THE STIKINE RIVER IN 1898 9 



spreading fans of boulders and muddy ice. One can count a 

 dozen great glaciers at once from a certain point of view, and 

 easily accepts Dr John Muir's count of 100 glaciers seen from 

 his canoe, and of 300 glaciers seen by climbs and tramps ashore, 

 all draining directly into the Stikine. There is a feast and al- 

 most a surfeit of glaciers in the next fifty miles, the Dirt or Mud 

 glacier, greatest of all, being almost the replica of the Orlebar 

 glacier, save that it is a dirt covered, dark-brown mass instead 

 of a dirty white one. The Dirt glacier remains longer in view, 

 by the serpentine windings of the river, than any one object save 

 the Eagle crag, a great, detached, snow-striped peak with a triple, 

 sharply dentated crown, that one sees ahead, to right and left, 

 in foreground, background, full front, and profile all day long ; 

 this peak and the earth-covered glacier omnipresent appearing 

 and reappearing from new points of view, to the utter confusion 

 of one's compass and topographical ideas. There was a superb 

 view," too, of Kate's Needle, over forested points and river fore- 

 grounds, as its dark summit pricked sharply through snow-fields 

 to the very sky. There is one superb glacier, just above the Dirt 

 glacier, whose neve is held in a broad amphitheater, whose re- 

 taining walls are buttressed on the further side by the finest ar- 

 rangement of peaks and palisades seen anywhere along the Sti- 

 kine ; and in some far recess near there hides that mysterious 

 Flood glacier, which several times each season breaks away a 

 natural dam and sends a torrent of muddy water roaring out to 

 the river, sensibly raising its level for a time. 



We had met signs of the recent rush of 'Klondike travel all 

 along the Stikine banks, rows of cordwood neatly piled showing 

 as melancholy reminders of abandoned camps and hopes and 

 ventures. Shrewd Klondikers who went up on the snow cut 

 wood diligently, counting upon quick returns for their labor 

 when the fleet of river steamers arid the campers in small boats 

 should come in the spring. All the Canadian Pacific boats 

 burned coal and kept their extra supplies on anchored boats 

 along the river. The Hudson's Bay Company had gangs of 

 Chinese cutting cordwood for their boats long before the ice 

 moved, and the independent prospectors in canoes were few. 

 Signs of " Wood and water," " Wood for sale," and the laconic 

 "' $ h">i) per cord," or only " $4," met one along the banks — mon- 

 uments of wasted energy, with pitiful epitaphs. 



Wherever the valley broadened and the river ran its most ser- 

 pentine course there were acres of bleached logs and tree roots 



