.^' r-'-^'' ^ ;> / ^nderla • / i MAMMOTH HOT SPRINGS HOTtL, YtLLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK. ONDEKLAND; OR Th E Pa CIRC Northwest AND Alaska With a Description of the Country Traversed by the Northern Pacific Railroad. jo|ij^ |irD^, AUTHOR OF ■THE WONDERLAND ROUTE TO THE PACFIC COAST/' ■■ ALICE'S ADVENTURES ,N THE NEW WONDERLAND," ETC., ETC. COPYRIGHTED, 1888, By CHAS. S FEE, General Passenger and Ticket Agent, Northern Pacific Railroad, St. Paul. ( Printers, Engravers and Electrotypers, Chicago. 4: INDEX. PAGE Alaska, Agricultural Capabilities of -_...._.__ go liibliography of--_....._.__y2 Climate of .......__.. 63, 77, 94 Extent of .......... .,.77 Facilities for Visiting -........._ gg Fisheries o{....-.._.__yQ Glaciers of . _ . _ . * . . _ . , . . 87, 8q Hunting in. .' _ . _ _ . . . _ -Q3 Mineral Resources of . - . . _ . _ . - 80, 85, 93 Native Races of -__.._..._. yo Scenic and General Attractions of ----... 68-04. Alaskans, Peculiar Customs of the -------...83 Angling in Clark's Fork of the Columbia, I . T. . _ . . _ _ _ 45 the Gallatin River, M. T. . . . . _ _ . _ . - 34 Green River, W. T. ------.._ 57 Lake Pend d'Oreille, 1. T. . . _ . _ _ . _ - 45 Minnesota -----..-._. 10, 13 Wisconsin _ . _ . . . . . _ . .11 the Yellowstone River, M. T. _ . . . _ _ 25 Arctic Scenery ---_.......___ 87 Ashland, Superior and West Superior -----.__. 11 Astoria, Oregon ----_--.._.__ 67 " Bad Lands " of the Little Missouri, D. T. -._.._ _ iq Bismarck, the Capital of Dakota . . . . . , . _ . 17 Butte City, the Greatest Mining Camp in the World . _ . _ . . 38 Cascade Mountains, Crossing the _ . . _ _ . . . - 55 Clark's Fork of the Columbia ------..... 43 Coeur d'Alene Country ---"---.... 45, 50 Columbia River -------_...._ 63 Dakota, Growth of.. -_-.._ ----.15 Detroit Lake, Minn. ----..... ... 13 Duck and Goose Shooting . . _ . . . . . . _ .1317 Duluth, Minn. -.--......_.. 10 Flathead Country, M. T. . _ . . _ . . . . _ - 43 Fort Wrangell, Alaska . ---..---..83 Glacier Bay, Alaska --.-..---....80 Gold Mine, the Richest in the World ^ . . . . . . _ 85 Goose Shooting in Dakota . . _ . . . . . . _ _ -17 Helena and the Romance of Mining ._......_ 35 Hunting in Alaska ._ ...........93 Idaho— Kootenai Country, Lake Kanasku, etc. . . - . _ 48 Minnesota ------..... 10, 12 Montana ------_._.". 26 Wisconsin . _ _ . _ . _ . . ... 12 James River Valley, D. T. . . . . . _ . . . _ ij 4 INDEX. PAGE Juneau, Alaska, and the Mines of Douglas Island . - . . . . _ 85 Lake Coeur d'Alene, I. T. . . . . ...... 50 Lake Park Region of Minnesota . - - - ■ - -I2 Lake Pend d'Oreille, I. T. ....----.-- 47 Lake Superior ... .. . - --- - ..lo Minneapolis and St. Paul -...------- 6 Minnehaha, Falls of-------------9 Montana, Grazing Industry of ._-.-.---- 22 Northwest, Marvelous Development of the . . _ - . . - - 6 General Attractions of the .._------ 6 Portland, Oregon . - . . - - - - - • - -6r Puget Sound Country — Climate, etc. -._.---- 60, 69 Red River Valley ... ....._.. 15, 16 Rocky Mountains, Crossing the .._-..- ... 37 San Francisco to Puget Sound, etc. _._------- 63 Sitka, Alaska ...._-.------ 91 Spokane Falls, W. T. ._.---.----- 49 Stock Raising in the Northwest . - - - - - - - - 19 St. Paul and Minneapolis .....----- ^ Tacoma, W. T., City of .....------59 Tacoma : The Sovereign Mountain - _ . . - - - - - 57. 60 Victoria, B. C. -.-.--------- 71 Washington Territory, Agricultural Capabilities of . - - - - - -51 Wheat Farms of Red River Valley ---------- 16 Wrangell, Alaska ..--...---.--83 Yakima Valley, W. T. ._.-.-....-- 55 Yellowstone National Park - . . . - . . - - .26 Yellowstone Valley .-.--. ..... 21 ILLUSTRATIONS. PAGE- Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel, Yellowstone National Park .... Frontispiece. Dining Car Interior on the Wonderland Route . . - . _ _ . . 8 Sleeping Car Interior on the Wonderland Route -.-.-.. 14 In the Yellowstone Valley ...... .....20 Geysers and Falls in the Yellowstone National Park --.... 24 Winter Scenes in the Yellowstone National Park -.-..... 28 Hydraulic Mining .-...--....- 32 Mission Mountains in the Flathead Country, M. T. . . . . . . . 40^ Thompson Falls and Scenery on Clark's Fork of the Columbia . . . . . 42 Cabinet Gorge, Clark's Fork of the Columbia -.-....- 44 Lake Pend d'Oreille. I. T. ..-.--.-.. . 46' Switch-back Line over the Cascade Mountains, W. T. ........ 52 Cougar Mountain, Green River, W. T. ..-.-..- . 54. Trout Fishing on Green River, W. T. .--..--.. 56- Hotel Tacoma, Tacoma, W. T ......... . 58- Mount Tacoma, W. T., as seen in August _. .. ... . .62 Oneonta Gorge, Columbia River, Oregon ........ 66 Puget Sound, W T. 70 Fort Wrangell, Alaska ............ 78 Alaskan Grave and Totem Poles at Fort Wrangell . . . . . - .82 A Thlinket Family ............ 84 Juneau, Alaska .....-- ......86 An Alaska Steamer approaching the Muir Glacier ....... 88 Indian River, Sitka, Alaska ... ....... .92.- WonslGpland. " Such is the patriot's boast where'er we roam : His first, best country ever Is his own." RAVELING, some years ago, in the Rocky Mountains, Mr. Norman Lockyer met, to his great surprise, a venerable French Abb6, who, observing the astronomer's ill-concealed astonishment, proceeded to give the following explanation of his own presence in that far-off region: "Some months ago," he said, "I was very ill. My physicians gave me up, and one morning I seemed to faint and thought that I was already in the arms of the Bon Dieu, and I fancied the angels came and asked me, ' Well, M. 1' Abbe, and how did you like the beautiful world you have just left?' And then it occurred to me that I who had been all my life preaching about heaven had seen almost nothing of the world in which I was living. I determined therefore, if it pleased Providence to spare me, to see something of this world ; and so here I am." Now, if the American people, or such of them as have the means and leisure to travel, are not open to the reproach of caring nothing for the beauties and wonders of the world they live in, that they have sought them hitherto in the eastern rather than the western hemisphere is a fact too notorious to be called in question. It is doubtful whether, of the 25,000 Americans who visited Europe during the summer of 1887, one in a hundred had ever gazed upon the mysterious and awe-inspiring scenes of that greatest of the world's natural wonders, the Yellowstone National Park; or whether even one in a thousand had experienced that indescribable exaltation of feeling which takes possession of the traveler as he looks for the first time upon the mountains and glaciers of imperial Alaska. It may be that the stately cathedrals, crumbling abbeys and baronial halls of Merrie England ; the gayety of the capital of La Belle France ; the castled crags and historic cities of Der Vaterland ; the far-famed mountain scenery of (5) 6 WONDERLAND. the Land of William Tell; the unique cities of sunny Italy; and even the antiquities of the Land of the Pharaohs, — have, notwithstanding three thousand miles of sundering ocean, been of easier access to the inhabitants of the New World than the incomparable natural wonders of their own far-extending domain. But, if this has been the case in the past, it is such no longer. By trains equipped with every convenience and luxury of modern travel, we can now journey to the very threshold of the enchanted land of geysers, cataracts and canons; while we can also gaze upon arctic scenery in a temperate clime, as we sail the placid waters of the Inland Passage, in a steamer scarcely inferior in its appointments to the floating palaces of Long Island Sound. Henceforward, the American who goes to Europe without having seen the Yellowstone Region, the Columbia River, Puget Sound and Alaska, will have to be classed with those 75,000 people of Buffalo, who, according to a leading journal of that city, have never seen the world-renowned cataract of Niagara, though living within sound of its roar. The scenic wonders of the Northwest, though discovered only within the last few years, have already made the region in which they lie as famous among lovers of the sublime and beautiful in nature, the world over, as the recent marvelous development of its agricultural and other natural resources has rendered it in the world's markets and exchanges. While, as the present writer has elsewhere observed, old-world armies have been contending for the possession of narrow strips of territory, in kingdoms themselves smaller than many single American States, and venerable savants have been predicting the near approach of the time when the population of the world shall have outstripped the means of subsistence, there has arisen, between the headwaters of the Mississippi and the mouth of the stately Columbia, an imperial domain, more than three times the size of the German empire, and capable of sustain- ing upon its own soil one hundred millions of people. What the United States is to the world at large, this particular region is, in many respects, to the Great Republic itself; and its scenic attractions have this additional advantage over those of other parts of the country, that, traveling to them as he does, through the vast wheat fields of Minnesota and Dakota, the gold and silver ribbed mountains and rich pastures of Montana, and the forests, wheat fields and hop gardens of Washington, the tourist sees something of a section of country whose extraordinary productiveness has drawn upon it the attention of the whole civilized world, and led to the most remarkable movement of population witnessed in modern times. Unless he should travel by the Great Lakes to Duluth ; be returning to Europe or the Eastern States from Australia, China or Japan; or, for any reason whatever, should have traveled westward to the Pacific Coast by some other route, — the tourist will enter this remarkable region at the great twin cities of St. Paul and Minneapolis. It almost taxes one's powers of belief to be told that, thirteen years after the accession to the British throne of the gracious sovereign whose jubilee was WONDERLAND. 7 recently celebrated, one of these now stately and flourishing cities was a little settlement with a population of only 840, and that the other had absolutely no existence ; but that they should have become what they are by a growth of less than forty years is even less wonderful than has been their expansion during the last decade. So recently as 1880, neither of them contained 50,000 inhabitants, or could take precedence of Hartford, Conn., Reading, Pa., or Nashville, Tenn. The beginning of the year 1888, however, finds them with a united popu- lation of fully 350,000, and a volume of trade that entitles them to rank among the greatest cities in the Union. The mileage of their tributary railroads, their banking capital and manufactures, as well as the outward and visible signs of their wealth and commercial importance, have all increased in corresponding ratio ; and everything that Chicago has been to the Western States generally, St. Paul and Minneapolis now are to the 700,000 square miles of territory lying between the Great Lakes and Puget Sound. To the east-bound traveler over that great railroad system, the Northern Pacific, which alone traverses this region from end to end, a distance of nearly 2,000 miles, they form a fitting climax to those gigantic operations in mining, lumbering, stock raising and agriculture, which, almost equally with the scenic wonders of the country, have excited his admiration and astonishment; while for the west-bound traveler they constitute an imperial gateway, a veritable Arc de Triomphe, upon whose twin columns he sees engraved the splendid achieve- ments of those who, alike on plain and mountain top, are engaged in subduing the refractory powers of Nature and despoiling of its vast and varied riches one of the greatest of her treasure houses. If St. Paul does not exactly answer to our ideas of a city set on a hill, its situation, upon a series of terraces rising from the left bank of the Mississippi River, is at once commanding and picturesque; and from its higher elevations, including the beautiful residential quarters of St. Anthony's Hill and Dayton's Bluff, there are always to be enjoyed magnificent views of the richly wooded valley beneath, that are among the most delightful reminiscences of a visit to this fine city. Situated on a great waterway and at the head of navigation, it has a river trade of considerable importance. It also enjoys whatever prestige attaches to the capital of a great State, while it is likewise the financial capital of the vast region lying to the west and northwest of it, and the focus of that extraordinary railway activity which is rapidly bringing every portion of that region into communication with the markets of the world. Few, perhaps, of the readers of this pamphlet would view with anything but dismay the prospect of visiting this city in mid-winter, so erroneous are the prevalent ideas with regard to the winter climate of the Northwest. One brief experience, however, would be sufficient to dispel all such mistaken notions, for the visitor would find, for the most part, clear skies, crisp snow, excellent sleighing, steady, dry, exhilarating cold, and during the months of January and February, an ice carnival eclipsing in brilliancy and gayety even that of the famous city on the St. Lawrence. 8 WONDERLAND. Minneapolis is built on a broad esplanade on the right bank of the Missis- sippi, and there are not a few visitors who prefer its broad, Chicago-like streets to those of the more picturesque Capital City. Its chief pride and glory are the Falls of St. Anthony and those colossal flouring mills which are clustered around them. Time was when Chicago stood at the head of the wheat markets of the world; but while the wheat received by that city has fallen from 34,106,109 DINING CAR INTERIOR ON THE WONDERLAND ROUTE. bushels, in 1879, to 21,476,016 bushels, in 1887, the amount handled by the mill- ers of Minneapolis has increased within the same period from 7,514,364 bushels to 46,026,120 bushels. On the left bank of the river is the famous Pillsbury "A" flouring mill, with a capacity of 6,200 barrels per day, the greatest in the world; while on the opposite bank are to be seen, among many others, those bearing the well- WONDERLAND. 9 known name of Washburn; the whole capable of converting, daily, 180,000 bushels of wheat into 36,000 barrels of flour, a flour-manufacturing capacity more than equal to the consumption of the three most populous States of the Union, or of one-half of the population of Great Britain. The busy toilers of these two great cities have an undoubted advantage over those of most other great centres of population in the generous provision made by nature for their physical recreation and enjoyment. It scarcely seems possible that it can be said of a State that is now leading the entire Union in the production of wheat, — not to mention its other enormous agricultural products, — that upward of one-half of its area is still covered with pine forests, and that it contains the extraordinary number of 10,000 lakes. Such, however, is the fact ; and of these latter, not a few of the most attractive are within easy reach of St. Paul and its sister city. The charming resorts of White Bear and Minnetonka, the latter justly famed for the beauty of its scenery and the luxuriousness of its hotels, are only a few miles distant. Prob- ably, however, the greatest local attraction to the tourist is the far-famed Falls of Minnehaha, immortalized by Longfellow. Situated almost midway between the two cities, they are accessible either by train, carriage, or river steamboat. To go by carriage is, however, the most satisfactory way to visit them, as the drive may conveniently be made to include the beautiful United States military post of Fort Snelling, which occupies a commanding situation at the confluence of the Minnesota and Mississippi Rivers. Having concluded his brief visit to the dual capital of the Northwest, our traveler will be ready to set out upon his long trip over the Northern Pacific Railroad. Assuming St. Paul to be his starting point, the train by which he will travel will, almost immediately after leaving the great Union depot, with its 300 passenger trains per day and its six miles of track, pass out of sight of the river, and bear off to the left, into that beautiful inter-urban district now so rapidly filling up. Passing the extensive State Fair grounds, with their imposing buildings, on the right, and Hamline University on the left, he will, in a very few minutes, again come in sight of the Mississippi River, and cross from its left to its right bank, with the more important of the great flouring mills in full view. Leaving Minneapolis, he will once more cross the river to its left bank, which the line will follow for the next 125 miles, though separated from the river, except at Elk River and St. Cloud, by a stretch of prairie and woodland, inter- spersed with wheat and corn fields, too considerable to admit of the traveler getting more than an occasional glimpse of its waters, flowing, as they do, in a deep channel fringed with timber. Forty-nine miles from St. Paul, Big Lake is passed on the right, and, fifteen miles farther. Clear Lake on the left. These, however, are but "prairie lakes," and by no means fair representatives of the beautiful lake scenery that has given this State so great a reputation. Presently the spires of St. Cloud are seen rising beyond the mass of dark foliage that lines the river. This beautiful city, with its elm and maple shaded streets, is the judicial seat of its county; its manufacturing industries are of considerable 10 WONDERLAND. importance, and it is the shipping and distributing point for an extensive tract of rich and well-settled farming country. A sharp bend in the river brings it into immediate proximity to the railway, at the town of Sauk Rapids. For a moment we see our train reflected in its waters; but its winding course soon carries it away, until another sweep once more reveals it rolling silently along, and our thoughts revert to the busy levees of New Orleans, 2,300 miles away, where dark-skinned stevedores toil with the cotton and the sugar. In another hour we come upon the pleasant town of Little Falls, built on a level stretch of prairie, lying between the railway and the river, and possessing one of the three important natural water-powers on the Upper Mississippi. From this point there goes off to the left the Little Falls and Dakota division of the great railway system on which we are traveling. On this branch are situated two of the best agricultural towns in the State, Sauk Centre and Morris, Its chief interest for the tourist, however, lies in the fact that a run of sixty miles would bring him to Glenwood, a charming village situated on one of the most beautiful lakes in the State. This is Lake Minnewaska, an extensive sheet of clear water, abounding with pickerel, whitefish and bass, and surrounded with a pebbly beach and a beautiful border of timber. Report says that in May, 1887 three visitors to Glenwood caught in a few hours 75 pickerel, 18 black bass and a number of other species, making in all 120 fish; and that two days later a party of six secured in a single day's sport 120 pickerel, 29 black bass and 23 pike. The train stopping only at the more important stations, it is not long before it reaches Brainerd, the City of the Pines. While the building of extensive railroad machine shops has given a great impetus to the growth of this city, It has by no means deprived it of its natural attractions. Within a radius of fifteen miles are many lakes, abounding with the choicest varieties of fish; while at no great distance the sportsman will find the finest deer hunting in the entire State. The traveler may be surprised to learn that it is only from this point onward that his journey lies over the main line of the Northern Pacific Railroad. Although the offices of the company are situated at St. Paul, and the through trains to and from the Pacific Coast make that city their eastern terminus, the main line really extends westward from Duluth, at the head of LAKE SUPERIOR. Duluth is a city of so much interest in itself, besides having various attractive points within easy reach of it, that the tourist may feel disposed to take advantage of connecting trains to pay it a brief visit; or he may have traveled from the East by the Lake route, in which case it will be the initial point of his overland journey. While there must be many who have forgotten the precise circumstances under which the Hon. Proctor Knott, of Kentucky, delivered, in the House of WONDERLAND. 11 Representatives, in February, 187 1, his famous speech on Duluth, every one knows with what a torrent of ridicule he overwhelmed the measure then under the consideration of the House. That remarkable oratorical effort having recently been reprinted by the Northern Pacific Railroad Company, with interlineations, showing the present condition of the trade and commerce of this now flourishing city, it will be sufficient to state that while it was, up to five years ago, a straggling village of no commercial importance, it is now almost as formidable a rival of Minneapolis, at least as a wheat market, as that city is of Chicago. Mammoth elevators rise on every hand ; its docks and wharves are crowded with shipping; and, when the visitor looks down upon it from the high ridge on whose southern slope it is built, he hardly knows whether to admire the more the beautiful picture spread out before him, or those evidences of com- mercial activity which are already justifying the prediction that the excellent harbor which forms the most westerly point of the most westerly of the great chain of lakes is destined to be surrounded by one of the greatest commercial cities on the continent. Duluth has unexcelled hotel accommodations and a delightful summer climate. It offers, also, such other advantages to the artist, the geologist, the angler, the sportsman and the health-seeker, as cannot fail to insure its continued growth in popularity. The neighboring cities of Superior and West Superior, in Wisconsin, also possess excellent terminal facilities, which will doubtless insure to them no small share of that enormous grain, lumber, coal and other trade which, in annually increasing volume, must pay tribute on transshipment at the head of the lake. A daily service of through trains connects Duluth, Superior and West Superior with the fashionable summer resort of Ashland, at which point the Northern Pacific trains connect with those of the Wisconsin Central and Mil- waukee, Lake Shore & Western Railways for Chicago and the East. This beautiful little city occupies a commanding situation overlooking Chequamegon Bay. It has one of the largest hotels in the Northwest, and there is much ta interest and delight the traveler, the far-famed Apostle Islands guarding the entrance to the bay, while the teeming waters of the lake and the innumerable trout streams that discharge themselves into it, as well as the deer-haunted forests that encircle it, afford unlimited sport for the angler and lover of the chase. The most famous of the various trout streams is the Bois Brule, popularly known as the Brule, which is crossed by the line of the Northern Pacific Railroad at a point almost equidistant between Ashland and Duluth. A sports- man's hotel has been erected close to the station, and its limited accommoda- tions are taxed to the utmost during the season. Only an ardent disciple of Izaak Walton can understand the enthusiasm to which anglers visiting this beautiful spot are wrought up. The river, a stream of clear, cold water, approaching one hundred feet in breadth, flows, for almost its entire length, through one of the great pine forests of Wisconsin. With its high banks and 12 WONDERLAND. free from low or marshy ground, it is an ideal trout stream. The best fishing is to be had in a stretch of fourteen miles, extending six miles above and eight miles below the crossing of the Northern Pacific Railroad. In the early part of the season the fish weigh from one-half pound to one pound each, but in July and August catches of three and four-pound trout are an every-day occur- rence. In the surrounding forests, moose, deer, beaver and pheasant are found in great abundance, and the shipments of venison during the early winter are very large. Pike Lake, four miles east of Brule, is a beautiful sheet of water, teeming with the voracious fish from which it takes its name. Here, also, fair accommodations are to be obtained. Returning to Duluth, we once more resume our journey toward the land of the setting sun. The line to Brainerd follows, for many miles, the winding valley of the St. Louis River, amid scenery for the most part stern and wild, yet not without an occasional suggestion of the gentler beauty of the far-off AUeghanies. Between Fond du Lac and Thompson, the river has a descent of 500 feet in a distance of twelve miles, tearing its way with terrific force through a tortuous, rock-bound channel, at many points of which are stratified rocks of an interesting character, some of them turned on edge. The best point for observing the fine effect of these impetuous rapids and cascades, known locally as the Dalles of the St. Louis, is between Greeley and Thompson, and near the twentieth mile-post westward from Duluth. Onward to Brainerd, the line traverses thick forests, abounding with deer, bear, wolves and var- ious other game. The little settlements passed at remote intervals depend almost entirely upon one or another of the various branches of the lumber industry. The Official Guide to the Northern Pacific Railroad, published by Riley Brothers, of St. Paul, and sold by the news agents on the trains, gives con- siderably more information relative to this and other sections traversed by the railroad than can possibly be embodied in this pamphlet, designed, as it is, to serve, within less than one hundred pages, the double purpose of a handbook for the traveler, and a not-too-detailed setting-forth of the general attractions of the Northwest, for those who, previous to taking it up, had never, possibly, entertained the least idea of visiting it. Continuing our journey, we enter that most beautiful section of the State known as the LAKE PARK REGION, with its richly diversified and in every way most charming scenery. Before reaching Detroit, which may be regarded as its metropolis, we pass the attractive little town of Wadena, the eastern terminus of the Fergus Falls and Black Hills Branch. This line runs through Fergus Falls, a flourishing town with some impor- tant manufactories, and Wahpeton, an agricultural centre of some note, on the Dakota side of the Red River. It leads also to the pretty little village of WONDERLAND. 