"OUR RUDDER'S GONE!" 97 



head must be made on the stock to take the tiller and 

 drilled for a set bolt. The whole rudder must be encased 

 in wood, for which a score of holes had to be bored 

 through the steel plates, each of these plates being a 

 scant quarter inch thick. By eleven o'clock the first 

 night we had bored all the holes in the plates, using 

 hand ratchets and ''old men" (wooden frames to support 

 the upper end of the drill) and had sawed the lower end 

 of the rudder stock around at the new shoulder to a 

 depth of five-eighths inch. After doing all this we 

 heartily cursed Ed Born, for this was the job he should 

 have done and yet he said he was busy overhauling the 

 " Abler 's" engine. 



While the night shift took an eighteen-mile tramp 

 into the hills and lunched on broiled ptarmigan, the 

 second day of work on the rudder produced Httie visible 

 results of the day shift's labors. Useless chisels were 

 again the principal output. 



Events took an interesting turn at noon. On coming 

 out of Judge Wood's store the men were leaving shore in 

 the launch and were unable to hear my hail. So I 

 walked down the beach to the "Kotzebue" to find a 

 boat to take me out. Here a tall spectacled man 

 inquired for Kleinschmidt and we rowed out in a skiff 

 borrowed from the "Kotzebue." 



"Are you the man he bought the rudder from?" 



"No, I am the marshal," he answered. 



"What's up?" 



"Well, just a social visit." He seemed to hesitate. 

 "They've been trading with the natives without a license 

 and I have come out to warn them that it is against the 

 law." 



Once on board, the marshal, John Riordan, lunched 



