222 
all these three Indian tribes in my passage 
through their country. 
Reaching Chilcat on the 2d of June, I 
found, as I had surmised from reports, that 
miners had pioneered the way some distance 
down the river in search of gold; but no one 
seemed to be much the wiser regarding the 
route, except that, as near as could be gleaned, 
they confirmed to a great extent the old Indian 
stories. My suggestion of a raft as my means 
of conveyance was ridiculed by whites and 
natives; and they could hardly conceal their 
contempt when the programme was known to 
be the passage, that summer, of the whole 
length of the river. Two or three hundred 
miles of tortuous lakes and a number of rapids. 
aggregating eight or ten miles in length, which 
the Indians never essayed, and around which 
the miners dragged their whip-sawed boats, 
were reported to exist, and supposed by all to 
be sufficient to wreck the raft theory of trans- 
SCIENCE. 
placed at my disposal by Mr. Spuhn, manager of 
the North-west trading company. At Chilcoot 
mission, four or five canoes were added to the 
already long chain, and the course resumed. 
Leaving Chilcoot Inlet, we entered another, 
that the Indians call the Dayay, an exact image 
of the fiord-like inlets characteristic of this part 
of the Alaskan coast; that is, having more the 
appearance of a large river than a salt-water 
estuary, its sides being immense precipitous 
mountains, covered three-fourths of the way to 
the top with a dense growth of spruce, fir, and 
pine, the latter holding to the lower levels, 
and capped with blue and white glacier ice that 
feeds innumerable and picturesque waterfalls 
coursing down the mountain sides. The mouth 
of the Dayay was reached that evening, our 
load of three or four tons lightered to the shore, 
the canoes and the bundles assorted and given 
to the different Indian packers, numbering over 
sixty. The packs varied from thirty-six to a 
DAYAY VALLEY, LOOKING UP THE NOURSE RIVER VALLEY. 
A glimpse of Baird Glacier covered with fog is given. 
The mountains holding the glacier being twice as high as the one shown on 
the left, their crests, if they had been visible, would not have shown in the photograph from which this illustration is made, 
being above the line where it is cut off. 
The lower edge of the fog-bank is just below the upper edge of the glacier. 
It is only 
at night that the fog-banks lift, when it is too late to take photographs. 
portation ; and, by the time I started, I felt very 
anxious myself regarding my plan. 
We left on the 7th of June from Chileat, with 
thirteen canoes, towed by a steam-launch kindly 
hundred and thirty-seven pounds in weight, the — 
adults generally carrying a hundred pounds, — 
and the boys according to their age and 
strength. Here was found a small camp of 
[Vou. III., No. 55. 
le 
£ 
, 
4 
- 
5 