13^ Battle Lake, deriving its name from the large and beautiful sheet of water on which it is situated. There are no fewer than sixteen other lakes and lake- lets within five miles of this charming resort, their various waters teeming with the choicest varieties of finny game, and their shores haunted by water fowl in great numbers. A well-deserved tribute to the excellence of the Battle Lake fishing grounds- appeared in the American Angler of June ii, 1887, where, after chronicling the success met with by a party of six gentlemen who caught 600 wall-eyed pike and pickerel between 9.00 a. m. and 8.30 p. m., it is stated that, " instead of decreasing, the fish in the Battle Lake waters have increased to such an extent that, on a fair day, bass and pike can be seen lying at the bottom of the lake by thousands," and also that ''at the lower, or eastern, end of the lake, the black bass are so numerous that a man has hardly time to put a new bait on one hook before another fish has grabbed the second." Four weeks later, the same journal recorded the fact of three gentlemen from Kansas City having caught, in one afternoon, 144 wall-eyed pike, seventeen pickerel and seven dog- fish, weighing, in all, 817 pounds. About the same date another party visited the fishing grounds about two miles east of the boat-house, and caught in twO' hours 144 black bass and a large quantity of rock bass. Returning to Wadena, we continue our journey to Detroit, a beautiful little city, equally attractive to the angler, the sportsman, the health-seeker and the mere votary of country pleasures. The accomplished editor of the American Angler, writing in his well-known journal, after a recent tour in the North- west, stated that during a life of nearly a quarter of a century as an angler,, no experience with the rod had equaled, in variety and weight, the two days' fishing he had had on Detroit Lake. Nor was Mr. Harris' success exceptional. A score of 100 pounds per day, on two rods, is, as he goes on to say, consid- ered quite a modest record. Eastern anglers certainly have no conception how full of fine fish, of many varieties, these Minnesota lakes are. For black and rock bass, mascalonge, pickerel, wall-eyed pike, and an infinite variety of smaller fish, a recent writer in the American Angler pronounces Detroit Lake "the finest fishing ground on the continent." In another recent issue of the same journal, Mr. Harris refers to Detroit Lake as "the famed home of the black bass and pike (pickerel)," while, in yet another, a visitor declares that " a mere novice in the art of fishing can take all the fish he may desire, without any aid or skill," and that it is considered "no good day if one cannot score from 50 to 100 pounds of fish each day." There are perhaps few things more unreasonable than the universal inclina- tion to discount everything in the nature of a " fish story;" for, if there is one department of human experience in which, above all others, "truth is stranger than fiction," it is in the achievements of the gentle angler. Nothing, for example, is further removed from all possibility of mistake or exaggeration than the fact that three recent visitors to Detroit took in, as the result of less than three days' work, 603 pike, 1^8 black bass. 178 rock bass, 28 catfish 14 WONDERLAND. and 25 pickerel, the entire catch weighing 2,321 pounds, or nearly 300 pounds per day for each man. The Hotel Minnesota, which occupies a beautiful situation overlooking the lake, is declared on the highest authority to be "a gem of a hostelry for anglers," every convenience they could wish for being obtainable at moderate charges. The scenic attractions of this locality are likewise of no common SLEEPING CAR INTERIOR ON THE WONDERLAND ROUTE. order, the natural features of the surrounding country being of the most diversified character. So pure and invigorating also is the atmosphere that hay fever and malarial diseases are absolutely unknown. Among various pleasant excursions for which Detroit is a convenient centre is that to White Earth Indian Reservation, twenty miles distant. Another, and one in great favor with canoeists, is afforded by the long chain of lakes which, with short and easy portages, extends southward almost to Fergus Falls. Thirteen miles west is WONDERLAND. 15 Lake Park, another charming resort, having good fishing, a delightful climate, and all the various other attractions common to the district. Another half-hour's ride, and we are at Winnipeg Junction, from which point a branch known as the Duluth and Manitoba line has recently been constructed northward to the international boundary, there to connect with a line to be built by the Provincial Government of Manitoba. This branch passes through Grand Forks, one of the largest and most prosperous towns in the entire Territory of Dakota, the country tributary to it being among the most product- ive in this proverbially rich and fertile region. North of Grand Forks, this important branch passes through the prosperous little city of Grafton, the judicial seat and principal shipping point of the rich county of Walsh, and also through the rapidly growmg town of Drayton, terminating in the old city of Pembina, which has shown wonderful vitality since it was brought within this great railroad system. We are now approaching the western boundary of the State, here formed by the famous Red River of the North, whose fringe of timber appears as a dark line on the horizon for almost a full hour before the sluggish waters of the river come into view. Before entering the Territory of Dakota, now lying before us, it may be well to cast a retrospective glance at the marvelous development of which it has been the scene during an astonishingly brief period of time. Beginning no further back than 1861, we see it first organized as a Territory, in which were included the whole of Eastern Montana and a portion of what is now Wyoming, its entire population numbering less than 3,000. The United States census of 1870 found it with its area reduced to its present limits, and with a population of 12,887, mainly settled in the southeastern part of the Territory, along the Missouri River. The next decade saw the beginning of a truly marvelous transformation; and by the summer of 1880 its population had increased to 135,180, of whom 51,793 were of foreign birth. But, rapid as was the increase of the Territory in population and corresponding production from 1877 to 1880, its growth since the beginning of the present decade has far exceeded the largest expectations that its earlier progress, marvelous though it was, would at all have justified. Already its 135,180 inhabitants in 1880 have become 575,000; the 7,352,589 bushels of cereals have grown to 141,058,031 bushels, 62,553,499 bushels of which represent its wheat crop for 1887 (exceeding by one-half that of any other State or Territory) ; its six national and eighteen private banks have increased to no fewer than 318; its 698 miles of railroad have multiplied six-fold, so that they already exceed the mileage of twenty-six States of the Union; while the limited provision then made for the education of the young is lost in the 3,856 public schools now in operation. These astonishing facts, however, but faintly foreshadow what coming years will witness. The historian Alison, writing in 1828, likened the gradual and con- tinuous progress of the European race toward the Rocky Mountains to a deluge of men, rising unabatedly, and daily driven onward by the hand of God. But, 16 V/CNDERLAND. at that time, the State of Illinois, but half-way toward the Rocky Mountains, and one-third of the way to the Pacific Ocean, was almost the limit of its mighty flow. Wisconsin, with no noteworthy settlements of its own, formed part of the Territory of Michigan; Iowa was an altogether vacant region, without any form of organized government ; while other great States of to-day were still either mere parts of the Louisiana Purchase, with no separate identity, or were com- prised within the then far-extending territory of the Republic of Mexico. But in the settlement of various sections of the Great West, history repeats itself, and the experience of one is the experience of all. No one could, five short years ago, have predicted that the year 1887 would witness, in North Dakota, such splendid achievements as are here related, without exciting more or less merriment; but, in view of what has already been done, it is surely against the man who would doubt that the near future will see all this multiplied seven-fold that the laugh will now be turned. So enormous is the area available for agricultural purposes, that, were the whole of this great region capable of being brought into view at one time, even those vast wheat fields, whose fame has traveled so far, would be seen to cover but a small part of its immense expanse. The population of the Territory, moreover, is still less than four to the square mile, as against 221 in Massachusetts ; and it will have to number more than three million souls before it equals in density even that of the sparsely popu- lated State of Maine. Where the railroad crosses the Red River, there have sprung up two impor- tant cities, Moorhead, in Minnesota, and Fargo, in Dakota. As the point from which the great tide of immigration that poured into the Territory in 1882 dis- tributed itself over the surrounding country, Fargo acquired a prestige and laid the foundations of a commercial greatness that have since been largely increased by its becoming a railroad centre of some importance, as well as by the gradual bringing under cultivation of the rich country naturally tributary to it. Its fine brick business blocks and other buildings would do credit to cities ten times its size, as would also its water-works and its telephonic and electric light systems, which are among the most complete and efficient anywhere to be found. Scarcely have we resumed our journey before we are looking out upon those vast wheat fields which have earned for this portion of the Territory the desig- nation of the GRANARY OF THE WORLD. At Dalrymple, eighteen miles from Fargo, and at Castleton, two miles farther west, are the great wheat farms of Mr. Oliver Dalrymple, comprising some 50,000 acres. The gigantic scale upon which wheat growing is here carried on is well- nigh incredible to any one familiar only with the more limited operations obtaining in the older States. Before harvest operations begin, the eye wanders over an apparently illimitable field of golden grain ; and, when the long proces- WONDERLAND. 17 sion of reaping machines moves out, the traveler, be he ever so unimpressionable^ cannot but be profoundly moved, as he sees the ingathering, on so prodigious a scale, of the food of toiling millions in the great cities of the world. Passing various healthy-looking little settlements, the train presently runs down into the valley of the James, or Dakota, River, said to be the longest unnavigable river on the continent, its flow for hundreds of miles being distin- guished by scarcely any perceptible increase of volume. From the attractive and flourishing little city of Jamestown, which has sprung up here, branch lines extend northward ninety miles, to Minnewaukan, and southward sixty- nine miles, to Oakes. The terminus of the former is situated on Devil's Lake,, a remarkable body of salt water about 45 miles in length, and from a few hundred yards to seven miles in width. The attractions of its shores for the tourist, angler and sportsman, are of no common order, its scenery being picturesque, its climate salubrious, fish and game plentiful, and its hotel accommodations comfortable, if not luxurious. On its south shore is the United States military post of Fort Totten, adjoining a small Indian reser- vation. It may be stated in this connection that one of the special attractions of North Dakota for the sportsman is to be found in the innumerable flocks of wild geese that fly southward in the fall. An interesting article on this subject appeared in the American Field of March 12, 18S7, entitled "Goose Shooting on Dakota stubbles." The sportsman cannot do wrong in establishing his temporary headquarters at any of the larger settlements along the line, and he will always find station agents, hotel keepers, and local sportsmen prepared to give him all the information and assistance in their power. At La Moure, a substantial town on the branch extending southward, con- nection is made with another important branch extending southwestward from Fargo. The latter has, at the present writing, its terminus at Edgeley, and is especially noteworthy on account of its traversing the largest body of unoccu- pied land adapted to wheat raising, east of the Missouri River. Between the valleys of the James and Missouri Rivers, here about 100 miles apart, there is a high table-land, 1,850 feet above sea-level, 450 feet above the station at Jamestown, and about 250 feet above the Missouri River at low water, and known geographically as the Coteaux de Missouri. It extends north- ward far into the British possessions, and is pronounced by Dr. G. M. Dawson, the eminent Canadian geologist, one of the most remarkable results of glacial action on the American continent. Several large and well-managed farms attract the traveler's attention as the train carries him over this great plateau, and down to the valley of the Missouri, on whose left bank, 195 miles west of Fargo, the train stops for a few moments at Bismarck, the capital of the Territory. The great river and its tributaries have no less than two thousand miles of navigable waters above '.his point, and Bismarck, while yet a small city, enjoyed, for some years, an extensive river trade with the different settlements 18 WONDERLAND. lying to the Northwest; as much as 45,000,000 pounds of freight having been transported in a single brief season of navigation. The removal of the seat of Territorial governnient from Yankton to this more central and progressive city, and the gradual settling-up of the fine agricultural country tributary to it, have greatly stimulated its growth, and it now presents quite an imposing appear- ance, as it gently rises from the level of the railroad, with Capitol Hill and its fine group of government buildings surmounting it on the north. Quietly drawing out of the station, the train gradually approaches that magnificent bridge by which the railroad is carried over the muddy waters of the Missouri River. Even though he should cross it during the dry season, the traveler can scarcely fail to be impressed with the breadth and volume of this great river, which is here 2,800 feet from bank to bank, although 2,000 miles from its confluence with the Mississippi and 3,500 miles from the ocean. The bridge, which is of immense strength, but not more substantial than it is grace- ful, consists of three spans, each of 400 feet, and two approach spans, each of 113 feet, with a long stretch of strongly built trestle-work at its western approach. Across the river, the train runs into the pleasant little city of Mandan, situated in the midst of a grassy plain, that is really an expansion of the Heart River Valley. Mandan has an extensive trade with the country naturally tribu- tary to it, and is the eastern and western terminus, respectively, of the Missouri and Dakota Divisions of the railroad. In its vicinity are some interesting pre- historic mounds, the partial exploration of which has brought to light a large quantity of human bones of extraordinary size, mixed with beautiful specimens of broken pottery, as well as vases of various bright colors, filled with flints and agates. The train stopping at Mandan twenty minutes, the tourist can spend a little time very pleasantly in the Indian Bazaar of Messrs. W. S. Barrows & Co., which opens on to the station platform. He will find there one of the largest and finest collections of game heads, horns and Indian curiosities in the entire West. Resuming his journey, he can scarcely fail to be struck with the very different appearance presented by the country from that through which he has been passing since he emerged from the Lake Park region of Minnesota on to the broad and level or, at most, gently undulating prairie. He no longer looks out upon immense wheat fields, stretching away as far as the eye can reach, or upon bright, grassy plains, flecked with the rich and varied colors of innumerable wild flowers. On the contrary, the country is decidedly hilly, often breaking into abrupt bluffs. Its magnificent agricultural capabilities have, however, been fully proved by the settlers who have taken up their residence within it, and who, by the way, enjoy many advantages that are denied to dwellers on the prairie, among which may be mentioned an abundance of cheap fuel, building stone, limestone, brick and clay, and also a somewhat earlier spring. The most important settlements in this region are New Salem, from which an exceptionally fine agricultural country extends northward to the Knife River Valley; Sims, where 250 tons of lignite coal of excellent quality are mined daily; Hebron, a WONDERLAND. 19 beautifully situated settlement, founded by the Evangelical Colonization Society of Chicago, and rapidly increasing in population ; Gladstone, founded by a colony from Ripon, Wisconsin, and named in honor of the great English states- man; and Dickinson, the most important of them all, having extensive ship- ments, both of cattle and agricultural produce. Twenty-four miles south of the last-named point, a New England colony, chiefly from Vermont, was established on well-selected farming lands, in the beautiful valley of the Cannon Ball River, during the summer of 1887. The appearance at intervals of large herds of cattle will indicate to the traveler that he is entering the GREAT STOCK REGION of the Northwest. It may be well to state in this connection that the serious losses sustained by the stock growers of this region during the winter of 1 886-87, were due, not to any exceptional severity of the weather, but to the fact that the prolonged drought and extensive prairie fires of the preceding summer had destroyed almost entirely the grass upon which the cattle should have subsisted during the winter. Notwithstanding that so much has been written with a view to the removal of the widespread misconception that exists with regard to the northwestern winter, the idea that it is one of almost arctic severity is clung to so tenaciously, that statements of which the very air must be weary have to be reiterated again and again. Once more, therefore, let it be declared that so long as cattle have a plentiful supply of the highly nutritious native grasses of the country, they can stand almost any degree of cold without serious suffering or loss of flesh; that the snowfall between the Red River and the Rocky Mount- ains is considerably less than it is in Iowa or northern Illinois; and that even the lowest temperatures that obtain in this region cause much less inconvenience and suffering than does a temperature of zero in the latitude of Chicago, in accordance with the well-known law of nature that cold, dry air abstracts heat from the body much less rapidly than cold, moist air. This last-named fact some extraordinarily " smart " man may be disposed to look upon as an ingenious device of the boomer to beguile the unwary. It may therefore be well to add that the law has been reduced to a mathematical formula, and that it has been ascertained that in the time that it would take a perfectly dry atmosphere to reduce the temperature of the human body eight degrees, exposure to air of the same temperature, but fully saturated with moisture, would reduce it no less than thirty-three degrees. Apropos of the comparatively light snowfall, it may be stated that the various stage lines connecting the railroad with more or less distant settlements have been known not to miss a single trip or to be more than a few hours late, during an entire winter. ^ For 1 20 miles westward from Mandan, the line traverses the valley of the Heart River. Twenty miles west of Dickinson it enters the singular and picturesque region known as the Bad Eands of the Little Missouri, — not, as might be sup- posed, from their unfitness for agricultural or stock-raismg purposes, but IN THE YELLOWSTONE VALLEY. (20) WONDERLAND. 