a good grammar school, a hospital, and churches of all sorts. There is no public library; apparently one isn’t badly missed. Seward’s a tradesmen’s town and tradesmen’s views prevail,—narrow reactionary thought on modern issues and a trembling concern at the menace of organized labor. A strike of the three newsboys of the Seward paper plunged the poor fool its printer into frantic fear of an I. W. W. plot. But even Seward smiled at the little man’s terror. The worst of Seward is itself; the best is the strong men that by chance are there or that pass through from the great Alaska. [Pg 105] <div class="figcenter"> <ANTIMG id="i130" class="border" src="images/i130.jpg" width-obs="600" height-obs="456" alt="" /> THE WHITTLER </div> [Pg 107] December second was a day for shopping. I bought all manner of Christmas things, things for the tree, things to eat, little presents for Olson—but nothing for Rockwell. He and I must do without presents this Christmas. Then more letters were written. A wood block that I had cut proved, on my seeing a proof of it, to be absolutely worthless. December third I had still so much mail and business to attend to that I stayed over another day. Set a door frame for Brownell and spent that evening at his house. The postmaster came too, fine fellow, and we’d a great evening taking turns singing songs—and the P. M. did mighty well with “School-master Mishter O’Toole.” The day I’d spent writing and gossiping about town. I heard then a story about Olson that’s worth while. He was once telling a crowd of men about the reindeer to the northward. Among his listeners was a Jew who was annoyed with his “hectoring.” At last this joker asked: “Olson, if you bred a reindeer to a Swede what would you get?” “You’d get a Jew,” replied Olson. The Jew, who still lives in Seward, has not bothered Olson since. The old man has a rare reputation for his honesty and truth and all round sterling qualities. It’s truly a satisfaction to be in a country where men are alert enough to take no offense at alertness, where enterprise is so common a virtue that it arouses no suspicion, and where it is the rule to mind your own business. December fourth we set about to leave for Fox Island. It took two hours to wind up our final business in town and embark. Brownell helped with the boat. Of course the engine balked for fifteen minutes and then (not “of course”) went beautifully. After traveling a quarter of a mile I learned that Rockwell had left our clock standing in the snow by Olson’s cabin. So for that we went back. Brownell saw us and brought it. The trip was swift and smooth. At Caine’s Head it began to snow,[Pg 108] obscuring Fox Island, but I knew the course. In mid-channel the engine stopped. After ten minutes’ tinkering it resumed going and went beautifully till we rounded the head of our cove. Then it sputtered and I had continually to crank it. However, it carried us to thirty or forty feet of the shore when it breathed its last, thanks to the snow that had by now thoroughly wet the engine and ourselves. We unloaded and with great labor hauled up the dory and turned her over. That night I was exhausted and went straight to bed, leaving Rockwell at his drawing. So now we’re on Fox Island again. <hr class="chap" /> [Pg 109] <div class="figcenter chapter"> <ANTIMG id="i134" class="border" src="images/i134.jpg" width-obs="600" height-obs="316" alt="" /></div> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

1 of 2

2 of 2