'Travels in Alaska 



blue, ineffably fine, all angles and harshness melted 

 off in the soft evening light. Even the snow and the 

 grinding, cascading glaciers became divinely tender 

 and fine in this celestial amethystine light. I got 

 back to camp at 7.15, not tired. After my hardtack 

 supper I could have climbed the mountain again and 

 got back before sunrise, but dragging the sled tires 

 me. I have been out on the glacier examining a mo- 

 raine-like mass about a third of a mile from camp. It 

 is perhaps a mile long, a hundred yards wide, and is 

 thickly strewn with wood. I think that it has been 

 brought down the mountain by a heavy snow ava- 

 lanche, loaded on the ice, then carried away from the 

 shore in the direction of the flow of the glacier. This 

 explains detached moraine-masses. This one seems to 

 have been derived from a big roomy cirque or amphi- 

 theatre on the northwest side of this Snow Dome 

 Mountain. 



To shorten the return journey I was tempted to 

 glissade down what appeared to be a snow-filled 

 ravine, which was very steep. All went well until I 

 reached a bluish spot which proved to be ice, on which 

 I lost control of myself and rolled into a gravel talus 

 at the foot without a scratch. Just as I got up and 

 was getting myself orientated, I heard a loud fierce 

 scream, uttered in an exulting, diabolical tone of voice 

 which startled me, as if an enemy, having seen me 

 fall, was glorying in my death. Then suddenly two 

 ravens came swooping from the sky and alighted on 

 the jag of a rock within a few feet of me, evidently 

 hoping that I had been maimed and that they were 



I 300 ] 