21 from the designation bestowed upon them by the early French voyageurs, who described them as mauvaises ter res pour traverser. Our approach to this unique section of country is announced by the occa- sional appearance of a conical butte, whose stratifications exhibit considerable variety of color. These increase in frequency, until, at last, we suddenly find ourselves surrounded by scenery of the most extraordinary character, the entire face of the country being broken up into domes, pyramids, mimic castles and other architectural forms, whose weird and fantastic appearance is not a little heightened by the wealth of color in which they are arrayed. Composed largely of clay solidified by pressure, they are in various stages of conversion into terra cotta, by the slow combustion of underlying masses of lignite, and it is to the clay, baked and unbaked, the coal of unequal quality and the vegetation not altogether absent from their slopes, that they are indebted for the vivid and startling contrasts of color they present. The almost Plutonic appearance of the scene is contributed to, also, by huge petrifactions and vast masses of scoria, and still more by the fire which, at various points, is seen issuing from the ground, and the smoke that proceeds from it. Notwithstanding all this, however, thousands of cattle may, at certain seasons of the year, be seen grazing on the rich grasses of its valleys and ravines. From Medora excursions may be made to Cedar Canon, one of the mo.st interesting localities in the Bad Lands, and the burning mine, perhaps the most extensive of the various sub- terranean fires of this extraordinary region. Sixteen miles beyond the Little Missouri, we pass Sentinel Butte, a lofty peak rising precipitously from the plain ; and in a few minutes more our atten- tion is arrested by a tall pole, surmounted by a handsome pair of antlers, which serves to mark the boundary between Dakota and Montana. Here we are at an elevation of 2,840 feet above sea-level, the highest point we have yet attained. In crossing the great Territory of Dakota, we have traveled as far as from New York to Petersburg, Va., or from Boston or Providence to Montreal. In travers- ing that of Montana, we perform a journey almost equal to the distance from New York to Indianapolis. Such are the dimensions of the future great States of the Northwest ! We are now approaching— " That desolate land and lone Where the Big Horn and Yellowstone Roar down their mountain path." Forty miles west of the Territorial boundary, we come to Glendive, an important centre of the grazing industry, and a divisional terminus of the rail- road. We are now in the far-famed Yellowstone Valley, whose various windings we shall follow, more or less closely, for the next 340 miles. As is the case with the other great geographical divisions into which the enormous stretch of country traversed by the Northern Pacific Railroad naturally falls, this valley would itself afford sufficient material for a volume of no incon^ siderable size ; and it is only by reason of the limited space at his disposal, that ■ the writer has to pass rapidly from one principal point of interest to another, 23 WONDERLAND. leaving the traveler to discover for himself the minor natural features, the social conditions, agricultural methods, and whatever else is peculiar to the country or its inhabitants. Of the valley itself, it may be said briefly that it varies from five to ten miles in width, and that it is inclosed by high bluffs of clay and sandstone, whose curious forms occasionally remind one of the Bad Lands, though lacking in color; and of the river, that its waters, save when swollen by heavy rain, or by the melting of the snow on the mountains, are, unlike those of the Missouri, bright and clear; and that it has many important affluents, whose fertile and beautiful valleys are the chosen locations of fortunate ranchmen, and the feed- ing grounds of their flocks and herds. Miles City, 78 miles west of Glendive, was, in days gone by, the principal rendezvous of the hunter, and as many as 250,000 buffalo hides have been shipped east from this point in a single season. In those days its gambling houses were in full swing day and night, Sunday and week-day, and its by no means sparsely tenanted cemetery contained the graves of only three persons who had not met violent deaths. Now, however, all this is changed, albeit this is the land of the cowboy, an enfant terrible to those who know him only from sensational newspaper paragraphs, but a gallant, generous and not unfrequently scholarly fellow to those thrown into immediate contact with him. The recent development of the grazing industry in western Dakota and eastern Montana has been not less remarkable than that of wheat raising on the Dakota prairies, and the economist who should turn to the United States census reports of i88a for the present condition of this region would be led seriously astray. In 1880, Montana contained 490,000 cattle and 502,000 sheep. According to a recent report of the Governor of the Territory, it now contains 1,600,000 cattle and horses, and upward of 2,000,000 sheep, and this, notwithstanding the serious losses of the winter of 1886-87. Leaving Miles City, with its handsome groves of Cottonwood and the sub- stantial brick business blocks which have taken the place of the log huts and hastily-built frame shanties of which it consisted when the writer first visited it in the spring of 1882, we cross the Tongue River, and in a few minutes are passing Fort Keogh, one of the largest and most beautiful military posts in the entire country. There are but few Indians now to be seen along the line of the railroad, and those are engaged in agricultural and industrial pursuits. The extinction of the buffalo has rendered the Indian much more amenable to the civilizing influences brought to bear upon him than he formerly was, and very fair crops of grain are being raised at some of the agencies. At the Devil's Lake agency, for example, 60,000 bushels of wheat have been raised by the Indians in a single season, and purchased by the Government at ^i per 100 pounds. The Crows, along the northern border of whose reservation — nearly as large as the State of Massachusetts — the railroad runs for 200 miles, are said to be the richest nation m the world m proportion to their numbers, their wealth aggregating $3,500 per WONDERLAND. ^3 head. This, however, is due to the natural increase of their hve stock, consisting chiefly of ponies, rather than to their own industry and thrift. Their great reservation is probably the garden spot of Montana, and the throw- ing open of a large portion of it to settlement, which cannot long be delayed, will assuredly give an immense impetus to the agricultural interests of the Territory. It does not require a large population m a country like this to make a town that shall dominate a very extensive region, and we have in Billings, which next calls for notice, a little city, with not more than 3,000 inhabitants, but the metropolis, nevertheless, of a region larger than Maine, South Carolina, West Virginia or Indiana. An important shipping point for cattle, and distributing point for eastern manufactured products, it has two of the most important mining districts in the Territory tributary to it, while it has coal of a good quality within a short distance, and likewise excellent sandstone. From Laurel, thirteen miles west of Billings, a line is now in course of con- struction to Cooke City, in the famous Clark's Fork mining district. This branch is being built chiefly for the transportation of the large silver product of that rich district, and the very fine bituminous coal found in such abundance on the Rocky Fork of the Yellowstone. It will, however, possess extraordinary attractions for the tourist, traversing, as it will, some of the most magnificent scenery in the entire Rocky Mountain range, including a canon whose precipi- tous walls have been estimated by a recent visitor, familiar with other famous canons, to be 5,000 feet in perpendicular height. Reference is made to this canon in a long and most interesting article by Rev. W. S. Rainsford, D. D., which appeared in Scribners Magazine for September, 1887, entitled " Camping and Hunting in the Shoshone." The writer of this article gives an exceedingly graphic account of various hunting adventures in this wild and beautiful country, together with an immense amount of information that cannot but be of the utmost value to all lovers of the chase. Passing Springdale, where the traveler will see hacks in waiting to convey visitors to Hunter's Hot Springs (for further information concerning which the reader is referred to an advertisement accompanying the Railroad Company's time tables), the train approaches, amidst scenery increasing in grandeur, the little city of Livingston, the starting point for the rich carbonate mines of Castle Mountain, forty miles north, and also one of the most impor- tant points in the operation of the railroad, but of far greater note as the gate- way to the world-renowned Yellowstone National Park. Here we leave the elegant drawing-room sleeping car and the luxurious dining car of the great through train, to travel by a connecting branch train the few miles that still separate us from the actual boundary of the Park; and, while the traveler who knows not the delights of what good old Izaak Walton called the most calm, quiet and innocent of all recreations, takes a brief stroll through the town, fol- lowers of the gentle craft may further acquaint themselves with those extraor- dinary GEYSERS AND FALLS IN THE YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK. (24) WONDERLAND. 25 ATTRACTIONS FOR THE ANGLER which have rendered this locaHty so famous. They may even have the good fortune to run across the editor of the American Angler himself, who, too ardent a craftsman to shut himself up in his office on Broadway, frequently visits these and other fishing grounds along the line of the Northern Pacific Railroad. The country traversed by this road he has declared to be, " for the angler and sportsman, a succession of surprises and a string of successes, good bags and grand catches awaiting him at every stage of his progress ;" while he has else- where pronounced a visit to the YellowstoHe important to every angler who aspires to a well-rounded life as a rodster. But, should the angler visiting this district for the first time not have the good fortune to fall in with so eminent a member of the brotherhood, he will at least be able to obtain, from thoroughly trustworthy sources, information that will leave him in no doubt as to the foun- dation on which rest the possibly startling reports that have reached him as to the waters of the Yellowstone and its affluents. He will learn that the Yellow- stone, west of Billings, contains trout of four distinct varieties, including the celebrated cut-throat trout, to whose size and abundance Mr. Harris himself bears testimony ; that the individual scores of various tourists, reported in the American Angler during 1885, and not containing any that were phenomenally large, averaged twenty-five trout per hour, for each rod ; that during the same season a visitor caught twenty-one fine, large trout "after supper," while two others brought in 160 as the result of one day's sport ; and that during the season of 1887 a trout, seven and one-half pounds in weight, was caught in the river at the foot of Main Street. He will hear, probably, of the two gentlemen who, having seen the reports of fishing in these waters in the American Angler, stopped off for a day on their way to the Pacific coast, and were rewarded with no beautiful fish ; of the young lady from Helena who caught a five and one- half pound trout close to the city ; of the two local anglers who caught forty pounds' weight in an afternoon, and the two others who captured 134 trout in the same length of time. He will learn how that in August last two gentle- men from Wyandotte, Kan., caught twenty-seven pounds one day and forty-six pounds the next ; how a visitor from Wichita, accompanied by one from Jack- sonville, 111., caught sixty-one fine trout in a day's fishing near Brisbin ; and that in June of the same year a lady and two gentlemen caught forty fine fish in Spring Creek, in one afternoon, one of them weighing three pounds, and three others two pounds each. All this, and more, will our inquiring friend be told, and he will also learn of Rosebud Lake, a beautiful spot near Billings, where the trout fishing is declared to be " splendid ;" of Little Rosebud Creek, near Stillwater, where eighty-seven trout are reported to have been caught in four hours, with a single rod ; of Prior Creek, near Huntley ; Mission Creek, twelve miles east of Livingston, and various other resorts of local sportsmen. So-fired, indeed, will be his enthusiasm, that it is more than likely that when his 26 WONDERLAND. traveling companions are ready to continue tlieir journey to the National Park, they will have to bid him a temporary adieu, and he will be found taking up his quarters at that handsome new hotel, the Albemarle, whose excellent accommo- dations contribute so largely to the attractiveness of this little city as a halting place. So far the tourist's interest has been excited chiefly by that marvelous trans- formation which, in so manifestly short a time, has been effected in the appear- ance of a large part of the country ; by the beauty and novelty of the prairie, whose illimitable expanse is as inspiring to the imagination as its atmosphere is physically exhilarating ; and by the Bad Lands, which also will have produced upon his mind an impression that will never pass away. Now, however, he is on the confines of the mountain world, and almost within sight of the very sanctuary of its tutelary genius. At Livingston he is 4,488 feet above sea-level, or 208 feet highei: than Mount Mansfield, and 684 feet above the highest point of theCatskills. Already several magnificent peaks are in full view, and before long he himself will be a good half-mile of perpendicular height nearer the blue vault of heaven. Leaving the main line for the YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK branch, we have a fine view of the rugged and majestic Crazy Mountains to the north. Elk, in large bands, still haunt that noble range, and the Ajnerican Field of January i, 1887, reported the shooting of twelve in two days by a local ranch- man. The same excellent journal recently contained an admirable series of articles from the pen of Lieut. J. M. T. Partello, U. S. A., entitled " Army Sports on the Frontier," which visiting sportsmen will do well to consult. A few minutes more and we enter the Third, or Lower, Canon of the Yellow- stone, from which we presently emerge into a beautiful valley, some thirty miles long, with an average width of about ten miles. This ancient lake-bed — for such it is — is known as Paradise Valley, and so beautiful is the series of pictures it presents, that the visitor can scarcely be persuaded that still more magnificent scenery lies beyond. The indications of ancient volcanic action that here abound have been commented upon both by Dr. F. V. Hayden and Dr. Archibald Geikie. The commanding mountain which overlooks the valley on the east, is Emigrant's Peak (10,629 ft.), with the famous mining gulch, from which so much wealth has been extracted, lying under its northern slope. At Sphinx, named from a lofty peak whose rugged summit bears some fancied tesemblance to the well-known Egyptian monument, we enter the Second, or Middle, Caiion, which Dr. Hayden describes as possessing the most uniform and beautiful series of terraces he has seen anywhere in the West, while Dr. Geikie refers to the striking proofs it furnishes of the power and magnitude of the old glaciers, one of which, he says, must have completely filled the canon, and flowed over into the adjoining valleys, — to do which, it must have had a depth WONDERLAND. 27 of fully 1, 600 feet. The railroad terminates at Cinnabar, under the shadow of the mountain of that name, remarkable for its exposure of vertical strata, of three distinct periods. Let not, however, the non-scientific reader labor for a moment under the delusion that the interest of this region is purely geological ; for not only is the scenery wild in the extreme, but it is of a novel and striking character. No visitor, for example, can ever forget the Devil's Slide, a singu- lar formation caused by the washing out of a vertical stratum of comparatively soft material, between one of quartzite and another of porphyry, which project- ing strata enclose, like walls, the almost perpendicular " slide," 2,000 feet high. At Cinnabar coaches are in waiting to convey us the remaining six miles to the Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel, the initial point in the Grand Tour of the Park. Among the many noble mountains which attract our attention as we proceed thither is Electric Peak (11,125 ^t.), so called from the fact of Mr. Henry Gannett, a member of Dr. A. C. Peale's exploring party of July, 1872, having been enveloped upon its slope in an electric cloud, with consequences far more amusing to his companions than agreeable to himself. The northern boundary of the Park is passed immediately south of the little village of Gardi- ner. Here, at last, we are in that enchanted region which contains, within its area of 3,675 square miles, a larger assemblage of varied natural wonders than are to be found within a like area anywhere else in the world ; and which, with well-deserved confidence in the almost entirely unsupported testimony and recommendations of Dr. F. V. Hayden, Congress, in 1872, wisely set apart for- ever for the benefit and enjoyment of the people. Within full view of the great hotel which is our first resting place and vir- tual headquarters, rise the wonderful terraces formed by the Mammoth Hot Springs, from which the hotel takes its name. The first view of this remark- able formation is not unlike that of the snout of a glacier, but nearer approach reveals a marvelous series of regular terraces, the margins of which are adorned with the most delicate fretwork, and the whole arrayed in exquisitely soft shades of color, surpassing in harmony and in subtle gradations any chromatic effects known to exist beyond the limits of this enchanted ground. The keenest interest of the newly-arrived tourist, however, invariably centres in those mysterious manifestations of subterranean energy, the geysers ; and it is therefore with the liveliest expectations of enjoyment that he sets out, usually on the day following that of his arrival, to visit the various geyser basins, the Great Falls, Grand Canon, and other points of interest in this veritable wonder- land. Proceeding by the new military road up the Gardiner River Cafion, through the Golden Gate and Kingman's Pass, and by the beautiful Falls of the West Gardiner, our typical tourist, comfortably seated in a canvas-covered car- riage, with an experienced driver, thoroughly familiar with the various points of interest that follow each other with such marvelous rapidity, soon reaches a lofty plateau, which commands some exceedingly beautiful mountain scenery, including Electric Pfeak, Cinnabar Mountain and Bunsen's Peak to the north, WINTER SCENES IN THE YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK. (28) WONDERLAND. 29 and three lofty peaks, all upward of 10,000 feet high, to the west. This is presently followed by the famous Obsidian Cliffs, a mountain of volcanic glass. This remarkable formation — entirely new to nineteen out of every twenty visit- ors — bears a close resemblance to jet ; although at places it is mottled and streaked with red, as well as with various shades of brown and olive green. The road over which we travel is, for some distance, nothing less than a glass highway, probably the only one in the world. Its construction was accom- plished by building great fires upon the largest detached blocks, which were suddenly cooled and, at the same time, shivered into fragments by the dashing of cold water upon them. The first of the distinctly marked areas in which the geysers are found is the Norris Basin. This has the highest elevation, 7,527 feet, and is, doubtless, the oldest, of them all. It is very extensive, and among its many objects of interest are the Monarch and Hurricane Geysers, the latter, a recent out-burst, being one of the most gigantic displays of subterranean energy to be seen in the Park. Three miles south of Norris Geyser Basin is Elk Park, a favorite haunt of the noble game whose name it bears. Capt. Harris, U. S. A., and Mr. F. Jay Haynes, Official Photographer to the Northern Pacific Railroad Company, have both borne recent testimony to the immense herds of elk that take refuge in the Park during the winter. An interesting letter upon the subject, from the pen of Capt. Harris, appeared in the American Field oi January 8, 1887. Continuing his journey, the tourist will come to the Gibbon Paint Pot Basin, with Its 500 springs of boiling mud, of every conceivable color and shade of color ; and the Gibbon Canon and Falls, the latter a beautiful cascade, 160 feet in height. A few miles more, and he will be looking out upon the wonders of the Lower Geyser Basin, known locally by the appropriate name of Firehole. This basin covers between thirty and forty square miles, and contains no fewer than 693 boiling springs, exclusive of seventeen that are of sufficient impor- tance to rank as geysers. From Firehole the tourist is conducted to the Mid- way Geyser Basin, or Hell's Half Acre, containing the famous Excelsior Gey- ser, the largest in the world. The eruptions of this geyser are very irregular, but the roar that proceeds from its crater and the dense volume of steam that almost hides it from view, sufficiently attest its terrible power, and abundantly justify the name by which it is best known. The terror of this scene is but partially redeemed by the immediate proximity of the Grand Prismatic Spring, whose margin is adorned with the most wonderful display of brilliant coloring of all the 10,000 springs of this extraordinary region ; and it is with a feeling of relief that the visitor makes his way over the foot-bridge, re-enters his car- riage, and is driven toward the Upper Geyser Basin. This contains the largest assemblage of powerful geysers in the world. In addition to 414 boiling springs, that elsewhere would be sufficient to constitute a wonderland by themselves, there are twenty-six geysers of great magnitude and power. Among them are the best known of all the geysers of the Park, — those with whose names the world has been made familiar by the pen and brush 30 WONDERLAND. of author and artist. Here are found the Giant and Giantess, the Castle and the Grotto, the Beehive, the Splendid and the Grand, all discharging, at vary- ing intervals, but with singular constancy, columns of water reaching not unfrequently a height of 250 feet. Here, too, is Old Faithful, whose hourly erup- tion affords even the most hurried visitor an opportunity of witnessing at least one display of its tremendous power. After a little time spent in this basin, the visitor is almost certain to con- clude that he has at length reached the climax of the wonders of the Park ; and the present writer has himself found it impossible to persuade tourists with whom he has been brought into contact that there still lay before them a scene which, though it might not entirely obliterate the impression made upon them by the geysers and other extraordinary objects, they would certainly declare to be the crowning glory of the Park. The reader, who, not having visited the National Park, has yet gazed into some of the profound gorges to be found in the great mountain ranges of the far West, will read with astonishment, if not wiih incredulity, that the Grand Caiion of the Yellowstone, though inferior in actual dimensions to the Yosem- ite Valley and the Grand Canon of the Colorado, infinitely surpasses them in sublimity, being made to stand pre-eminent among the natural wonders of the world, by the majesty of its cataract and the gorgeous blazonry of its walls. To say that its cataract — no mere silver ribbon of spray, but a fall of great volume — is a little more than twice the height of Niagara, would, by means of a familiar comparison, enable almost any one to form a not altogether inade- quate conception of its grandeur. But for the matchless adornment of its walls, we have no available comparison ; naught but itself can be its parallel. One recent visitor describes it as being hung with rainbows, like glorious banners. Another, borrowing from Mr. Ruskin, likens it to a great cathedral, with painted windows, and full of treasures of illuminated manuscript. But, as we take our stand on the brink of the Falls, with twelve miles of sculptured rock spread out before us, rising from 1,500 to 2,000 feet in height, and all aflame with glowing color, we have to acknowledge, with a distinguished writer and a no less cele- brated artist, that, neither by the most cunningly wrought fabric of language nor the most skillful manipulation of color, is it possible to create in the mind a con- ception answering to this sublime reality. For countless ages, frost and snow, heat and vapor, lightning and rain, torrent and glacier, have wrought upon that mysterious rock, evolving from its iron, its sulphur, its arsenic, its lava and its lime, the glorious apparel in which it stands arrayed. And the wondrous fabrica- tion is still going on. The bewildered traveler would scarcely be surprised to see the gorgeous spectacle fade from his vision like a dream ; but its texture is con- tinually being renewed : the giant forces are ever at work ; still do they — " Sit at the busy loom of time and ply, Weaving for God the garment thou seest Him by." It is expected that the great Yellowstone Lake will shortly be embraced within the Grand Tour. This magnificent sheet of water — at so great an WONDERLAND. 31 elevation that could Mount Washington, the highest peak in the New England States, be submerged in it, with its base at the sea-level, its summit would be more than a quarter of a mile below the surface — is fully described in the Official Guide to the Yellowstone National Park, published by Riley Brothers, of St. Paul, and sold on the trains at 50c paper, and $1.00 cloth. To that work the reader is also referred for a description of the trip over Mount Washburn, as Avell as of various points of interest, that cannot even be enumerated in these pages. He will also find much interesting and valuable information rela- tive to the Park in the Reports of the United States Geological Survey for 187 1, 1872, 1878 and 1887. The "Geological Sketches " of Dr. Archibald Geikie, F. R. S., Director-General of the Geological Survey of the United Kingdom, like- wise contains a chapter devoted to the geology and natural wonders of the Park, and, having been reprinted in pamphlet form by J. Fitzgerald, of New York, as No. 39 of the Humboldt Library, it is easily procurable, besides having the merit of being concise in statement and convenient in size. It must, how- ever, be borne in mind that Dr. Geikie's visit to the Park was made before the completion of the Northern Pacific Railroad ; and in this connection it may also be stated that the approach from the South still involves 100 miles of hard staging, besides reversing the order in which the wonders of this incomparable region are best seen. Although the physical conditions obtaining in the National Park in mid- winter are such as to render it exceedingly dangerous, if not absolutely impos- sible, for any ordinary traveler to penetrate beyond the Mammoth Hot Springs at that season of the year, it will not be out of place to make mention here of the extraordinary feat performed in January, 1887, by Mr. F. Jay Haynes, already mentioned in these pages as the Ofificial Photographer to the Northern Pacific Railroad Company. That gentleman was a member of the Schwatka party, whose departure on a snow-shoe expedition through the Park was so loudly trumpeted throughout the length and breadth of the land, but whose inglorious collapse, the second day out, gained no such general publicity. Being familiar with the topography of the country, and having long cherished a desire to see its wonders in their winter garb, as well as to have an opportunity of reproducing them with that fidelity to nature for which his work is so well known, Mr. Haynes determined not to be foiled in his purpose by the inability of his leader and the unwillingness of other members of the party to leave the Norris Geyser Basin ; and so, accompanied only by two packers, wearing, like himself, the eight-feet-long snow-shoes known in Northern Europe as "skier," he continued his journey, and made the entire circuit of the Park, and, although overtaken on Mount Washburn by a terrific blizzard, and without food, fire or shelter for nearly three days, with the temperature 40° below zero, succeeded in getting back to civilization without having to sacrifice the wonderfully beau- tiful series of views he had secured, illustrative of the remarkable effects brought about by that extraordinary conflict of heat and cold which he had had the good fortune to witness. (32) WONDERLAND. 