The Stickeen River 



you have no right to risk your life on treacherous 

 peaks and precipices." 



The captain, Nat Lane, son of Senator Joseph 

 Lane, had been swearing in angry impatience for be- 

 ing compelled to make so late a start and thus en- 

 counter a dangerous wind in a narrow gorge, and was 

 threatening to put the missionaries ashore to seek 

 their lost companion, while he went on down the river 

 about his business. But when he heard my call for 

 help, he hastened forward, and elbowed the divines 

 away from the end of the gangplank, shouting in 

 angry irreverence, "Oh, blank! This is no time for 

 preaching! Don't you see the man is hurt?" 



He ran down to our help, and while I steadied my 

 trembling companion from behind, the captain kindly 

 led him up the plank into the saloon, and made him 

 drink a large glass of brandy. Then, with a man hold- 

 ing down his shoulders, we succeeded in getting the 

 bone into its socket, notwithstanding the inflamma- 

 tion and contraction of the muscles and ligaments. 

 Mr. Young was then put to bed, and he slept all the 

 way back to Wrangell. 



In his mission lectures in the East, Mr. Young 

 oftentimes told this story. I made no record of it in 

 my notebook and never intended to write a word 

 about it; but after a miserable, sensational caricature 

 of the story had appeared in a respectable magazine, 

 I thought it but fair to my brave companion that it 

 should be told just as it happened. 



