CHAPTER XX

Our ship having been delayed by the storm, it was mid-afternoon when we reached Yakutat. A vast plateau borders the ocean from Cross Sound, north of Baranoff and Chicagoff islands, to Yakutat; and out of this plateau rise four great snow peaks--Mount La Perouse, Mount Crillon, Mount Lituya, and Mount Fairweather--ranging in height from ten thousand to fifteen thousand nine hundred feet.

In all this stretch there are but two bays of any size, Lituya and Dry, and they have only historical importance.

Lituya Bay was described minutely by La Perouse, who spent some time there in 1786 in his two vessels, the _Astrolabe_ and _Boussole_.

The entrance to this bay is exceedingly dangerous; the tide enters in a bore, which can only be run at slack tide. La Perouse lost two boatloads of men in this bore, on the eve of his departure,--a loss which he describes at length and with much feeling.

Before finally departing, he caused to be erected a monument to the memory of the lost officers and crew on a small island which he named Cenotaphe, or Monument, Isle. A bottle containing a full account of the disaster and the names of the twenty-one men was buried at the foot of the monument.

La Perouse named this bay Port des Francais.

The chronicles of this modest French navigator seem, somehow, to stand apart from those of the other early voyagers. There is an appearance of truth and of fine feeling in them that does not appear in all.

He at first attempted to enter Yakutat Bay, which he called the Bay of Monti, in honor of the commandant of an exploring expedition which he sent out in advance; but the sea was breaking with such violence upon the beach that he abandoned the attempt.

He described the savages of Lituya Bay as treacherous and thievish. They surrounded the ships in canoes, offering to exchange fresh fish and otter skins for iron, which seemed to be the only article desired, although glass beads found some small favor in the eyes of the women.

La Perouse supposed himself to be the first discoverer of this bay. The Russians, however, had been there years before.

The savages appeared to be worshippers of the sun. La Perouse pronounced the bay itself to be the most extraordinary spot on the whole earth. It is a great basin, the middle of which is unfathomable, surrounded by snow peaks of great height. During all the time that he was there, he never saw a puff of wind ruffle the surface of the water, nor was it ever disturbed, save by the fall of masses of ice which were discharged from five different glaciers with a thunderous noise which reechoed from the farthest recesses of the surrounding mountains. The air was so tranquil and the silence so undisturbed that the human voice and the cries of sea-birds lying among the rocks were heard at the distance of half a league.

The climate was found to be "infinitely milder" than that of Hudson Bay of the same latitude. Vegetation was extremely vigorous, pines measuring six feet in diameter and rising to a height of one hundred and forty feet.

Celery, sorrel, lupines, wild peas, yarrow, chicory, angelica, violets, and many varieties of grass were found in abundance, and were used in soups and salads, as remedies for scurvy.

Strawberries, raspberries, gooseberries, the elder, the willow, and the broom were found then as they are to-day. Trout and salmon were taken in the streams, and in the bay, halibut.

It is to be feared that La Perouse was not strong on birds; for in the copses he heard singing "linnets, _nightingales_, blackbirds, and water quails," whose songs were very agreeable. It was July, which he called the "pairing-time." He found one very fine blue jay; and it is surprising that he did not hear it sing.

For the savages--especially the women--the fastidious Frenchman entertained feelings of disgust and horror. He could discover no virtues or traits in them to praise, conscientiously though he tried.

They lived in the same kind of habitations that all the early explorers found along the coast of Alaska: large buildings consisting of one room, twenty-five by twenty feet, or larger. Fire was kindled in the middle of these rooms on the earth floor. Over it was suspended fish of several kinds to be smoked. There was always a large hole in the roof--when there was a roof at all--to receive the smoke.

About twenty persons of both sexes dwelt in each of these houses. Their habits, customs, and relations were indescribably disgusting and indecent.

Their houses were more loathsome and vile of odor than the den of any beast. Even at the present time in some of the native villages--notably Belkoffski on the Aliaskan Peninsula--all the most horrible odors ever experienced in civilization, distilled into one, could not equal the stench with which the natives and their habitations reek. As their customs are somewhat cleanlier now than they were a hundred and thirty years ago, and as upon this one point all the early navigators forcibly agree, we may well conclude that they did not exaggerate.