33 It now only remains to be added that the roads in the Park have been con- structed by military engineers, and are kept in excellent condition ; that com- fortable hotel accommodations are provided at the principal points of interest ; and that the hotel rates and transportation charges are all regulated by the Secretary of the Interior. It may be well, however, to remind the angler, in conclusion, that this is the far-famed region where the juxtaposition of streams of hot and cold water enables him to cook his fish as fast as he can catch them, without changing his position or removing them from the hook. WESTWARD STILL. Resuming his westward journey at Livingston, the traveler is soon ascending the first of the great mountain barriers that had to be surmounted by the engineers of the Northern Pacific Railroad. This is the Belt Range, which is crossed twelve miles from Livingston, at the comparatively low elevation of 5,565 feet. Considerable mountain climbing has been avoided by the construc- tion of a tunnel, 3.610 feet in length, from the western portal of which the line emerges into a fine rocky canon. Passing the recently abandoned military post of Fort Ellis, we come to Bozeman, a beautifully situated and flourishing little city, twenty years old. Few cities can boast of more picturesque surroundings than this interesting old town, in the rich and fertile Gallatin Valley, there being no direction in which the range of vision is not bounded by majestic ranges of mountains, seamed with eternal snow. It is no uncommon thing to get forty bushels of hard sprmg wheat, sixty bushels of fall wheat, or one hundred bushels of oats to the acre in this valley, eleven degrees and more west (jf the meridian which was so long supposed to be the western limit of cultivable land in the basin of the Mississippi. Barley also is raised here in large quantities, and of such superior excellence as to be in great demand for malting purposes at Milwaukee and other eastern cities. At the lower end of the valley are the promising little settlements of Gallatin and Three Forks, com- manding the valleys of the Madison and Jefferson Rivers, the agricultural lands of which, now being brought under cultivation, are not inferior to those of the longer settled valley of the Gallatin. Four miles more, and the tourist comes upon a point of considerable geograph- ical interest, the three mountain streams just mentioned pouring their waters into a common channel to form the Missouri River. It is through a rocky canon, abounding in wild and magnificent scenery and containing many interesting geological exposures, that the greatest river of the continent enters upon its long course of 4,450 miles. For nearly fifty miles the line follows its various wind- ings, until finally the river runs away northward, through that profound chasm known as the Grand Canon of the Missouri, or the Gates of the Rocky Mountains. Two new branch lines, to leave the main line at the lower end of the Gallatin Valley, are projected for the year 1888. One of them, diverging at 34 WONDERLAND. a point 23 miles west of Bozeman, will run to Boulder, a distance of 42 miles, where it will connect with a line now in course of construction from that town to Butte. This will bring Butte, the greatest mining city on the continent, within easy reach of the agricultural district of Bozeman, and 93 miles nearer St. Paul, Chicago and other eastern cities than it now is. The other projected branch will run from Three Forks southwest to Pony, an important mining dis- trict in which a mineral property was recently sold to a syndicate of eastern and other capitalists, among whom were no fewer than four United States Senators. It is probable that this branch will be extended to Red Bluff and Virginia City, and possibly also to the borders of the National Park. MORE ABOUT ANGLING. We are now in a district whose attractions for the angler are of such an order as to call for more than passmg notice. In an interesting article, extending through several numbers of the American Angler, the editor of that journal relates his experience in this locality, in the course of which he describes the Gallatin as the fish river of his dreams, the grayling, the Rocky Mountain trout and the whitefish " veritably swarming in its waters." In another place he declares the Gallatin to be "the pearl of the Rocky Mountain waters," while another correspondent of the same journal, who states that he has fished in twenty different States and Territories, declares that he "never saw a place where you could catch half as many as at Three Forks." Anglers, by the way, are recommended by local sportsmen to take guns with them, geese, ducks and snipe being abundant. Some excellent scores are reported from Bozeman, which has a dozen streams, teeming with mountain trout and grayling, within as many miles of the city. Among recent reports are those of two gentlemen who, in July, 1887, caught, between them, 103 trout in three hours ; and a party who, in the following month, made a score that averaged six trout per hour for each man. Grouse, pheasant and prairie chicken are plentiful around Bozeman, and it is also the outfitting point for Henry's Lake, a beautiful sheet of water on the summit of the Rocky Mount- ains, near the Idaho and Montana boundary. Sixty-five miles west of Bozeman is Totvnsend, the principal shipping and distributing point for no inconsiderable portion of one of the best counties in Montana. This is Meagher County, named in honor of that brilliant soldier of the War of the Rebellion, Gen. Thonns Francis Meagher, who met with his death, under somewhat mysterious circumstances, at Fort Benton, in this Territory, of which he was at the time — July, 1867 — Secretary and acting Governor. Townsend has daily communication by coach with White Sulphur Springs, a substantially built town lying in a beautiful valley 5,070 feet above sea-level, and surrounded by the grandest of Rocky Mountain scenery. This town, which is the judicial seat of the county, has excellent accommodations for all classes of visitors, including one of the best hotels in the Territory. WONDERLAND. 35 Medicinal properties of wonderful eflficacy are claimed (or the waters of a spring in its vicinity, further information regarding which will be found in the Railroad Company's time tables. Besides the Missouri River, which, at Townsend, is a beautiful, clear stream, there are three creeks, abounding with trout and whitefish, in close proximity to that town. In July, 1887, two gentlemen caught ^^ fish in one of them in two hours ; the following month, two others caught 42 grayling, weighing 39 pounds, in three hours ; while two others again caught 82, weighing 74 pounds, and that as the result of one day's sport. In the same month, a single angler caught no trout and whitefish in three hours, in the Missouri River. Ducks and prairie chickens are equally abundant. With the exception of Bozeman, of which but little is to be seen from the railroad, not a single town, city or settlement of any kind, which the traveler has passed since leaving St. Paul or Duluth, from the great city of Minneapolis to the smallest prairie settlement, but has had almost its entire growth since the advent of the railroad. Now, however, he is approaching a city which was one of commanding position and great commercial importance even when hundreds of miles of mountain and prairie separated it from the nearest railroad. This is Helena, the capital of the Territory, and the QUEEN CITY OF THE MOUNTAINS. It was on the afternoon of the 15th of July, 1864, that four weary and heartsick miners pitched their tents in that desolate-looking gulch where now stands this flourishing city. Disappointed at not being able to secure claims in the then prosperous camp of Virginia City, and reduced to great extremity, they regarded the little gulch on the Prickly Pear as their "last chance." Finding gold in paying quantities, they resolved to settle down, and it is said that within two years each of them was worth $50,000. In the meantime the little camp, in what was thenceforward known as "Last Chance Gulch," had attracted miners from all parts of the Rocky Mountains. It is stated in a recent official publication of the Territory that the gulch yielded $30,000,000 during the first three seasons it was worked ; but these figures so far exceed the popu- lar estimate that they ace-repeated only under reserve. For many years this important mining centre was dependent upon the Mis- souri River for its commercial intercourse with the world, and was thus in a state of Well-nigh complete isolation during the greater part of every year. Important, however, as the city became, the visitor will not need to be told that It is since the opening of the railroad that those substantial-looking business blocks and truly magnificent residences, at which he will never cease to wonder from his first setting foot in the city until leaving it, have arisen. Helena now claims to be the wealthiest city of its size in the United States. Of its four National Banks, one alone has the custody of individual deposits exceeding $3,000,000. 36 WONDERLAND. The romance of mining is well illustrated by the story of the citizen of Helena, who was digging out a cellar to his house, when a passing stranger asked permission to remove the pile of earth that was being heaped up in the roadway, promising to return with one-half of whatever dust he might obtain by the washing to which he proposed to submit it. Permission granted and the earth removed, the citizen thought no more of the matter. Great, therefore, was his astonishment when, a few days later, the half-forgotten face of the stranger appeared at the door, and he was handed, as his share of the yield of that unpromising dirt, the equivalent of $650. Possibly, however, a story involving only a paltry sum of three figures, may not answer to the reader's conception of the romantic. It does not excite his imagination. He expects to read of millions. If so, let us turn to the story of the miner, who, confident that he was the possessor of a valuable claim, held on to it, in spite of the most adverse circumstances, hiring himself out in winter that he might have a little money wherewith to work upon his claim in summer, until, at last, after eight years of indomitable perseverance and patient toil, he was able to sell his property for $2,250,000 ; or that of the weary and penniless wanderer, who, having tramped all the way from Nevada, began a toilsome search, to be continued through much suffering and privation for several years, but destined to be rewarded at last by the discovery of one of the richest veins of gold in the Territory, a vein that has yielded, up to the present time, $4,000,- 000 worth of gold. Among facts not more startling than hundreds of others that might be- quoted, it is related that a four-mule team once hauled from Helena to Fort Benton, for transportation down the Missouri River, two and one-half tons of gold, valued at $1,500,000 ; that in the early days potatoes were worth fifty cents per pound, and flour $1.00, and that oranges were sold at $1.00 each, and small pine-apples at $7.00. In those days many individual claims yielded $1,000 a day, and the condition of society was very much the same as that which existed in California during the corresponding period of its history, and- was similarly brought to an end, only by the stern measures of the vigilantes. The most valuable gold nugget ever found in Montana is said to have been worth about $3,200. There is a nugget in the vault of the First National Bank at Helena, weighing 47.7 ounces, and valued at $945.80. But the most inter- esting sight in the city is, undoubtedly, the process of assaying at the United States Assay Office, where may also be seen those marvelously adjusted and delicately graduated scales, by which the weight of even an eye-lash can be exactly determined. There are several interesting excursions that can conveniently be made from this city. The first is to the Grand Canon of the Missouri, known as the Gates of the Rocky Mountains ; which name was bestowed upon it by Lewis and Clark, in 1805. A delightful drive across the prairie, with the main range of the Rockies and much other fine scenery in full view, brings the visitor to Hilger's Landing, from which point a steamer makes regular trips through the- WONDERLAND. 37 -Grand Canon to Picnic Caiion, Willow Creek and Bear Tooth Rapids. The ■cliffs for the most part are vertical, and from 500 to 1,500 feet high, rising from the water's edge. Near the lower end of the caiion is the sharp peak called by the Indians the Bear's Tooth, rising abruptly from the river to a height of 2,500 feet. The hours of sailing, rates of fare, etc., are usually to be found in the advertising columns of the Helena papers. Another interesting excursion is that to Marysville, the terminus of a branch twenty miles long, known as the Helena and Northern. This line, which scales for ten miles a steep mountain side, is a wonderful piece of railroad engi- neering, and scarcely less interesting to the traveler than the famous mines to which it leads. Of these, the most famous is the Drum Lumon, perhaps the greatest silver-gold mine in the world, shipping an average of nearly $150,000 worth of bullion per month, of which fully one-half may be set down as profit. Visitors to the New Orleans Expositions of 18S4 and 1885 will remember the magnificent exhibits from this mine, which included one solid chunk of high- grade ore, weighing 1,715 pounds. There are three other valuable mining properties near the terminus of this branch, including the Gloster, which, crushing about 4,500 tons of gold and silver quartz monthly, has produced since 1881 upward of $4,500,000. A day may also, with advantage, be devoted to Wickes, to which point a branch twenty miles long has been constructed from Prickly Pear Junction, a station on the main line, five miles east of Helena. This village in the mount- ains is famous for its reduction works, which are among the largest in the country, having produced in 1886 156,399 dwts. of gold, 573,237 ounces of silver, and 8,252,922 pounds of lead, the whole valued at $1,105,190.76. From the old town of Jefferson, on the Wickes branch, the line has been extended to Boulder, and this extension the year 1888 will probably see continued to Butte, reducing the distance between the two principal towns of the Territory twenty-six miles. Another branch has recently been completed to Rimini, seventeen miles distant. Here is the famous Red Mountain Mine, containing a ten-foot bed of high-grade ore, assaying on an average $170 per ton. Among other notable mining properties on the eastern slope of the mountains are the Whitelach Union, long the most celebrated gold mine in the Territory, and the Lexington, which has produced silver ore averaging in assay value from $15,000 to $20,- 000 per ton. This is by no means a complete list of the great mining proper- ties tributary to Helena, and the mention of the foregoing might seem invidious were it not stated that they furnish the most accessible data for illustrating, with all possible brevity, the importance of individual mining enterprises in this great Territory. The next stage of the traveler's overland journey lies across the MAIN RANGE OF THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS. An eminent geologist, whose name has already been twice mentioned in these pages, and who crossed the Rocky Mountains by the railway that was the 38 WONDERLAND. first to be carried over the continental divide, some years before the completion of the Northern Pacific, declares, in his well-known " Geological Sketches," that it was with a feeling of disappointment, almost of incredulity, that he looked out upon the scene on either side of the railroad track, as the train approached the summit of the route. Instead of the peaks and crests he expected to see, there was "only a long, smooth, prairie-like slope," which no traveler would ever have supposed was the summit of the famous Rocky Mountains, had not the railway company, as Dr. Geikie puts it, " with a laudable desire for the diffusion of correct geographical knowledge," had a board erected with an inscription to that effect. Although the Northern Pacific Railroad crosses the main range of the mountains at an elevation 2,693 *eet lower than that of the line over which Dr. Geikie traveled, the traveler by the former is all the while looking out upon scenery of that peculiarly rugged character which has earned for the great mountain chain of the continent the distinctive name it bears. Foot by foot the train climbs the mountain side, overcoming, one after another, the various gigantic barriers that seem to forbid its further progress. Under the shadow of great rocks, towering above the tall pines at their feet like the ruins of some ancient stronghold, along rocky shelves, through deep cuttings, and across innumerable ravines, it pursues its tortuous course, doubling upon itself so sharply that it might almost be said to be going in two opposite directions at the same time. Finally, at an elevation of 5,547 feet, it enters the Mullan Tun- nel, 3,850 feet in length, from the western portal of which it emerges on to the Pacific Slope. Following the valley of the Little Blackfoot, between grassy hills that present a singular contrast to the grandeur that distinguishes the eastern approach to the mountains, the train presently arrives at Garrison, from which point the Northern Pacific Railroad has running powers into the city of Butte, over a joint line operated under the name of the Montana Union. No traveler should fail to embrace the opportunity for visiting the GREATEST MINING CITY ON THE AMERICAN CONTINENT, if not indeed in the world, afforded him by the fact of his being at this point within a couple of hours' ride of it. The trip need not seriously delay him, and the route, lying, as it does, through the beautiful Deer Lodge Valley, with the attractive little city of Deer Lodge in the midst of it, the journey would well repay him for the time bestowed upon it, even were there no Butte City at the end of it. It is at the head of this valley, on the western slope of the main range of the Rocky Mountains, that Butte pours forth the smoke of its innumerable furnaces ; for not only, be it remembered, is its production of silver so great that it has come to be known as the "Silver City," but its copper mines are such as to give employment to the most extensive smelting works in the United States. We have only to go back to the last United States census to find Butte merely WONDERLAND. 39 a promising mining village, with a population of 3,363. To-day, however, it claims six times that number, — not, moreover, of ragged adventurers, attracted to it by the prospect of getting rich by luck, but of men whose good, hard, systematized labor earns them in the aggregate a round half-million dollars per month in wages; of wealthy merchants, of substantial tradesmen, and the various other classes necessary to the making up of a typical Western city. Had it been proved with mathematical certainty that those vast deposits of the precious metals which have made Butte what it is could be worked with equal facility and equally favorable results for a hundred years to come, this enterpris- ing city could scarcely present a more solid and substantial appearance than it does ; but the foundations on which its prosperity rests are too manifestly endur- ing for there to be even so much as an undercurrent of doubt as to its future. As the city has long passed the stage at which the visitor might safely be left to find out its chief objects of interest for himself, it may be well to inform him that it possesses, among other handsome buildings, a $150,000 Court House, and the finest Opera House on the Pacific Slope, outside of San Fran- cisco. The various costly goods with which its magnificent stores are stocked will undoubtedly be a revelation to him, and will show him that nothing is too good for the people of this flourishing city. The leading silver mines of the district are the Alice, Blue Bird, Lexington, Moulton, Silver Bow and Dexter, which alone employ 285 stamps, and produce over 300 tons of ore daily. The magnificent appliances of the Alice mine, including the great Cornish pump, that cost $40,000, are the v/onder of every visitor. The process of reduction, here, as elsewhere, is somewhat complex, especially in the case of the baser ores, being in part chemical and in part mechanical. It involves the crushing of the ore to powder, under the pressure of enormous bars of iron, weighing 900 pounds each, and known as " stamps," and its subsequent roasting in large, hollow cylinders, salt being largely employed in the former, and quicksilver in the latter, stage of the operation. The Alice mine, the main shaft of which is i,ooo feet deep, yields about 100 tons of ore per day, and its bullion product approaches $100,000 per month. The great Lexington property is owned by a French company, which, in 1881, gave $3,000,000 for it to an honored citizen of the Territory, who is said to have bought it, some few years before, for one dollar. It has the reputation of being one of the richest, most extensive and most complete mines in the entire West, and its production has been $1,000,000 per annum for some years past. The Blue Bird, Moulton and Silver Bow have 70, 40 and 30 stamps, respect- ively. They are magnificent properties, and exceedingly productive. The first-named is a comparatively new enterprise, and its appliances are of the most improved description, while the Moulton has long made the proud boast of working its ore to a higher percentage of its value than any other mill in the district. But it is the copper mines and smelters that represent the largest capital ; give employment to the greatest number of men ; have the largest production, (40) WONDERLAND. 