153 
the fatal march of civilization will proceed as irresistibly as 
ever. That cannot be held back, and unsafe as the salmon 
are now in our Atlantic and Pacific coasts rivers, they will 
become more and more unsafe every year; all of which 
goes to show that there is no safe place for the salmon 
within the limits of the United States proper. 
This leaves us only Alaska. Now, how is it with the 
salmon streams of Alaska? Not even there are the salmon 
safe. Countless myriads of salmon formerly filled all the 
rivers and streams of the long Alaskan coast, and they 
were nearly 2,000 miles from the destroying hand of 
civilized man, but they were not safe even on those distant 
shores. The ubiquitous canneryman found them, and he 
already has his grip on the best and most fruitful of the 
Alaskan rivers. ‘The pressure of the world’s demand on 
the world’s supply of canned salmon renders it necessary 
for the salmon canner to occupy more distant and less 
fruitful fields every year, and it is only a question of time 
when all the Alaskan salmon streams are given over to 
the canneries, and when that time comes no one will 
claim, I think, that the salmon are safe in Alaska. 
One or two illustrations are sufficient. The Karluk 
River on Kodiak Island is probably the most wonderful 
salmon river in the world. On Aug. 2, 1889, the cannery 
nets caught on Karluk beach at the mouth of the river, 
153,000 salmon by actual count. A short time after, the 
writer went up the Karluk River in a bidarka—the skin 
boat of the natives—expecting to see myriads of salmon 
spawning and thousands on their journey to the spawn- 
ing grounds, but instead of the wonderful sight we an- 
ticipated, our whole party, I think, saw less than a dozen 
in the river till we reached the Jower spawning grounds, 
and then to our astonishment we saw only a few scatter- 
ing fish spawning, such as one might expect to see in the 
most commonplace salmon river in the world; 153.000 
salmon caught in one day at the mouth of the river, and 
none to speak of going up the river to reproduce their 