The one room was used for eating, sleeping, cooking, smoking fish, washing their clothes--in their cooking and eating wooden utensils, by the way, which are never cleansed--and for the habitation of their dogs.

The men pierced the cartilage of the nose and ears for the wearing of ornaments of shell, iron, or other material. They filed their teeth down even with the gums with a piece of rough stone. The men painted their faces and other parts of their bodies in a "frightful manner" with ochre, lamp-black, and black lead, mixed with the oil of the "sea-wolf." Their hair was frequently greased and dressed with the down of sea-birds; the women's, also. A plain skin covered the shoulders of the men, while the rest of the body was left entirely naked.

The women filled the Frenchman with a lively horror. The labret in the lower lip, or ladle, as he termed it, wore unbearably upon his fine nerves. He considered that the whole world would not afford another custom equally revolting and disgusting. When the ornament was removed, the lower lip fell down upon the chin, and this second picture was more hideous than the first.

The gallant Captain Dixon, on his voyage a year later, was more favorably impressed with the women. He must have worn rose-colored glasses. He describes their habits and habitations almost as La Perouse did, but uses no expression of disgust or horror. He describes the women as being of medium size, having straight, well-shaped limbs. They painted their faces; but he prevailed upon one woman by persuasion and presents to wash her face and hands. Whereupon "her countenance had all the cheerful glow of an English milkmaid's; and the healthy red which suffused her cheeks was even beautifully contrasted with the white of her neck; her eyes were black and sparkling; her eyebrows of the same color _and most beautifully arched_; her forehead so remarkably clear that the translucent veins were seen meandering even in their minutest branches--in short, she would be considered handsome even in England." The worst adjectives he applied to the labret were "singular" and "curious."

Don Maurello and other navigators found now and then a woman who might compete with the beauties of Spain and other lands; but none shared the transports of Dixon, who idealized their virtues and condoned their faults.

Tebenkof located two immense glaciers in the bay of Lituya, one in each arm, describing them briefly:--

"The icebergs fall from the mountains and float over the waters of the bay throughout the year. Nothing disturbs the deep silence of this _terribly grand_ gorge of the mountains but the thunder of the falling icebergs."

La Perouse found enormous masses of ice detaching themselves from five different glaciers. The water was covered with icebergs, and nearness to the shore was exceedingly dangerous. His small boat was upset half a mile from shore by a mass of ice falling from a glacier.

Mr. Muir describes La Perouse Glacier as presenting grand ice bluffs to the open ocean, into which it occasionally discharged bergs.

All agree that the appearance and surroundings of the bay are extraordinary.

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Yakutat Bay is two hundred and fifteen miles from Sitka. It was called Behring Bay by Cook and Vancouver, who supposed it to be the bay in which the Dane anchored in 1741. It was named Admiralty Bay by Dixon, and the Bay of Monti by La Perouse. The Indian name is the only one which has been preserved.

It is so peculiarly situated that although several islands lie in front of it, the full force of the North Pacific Ocean sweeps into it. At most seasons of the year it is full of floating ice which drifts down from the glaciers of Disenchantment Bay.

At the point on the southern side of the bay which Dixon named Mulgrave, and where there is a fine harbor, Baranoff established a colony of Siberian convicts about 1796. His instructions from Shelikoff for the laying-out of a city in such a wilderness make interesting reading.

"And now it only remains for us to hope that, having selected on the mainland a suitable place, you will lay out the settlement with some taste and with due regard for beauty of construction, in order that when visits are made by foreign ships, as cannot fail to happen, it may appear more like a town than a village, and that the Russians in America may live in a neat and orderly way, and not, as in Ohkotsk, in squalor and misery, caused by the absence of nearly everything necessary to civilization. Use taste as well as practical judgment in locating the settlement. Look to beauty, as well as to convenience of material and supplies. On the plans, as well as in reality, leave room for spacious squares for public assemblies. Make the streets not too long, but wide, and let them radiate from the squares. If the site is wooded, let trees enough stand to line the streets and to fill the gardens, in order to beautify the place and preserve a healthy atmosphere. Build the houses along the streets, but at some distance from each other, in order to increase the extent of the town. The roofs should be of equal height, and the architecture as uniform as possible. The gardens should be of equal size and provided with good fences along the streets. Thanks be to God that you will at least have no lack of timber."

