Dutch Harbor 229 



some four hundred feet. I think that I shall have 

 more sense hereafter. There was a pretty badly de- 

 moralized old man lying panting on the top of that 

 cliff when all was over. It did not teach me any 

 sense, though. Later, at Juneau, the Fairy left me 

 on the wrong side of the sound, and I applied to an 

 Aleut to row me across. After many grimaces he 

 consented, and he and his boy launched his boat, 

 a picturesque-looking dugout. I never rode in a 

 wooden kyack before, and don't think I shall again. 

 I did not notice that it was as tippy as a foot-wide 

 board set on edge, till we had left the beach. I 

 judge it was about two miles to the dock on the 

 other side, but less than a mile straight across. I 

 winked both eyes at once. I said, in a very level 

 and evenly balanced tone, "Go straight across — 

 straight over." "But the tide won't let you walk," 

 he said. "Never mind the tide; put me straight 

 over." He was very willing for that. I kept 

 watching the distance, and calculating how far I 

 could swim with my clothes on. I did not know 

 why he hesitated to take me. It was probably 

 because he did not like to trust himself with a white 

 man in an Aleut boat. These be petty adventures. 

 They would be nothing to a mountaineer, a whaler, 

 or an Aleut. But to a "cheechecho" (a tender- 

 foot) maybe they will serve as warnings not to trust 

 to one's own ignorance — not to be too self-confi- 

 dent while touring in these strangely attractive 

 regions. 



