THE WHITE WORLD 



high peaks of the Rocky mountains, but the Alpine speci- 

 mens are of more robust habit, their stems are coarser, 

 and their whole appearance less delicate, less succuleni 

 and smooth, than those of their Arctic relatives. Then, 

 too, they have more down or other characteristics which 

 probably protect them from the fiercer sun and drier air 

 of those elevated regions. Beautiful as are Alpine flowers, 

 they lack the brilliancy and delicacy of those whose bloom 

 brightens the desolation of the Arctic. 



Then, too, the cold waters abound in the smaller forms of 

 animal life. There are creatures that burrow in the slimy 

 mud in the shallows. Some of the Alaskan marine worms 

 are of great length and of brilliant colors; and there are 

 small crustaceans in infinite numbers, and of many kinds, 

 which furnish food for fish and bird and beast. Sea-fowl 

 often hover in cloud-like flocks over the water, pursuing 

 this small prey. 



The whales are always of special interest. To the child 

 and schoolboy no other tales about the savage world have 

 a greater fascination than stories about whales. The ad- 

 ventures incurred in hunting the whale form a precious 

 portion of the literature for youth, and few of us ever get 

 entirely over the liking for it. 



We saw numerous whales on the Harriman Alaskan 

 Expedition, and of several species, but no such large indi- 

 viduals as we saw in the Greenland seas on the " Last 

 Cruise of the Miranda." On our way home, in the Bering 

 Sea, north of the Aleutian Islands, we saw an extensive 

 school of whales. Speaking as a landsman, a " herd " of 

 whales would seem like a better term. It extended for 

 miles apparently to the northern horizon; the whales were 

 not close together, but seemed to go in pairs, apparently 

 feeding rather than playing, and most of them traveling 

 in the same direction, blowing as they came to the surface, 

 and showing often an enormous extent of back before 

 diving again. There must have been two score or more 

 of them, but not often were more than three or four in 

 actual sight at once. Six was the largest number I saw 

 blowing at the same instant. Great flocks of screaming 

 sea-birds swept over the same waters, for that was their 

 pasture also. 



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