41 both in tonnage and aggregate value ; and, it may be added, make the most smoke. At the head of the rich and powerful companies engaged in this indus- try, stands the Anaconda, — its mine at Butte, the greatest copper property in America, its smelting works, at the neighboring town of Anaconda, the largest of their kind in the world. Sold, seven years ago, for an amount that would not now be more than sufficient to pay its employes a week's wages, its property is roughly estimated to be worth $15,000,000. It handles daily 1,500 tons of ■ore, yielding 225 tons of matte, or 150 tons of pure copper. Its entire machin- •ery run by water-power, it yet requires for its furnaces upward of 200 cords of wood per day, and it is known to have once let a contract for 300,000 cords, representing upward of $1,000,000. Second only to this gigantic concern, is the Parrott Company, with an annual output of about 14,000,000 pounds, valued, with its silver contents, at about ^1,500,000. Mention must also be made of the works of the Montana Copper Company, which have a capacity averaging over a million pounds of fine copper per month ; Clark's Colusa, which produced last year about $800,000 in copper and $950,000 in silver, and is said to have in sight, above the 300-foot level, at least 150,000 tons of valuable ore ; and the Colorado, whose gross output in 1886 was valued at $890,000. While there are no mines in Butte that outrank the foregoing in importance, some there probably are that might seem to have an equal claim to a place in this list. It should therefore be stated that, as in the case of those tributary to Helena, the line has been drawn, not arbitrarily, but at those which furnished the most accessible statistical and other information likely to be of interest to the general reader and the visitor. Returning to the main line, and resuming our westward journey, with fine mountain scenery, including the snowclad peaks of Mount Powell, on our left, we come to Drummond, from which point a branch line has been constructed to the rich mining districts of New Chicago and Phillipsburg. Four miles from the latter town is the famous Granite Mountain mine, said to be producing more silver per month than any other mine in the world. Its vein of ore is six feet wide, and there are places where it assays as high as 2,000 ounces of silver to the ton. There are several other valuable mining properties in this locality, and it may safely be predicted that Phillipsburg, now rarely heard of beyond the limits of the Territory, except in mining circles, will become as widely known as the most famous mining city on the continent. Following the valley of the Kell Gate River, the name assumed by the Deer Lodge, after receiving the waters of the Little Blackfoot, we presently enter Hell Gate Canon, at first a beautiful valley, from two to three miles in width, but narrowing as we go westward, until, from between its stupendous walls, we suddenly emerge upon a broad plateau, where stands the city of Missoula. Before the advent of the railroad, Missoula was merely an isolated military post. Now, however, it is a flourishing little city, and the recent construction of a branch line up the Bitter Root Valley (an exceedingly fertile and well-settled THOMPSON FALLS AND SCENERY ON CLARK S FORK OF THE COLUMBIA T. ^ ,, Hoor Parl< 3 East Entrance to Horse Plains, 1. Thompson Falls. ^- Ueer rarn. -=• ■-<»»' •- (42) WONDERLAND. 43 region, where fine crops of cereals, fruit and vegetables are raised annually), bids fair to invest it with still greater importance. Missoula, though not possessing any luxurious hotel accommodations, is a place at which the tourist traveling in a leisurely way will do well to make a brief halt, especially if he be anything of a sportsman, mountain trout and grayling abounding in the various streams of the locality, while ducks and prairie chickens, deer, elk and bear are also plentiful. It is not too much to say that there are few tracts of country within the four corners of the Union less known than the region lying between the Northern Pacific Railroad and the international boundary, and bounded east and west by the Rocky Mountains and the Columbia River. From the testi- mony of those who have explored it, however, it undoubtedly possesses many features of extraordinary interest. Readily accessible from the railroad is the Flathead Indian Reservation. At Arlee station, the tourist is within five miles of the agency, and at Ravalli a 'ike distance from St. Ignatius Mission. A full account of the excellent work :arried on among the Indians by the Jesuit Fathers, together with an exceed- ingly interesting description of the Flathead country generally, appeared in the Century Magazine for October, 1882. Some very fine scenery, including Pumpelly Canon, said to possess many of the striking features of the Yosemite Valley, can be embraced within a single day's excursion from the Mission. It is doubtful, however, whether of the thousands of tourists who will pass through Arlee and Ravalli in the near future, there will be more than a few who will turn aside to visit this interesting-locality, for the simple reason that the entire region through which they are traveling is so full of attractions of world-wide fame. Those, therefore, who are disposed to leave the beaten track and make an excursion into less traveled districts, will do well to communicate in advance, either by letter or telegram, with the Railroad Company's agent, at the station nearest to the locality they wish to visit. Five out of every six of such visits will probably be from sportsmen, attracted by the fact, now rapidly- gaining publicity, that this is the finest game country in the United States. But of this, more anon. The better acquainted the tourist is with other routes to the Pacific Coast, the less hesitation will he have in awarding the palm, for beauty and diversity of natural scenery, to the Northern Pacific. He is now approaching a long stretch of line where he will look out upon scenery of an entirely different char- acter from any that has preceded it. It is in the country of the famous LAKE PEND D'OREILLE, and Clark's Fork of the Columbia. For 140 miles of its course, in western Montana and the Panhandle of Idaho, the line follows the windings of a stream that for grand and imposing river scenery is second only to the peerless Columbia itself. It is near Arlee that there approaches the railway the first of those beautiful streams whose gathered waters subsequently spread themselves. C44) WONDERLAND. 45- out into, perhaps, the most beautiful of all American lakes, before they finally sweep northward to join the great Columbia. This stream, the Jocko, the line follows to its confluence with the Flathead, coming out from the great Flathead Lake. Their united waters take the name of the Pend d'Oreille, to become the Clark's Fork of the Columbia, at the point at which they mingle with those of the Missoula. One hundred and two miles from Missoula is the town of Thompson Falls, with several fine trout streams in its vicinity, and an abundance of large game in the surrounding forest. This is the principal diverging point for the Coeur d'Alene mines. Every reader will remember the excitement that followed the discovery of this rich district in 1883, and the distress which accompanied the non-realiza:tion of the extravagant expectations with which some thousands of penniless adventurers had poured into the district. " 111 news travels apace," says the old proverb, and it is probably not nearly so well known that, with the introduction of hydraulic mining, the district has taken high rank among the mineral regions of the Northwest, and has abundantly demonstrated that former' clamis as to the richness and permanency of its mines were well founded. It is probable that a Ime will be built during the summer of 1888 from Thomp- son Falls to Murray and Wardner, the two chief towns of the district, thus bringing them into more direct communication with the East than they have hitherto been. Continuing that great northwestward sweep, wh'ch finally brings it within 45 miles of the international boundary, the train presently arrives at Heron, an important divisional terminus, where there is a change of one hour, from Mountain to Pacific time. This littlj settlement has long been a favorite resort of the angler and sportsman. Mr. W. C. Harris, himself, says of it that there is undoubtedly some of the best fishing in the entire West in its vicinity. Its streams abound with mountain trout, char, and a fish known locally as the grayling, which, however, is not the Montana grayling, bu,t the much-esteemed Dolly Varden trout. The last named sometimes reaches ten pounds in weight. A fine specimen 27^ inches long, caught by Mr. Egbert A. Brown, Divisional Telegraph Superintendent at Heron, was sent east, in October, 1886, where it was examined by Professor Bean, of the Smithsonian Institution, Professor Gordon and other authorities, all of whom pronounced it the Dolly Varden Trout [salveliuus inalma). In the correspondence of the American Angler of recent dates are found scores in this locality that average some 70 fish per day, for each man. A local correspondent of the same paper gives the following comparative record of the success that has attended visits to the various waters of the district, each of which represents one day's sport : — in the Jocko River, between Ravalli and Jocko, 63 pounds ; in the Bull River, seven miles east of Heron, 42 pounds ; in Lightning Creek, 14 miles west of Heron, 29 pounds ; and in the Spokane River, between Idaho Line and Trent, 73 pounds. But while in the economy of nature it is wisely ordained that perhaps not more than one man in a hundred should have the tastes of an angler, there are- (46) WONDERLAND. 47 few who have not a sufficient taste for the beautiful to look out of the car win- dows with delight upon that infinitely varied and beautiful scenery, through which the train passes, both east and west of Heron. For many hours there is a continuous unfolding of scenes, in which are combined, with nature's inimitable skill and infinite variety, all that is grandest in mountaiii, all that is most grace- ful in woodland and stream. Sometimes on a level with the railway, at other times far beneath it ; here on the right, there on the left ; now flowing calmly along in one unbroken sheet of liquid emerald, in which are reflected with won- drous fidelity the stately forms of the g.igantic pines that grow upon its banks and the imposing mountains that rise thousands of feet above it, and then tear- ing its way tumultuously through a magnificent rocky gorge, whose wild and romantic appearance presents one of those startling contrasts to what has pre- ceded it which never fail to produce a powerful impression on the beholder — such is Clark's Fork of the Columbia, a river whose changeful scenes are always among the most delightful reminiscences of a trip over this great scenic line. Where, hour after hour, every revolution of the car wheels reveals a new scene of beauty or sublimity, it is difficult to single out particular points as worthy of special notice, but probably Cabinet Gorge, five miles west of Heron, may be regarded as the climax of this long stretch of charming scenery. Here the river makes a sudden turn through a romantic rocky channel, with a perpen- dicular cliff rising sheer from its right bank to a height of several hundred feet. Imposing mountains tower far above, and the entire scene is so replete with the elements of the picturesque, and so admirable in its proportions, that it can scarcely fail to arrest the attention of even the most preoccupied traveler. Seven and one-half miles west of this point, the railroad crosses the river by a fine bridge, from which the tourist gets the last of that wonderful series of pictures which in a ride as long as from New York to Albany, — but immeasur- ably surpassing the Hudson in beauty, — has never for a moment relaxed its spell over him. This is his last viev/ of the river, until, after a short interval, it reap- pears in the form of the lovely Lake Pend d'Oreille. So irregular in shape and deeply indented in outline, that, while it possesses a shore line of probably 250 miles, the longest straight line that could be drawn upon it would not exceed forty miles in length, this beautiful sheet of water may, without exaggeration, be said to challenge comparison with the most famous lakes, either in the Old or New World. Its extent is so great that, were it surrounded by mountains of no higher elevation than those which overshadow not a few eastern lakes standing high in popular estimation, its scenery, if not absolutely tame and uninteresting, would fall infinitely short of the beauty and grandeur that really distinguish it ; but the magnificent mountains that look down upon it rise, range above range, until they reach an elevation of more than 10,000 feet. The railroad follows its winding north shore for twenty-five miles, and until recently what the traveler could see of its beauty was limited to this small section, just about one-tenth, of its devious shore line. The rail- road company has, however, recently erected, at an admirably selected point 48 WONDERLAND. that not only commands an extensive panoramic view, but is also an advanta- geous one for visiting the chief points of interest, a small hotel, which, operated in connection with the dining-car department, affords the best accommodations- at reasonable cost. The prospect commanded by this home-like resting place, known as " Highland House," is a superb one, indeed. In the immediate fore- ground the green waters break soothingly upon a pebbly beach, or fall in crested waves. Beyond the picturesque islands that lie out a mile or two from shore (one of which has a number of Indian graves in an excellent state of preserva- tion), the traveler looks southward over the widest part of the lake to where, nineteen miles away, Granite Point rises perpendicularly from the water 724 feet, with Granite Mountain behind it, towering 5,300 feet above the level of the lake, itself surmounted by the snowy peaks of Pack Saddle Mountain, and they, in turn, by the great purple range of the Coeur d'Alenes. On the right and left recede into distance the deeply indented shores, here clothed with luxuriant forests, there bare and precipitous, with mountains of imposing height beyond. The lake is said by local anglers to contain Silver and Rainbow trout, gray- ling (Dolly Varden trout?) and char. There is an abundance of mountain trout in the many small creeks discharging themselves into it. In June, 1887, over thirty trout were taken in two hours by a couple of anglers who were entire strangers to the stream in which they were fishing. The following month a visitor from Minneapolis and one from New York went out together to Trestle Creek, within a short distance of the hotel, and caught forty trout, averaging one pound each, in the course of the forenoon. In July, a visitor from Man- chester, la., who went out with three local sportsmen, returned with five pairs- of deer horns, in addition to having had " an extra fine time with trout fishing." Reference has already been made to the ABUNDANCE OF LARGE GAME in the forests lying between this section of the Northern Pacific Railroad and the international line. Within a few miles of any of the stations on Lake Pend d'Oreille may be f-^und mule deer, white-tailed deer, elk, caribou and moose,, black and cinnamon bear, and mountain sheep. Of winged game, geese, ducks- and partridge are plentiful, and they may be shot at any season of the year. The railroad company has four stations on the north shore of the lake. The first is Hope, where is situated the hotel, and that only. The others are Pack River, Kootenai and Sand Point, but only at the last named is there anything like a settlement. From Kootenai, a wagon road extends northward through the famous Kootenai country to Bonner's Ferry, on the Kootenai River, a fine but, in places, shallow stream, three or four hundred feet broad. From the Ferry, hunting parties can follow the river, either into the mountains or down to- Kootenai Lake. A few miles distant from the foot of Lake Pend d'Oreille, and easily accessi- ble, is a lake of doubtful orthography, but the very opposite of doubtful in its claims upon the attention of the angler and sportsman. It bears an Indian WONDERLAND. 49 name, which phonetic spelling has rendered in at least three different ways: Kaniksu, Kanasku and Kunusku. The district is a famous one for game. Beaver and mink skins, to the value of over $2,000, were brought down from it to the railroad last fall and spring, while two gentlemen who paid a brief visit to the lake in May, 1887, killed thirteen caribou in one day. In the following September it was visited by a large party of gentlemen from New York and Brooklyn, whose adventures formed the subject of a long and interesting article, entitled " Esoc Quet," in Forest and Strea/n, of October 20, which sportsmen will do well to peruse. Among the game killed by this party were twenty-three black-tailed deer, besides white-tailed deer, caribou, hares, beaver, grouse of three varieties, and ducks. From the lower end of Lake Pend d'Oreille, the Clark's Fork River, which forms its outlet, runs away northwestward to meet the Columbia. The railroad, which has likewise been running northwestward since leaving Livingston, now takes a southwestward sweep, which carries it, first of all, through a dense forest, containing but few settlements, and little that is of special interest, except the beautiful Lake Cocolala, a long but narrow sheet of water on the north side of the track. The first place of importance is Rathdrum, one of the best points on the line both for game and fish, having three lakes — Hayden Lake-, Spirit Lake and Fish Lake — within ten miles, as well as a dense forest to the east, south and northwest. Priest Lake, fifty miles north, was visited during 1887 by various eastern and other sportsmen, who, in addition to an abundance of fish, were rewarded also with grouse, pheasants, black and white-tailed deer, caribou and bear. Nine miles west of Rathdrum, the line leaves the Panhandle of Idaho and enters Washington Territory, to which that northern projection of the former Territory will probably, at no distant day, be annexed. Near this point, the forest, which has closely hemmed in the line on both sides, recedes, leaving a fine open space. In a half-hearted sort of way, however, it again approaches the track, but almost immediately there is spread out before the traveler the great Spokane plain. Two miles west of Trent, the Spokane River, the outlet of Lake Coeur d'Alene, comes in from the south, and after making a broad sweep on the right side of the track once more approaches the railroad, which it finally leaves for that sinuous rocky channel which has given to the flourishing little city on its banks the well-known name it bears. SPOKANE FALLS, whatever it may have been in ante-railroad days, has always been a bright and promising little city since the great transcontinental highway over which we are traveling first reached it. But it has been promising in the magnificence and diversity of the capabilities of the country naturally tributary to it, rather than in actual enterprise or the evidences of rapid growth, until quite recently, when it has received an impetus that has made it the most rapidly growing town between Lake Superior and Puget Sound. Travelers by rail, seeing nothing of 50 WONDERLAND. its great falls, and being in entire ignorance of the vast wheat country and the seven rich mining districts soon to pour their wealth into its lap, have been wont to inquire whether it was supposed that beauty of situation was of itself sufficient to make a large and substantial town. Everyone, however, who was acquainted with the capabilities of the surrounding country knew that it was only a ques- tion of time when Spokane Falls would become a flourishing city, and their predictions are being verified even sooner than they expected. While it is more particularly with regard to its claims upon the attention of the tourist that we have to deal in these pages, its growing importance as a commercial and manufacturing centre cannot be altogether overlooked. The first may be summed up in a brief reference to its beautiful situation, upon a gravel plateau, sloping gently towards the river, overlooked by pine-clad hills with lofty mountain ranges in the far distance, and to those great falls where the river, divided by basaltic islands into three distinct streams, curving towards each other and pouring their floods into a common basin, comes surging and foaming to make its final plunge of sixty- five feet into the deep chasm below. These falls are undoubtedly the key to that commercial supremacy which the city is most assuredly destined to exercise over a wide area of country. While the well-known Falls of vSt. Anthony, at Minneapolis, represent a force of 135,000 horse power, those of the Spokane represent one of 216,000 horse power, utilizable with equal facility at all seasons of the year. Two branch lines have already been built from points on the main line within a few miles of Spokane Falls, one of them furnishing direct communi- cation with the Coeur d'Alene mining district, and the other with the Palouse wheat country. Other branches are in contemplation — one northward to the Colville mines, and another westward into the Big Bend country. So rapid and of such importance have been the recent developments in the Colville dis- trict, as also in the Salmon River and other mining districts still further north, that the summer of 1888 will probably witness the construction of at least the former of these projected lines. The Coeur d'Alene branch, already in operation, leaves the main line at Hauser Junction, nineteen miles east of Spokane Falls. Even should the tourist take no particular interest in that wonderful development of mineral wealth which is taking place in the Cosur d'Alene region, he will still do well to take a short trip into the district, if only for the sake of the beautiful scenery it affords, and the delightful sail on Lake Coeur d'Alene which the excursion includes. The Coeur d'Alene branch passes Fort Sherman, long known as Fort Coeur d'Alene, and recently re-named in honor of Gen. W. T. Sherman, who first selected its site. Its terminus is Coeur d'Alene City, situated at the outlet of a lake that even rivals in the beauty of its waters and the grandeur of its mount- ain scenery the more accessible Pend D'Oreille, while its conveniences for boating and fishing are equally good. A well-appointed steamer makes round trips daily, except Sunday, during the season, between Coeur d'Alene City and Mission, where the Jesuit Fathers began, many years ago, an excellent work WONDERLAND. 51 among the Indians of the district, which they have continued with marked suc- cess down to the present time. From Mission, the narrow-gauge railway of the Cceur d'Alene Railway and Navigation Company will convey the tourist to Wardner, one of the most important centres of the mining district, and destined, as already stated, to have a branch connecting it with the Northern Pacific Railroad at Thompson Falls, in the near future. This trip is in every way a delightful one, and unless the tourist is absolutely satiated with lake and mountain scenery, he should on no account fail to make it a part of his programme. Equally worthy of the observant traveler's attention is the Palouse wheat country. The branch that connects Spokane Falls v/ith this famous region leaves the main line at Marshall Junction, and runs almost directly southward. The capabilities of this section of the Territory for the annual production of a prodigious crop of wheat at a cost undreamt of even in Dakota, save on one or two isolated farms (and there, only under exceptionally favorable con- ditions), recently led the accomplished and practical correspondent of an in- fluential New York journal, who had been taking an exceedingly pessimistic view of the future of wheat-growing in the West, to declare, in an outburst of enthusiasm, that this Palouse country is destined to do nothing less than entirely destroy 7vheat-groiving in I?idia, by virtue of its immense crops, its favorable seasons, its economy of production and its proximity to the sea- board. Certainly it is a wonderful region. What thirty bushels to the acre are to the Dakota farmer, a crop of fifty bushels is to the farmer in the Palouse country. The climate of eastern Washington, to which alone this remarkable state of things is due, differs entirely from that of the western half of the Territory, from which it is divided by the Cascade Range of mountains. Indeed no greater mis- take could be made than to suppose that the more or less humid climate of the coast is characteristic of the Territory as a whole. On the contrary, the eastern half is remarkably dry, and that,, too, without those extremes of temperature which usually accompany a dry climate. The climate of the Palouse country, as of other sections adjacent to Spokane Falls, has even a less rainfall than the Mississippi Valley, while snow rarely lies more than a few days at a time. Mild, sunny weather usually prevails until the middle of December, and the brief spells of cold that may visit it during the following few weeks are invari- ably cut short by the Kuro-siwo, or Japan current, popularly known as the Chine ok wind, which, striking the coasts of British Columbia and Washington Territory, sends a warm wave over the entire northwestern country, extending even to the valleys of Montana, where it has been known to raise the temperature ninety degrees in a few hours. In this connection it may be added that the sloppy, dismal weather which throughout so large a part of the United States accompanies the dreary months of winter, is here almost unknown, nor do the storms which actually visit the country at all approach in severity those experienced elsewhere. "-^^^1 " ''\ •';fpr y J AlA^ Mm (52) WONDERLAND. 