In the same letter poor Baranoff was reproached for exchanging visits with captains of foreign vessels, and warned that he might be carried off to California or some other "desolate" place.

The colony of convicts had been intended as an "agricultural" settlement; but the bleak location at the foot of Mount St. Elias made a farce of the undertaking. The site had been chosen by a mistake. A post and fortifications were erected, but it is not chronicled that Shelikoff's instructions were carried out. There was great mortality among the colonists and their families, and constant danger of attack by the Kolosh. Finally, in 1805, the fort and settlement were entirely destroyed by their cruel and revengeful enemies.

The new town of Yakutat is three or four miles from the old settlement. There is a good wharf at the foot of a commanding plateau, which is a good site for a city. On the wharf are a saw-mill and cannery. A stiff climb along a forest road brings one to a store, several other business houses, and a few residences.

There are good coal veins in the vicinity. The Yakutat and Southern Railway leads several miles into the interior, and handles a great deal of timber.

In 1794 Puget sailed the _Chatham_ through the narrow channel between the mainland and the islands, leading to Port Mulgrave--where Portoff was established in a tent with nine of his countrymen and several hundred Kadiak natives. He found the channel narrow and dangerous; his vessel grounded, but was successfully floated at returning tide. Passage to Mulgrave was found easy, however, by a channel farther to the westward and southward.

In this bay, as in nearly all other localities on the Northwest Coast, the Indians coming out to visit them paddled around the ship two or three times singing a ceremonious song, before offering to come aboard. They gladly exchanged bows, arrows, darts, spears, fish-gigs--whatever they may be--kamelaykas, or walrus-gut coats, and needlework for white shirts, collars, cravats, and other wearing apparel.

An Indian chief stole Mr. Puget's gold watch chain and seals from his cabin; but it was discovered by Portoff and returned.

The cape extending into the ocean south of the town was the Cape Phipps of the Russians. It has long been known, however, as Ocean Cape. Cape Manby is on the opposite side of the bay.

Sailing up Yakutat Bay, the Bay of Disenchantment is entered and continues for sixty miles, when it merges into Russell Fiord, which bends sharply to the south and almost reaches the ocean.

Enchantment Bay would be a more appropriate name. The scenery is of varied, magnificent, and ever increasing beauty. The climax is reached in Russell Fiord--named for Professor Russell, who explored it in a canoe in 1891.

From Yakutat Bay to the very head of Russell Fiord supreme splendor of scenery is encountered, surpassing the most vaunted of the Old World. Within a few miles, one passes from luxuriant forestation to lovely lakes, lacy cascades, bits of green valley; and then, of a sudden, all unprepared, into the most sublime snow-mountain fastnesses imaginable, surrounded by glaciers and many of the most majestic mountain peaks of the world.

Cascades spring, foaming, down from misty heights, and flowers bloom, large and brilliant, from the water to the line of snow.

Malaspina, an Italian in the service of Spain, named Disenchantment Bay. Turner Glacier and the vast Hubbard Glacier discharge into this bay; and from the reports of the Italian, Tabenkoff, and Vancouver, it has been considered possible that the two glaciers may have reached, more than a hundred years ago, across the narrowest bend at the head of Yakutat Bay.

The fiord is so narrow that the tops of the high snow mountains have the appearance of overhanging their bases; and to the canoeist floating down the slender, translucent water-way, this effect adds to the austerity of the scene.

Captains of regular steamers are frequently offered good prices to make a side trip up Yakutat Bay to the beginning of Disenchantment; but owing to the dangers of its comparatively uncharted waters, they usually decline with vigor.

One who would penetrate into this exquisitely beautiful, lone, and enchanted region must trust himself to a long canoe voyage and complete isolation from his kind. But what recompense--what life-rememberable joy!

Each country has its spell; but none is so great as the spell of this lone and splendid land. It is too sacred for any light word of pen or lip. The spell of Alaska is the spell of God; and it holds all save the basest, whether they acknowledge it or deny. Here are sphinxes and pyramids built of century upon century's snow; the pale green thunder of the cataract; the roar of the avalanche and the glacier's compelling march; the flow of mighty rivers; the unbroken silences that swim from snow mountain to snow mountain; and the rose of sunset whose petals float and fade upon mountain and sea.

