WAITING 
295 
ing on by gripping my knees to the horse’s body, 
and as the horse started for some low trees I slid 
off without a scratch, though I did not deserve any 
such luck. The others came up very much dis¬ 
turbed, for they were sure that I would fall off 
among the boulders and be killed. 
The time that I spent at Nome, though I was 
naturally very anxious for the moment to come 
when we should be on our way to get the men on 
the island, was made to pass pleasantly by the 
many good friends whom I made there. I lived at 
the Golden Gate Hotel but took my meals at the 
Log Cabin Club. The club had a Japanese chef 
named Charlie, who was really a wonder; one dined 
as well there as at any good hotel in San Francisco. 
The club is the great meeting-place in Nome and 
many were the lively political discussions we had 
there. 
I could fill a book with descriptions of the in¬ 
teresting people I met in Nome. There was Doc¬ 
tor Neuman, a great student of the Alaskan 
Eskimo, and the author of important books about 
them, and more than that a man who has done them 
a great deal of good and is greatly beloved by them. 
There was Jim Swartzwell, the proprietor of the 
Golden Gate Hotel, a typical, open-hearted, Alas¬ 
kan sour-dough; no man or woman ever came to 
