I? 



navigation of Sheep Creek a most arduous undertaking — 

 especially as the current runs eight miles an hour. In fact 

 it is only possible to attempt the task with a small boat and 

 the use of a " track " line. 



Near the source of the creek the country becomes much 

 broken on the south by the foothills of the Kenai Mountains, 

 which are heavily wooded and carpeted with the softest moss. 

 In such localities dogwood and blackberries are found, but so 

 dwarfed they hardly deserve the name. The stems of both 

 grow beneath the moss and send up only an occasional leaf 

 and blossom. 



The timber-belt extends to an altitude of about two thou- 

 sand feet, where it ceases very abruptly and is replaced by 

 alder thickets for about three hundred feet higher. These 

 alders somewhat resemble our black alder of the east, and in 

 places are so thick as to be almost impenetrable to all but 

 tlie bears which infest them. Heavy winter snows have 

 borne the bushes to the ground, where the main stems 

 send forth numerous branches, which in turn produce other 

 branches, and thus form a very compact mass of trunks and 

 limbs to a height of about fifteen feet. As they lie with 

 the tops down hill, it is next to impossible to work up 

 against them. The ground, succeeding the alders, is almost 

 covered, for the next one thousand feet in altitude, with 

 flowers in the greatest profusion. It seems incredible that 

 they can thrive on these otherwise barren mountain sides, 

 yet they do thrive and with a luxuriance that is astonishing. 

 Dozens of acres will be covered by a solid mass of flowering 

 plants, among them lupine, columbine, three species of 

 daisies, bluebells, buttercups, forget-me-nots, wild violets, 

 and many others with which I am not acquainted; while 

 in the low swampy places purple iris and pond lilies are 

 abundant. 



Within this belt the flowers are not in the least dwarfed; 

 in fact they are quite the contrary. Columbine attains a 