As one sails past these mountains days upon days, they seem to lean apart and withdraw in pearly aloofness, that others more beautiful and more remote may dawn upon the enraptured beholder's sight. For hundreds of miles up and down the coast, and for hundreds into the interior, they rise in full view from the ocean which breaks upon the nearer ones. At sunrise and at sunset each is wrapped in a different color from the others, each in its own light, its own glory--caused by its own peculiar shape and its position among the others.

* * * * *

While the steamer lies at Yakutat passengers may, if they desire, walk through the forest to the old village, where there is an ancient Thlinkit settlement. There is a new one at the new town. The tents and cabins climb picturesquely among the trees and ferns from the water up a steep hill.

In 1880 there was a great gold excitement at Yakutat. Gold was discovered in the black-sand beaches. A number of mining camps were there until the late 'eighties, and by the use of rotary hand amalgamators, men were able to clean up forty dollars a day.

The bay was flooded by a tidal wave which left the beach covered with fish. The oil deposited by their decay prevented the action of the mercury, and the camp was abandoned.

The sea is now restoring the black sand, and a second Nome may one day spring up on these hills in a single night.

As I have said elsewhere, the Yakutat women are among the finest basket weavers of the coast. A finely twined Yakutat basket, however small it may be, is a prize; but the bottom should be woven as finely and as carefully as the body of the basket. Some of the younger weavers make haste by weaving the bottom coarsely, which detracts from both its artistic and commercial value.

The instant the end of the gangway touches the wharf at Yakutat, the gayly-clad, dark-eyed squaws swarm aboard. They settle themselves noiselessly along the promenade decks, disposing their baskets, bracelets, carved horn spoons, totem-poles, inlaid lamps, and beaded moccasins about them.

If, during the hours of animated barter that follow, one or two of the women should disappear, the wise woman-passenger will saunter around the ship and take a look into her stateroom, to make sure that all is well; else, when she does return to it, she may miss silver-backed mirrors, bottles of lavender water, bits of jewellery that may have been carelessly left in sight, pretty collars--and even waists and hats--to say nothing of the things which she may later on find.

These poor dark people were born thieves; and neither the little education they have received, nor the treatment accorded them by the majority of white people with whom they have been brought into contact, has served to wean them entirely from the habits and the instincts of centuries.

At Yakutat, no matter how much good sound sense he may possess, the traveller parts with many large silver dollars. He thinks of Christmas, and counts his friends on one hand, then on the other; then over again, on both.

When the steamer has whistled for the sixth time to call in the wandering passengers, and the captain is on the bridge; when the last squaw has pigeon-toed herself up the gangway, flirting her gay shawl around her and chuckling and clucking over the gullibility of the innocent white people; when the last strain from the phonograph in the big store on the hill has died across the violet water widening between the shore and the withdrawing ship--the spendthrift passenger retires to his cabin and finds the berths overflowing and smelling to heaven with Indian things. Then--too late--he sits down, anywhere, and reflects.

The western shore of Yakutat Bay is bounded by the largest glacier in the world--the Malaspina. It has a sea-frontage of more than sixty miles extending from the bay "to Westward"; and the length of its splendid sweep from its head to the sea at the foot of Mount St. Elias is ninety miles.

For one whole day the majestic mountain and its beautiful companion peaks were in sight of the steamer, before the next range came into view. The sea breaks sheer upon the ice-palisades of the glacier. Icebergs, pale green, pale blue, and rose-colored, march out to meet and, bowing, pass the ship.

One cannot say that he knows what beauty is until he has cruised leisurely past this glacier, with the mountains rising behind it, on a clear day, followed by a moonlit night.

On one side are miles on miles of violet ocean sweeping away into limitless space, a fleck of sunlight flashing like a fire-fly in every hollowed wave; on the other, miles on miles of glistening ice, crowned by peaks of softest snow.

At sunset warm purple mists drift in and settle over the glacier; above these float banks of deepest rose; through both, and above them, glimmer the mountains pearlily, in a remote loveliness that seems not of earth.

But by moonlight to see the glacier streaming down from the mountains and out into the ocean, into the midnight--silent, opaline, majestic--is worth ten years of dull, ordinary living.

It is as if the very face of God shone through the silence and the sublimity of the night.