636 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



Michael, above the mouth of the Yukon River, I had easy oppor- 

 tunity to verify for myself the accuracy of the statements that had 

 been sent out, and to cast a geological glance at the situation. 

 My examination of the region was confined to a few of the later 

 days of September and to early October. 



The geographical position of the Nome region is the southern 

 face of the peninsular projection of Alaska which separates Kotze- 

 bue Sound on the north from Bering Sea on the south, and ter- 

 minates westward in Cape Prince of Wales the extent of the North 

 American continent. In a direct line of navigation, it lies about 

 twenty-five hundred miles northwest of Seattle and one hundred 

 and seventy miles southeast of Siberia. The nearest settlement 

 of consequence to it prior to 1899 was St. Michael, a hundred miles 

 to the southeast, the starting point of the steamers for the Yukon 

 River; but during the year various aggregations of mining popula- 

 tion had built themselves up in closer range, and reduced the isola- 

 tion from the civilized world by some sixty miles. The Nome dis- 

 trict as settled centers about the lower course of the Snake River, an 

 exceedingly tortuous stream in its tundra course, which emerges 

 from a badly degraded line of limestone, slaty, and schistose moun- 

 tain spurs generally not over seven hundred to twelve hundred feet 

 elevation, but backed by loftier granitic heights, and discharges into 

 the sea at a position thirteen miles west of Cape Nome proper. 

 Three miles east of this mouth is the discharge of Nome River. 

 Both streams have a tidal course of several miles. Nome, or, as it 

 was first called. Anvil City — named from a giant anvil-like protru- 

 sion of slate rock near to the summit of the first line of hills — occu- 

 pies in greater part the tundra and ocean beach of the eastern or 

 left bank of Snake River, but many habitations, mainly of a tempo- 

 rary character, have been placed on the bar beach which has been 

 thrown up by the sea against the mouth of the stream, and de- 

 flected its course for some distance parallel with the ocean front. 

 A number of river steamers (one even of considerable size) and 

 dredges have found a suitable anchorage or " harbor " in the bar- 

 rier-bound waters, and much driftwood passes into them at times 

 of storms and higher waters, when the greatly constricted and 

 shallow mouth is made passable. The entire region is treeless, and 

 the nearest approach to woodland is in the timber tract of Golovnin 

 Bay and its tributaries, about forty miles to the northeast. A 

 fairly dense growth of scrub willow, three to five feet in height, 

 with elms and alders, forms a fringe or delimiting line to parts 

 of the courses of the streams in the tundra, which greatly undu- 

 lates in the direction of the foothills and incloses tarnlike bodies 

 of fresh and slightly brackish waters. Tt is covered merely with a 



