FAR AND NEAR 



were ver}' old, doubtless the work of the Russians. 

 Sitka is ver}^ prettily situated ; a rin^]; of high, dark, 

 snow-topped mountains just behind it, and a spar- 

 kling bay, dotted with islands, rock-based and tree- 

 crowned, in its front, with white volcanic cones in 

 the distance. About the only bit of smooth dirt-road 

 we saw in Alaska, we walked on here for the distance 

 of a mile, in going from the town to the park. 



IN YAKUTAT BAY 



After four warm, humid days at Sitka we turned 

 our faces for the first time toward the open ocean, 

 our objective point being Yakutat Bay, a day's run 

 farther north. The usual Alaska excursion ends at 

 Sitka, but ours was now only fairly begun. The 

 Pacific was very good to us, and used us as gently as 

 an inland lake, there being only a long, low, sleepy 

 swell that did not disturb the most sensitive. The 

 next day, Sunday the 18th, was mild and placid. 

 Far at sea on our left we looked into a world of sun- 

 shine, but above us and on our right lay a heavy 

 blanket of clouds, enveloping and blotting out all 

 the upper portions of the great Fairweather Range. 

 We steamed all day a few miles offshore, hoping 

 that the great peaks, some of them fifteen thousand 

 to sixteen thousand feet high, would reveal them- 

 selves, but they did not. We saw them only from 

 the waist down, as it were, with their glaciers like 

 vast white aprons flanked by skirts of spruce forests. 



56 