53 As is the case in northern Dakota and Montana, the nutritious native grasses are converted into hay as they stand, thus affording winter nourishment for the domestic flocks and herds of to-day, just as they did for the buffalo in days gone by. It may be well to add, in view of the foregoing statement relative to the dryness of the climate, that if any reader should suppose that irrigation is necessary, he will be utterly mistaken. Where the cereal crops and the vegetables that grow in such profusion derive the moisture necessary to their maturity is a mystery, but the crops never fail, and it must not be for- gotten that, new as is the country in the main, there are portions of it, here and there, where farming operations have been carried on for many years, and the capabilities of the soil thoroughly tested. Not to make this agricultural digres- sion too long for the general reader, ic may be added in conclusion that from one point alone — Oakesdale, on the Spokane and Palouse branch, there were shipped last season 6,000 pounds of fruit, including peaches, plums, cherries and apples, and 97,000 pounds of wool, besides a large quantity of wheat; and that the en- tire region, which contains about 5,000,000 acres of agricultural land, is capable of producing 200,000,000 bushels of wheat annually, at a cost but slightly ex- ceeding ten cents per bushel, besides enormous quantities of fruit and wool, thus keeping the wharves of Tacoma busy with a foreign commerce greater even than that of San Francisco. The country westward from Spokane Falls is of no special interest until ■Cheney is reached, an important wheat-shipping point in the midst of a rich farming country, very little of which, however, is seen from the car windows. Eight miles distant is a large sheet of water known as Medical Lake, from the remedial properties of its waters. Thirty-one miles west of Cheney, the train runs into Sprague, the judicial seat of its county, the headquarters for a division of the railroad, and the ship- ping and distributing point for a rich section of country, which, though unseen by the traveler, is at no great distance from the railroad. Sixty-nine miles westward from Sprague is Palouse Junction, from which point also a line has been built into the Palouse wheat country. Thirty-five miles more and we arrive at Pasco Junction, the eastern terminus of the Cascade division of the railroad, and the point at which passengers for Portland have to elect whether they will continue their journey via Wallula Junction and the Columibia River line or by way of Tacoma. The Cascade division, 260 miles in length, presents the same remarkable diversity of physical conditions and natural scenery that characterizes the country traversed by the Northern Pacific Railroad as a whole. For 150 miles, as we journey northwestward, it consists mainly of a far-extending plain, covered with sage brush and bunch grass, and of fertile and beautiful valleys. We then enter a great forest belt, some seventy-five miles in breadth, which affords us an opportunity to see something of the wealth of the Territory in merchantable timber. It is here that we cross the Cascade range, indeed the largest timber is on the west slope of the mountains, magnificent forest trees growing almost COUGAR MOUNTAIN, GREEN RIVER, W. T. (54) WONDERLAND. 55 down to the water's edge. The remainder of the line lies in a narrow valley, from whose rich, warm soil are raised those immense crops of hops which are the astonishment of the hop-grower all over the world. Leaving Pasco Junction, the line runs down to the Columbia River, across which it is carried by a substantial bridge. The first important town we reach is Yakima, situated in a fertile valley of the Yakima River. Not only has this long been a favorite district with stockmen, but its rich soil produces sorghum (yielding about 300 gallons of syrup to the acre), sweet potatoes, tobacco, &%% plant, melons, wheat of a superior quality, garden vegetables and fruits of all descriptions. After leaving Yakima, the line follows for many miles the tortuous course of the Yakima River, through a winding cailon abounding in beautiful scenery. This brings it to the valley of the Kittitas, a well-settled region, some 400 square miles in extent. The most important town here is EUensburgh, the railroad headquarters for the division. This flourishing town has a good water-power, which has been taken advantage of in the erection of both flouring mills and saw mills. Not only has it tributary to it an extensive area of good agricultural land, but gold, silver, copper and bituminous coal are all found in its vicinity. Gold to the value of $150,000 has already been shipped, and the other mineral deposits are equally promising. Twenty-four miles beyond EUensburgh, the train stops at Clealum Junction, from which point a branch extends to Roslyn, where there is a deposit of true bituminous coal, 35,000 acres in extent. Twenty-five thousand tons per month are already being mined, and this shipment will doubtless be largely uicreased, for the possibilities of production are almost unlimited, one vein alone being estimated to contain 300,000,000 tons. Another half-hour and we reach Easton, where the line, which has been gently rising since leaving Yakima, is confronted by a mountain grade of 116 feet to the mile, the same as that by which the Belt Range and the Main Range of the Rocky Mountains are crossed ni Montana. It is the maximum permanent grade permitted the railroad by its charter, though much lighter than many now in operation in the Rocky Mountains. If this limitation involves a somewhat larger outlay in the original construction of the line than would otherwise be necessary, the company will doubtless be more than repaid by the greater facility and economy with which it can haul freight over its various mountain barriers. With the ascent of this steeper grade, the pathway cut for the railroad through the forest, extending for many miles in a per.ectly straight line and forming an avenue of singular beauty and stateliness, is exchanged for comprehensive and imposing miountain views, which become more and more extensive with the approach of the train to the eastern portal of the Stampede tunnel, whence the mountains are seen uprearing themselves grandly against the sky, and forming a striking contrast to the great valley that lies beneath, clothed with one handsome garment of foliage. The tunnel through which the train passes from the east to the west slope is 9,850 feet in length, and is, with the exception of the Hoosac Tunnel in Massachusetts, the longest in America. During its construction, trains crossed (56) WONDERLAND. 57 the mountains by a switch-back line, which was without exception the most marvelous piece of railroad engineering in the country. With such wonderful skill has the line been carried over heights absolutely insurmountable, except by the switch-back system, and of such indescribable magnificence are the views from the summit, that it is to be hoped that summer tourist travel, at least, will continue to be carried over the summit of the pass, rather than through the more direct tunnel. Emerging from the west portal, the traveler will get his first view of Tacoma, the Sovereign Mountain. With the possible excep- tion of Mount St. Elias, this magnificent peak has no rival on the entire American Continent. Towering to a height of 14,444 feet and 100 miles in •circumference, it is not, like the well-known peaks of the Rocky Mountain Range, merely a pinnacle rising a few hundred feet above the continuous range of which it forms a part, and to be surveyed by the traveler only from an elevation that practically diminishes its height by two-fifths. On the contrary, it rises to its perpendicular height of nearly three miles, from the very shores of the Pacific Ocean, while it has the further advantage of not being merely seamed or flecked with snow, but robed in unbroken, dazzling whiteness all the year round. Descending the west slope by the gorges of Camp and Sunday Creeks, the train soon reaches the narrow valley of Green River, which it follows for many miles, crossing and recrossing the river no fewer than ten times. The charming scenery of this romantic defile presents a delightful contrast to the imposing mountain views the traveler has so recently gazed upon. The Green River, moreover, is a famous trout stream. Mr. F. A. Carle, writing in the St. Paul Pioneer Press, declares it to be the prettiest trout stream in America, and goes on to tell, with the enthusiasm of the ardent rodster that he is, how his palm tingled for the pressure of the butt and his ear pricked itself for the rattle of the reel, at the first glimpse of its clear pools and dancing ripples. Certainly, if there is a river in the world that would tempt us all to be- come anglers, this is the one, for it needs no practised eye to see, even from the windows of the flying train, that the clear and quiet pools that alternate with its rapids and cascades, are fairly alive with fish. Beautifully situated in this valley is the sanitarium of Hot Springs, which will doubtless become a popular resort with the contemplated increase of its accommc)dations for visitors. It may be added in this connection that the attractions of the district for the sportsman include grouse, pheasant, mountain goat and bear. Presenting a striking contrast to the emerald -hued stream whose windings the train follows for so great a distance, is the White River, over whose milky, glacier-fed waters the line is carried twenty miles west of Eagle Gorge, and five miles east of South Prairie, a little town which, in addition to having important coalmines of its own, is the junction for a branch extending to Wilkeson and Carbonado, both of which are important coal mining centres, the latter shipping some 700 tons per day. It is through the valley of the Puyallup River, the outflow of the great Puy- allup Glacier, that the line now runs. This is the hop district, to which refer- WONDERLAND. 59 ence has already been made. Not only does its soil, washed down from the great volcanic formation of Mount Tacoma, yield, year after year, phenomenally large crops of hops, but its product is of greater strength, is freer from disease, is cleaner, and of more uniform color than that of any other part of the country. The hop picking is done almost entirely by Indians, who, to the number of 4,000, come annually during the season from points as far distant as British Columbia. A recent governor of the Territory states in a report to the Secre- tary of the Interior that they excel the whites in their ability for picking. They come up the river in their canoes towards the end of August, and their arrival and departure are events of no little interest to the tourist who happens to be visiting the district at the time. A rapid run through the Puyallup Indian Reservation, and there rises before us the coming great seaport of TACOMA, looking down from the series of terraces on which it is built, upon Commence- ment Bay. Tacoma possesses many features that are interesting to the tourist. First, we have its geographical position at the head of that remarkable body of water, Puget Sound — a deep inland sea, extending nearly 200 miles from the ocean, covering an area of 2,000 square miles, and with shores so remarkably bold, that at almost any point in its 1,600 miles of shore line a ship's side would touch the shore before her keel would touch the bottom. This is not the place to dwell at any length upon the commercial advantages enjoyed by the city, but the excellence of its harbor, and its proximity to great forests and a highly productive wheat region, can not be allowed altogether to escape notice. One of the greatest wonders in the whole place is, as has oftentimes been remarked, its great hotel, the Tacoma, one of the most beautifully situated, admirably designed, and altogether home-like hotels in the country. Having established his headquarters here, the tourist can stroll on to the eastern piazza and look out upon the incomparable scene that will there greet him ; mountains, woodland and sea — the matchless Tacoma rising above all, its dazzling robe of snow catching perchance a ruddy glow from the setting sun. Sauntering forth into the city, he will see its substantial brick business blocks and other evidences of commercial importance, and continuing his walk to the Episcopal Seminary, founded by Mr. C. B. Wright, of Philadelphia, in memory of a deceased daughter, he may look northwestward to the Olympic Mountains, whose highest summit. Mount Olympus, stands out clearly against the sky — 70 miles away. Continuing his ramble, tliough with that in prospect, he would have done well first of all to have engaged a carriage, he may proceed to the original town of Tacoma, now known as Old Tacoma or Old Town. Here he will find a gigantic saw mill, with enormous engines of 1,400 horse power, deriving their motive power entirely from the consumption of sawdust produced in the manufacturing of the lumber. He will see a fine fleet of merchantmen waiting to convey the product of this mill to all parts of the world. In the -60 WONDERLAND. village itself he will see a little church with the oldest tower in America, the fact being that the edifice has been built with one of its corners adjoining the trunk of a standing fir tree, sawed off about 60 feet above the ground. Returning to the city, the visitor may next direct his steps to the main wharf, where the coast and ocean steamships visiting the port embark and disembark their passengers, and where tea ships from China may occasionally be seen unloading their valuable cargoes. Close at hand are the coal docks, from which an average of nearly 1,000 tons of coal is shipped daily to San Francisco and other points on the coast. A delightful afternoon's drive will take him to Puyallup, affording him a more leisurely view of the Indian Reser- vation and the hop fields than he obtained from the windows of the passing train. A still more enjoyable carriage excursion is to Steilacoom, 18 miles distant, in the vicinity of which was situated the now abandoned military post of Fort Steilacoom. But what of the climate ? queries the reader. Is it such as to invite anything more than a brief visit to this evidently interesting locality ? In answer to this question, it is scarcely too much to say that nowhere in the United States is there to be found a more delightful summer climate than that of the Puget Sound country; while in winter, though there is certainly a considerable rain- fall, there is no severe cold, and the English traveler who should find himself in Tacoma between November and March, would be reminded by the climate of that season of that of the most favored section of his own sea-girt home. It is almost the only section of the United States, north, south, east or west, that is entirely exempt from spells of intense heat during the dog days; but on July 5, 1887, when a veritable simoom swept across the entire country — when the temperature at New York rose to 99°, at St. Louis to 102°, and even at Chicago, with its boasted cool summer temperature, to 96'', 77° was the maximum at Tacoma. Nor is this comparison an exceptional or otherwise unfair one, for the maximum summer temperature at Tacoma in 1884 was only 86°, in 1885 85°, in 1886 84°, and in 1887 86°. Visitors to Tacoma who, when in Colorado, have accomplished the wonder- ful feat of ascending Pike's Peak on horseback, sometimes cast wistful glances in the direction of that great Colossus whose white dome stands out so grandly against the clear blue sky, and think what a magnificent prospect its summit must command. They wonder, too, if it is possible to make the ascent, and whether they can get up and down in a day, as they did with their sisters, their cousins and their aunts in the case of some other scarcely less lofty peak. Yes, dear reader, the summit is not absolutely inaccessible, although, if you succeed in reaching it, you will have the honor of being one of not more than half a dozen persons, who have ever scaled its well-guarded heights. You may, how- ever, if you can afford to devote a week's time to the trip and a fifty-dollar bill, reach a point at which, 11,000 feet above the tide waters that lie so near, you can survey its virgin snow fields and the great glaciers that lie embedded in its jmighty bosom; can look northward over the Sound and the country bordering WONDERL AND. 6 1 upon it, spread out like a map before you, to where the great sugar-loaf of Mount Baker pierces the sky at a distance of 125 miles as the crow flies, and sharp and clear as though it were but half the distance — all this, and more, you can accomplish, without risk to life or limb, and with no sacrifice of personal comfort that is not immeasurably outweighed by the enjoyment you will derive from the trip. Nor have you the trouble of making the very elaborate prepa- rations necessary to such a trip. Mr. W. D. Tyler, the manager of the Hotel Tacoma, will do all this for you on short notice, providing horses, camping out-fits, experienced guides and all other necessaries. Among those who have already visited the mountain and its great glaciers, is Senator Edmunds, of Vermont, who declared, on his return, that the finest peaks he saw during a long tour through the Alps, fell far short of what he had seen on Mount Tacoma. Before embarking on the now popular trip to Alaska, for which Tacoma is the starting point, our typical traveler would doubtless like to visit the city of Portland, and see something of the glories of the Columbia River. The Northern Pacific Railroad has its own line extending southward to that city. It lies to some extent through a belt of forest, but it also intersects a fine agricult- ural country in which several prosperous little towns are growing up. On arrival at Kalama on the north bank of the Columbia, the train is carried across the river by one of the finest transfer boats in the world, built expressly for the Northern Pacific Railroad Company, and constructed to carry thirty cars at one time. From Hunter's Point on the opposite bank, the train soon reaches PORTLAND. Its phenomenal growth, its commanding position on one of the great water- ways of the continent, its wealth, commerce and enterprise, render this city one of the most attractive on the American Continent. Contenting ourselves with touching upon its commercial importance, only so far as it is of interest to the ordinary tourist, it may be said, that, although 100 miles from the coast, Port- land, like London, Rotterdam and Antwerp, is virtually a seaport, and that load- ing at its wharves or riding at anchor on the bright bosom of the river, may be seen, not only river craft of all sorts and sizes, but ocean-gomg vessels of 3,000 tons. Its chief exports are wheat (for which alone a fleet of over 100 first-class merchantmen visit the port annually), wool, hides, hops and potatoes, to an ag- gregate value, for the year 1886-87, of $15,703,995. The actual capital em- ployed in banking and jobbing is estimated in a recent official publication of the State of Oregon at $75,000,000, and when the visitor drives past the hand- some business blocks that line its principal streets and the beautiful residences of its merchant princes, upward of twenty of whom are said to be millionaires, he will not for a moment doubt that Portland is a city not only of commercial importance, but also of wealth and refinement. Its picturesque surroundings render Portland an exceedingly desirable place of residence. From the summit of Robinson's Hill, a view which it is no extrava- gance to pronounce one of the finest in the world is to be obtained. At our (62) WONDERLAND. 63 feet lies the city, nestled in rich foliage. Stretching away for many miles from where their waters unite in one common flood may be seen the Columbia and Willamette Rivers. But above all, bounded only by the limits of the horizon, is the great Cascade range, with all its glittering peaks. On the extreme right, 78 miles distant, as the crow flies, is seen the snowy crown of Mount Jefferson. Across the river, 5 1 miles distant, rises the shapely Mount Hood, one of the most beautiful mountains on the coast, and the pride and glory of Oregon. To the northeast stand out the crests of Mount Adams and Mount St. Helens, and in the same direction, 105 miles away, maybe descried the great Tacoma, the monarch of the range. All these five peaks are radiant with eternal snow, and it may well be imagined that the uplifting of their giant forms against the clear blue sky is grand in the extreme. At Portland the tourist travel from the East meets that from San Fran- cisco, the latter, however, usually including a large eastern element that has reached the Pacific coast by one of the southern routes. Tourists coming northward from San Francisco have the choice of two routes and two modes of travel. They may either take one of the fine steamers of the Oregon Railway and Navigation Company, sailing every fourth day and performing the voyage in from sixty to seventy-two hours; or they may travel overland by the Shasta route — a line that traverses some of the most fertile plains and beautiful valleys of this rich State, besides passing within a short distance of Mount Shasta. Through trains run over this line from San Francisco (Oakland) to Portland. The route lies through Sacramento, the well-known capital of California ; Red- ding, at the head of the Sacramento Valley; Sisson, where the traveler has a grand, full-face view of Mount Shasta; Edgewood, where the same great mount- ain is seen in profile; over the Siskiyou Mountains to Ashland; through the beautiful and highly productive Rogue River Valley; through the Valley of the Umpqua and that of the romantic Azalea River, known locally by the utterly unromantic name of Cow Creek; tlirough Eugene City, charmingly situated and finely laid out, and the seat of the State University; through Salem, the State capital, beautifully situated on the sloping banks of the river; down the Willa- mette Valley, fine views of the Cascade Range being obtained on the right; through Oregon City, near the beautiful Falls of the W^illamette, which repre- sent a force of over a million horse power, and so on to Portland. There are two delightful river excursions that should be made by every visitor to Portland. One is up the COLUMBIA RIVER to The Dalles, and the other down to Astoria. Neither of these trips need occupy more than a single day during the tourist season, although longer time may with advantage be devoted to them. The hours of sailing and other par- ticulars being advertised from day to day in the Portland papers, all that is necessary in these pages is to set forth the principal scenic attractions of the two excursions and the points that are otherwise of interest. The trip to The 64 WONDERLAND. ' Dalles, to begin with, embraces the most magnificent scenery on the entire river.. As the reader need scarcely be reminded, Portland is not on the Columbia River, but on its great affluent, the Willamette. It is situated twelve miles above the confluence of the two rivers, and there is consequently a short stretch that is common to both excursion's. The first point at which the steamer touches after entering the Columbia and turning eastward, is Vancouver, on the north bank, a pleasant little town occupy- ing an exceptionally fine situation, and surrounded by handsome groves of trees. Fort Vancouver is an important military post, being the headquarters of the Department of the Columbia. For some miles above this point the tourist will have the queenly Mount Hood in full view. Travelers who have seen only the serrated peaks of a continuous range rising at the most 9,000 feet above the point of observation, cannot possibly have any idea of the magnificent appear- ance presented by the great volcanic cones of the Cascade Range, rising, some of them, with wondrous grace of outline and symmetry of form, to upwards of 14,000 feet above the ordinary point of observation. Mount Hood is, by general consent, the most beautiful of them all, and the matchless grace with which she wears her glittering crown renders her a fit consort for the kingly Tacoma. Another hour's sail brings the steamer to the village of Washougal, prettily situated on the right bank of the river, with pleasant pastures on either side, and a forest of spruce in the rear, backed by a lofty hill. Six miles further, and we reach the gateway through which the river emerges from the channel — so long, and yet so profound, — that it has worn for itself, in countless ages, through the great Cascade Range. This is the beginning of the scenery that has given the Columbia River its great and far-extending reputation. Passing Table Rock on his right (the left bank of the river) and Rooster Rock, a peninsula which attains its greatest height at its extreme point, in the shape of an immense column rising vertically to a height of several hundred feet, the tourist's now thoroughly aroused interest is almost immediately afterward attracted by one of the most admirable pieces of scenery on the river. This is Cape Horn, an immense rocky promontory on the opposite bank, which has withstood the action of the river when more yielding materials have been swept before it. It is, however, but one of many bold and more or less sharp pro- jections that stand out from the great rounded masses of those overshadowing mountains whose varied forms astonish and delight the tourist as the steamer continues its course. At Warrendale, on the left bank of the river, is a large salmon cannery. Here the mountains are grouped with magnificent effect, their precipitous and, in places, perpendicular sides, relieved by the sombre foliage of giant firs. Nearly opposite Warrendale is the huge form of Castle Rock, rising in stern and imposing isolation at least 1,000 feet above the river. Continuing, we pass a large wooded island. The bottom lands on the right bank, which are here very extensive, are also beautifully wooded, and some little farming land adds a pleasing variety to the scene. In this vicinity there are usually to be seen a. WONDERLAND. 