Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 55.djvu/18

8 were hovering about, only too certain of the meal which was being prepared for them. Oftentimes pack saddles, and sometimes even the packs, were allowed to remain with the struggling or sunken animal—such was the mad race which the greed of gold inspired.

On October 9th I was again at Bennett, this time returning from my journey into the interior, and full of experience of what steam navigation on the upper six hundred miles of Yukon waters might mean. There was now a change in the sentiment regarding the quality of the two passes. The Pacific and Arctic Railway, the pioneer of Alaska steam railways, was operating twelve miles of track, and had thus materially reduced the "hardships" of the Skaguay trail; the Chilkoot, on the other hand, was represented to be in the worst of mood, and prepared to put the passing traveler into the same condition. It was more than late in the season, but the winter's blasts had been stayed off by a full month, and there were still no signs of their coming. A little ice had begun to form along the river's margin and over sheltered pools, and an occasional cool night made demands for moderately warm clothing proper; but, on the whole, the temperature was mild and balmy, and to its influence responded a vegetation which in its full glory might easily have called to mind the region of the Juniata.

Although strongly warned against taking the Chilkoot Pass so late in the season, many of the outgoers, whose recollections of events in the early part of the year were still vividly fresh, and who could not be persuaded that the period of a few months had so effaced the conditions of the past as to permit a steam railway to enter for twelve miles into the region, chose it in preference to the White Pass. My own mind had been cast in the same direction; not, however, from a point of judicious preference, but merely because I was anxious to see for myself that which had become historic in the movement of 1898, and of instituting a direct comparison of the physical features and general characteristics of the two routes. With no serious hindrance, the journey from Bennett out was that of a full day only, and there was no particular reason to suspect that there would be delay. Snow had fallen on the summit and whitened all the higher points, but seemingly it hung in only a measurably thin crust, and with not enough to necessitate breaking a trail.

A crude steam ferry across Lake Lindeman cuts off about six miles from the first part of the trail, after which a rapidly rising path, sufficiently distinct to permit it to be easily followed, winds over the rocks and among rock debris to Long Lake, situated at an elevation of some twenty-six hundred feet, where night shelter is found in a fairly comfortable tent. Up to this point we had encountered but little snow, and the condition of the trail was such as to allow of rapid travel. A