TWO DIANAS IN ALASKA 203 



At one of our camps we called a longer halt, and 

 Cecily and I had a washing day, making a fire by 

 the unlimited water supply, and requisitioning the 

 constant services of the camp kettle. As we rinsed 

 the clothes in the river my boot struck against some- 

 thing hard beneath the sand, and I stooped down 

 to redeem the treasure trove of a mastodon tooth 

 in excellent preservation. We thought that this rem- 

 nant of a pre-historic monster had been washed down 

 from the river banks during the floods of spring, or 

 snow-falls of winter. Our natives told us that they 

 often came on many large bones buried in the shale- 

 like bluffs along the sides of the Kuskokwim. We 

 * saw no game of any kind, and save for a musk-rat 

 or two swimming away from us for dear life, and the 

 wildfowl who had their haunts in the quiet slopes 

 fringing the stream, this world of ours was solemn in 

 its desolation. 



On and on we went, a round of days very much 

 alike, rain and storm and shine, strenuous days 

 enough, crammed to overflowing with the manifold 

 interests of the trip. So at last to wilder waters, 

 broken country, split up into many channels, with 

 infinitesimal islands and streams branching forth from 

 the mighty mother. Mountains loomed on our 

 horizon, and above all rose the dominating peak of 

 Mount MacKinley, the highest on the North American 

 continent. Chains and networks of water intersected 

 the land and spread into lagoons, where mallard, teal, 

 and the common snipe abounded. 



On the other side of Fort Kalmakoff, established in 