65 number of fish wheels, those novel contrivances by which the fish are literally scooped up out of the water in shoals. Three miles above Warrendale we come to the Cascades, where the river, which has elsewhere the appearance of a placid lake, changes to swift rapids and a foaming torrent. A narrow gauge railway, six miles long, has here been constructed oh the right bank of the river, and passengers are quickly trans- ferred to another steamer in waiting to receive them. This transfer is still known by the old name of a "portage," though it is one that would make the early traders open their eyes m astonishment, could they see it. So far from involving trouble or inconvenience, the transfer is an exceedingly pleasant feature of the trip. For some little distance the train forsakes the river, traversing a narrow and sparsely wooded tract of land. When the river once more comes in sight, it is about 200 feet beneath us, rushing swiftly along and white with foam. Another instant and the Cascades are in view, — the point at which the great river tumultuously forces its passage through a rocky and con- tracted channel, forming, with the great mountains that rise on either side, a scene of savage grandeur, for which no adequate comparison can be found. Having re-embarked, the tourist will notice the solid rock cuttings through which is carried the line of the Oregon Railway and Navigation Company? which follows the left bank of the river, and whose construction along the face of mountains rising precipitously from the water's edge, was one of no ordinary difficulty. Amid ever changing scenery, the steamer keeps on its course. At Chenoweth, on the right bank, an object of especial interest is the great flume in which logs and manufactured ties are sent down from the top of a neighbor- ing mountain, making the descent, a distance of over half a mile, in from eighteen to twenty seconds. Near the mouth of the Klickitat, the steamer passes through one of several sharply cut natural gateways in a rocky barrier that here stretches across the river, and in a few minutes more it is alongside the wharf at the good old town of The Dalles. As long ago as 1847, this place was an important fur-trading centre, and with the gradual development of the country naturally tributary to it, more particularly on the south or Oregon side of the river, it has continued to grow in importance. Five miles above the city are the great Dalles of the Columbia, where the river is literally turned on edge, so narrow and profound being the chasm through which it flows that the huge proportions of its mighty flood are absolutely inverted. The return journey to Portland may be made, either by boat or by any of the trains of the Oregon Railway and Navigation Company. The latter route not only affords fine views of the scenery on the right bank of the river, but also embraces several waterfalls of exceeding beauty that come down from the mountains on the left and are not seen to advantage from the river itself. Among them is the lovely Oneonta, 600 feet of silvery ribbon floating from a dizzy height, situated near the thirty-fourth mile-post eastward from Portland. A few minutes more, and the train comes to a stand opposite the still more ONEONTA GORGE, COLUMBIA RIVER, OREGON. (66) WONDERLAND. 67 beautiful Multnomah, which has a descent of no less than 820 feet. At the Pillars of Hercules, two gigantic columns of rock, one on either side of the track, the railroad leaves the river and runs direct to Portland. If the scenery of the Lower Columbia is not so abrupt, stern or impressive as that of the middle river, it has many admirable points of interest, and is far from being tame or monotonous. To begin with, the river winds considerably, for so great a body of water. The picturesque hill sides are covered with heavy firs; islands, wooded and exceedingly pretty, occur at intervals, and salmon canneries in great numbers lend an additional element of novelty to the trip. Until within the last three years, the canning industry of the Columbia River showed a steady mcrease. In 1883, the total pack was no less than 629,- 400 cases, valued at $3,147,000. Each of the last four seasons, however, has shown a marked falling-off from its predecessor, until in 1887 the catch amounted to only 356,000 cases, valued at $2,124,000. The entire export since the year 1866, exclusive of the salt-pack in barrels and of the large local con- sumption, amounts to 371,116,000 pounds, or about 25,000,000 fish. Twenty miles or so from its mouth, the river widens out into a broad estuary, some seven miles across. Here is Tongue Point, a bold headland projecting into the river from the Oregon shore. It is on a beautiful bay, between this point and Point Adams, that there stands the city of Astoria, known far beyond the limits of its own trade and commerce, important though these are. With its early history, including the arrival of John Jacob Astor's trading ship Ton- qiiin^ and its subsequent British occupancy, the world has been made familiar by Washington Irving's delightful volume " Astoria", and it is, perhaps, suf- ficient to say that it is to-day an exceedingly interesting city to visit, not more on account of its being the oldest British settlement in the Northwest and the central figure in the salmon fishing of the Columbia River than for the novelty of its construction, built, as it is, largely on piles, after the manner of Amster- dam. Its busy wharves and abundant shipping proclaim it a seaport of con- siderable importance, requiring only a railroad or uninterrupted navigation on the middle Columbia, to make it a great city. Of the ten thousand excursionists said to visit Astoria annually, a large majority are on their way to the various attractive summer resorts which have sprung up on the sea coast, both on the Washington and Oregon sides. The entrance to the river is guarded on the north by Cape Hancock, formerly known as Cape Disappointment, a bold headland commanding a magnificent view of the ocean, of a long stretch of picturesque shore line and of the Columbia River valley. Between Ilwaco — a little town in its vicinity, with a long crescent-shaped beach of fine white sand sloping to the water and heavily wooded hills in the rear — and Astoria, a steamer runs daily, making close connection with those to and from Portland. During the summer of 1887, a superbly appointed steamer performed a through service between Ilwaco and Portland. The best accommodations are obtainable, not in the village itse'f, which is 68 WONDERLAND. really situated on an expansion of the river, just within the two great head- lands before mentioned, but at Seaview, on the coast, from which point car- riages cross over to Ilwaco to meet the boats. On the Oregon shore, south of Cape Adams, are Clatsop Beach, where there are good hotel accommoda- tions and excellent hunting and fishing, and a popular resort known as Seaside, possessing a multitude of attractions, including a fine ocean beach and a trout creek. If the tourist be unable to make a long stay at any of these places, he ought at least to pay them a brief visit, if only to see where the great river discharges itself into the ocean, at the rate of one million gallons per second. Our typical traveler has now practically reached both the northern and western limits of United States territory, save that distant province of ALASKA, which stretches away from a point six hundred miles north of the dividing line between the United States proper and the British possessions to the shores of the Polar Sea, and as far west of San Francisco as the coast of Maine lies to the east. There is so much of romance associated with the idea of a trip to this far and mysterious Northland, so much that appeals to the imagination of even the most phlegmatic and sober-minded among us, that could it be brought home to the American people, with the force and vividness of some great and sudden event in contemporary history, that it is possible to make, comfort- ably and inexpensively, within the narrow compass of fourteen days, a voyage extending to within a few degrees of the Arctic circle and embracing many of the greatest wonders of that land of icebergs and glaciers, not all the ships that sail American waters would be adequate for the conveyance of the rush of travel that would at once ensue. So erroneous, however, are the prevailing ideas with regard to our distant possession, and so liable to become the foundations of utterly wrong inferences are even those actual facts regarding the country, which have, by slow degrees, found entrance into the public mind, that such statements as that a temperature of zero is rarely ever known at Sitka, that often an entire winter will pass without ice being formed thicker than a knife blade, and that there is not a day in the year when vessels may not load and unload in the harbor of the capital city, are received with more or less incredulity, and regarded as utterly incon- sistent with the fact that perpetual snow is found within three thousand feet of the sea-level, and that rivers of ice, i,ooo feet deep, run down to the sea from far in the interior of the country. Visions, too, are conjured up of cramped and greasy little whale boats, making tedious voyages, at irregular intervals, through rough seas that in so great a distance cannot fail to be tempestuous. That large and well-appointed steamships are engaged in a regular service, and that the long voyage they make is never productive of more than a transient squeamishness, however susceptible be the traveler, are almost incredible pieces WONDERLAND. 69 of news to those who hear them for the first time; and yet, while such erroneous notions as have been cited are current, one venturesome traveler after another, • to the surprise, and not unfrequently against the advice and remonstrance of his friends, ventures forth to put the claims and pretensions of the railroad and steamship companies to the test, and return to be the hero of the social circle m which he moves. But if this is the condition of things to-day, it will be but a short time before the Alaska excursion will no longer be the subject of these various misconceptions, but will have taken the place to which it is entitled in popular estimation. The handful of daring spirits contributed by over thirty States and Terri- tories durmg the season of 1887 aggregated, after all, the respectable total of 1,500 persons, and these, including, as they did, three United States Senators and three members of the House of Representatives, four ex-Governors, and a distinguished array of University professors, journalists, and worthy represent- atives of the Bench, the Bar, of Science and of Art, will be the most efficient agents Alaska could possibly have for proclaiming, far and wide, its incompar- able attractions and the facility and comfort with which a visit to it can be made. Tacoma, as already stated, is the starting point for the Alaska excursion, and it is there that our representative company, drawn from every part of the country and even from abroad, will gather, in the spacious halls of its great hotel, within twenty-four hours of the advertised time of sailing. During the season of 1887, that hour was 4.00 A. M., and passengers went aboard the previous evening, to look out in the early morning through the windows of their state- rooms upon the city of Seattle, beautifully situated on a series of terraces rising from the east shore of Elliott Bay. Seattle is the oldest American city on the Sound, and has long been a place of considerable importance. The enterprise of its people and their unbounded faith in its future, even after Tacoma was selected as the western terminus of the great transcontinental line over which the traveler has journeyed, need no setting-forth in these pages; neither do the great and varied resources of the rich country tributary to it, for have they not been advertised through the length and breadth of the land ? On the outward voyage, the tourist has to ■content himself with surveying the city from the deck of the steamer, deferring until his return that more careful inspection of which the city and its environs are so well worthy. A delightful three hours' sail on the broad waters of the Sound, the Medit- erranean of the Northwest, with its fir-lined shores, and the glorious, snow- crowned peaks of Tacoma and Baker looming up against the sky in regal majesty, and the steamer runs alongside the wharf at Port Townsend, the port of entry for the Puget Sound district. This town, not inaptly called the Gate City of the Sound, possesses an excellent harbor, with both good anchorage and adequate shelter. It takes but a short time for compliance with the requirements of the Customs as they affect an outward-bound steamer, and off we go (70) WONDERLAND. 71 again, this time right across the Strait of San Juan de Fuca, an outlet to the open sea. As the kingly form of Mount Tacoma recedes into the distance, that of Mount Baker increases in distinctness, while we have also a fine view of the Olympic Mountains on our left, and the lofty ranges of Vancouver Island, for whose beautiful capital we are now steering, right before us. So exceedingly picturesque and generally attractive is the appearance pre- sented by the City of Victoria to an approaching steamer, that it is with no little satisfaction that the traveler learns that a stop of several hours will be made in its harbor. While there is no lack of American cities that have attained, within a period corresponding to that of the growth of Victoria, far greater magnitude and commercial importance, the beautiful capital of British Columbia IS fashioned after so very different a pattern, and presents, if not to old-world eyes, at least to most Americans, so quaint an appearance, with its ivy-covered houses, its admirable roads and its fortifications, that it is hard to believe that it is really the young city it is. It is, however, but little more than forty years since the United States ship Vincennes, entering the Sound through the Straits of Fuca, found what is now its site a most forbidding picture of sav- age life. It was the Caribou mining excitement of 1868, that first brought any considerable population — and that a mere transient one — around the post established here, a few years before, by the Hudson's Bay Company. In 1870, although it had in the meantime been made the capital of the Province, Victoria contained but 3,270 inhabitants. Its present population is about 12,000, and there is probably no more self-contained city of its size in the world, for it has its own orchards and pastures, forests and coal fields, while Its manufactories are as varied as those of many cities ten times its size. It is not, however, with these things that the transient visitor is chiefly concerned, nor even with the exceptionally fine climate it enjoys, except in so far as the clear skies and balmy air he is almost certain to find there may con- tribute to the sum total of his enjoyment. It is rather with its superb situa- tion, with the sea on three sides, bordered by picturesque shores and grassy hills. These will assuredly delight him, as will also — and possibly still more — a drive through its glorious woods, with their lovely undergrowth of almost tropical luxuriance, to the neighboring village of Esquimalt, with its fine harbor, its immense dry dock, its naval arsenal, and the ships of the British Naval Squadron of the Pacific, of which it is the rendezvous. Returning to the city, he may stroll into one of its old curiosity shops, filled with a tempting display of those various artistic products in which the native races of the northwest coast so greatly excel. On his way back to the steamer, he will not fail to ad- mire the striking picture presented by the almost land-locked inner harbor, with its shipping, its Indian canoes, its narrow rocky entrance, and its white lighthouse, standing out against the dark foliage of the adjacent woods; nor the glistening peaks of the Olympic Mountains, over in Washington Territory; nor yet the trim and tasteful, but unpretentious, government buildings over- looking James Bay. 72 WONDERLAND. While, among the thousands of tourists who visit this city annually, there may be one or two who will give it a bad name, because they have had to pay for some trifling article a few cents more than they had been accustomed to, or, rushing into the Post-Ofifice just as the mail was being made up were sur- prised to learn that postage stamps were obtainable only at the stationery stores, ninety-nine out of every hundred leave this beautiful and interesting little city with regret, and carry away with them only the pleasantest recollections of their brief visit. When the steamer once more gets under way, we feel as though our voya'ge had at last begun in good earnest, and maps, guide books and glasses make their appearance, in numbers almost sufficient to start a bookseller and optician in business. One will have provided himself with "Alaska and its Resources," by Mr. W. H. Dall, of the Smithsonian Institution, a work which, although twenty years old or nearlv, is still the only comprehensive and trustworthy description of the Territory, as a whole; another will have the Alaska volume of Mr. H. H. Bancroft's "History of the Pacific States"; while a third will produce from his baggage Dr. Sheldon Jackson on " Alaska and Missions", an excellent work founded on extensive observation during several years' residence, and dealing especially with the labors of the various Christian missionaries in this great field. Others, desirous of seeing the impression produced upon transient visit- ors like themselves, will be conning the pages of Miss Scidmore's "Journeys in Alaska" or those of "Our New Alaska," by Mr. Chas. Hallock; while probably some English tourist, with the love of mountain climbing and advent- ure characteristic of his race, will follow the wanderings of Mr. Whymper or Mr. Seton-Karr, in their respective works " Travels in Alaska " and " The Shores and Alps of Alaska." Before reaching any broad expanse of open water, the steamer passes through a picturesque archipelago, which faintly foreshadows in beauty the island- studded waters through which will lie so large a part of our voyage. A momen- tary interest is here excited by our passing on the right the island of San Juan, the possession of which, as every reader will remember, was awarded to the United States, in 1872, by the Emperor of Germany, then King of Prussia, to whom had been referred the interpretation of a treaty of somewhat ambiguous phraseology. Almost uniformly smooth as is the navigation of the Inland Passage, the arrival and departure of the steamer at or from particular points cannot be pre- dicted many hours in advance, so much depends upon the state of the tide. Even in this high latitude night comes at last, and the first question in the morning, from almost every passenger, is Where are we now? If, therefore, it were possible to relieve the ship's officers of the endless string of questions with which they are plied, as to the whereabouts of the steamer at particular times, it would be a grateful task to do so, but all that is practicable is to point out the principal landmarks and the chief points of interest, so that these more or ess troublesome inquiries may be reduced to a minimum. WONDERLAND. 73 For fuliy a day and a half after leaving Victoria, we have on our left the great island of Vancouver, 300 miles in length, and by far the largest island on the Pacific Coast. Having passed through the archipelago, to which reference has already been made, and which occupies the extreme southern portion of the Strait, or Gulf, of Georgia, as it is variously designated, we come to the greatest expanse of water to be met with on our entire trip, save those occa- sional points where we are able, for a brief period, to look out upon the open sea. Before long, however, we have the large island of Taxada on our right. This island, which is largely in the hands of speculators, among whom is at least one American company, contains an immense deposit of iron ore, rendered especially valuable by its exceptionally low percentage of phosphorus. Another unbroken expanse of water, and we enter the first of those wonder- ful river-like channels through whose picturesque sinuosities three-fourths of our voyage will lie. This is Discovery Passage. It lies between the western side of Valdes Island and the northeastern shore of Vancouver Island. The southern extremity of the former island, known as Cape Mudge, is a peculiar headland about 250 feet high, flat and wooded on its summit. As the steamer approaches this point, every passenger on deck expects it to continue on its course through the broad open waters to the right. Instead of that, however, it leaves the headland to the right, and enters the narrow passage, not more than a mile in breadth, lying to the west of it. For 23 miles it follows this picturesque waterway, overshadowed by noble mountains rising from both shores. From an expansion of the Passage, caused by an indentation on the Van- couver shore, known as Menzies Bay, we pass into the famous Seymour Nar- rows, a gorge two miles in length, and less than one-half mile in breadth. Through this contracted channel, the tides rush with great velocity, sometimes running nine knots an hour. The steamer is usually timed to reach this point at low water, but it rarely happens that the waters are not seen in a state of tu- mult sufficient to constitute their passage a decidedly interesting feature of the voyage. At Chatham Point, a low rocky promontory on the Vancouver Island shore, we take the more westerly of two apparently practicable channels, and enter Johnstone Strait, 55 miles in length. For some distance, this channel is very similar to Discovery Passage, though it subsequently broadens out to a width of from one and one-half to three miles. The magnificent range that rises from the Vancouver Island shore is the Prince of Wales range, the highest point of which, Mount Albert Edward, rises 6,968 feet above the waterway that washes its base. It is never entirely free from snow, traces of which, indeed, extend down the dark sides of the mountain to within 2,000 or 3,000 feet of the sea level. A noble snow-covered peak is about this time a prominent object on the right, while nearer at hand many beautiful inlets engage the traveler's atten- tion. For some miles northward from the entrance to Johnstone Strait, the land on the right is Thurlow Island. This is succeeded by Hardwick Island, 74 WONDERLAND. from which it is separated by Chancellor Channel, connecting with the broad waterway which seemed to the traveler the more likely course for the steamer to take when, a few hours before, she entered the narrow Discovery Passage. Another channel intervening, and we have the mainland of British Columbia forming the eastern shore of the strait. It is much indented by bays and inlets, and many fine lofty peaks tower up beyond it, while on the opposite or Vancouver Island shore, Mount Palmerston presents an exceedingly fine appear- ance. The islands which have been mentioned are only those larger bodies of land separated from the mainland by narrow channels, and for the most part so mountainous that they would be mistaken for the mainland in the absence of any statement to the contrary. The thousands of islands, from mere rocky points, a few square feet in extent, to those larger summits of sub'nerged mountains which may sometime become the sites of delightful summer homes, it is impossible to particularize; and it need only be said that in their multitude and variety — each having some beauty peculiar to itself — they form, with the bold shores of the strait and the distant snow-covered peaks, a series of pictures of which the traveler never wearies and which he can never forget. The northern entrance to Johnstone Strait is occupied by a beautiful archi- pelago, the two largest islands of which are Hanson Island and Cormorant Island. On the latter, between which and Vancouver Island we continue our course northwest through Broughton Strait, is Alert Bay, with a large salmon cannery, an Indian village and a Mission. The remarkable conical peak long visible on Vancouver Island is Mount Holdsworth. From Broughton Strait, fifteen miles in length, we suddenly emerge into the broad Queen Charlotte Sound, a magnificent expanse of water, twelve to eighteen miles from shore to shore. The extensive views here obtained present a striking contrast to the scenery of the narrow passage through which for some hours the steamer's course has lain. An interesting point on the west shore is Fort Rupert, a post of the Hudson's Bay Company, with a large Indian village adjoining it. Continuing on its course, within a short distance of the Van- couver Island shore, our good ship next enters Goletas Channel, where we have Galiano and Hope Islands, together with some hundreds of smaller islands, on our right, and picturesque mountains of considerable elevation on both right and left. We have now to bid farewell to the great Vancouver Island, whose most northerly point. Cape Commerell, we leave to the left. Emerging from the channel, which affords us, at its western entrance, an exceedingly fine retro- spective view in which Mount Lemon is a prominent object, we look westward over the broad expanse of the Pacific Ocean. Here, if anywhere on our entire voyage, we are sensible, for a short time, of a gentle swell. Those, however, whom the mere mention of the open sea would be sufficient to drive to the seclusion of their cabins, may take comfort in the assurance that the steamer has scarcely begun to yield to its influence when it passes under the lee of the great Cal- vert Island, and enters the land-locked channel of Fitzhugh Sound. Here, again, WONDERLAND. 