The Route and the Surveys. 119 



features of the region is such that a clear idea of their relations 

 is easily obtained even without instruments. 



The whole of the route from Taku inlet to the Lewes was 

 traversed in the spring and summer of 1890 by a party of eight 

 miners, among whom Mark Russell, a member of our party, was 

 a leading spirit. They started from Juneau before the ice was 

 out of the river, hauling their outfit on hand-sleds so long as the 

 snow lasted, and then packing them. It required eighty days to 

 reach the lake, where the party built a number of boats. After 

 prospecting the Nisutlin and other streams on the eastern side 

 of Ahklen valley they went down the Teslin and back to the 

 coast by Lewes river and CJiilkoot pass. This is an example of 

 the many unheralded exj^editions which the Alaskan prospectors 

 have carried out, facing dangers and privations which appear in- 

 credible to one who is not familiar with the men themselves. Less 

 arduous or novel expeditions have brought fame to explorers 

 better versed in the art of advertising than these unassuming 

 miners. Unfortunately, however, geography is but slightly the 

 gainer from the work of the prospector, since he usually has 

 neither the training nor the inclination to use instruments even 

 if he should be supplied with them, which is rarely the case, and 

 ordinarily the maj) which he draws from memory, unassisted by 

 notes of any sort, is not a model of accuracy. 



At the head of Taku inlet a " track survey " was begun and 

 carried continuously to the mouth of Teslin river, where it 

 connected with the line surveyed by Mr Ogilvie in 1886. The 

 instruments used were a prismatic compass for determining 

 direction, and a sextant for latitude. Distance was obtained 

 during the boat journey on the Taku, lake Ahklen, and Teslin 

 river by time and eye estimates, and on the portage between 

 Taku river and the lake by pacing. Altitudes were determined 

 from the mean of four aneroids with synchronous readings of a 

 base barometer at Juneau, for which we are indebted to the 

 kindness of Mr E. S. Willard. The route was plotted in the 

 note book and relief indicated by sketch contours ; all prominent 

 points within sight along the line of travel being approximately 

 located by compass bearings. While such a survey does not, 

 of course, possess the precision of an instrumentally measured 

 line, still, when carefully executed, it represents the character 

 and relations of the topographic features of a country with a 

 fair degree of accuracy. 



