24 
miles above its month, where discovery and research are retarded 
on account of the reported hostility of the natives. . . . 
All the peculiarly figured copper-plates of the natives, twenty- 
six by fifteen inches, and so much-prized as heir-looms by the 
Indians as far south as Vancouver’s island, are hammered out 
of pure copper obtained from this river. . . . Gold is found 
on the Sticknine river, and even with very crude means of 
working the miners report that they can make from $2 to $7 per 
day, but the climate forbids them working more than six months 
of the year. Proper methods of working the fine gold placers 
of this river would yield twice the amount. Gold is reported to 
have been found by mining engineer Doroschin on the ICenay 
river, which enters Cook’s inlet on the eastern shore about lat. 
60° 32, at the Russian station of St. Nicholas, but we have no 
authentic information on the subject beyond the statement of 
Tebenkoff.* In little Naquashinski inlet, fifteen miles from 
Sitka, the coast survey party discovered very fine marble in in¬ 
exhaustible quantities, and at the mouth of the Chilkaht speci¬ 
mens of marble of a very coarse grain, and others of a very fine 
crystalization, were discovered, all being white, very pure and 
unmarked. . . . The hot springs laying on the south-west 
part of Sitka Sound, were not visited, and we know nothing 
more than the meagre descriptions of Lisiansky, Simpson, and 
others. There are four distinct springs issuing frQm fissures in 
the granite rock. At its source the principal spring has a tem¬ 
perature of 153£° Fahrenheit, and is chiefly impregnated with 
sulphur, but also has salt and magnesia in solution. There 
is also a large basin, purposely dug in the ground, to receive the 
waters of the springs, about two or three hundred yards from 
the beach and fifty feet above high water; in this basin the 
water has a temperature of about 100° Fahrenheit. Two sub¬ 
stantial buildings of hewn logs, erected by the Russian Company 
for hospital cases of chronic rheumatism and cutaneous diseases, 
are situated on the sloping face of the bank; in front lies a 
pretty little cove, completely sheltered by an archipelago of 
small, wooded islands; in the rear is a barrier of rugged 
mountains, while immediately within the influence of the warm 
waters and continually rising vapors, there grows a luxuriant 
*We visited Fort St. Nicholas in September, 1869, and saw specimens of coarse 
goid among the people residing in that vicinity; we brought several soldiers from 
the military post at that place to San Francisco; they exhibited quantities of g;old 
which they obtained m the mines above stated some weeks previous, and reported 
the placers rich in coarse gold. * 
