CHAPTER XIII.

LONELY NORTHERN WASTES pp. 412-435

The Mississippi of Alaska: the Yukon River, and its Thorough Exploration.—Its vast Deltoid Mouth.—Cannot be Entered by Sea-going Vessels. Its Valley, and its Tributaries.—Dividing Line between the Eskimo and the Indian on its Banks.—The Trader’s Steamer; its Whistle in this Lone Waste of the Yukon.—Michaelovsky, the Trading Centre for this Extensive Circumpolar Area.—The Characteristic Beauties of an Arctic Landscape in Summer.—Thunder-storms on the Upper Yukon; never Experienced on the Coast and at its Mouth.—Gorgeous Arches of Auroral Light; Beautiful Spectacular Fires in the Heavens.—Unhappy Climate. Saint Michael’s to the Northward.—Zagoskin, the Intrepid Young Russian Explorer, 1842.—Snow Blizzards.—Golovin Bay; our People Prospecting there for Lead and Silver.—Drift-wood from the Yukon Strews the Beaches of Bering Sea.—Ookivok, and its Cliff-cave Houses.—Hardy Walrus-hunters. —Grantley Harbor; a Reminder of a Costly American Enterprise and its Failure.—Cape Prince of Wales—facing Asia, thirty-six miles away.—Simeon Deschnev, the first White Man to see Alaska, 1648. —His Bold Journey.—The Diomede Islands; Stepping-stones between Asia and America in Bering Straits. —Kotzebue Sound; the Rendezvous for Arctic Traders; the Last Northern Station Visited by Salmon. Interesting Features of the Place.