75 we have superb scenery on either side, the mountains of Calvert Island cul- minating in an exceedingly sharp peak, known as Mount Buxton (3,430 feet), the retrospective view of which is very fine. The scenery on the mainland and the islands on our right is similar in character. The soundings here indicate very deep water, although there is excellent anchorage in many of those beautiful bays which are formed by the indented shores. As we approach the northern extremity of the Sound, where Burke Canal opens out on the right (opposite the great Hunter Island, the most northerly of the three large islands which, with a number of smaller ones, form the west shore of the Sound), the scenery increases in grandeur, the lesser and nearer hills being clothed to their summits with coniferous trees, while the more distant ones, overtopping them, are covered with snow. Here a surprise awaits the traveler in the sudden turning-about of the steamer, whose helm is put hard-a-starboard with the result that, instead of continuing its course through the broad and exceed- ingly attractive Fisher Channel, it turns sharply to the left, through the nar- row Lama Passage, which, midway between its two extremities, itself makes a sharp turn northward. On the shore of Campbell Island, we pass the trim native village of Bella Bella, with its little church. On the opposite shore are a number of graves, some of them with totem poles, one of the domestic peculiarities of this region, of which more will be said in its proper place. The northern entrance to Lama Passage, through which we emerge into the broad Seaforth Channel, with its multitude of picturesque islands, is extremely narrow, but entirely free from concealed dangers. Just before turning west- ward into Seaforth Channel, we have the finest scenery we have so far gazed upon, the grouping of the mountains being grand in the extreme. If it be afternoon, its exquisite beauty will be greatly enhanced by atmospheric effects utterly unlike anything that ninety-nine out of every hundred of our fellow passengers have ever before seen. The sunset, too, is almost certain to be of such indescribable grandeur that pen and brush will be thrown down by the despairing author and artist, who will alike resign themselves to the ravishing beauty and splendor of the scene. Another turn in our remarkably devious course, and we are steaming north-. ward through Milbank Sound, through whose broad entrance we look out to the open sea. Islands succeed islands, and mountains, mountains; and the traveler is almost as much impressed with the mere geographical features of this extraordinary region as with the beauty of its scenery. Here we see, for the first time, glacier paths on the mountain sides, the lofty pyramidal Stripe Mountain, so called from the white streak on its southern flank, being an especially prominent object. Leaving Point Jorkins, the southern extremity of the great Princess Royal Island, on our left, we continue our course almost directly northward through the long and narrow Finlayson Channel, some 24 miles long, with an average width of two miles. The bold shores of this fine channel are densely wooded to a height of 1,500 feet or more; precipitous peaks, rising 7t5 . WONDERLAND. to a height of nearly 3,000 feet, occurring at intervals, with still higher mount- ains, whose dark masses are relieved with patches of snow, rising behind them. Waterfalls of remarkable height here add a new element of beauty to the incom- parable series of pictures revealed to us with the continued progress of the steamer. A contraction of the channel known, for twenty miles, by the name of Graham Reach, and, for the next ten miles, as Fraser Reach, brings us to the north point of Princess Royal Island, where we turn westward through McKay Reach into Wright Sound. There is nothing here calling for special notice, although it must not be understood that the scenery is, on that account, any the less picturesque. It is worth while studying these successive channels upon the charts of the United States " Pacific Coast Pilot," so singular is the appearance they present. Grenville Channel, which we enter from Wright Sound and which lies between Pitt Island and the mainland, is, for fully 50 miles, as straight as any canal in the world. Its scenery, on both sides, is exceptionally line, the mountains grouping themselves with magnificent effect. Those near at hand are clothed with dark foliage, others more remote assume a purple hue, while many are seen to be seamed with the paths of glaciers and avalanches, the higher peaks being in every case covered with snow. Many beautiful islands start up in mid-channel, uniformly covered with a dense growth of fir, to the very edge of the water. The channel, too, is, at places, exceedingly narrow, and the precipitous mountains which rise from its shores attain a height varying from 1,500 to 3,500 feet. From an expansion of this channel, we pass through a narrow strait known as Arthur Passage, which has Kennedy Island on the right, and the large Porcher Island, with many fine mountain peaks, on the left. If the frequent recurrence of geographical designations renders this brief description of the Alaska trip less interesting to the general reader than it otherwise would be, there will be a counterbalancing advantage gained by the actual traveler, who will find none of the more entertaining works that have been written on the subject of any great use to him as practical guide books. Continuing our course, we emerge from the channel last named into the great Chatham Sound, a broad expanse of water from whose distant shores rise imposing mountains. The eastern shore is here formed by the remarkable Chim-sy-an Peninsula, which, though forty miles long and from five to fifteen miles in breadth, is connected with the mainland only by a narrow isthmus. Continuing our course northward through the broad Chatham Sound, with Dundas Island on our left and a range of snowy mountains, presenting a mag- nificent appearance, on our right (Mount McNeill, the highest of its peaks, rising 4,300 feet above the sea, and having the appearance of being much higher by reason of our seeing its entire height from the ocean level), we soon cross, in latitude 54° 40', the boundary line between British Columbia and the United States Territory of Alaska. Here, we shall do well to acquaint our- selves with such facts relative to the extent, physical conditions, ethnological features and natural resources of the "district" (to give it the ill-chosen name WONDERLAND. 77 by which it is known to the United States Government) as will, at least, give us a comprehensive and, in the main, correct idea of the great territory we are about to visit. As to its history, little need be said, for its Russian occupation is of no practical concern to us, while, on the other hand, every reader will remember the circumstances of its transfer to the United States Government in 1868, for the sum of $7,200,000. Its extent is probably not nearly so well known, or, if the numerals which represent it have been learned by heart, it is still doubtful whether they have created in the mind any adequate con- ception of the vast extent of the province. Availing ourselves, therefore, of the figures and comparisons that we find ready to our hand in the Reports of Governor Swineford and Dr. Sheldon Jackson, we may remark that its extreme breadth from north to south is 1,400 miles, or as far as from Mame to Florida. and that from its eastern boundary to the western end of the Aleutian Islands is 2,200 miles; so that the Governor, sitting m his office at Sitka, is very little farther from Eastport, Me., than from the extreme western limit of his own jurisdiction, measuring, of course, in a straight line. Its coast line of 18,211 miles is nearly twice as great as the combmed Atlantic and Pacific coast lines of the United States proper, and its most westerly point extends beyond the most easterly point of Asia a distance of nearly 1,000 miles. In actual extent it is as large as all the New England and Middle States, together with Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, Michigan, Kentucky and Tennessee combined, or as all that portion of the United States lying east of the Mississippi River and north of Georgia and the Carolinas. A country so vast as this must be a poor one indeed, if the paltry $7,200,000 paid for it does not turn out to bear little more than the same proportion to its value that was borne by the pepper-corn rent in so many old English legal conveyances to the valuable estates for whose holding it was the nominal annual consideration. With regard to its physical conditions, it is sufficient for our present pur- pose to say that a large part of it is still passing through the glacial period; that it contains in Mount St. Eliasthe highest mountain on the North American Continent, and in Mount Cook, Mount Crillon and Mount Fairweather peaks exceeded in height only by Mount Popocatapetl and Mount Orizaba, in Mexico; that its great river, the Yukon, computed to be not less than 3,000 miles long, is navigable for a distance of 2,000 miles, is from one mile to five miles in breadth for no less than 1,000 miles of its course, and is seventy miles wide across its five mouths and the intervening deltas; and that, while the climate of the interior is Arctic in the severity of its winter and tropical in the heat of its summer, that of the immense southern coast, with its thousands of islands, is one of the most equable in the world, by reason of the Kuro-siwo, or Japan current, a thermal stream which renders the entire North Pacific Coast, even in this high latitude, warm and humid. Only four times in forty- five years has the temperature at Sitka fallen to zero, while only seven summers in that same period have been marked by a higher temperature than 80^ Fah. (78) WONDERLAND. 79 The influence of moisture in regulating temperature is too well known to call for any further remarks under this head, and the facts above given are stated only that they may help to dispel from the non-scientific mind the erroneous notions relative to the climate of this great territory, that so largely prevail. With the exception of the Tinneh, a tribe which has forced its way to the coast from the interior, the natives of Alaska are not Indians. Their traditions, manners, customs and other race characteristics prove them to belong to the Mongolian branch of the great human family. Between their racial and tribal des- ignations, the visitor, who hears of Thlinkets, Hydahs, Chilkats, Auks, Sitkans and many others, is liable to get somewhat confused. It may, therefore, be not only interesting but otherwise of advantage to him to know beforehand that the native population of the Territory, estimated to number 31,240 at the United States census of 1880, is divided into five races: (i) the Innuit, or Esquimaux, numbering 17,617, who occupy almost the entire coast line of the mainland; (2) the Aleuts, numbering 2,145, inhabiting the Aleutian Islands; (3) the Tinneh, numbering 3,927, found chiefly in the Yukon district, on the Copper River and at Cook's Inlet, and the only race not supposed to be of common origin with the rest; (4) the Thlinkets, numbering 6,763, occupying almost exclusively that Southeastern division which the tourist is on his way to visit; and (5) the Hydahs, 788. in number, on the southern half of Prince of Wales Island. The various tribes with which the traveler will come into contact are of the Thlinket race — des- cribed by Dr. Jackson as "a hardy, self-reliant, industrious, self-supporting, well- to-do, warlike, superstitious race, whose very name is a terror to the civilized Aleuts to the west, as well as to the savage Tinneh to the north of them." Deferring statements as to their tribal peculiarities to a place at which they can be set forth with greater advantage, let us now glance at the resources of the country, so far, at least, as they have been brought to light. These com- prise: (i) its world-renowned seal fisheries; (2) its salmon, cod, whale and her- ring fisheries; (3) its extensive deposits of gold, silver, copper, iron, coal and other minerals; and (4) its vast forests. The seal-fur fisheries, as is well-known, are leased for twenty years, from 1868, to the Alaska Commercial Company, which pays the Government an annual rental of $55,000 for the islands, and a royalty of $2.62^ each on the 100,000 seal skins allowed to be taken annually. From this one source alone, therefore, the Government receives an annual sum of $317,500, or more than /\^\ per cent, per annum on the amount paid to the Russian Government for the Territory. It may be mentioned in this connection, but only in view of its coming from an official source, that the Governor of the Territory, in his Report to the Secre- tary of the Interior for 1887, contends that this great monopoly is wholly inimi- cal to the true interests of the country. His Excellency brings many grave charges against the Company, which it is unnecessary to repeat here, and which are adverted to, only that an enlightened public sentiment may be created, and the hands of the Federal Government strengthened in dealing with the corpo- ration which has the control of so important a part of the wealth of the Territory. 80 WONDERLAND. The salmon, cod and whale fisheries of Alaska are of far greater importance than is generally known, their yield, during 1887, being valued at $3,000,000, exclusive of the various products of the herring fisheries, which are both exten- sive and valuable. The most important point in the operations of this last- named industry is Killisnoo, on Admiralty Island, where as many as 138,000 barrels of oil have been put up in a single month. Men are so liable to be carried away by excitement upon finding even the smallest traces of the precious metals, that the outside world, hearing or read- ing of their discoveries, at a distance, usually pays but little attention to them. While, however, the claims of Alaska to untold wealth in silver and copper must be admitted, if admitted at all, on mere hearsay, except so far as the reports of explorers are borne out by the geological formation of the country, every tourist has an opportunity of visiting, under the most advantageous and pleasurable circumstances, the greatest gold mine in the world, namely, the Treadwell Mine, on Douglas Island, of which more will be said in its proper place. It will be but a few years before the lumbering operations now going on in the forest belt of Washington Territory extend to this far northern region. The whole of southeastern Alaska is covered with a dense growth of spruce, hemlock and yellow cedar, frequently containing timber of from four to six feet in diameter at the base, and growing to a height of from thirty to forty feet before branching. The yellow cedar is said to be the most valuable timber on the Pacific coast, being highly prized, both by the cabinet-maker and ship-builder. With regard to agriculture, it will be sufficient to refer to the admirable report of the Governor of Alaska, for 1886, in which he combats the rash statements of various transient visitors, whose prominence obtains for their assertions a credence of which they are not always worthy; and, fortifying his statement with the authority of Mr. W. H. Dall, of the Smithsonian Institution, who has devoted more time and made more thorough researches into the natural resources of Alaska than any other person, declares that there are con- siderable areas of arable land, with a soil of sufficient depth and fertility to insure the growth of the very best crops, and that the experiments which have been made in the past two or three years have proved most conclusively that all the cereals, as well as the tubers, can be grown to perfection in Alaskan soil and climate. It is impossible in these pages to pursue this interesting and important subject further, but it may be stated that the Governor does not con- tent himself with mere assertion, but that, in addition to giving the results of the various experiments that have been made, he deals at some length with the subject of the native grasses of the Territory, all going to prove that the country is not nearly so worthless for agricultural purposes as interested detractors or careless and superficial observers would have us believe. Having thus acquainted himself with a few of the more important facts concerning this great Territory, the tourist is now prepared to resume his voyage. Crossing the broad expanse of Dixon Entrance, where, looking westward, we WONDERLAND. 81 see the open sea, we enter Clarence Strait, over one hundred miles long and nowhere less than four miles in width. We are now within the remarkable geographical area known as Alexander Archipelago, a congeries of straits, islands, inlets, rocks and passages extending through nearly five degrees of latitude and seven of longitude. The islands of this archipelago definitely- placed on the charts number i,ioo, and we have the authority of the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey for the statement that, if all the existing rocks and islands were enumerated, the number stated would have to be very considerably increased. Throughout the whole of Clarence Strait, we have on our left the great Prmce ot Wales Island, the home of the Hydahs, with whose marvelous skill in carving, the tourist doubtless became familiar during his brief stay at Victoria. Their miniature totems, cut in dark slate-stone, are greatly sought after by tourists and command a somewhat high price. The artistic skill of this famous tribe has, however, been better exemplified in its spoons, carved out of the horn of the mountain goat; but these have nearly all gone to enrich the collections of eastern visitors during the last two or three seasons, and during his visit to the Territory, in the summer of 1887, the present writer found but a single specimen in many hundreds of carved goat's horn spoons, that sustamed the reputation of the Hydahs for that delicacy of workmanship in which they well-nigh rival the ivory workers of Japan. It may be mentioned in this connection that the recently formed Alaskan Society of Natural History and Ethnology, whose headquarters are at Sitka, has already gathered together an exceedingly interesting and valuable collection of specimens of native handiwork; and visitors are invited to contribute to a fund which is being raised for the purchase and preservation of Alaskan curios- ities of every description, especially those made by the natives before the influx of tourists found them the ready market they now possess, and led them, as it unfortunately did, to think more of the quantity than the quality of their work. The islands on our right as we continue our voyage are the Gravina Group, Revilla Gigedo and, after a promontory of the mainland, Etolin Island, round whose northern coast we steer northeastward to Fort Wrangell, usually the first calling place of the steamer, during the tourist season. The Gravina Islands contain a fine range of mountains, the higher peaks of which have their dark masses relieved by patches of snow. Revilla Gigedo Island likewise is mount- ainous — its nearer summits clothed with pine, its more distant ones crowned with everlasting snow. On Prince of Wales Island, the mountains rising before us are enveloped, for the most part, in a delicious purple haze. As we approach them, their rocky, precipitous and deeply fissured sides (the last the result of glacial action, which is plainly visible) afford a striking diversity of outline and color, which, added to the beauties of light and shade lent them by passing clouds, have a very fine effect. Clarence Strait is, indeed, a magnificent sheet of water, well worthy of its place in that remarkable series of devious water- ways through which our voyage lies. ALASKAN GRAVE AND TOTEM POLES AT FORT WRANGELL. (83) WONDERLAND. 83 Fort WrangcU, although formerly a place of some importance as the port of the Cassiar mines, away in the interior beyond the international boundary, is, of all the settlements at which the steamer calls, the least attractive in every respect save that it is here that the tourist will find the largest assemblage of totem poles that he will have an opportunity of seeing, as well as several old graves of singularly striking appearance. The village, which occupies a beauti- ful site, is given up almost entirely to the Stikine tribe of the Thlinket race, and, within a few minutes after the arrival of the steamer at the wharf, the interior of almost every house presents an animated appearance, curio-huntmg passengers thronging them to the doors, and bargaining with their inmates for the various objects of interest they see around them. The ship's officers, government ofificials and other persons supposed to be well informed are frequently asked which of the various stoppmg places is the best for the purchase of curiosities. In anticipation of this inquiry, it may be stated that there is little to choose between Fort Wrangell, Juneau and Sitka, except that in the fine store of Messrs. Koehler & James, at Juneau, the visitor will find a larger collection of the more desirable and costly specimens of native handiwork, as well as of valuable furs, than at either of the other two places. At anyone of them, however, and at any moment, he may run across something that could not be duplicated in the entire Territory, although each recurring sea- son renders this less and less probable. A strongly marked trait m the character of the Thlinkets is their respect for their ancestors. Independently of their tribal distinctions, which are little more than local, they are divided into four totems or clans, each of which is known by a badge or emblem used much in the same way as is the crest or coat of arms among the old families of Europe. These, according to Mr. W. H. Dall, are the Raven, the Wolf, the Whale and the Eagle ; and these emblems are carved on their houses, household utensils, paddles and fre- quently on amulets of native copper, which they preserve with scrupulous care and consider to be of the greatest value. In front of many of their houses, and also at their burial places, are posts varying from twenty to sixty feet in height and from two to five feet in diameter, carved to represent successive ancestral totems and usually stained black, red and blue. As already stated, several of these totem poles, as they are called, are to be seen at Fort Wrangell, as well as two remarkable graves, one surmounted by a rudely carved whale, and the other by a huge figure of a wolf. Resuming our voyage, we leave this curious old Stikine town, and after steaming westward to the southern entrance to Wrangell Strait, turn northward and follow that narrow passage into the broader Dry Strait, where we have the magnificent Patterson Glacier on our right and find considerable floating ice. Following the north shore of Kupreanoff Island, we enter Frederick Sound ; but quickly resume our almost directly northward course by entering Stephens Passage, where we have Admiralty Island on our left, said, by the way, to be swarming with bear, and the mainland on our right. On Stockade A THLINKET FAMILY. (84) WONDERLAND. 85 Point, a comparatively low peninsula from which the land rises rapidly to snow-capped mountains, is a ruined block-house and stockade, built by the Hudson's Bay Company, and on the other side of a small inlet is Grave Point, a native burial ground. Leaving to the right Taku Inlet, we enter the narrow and picturesque Gastiaeau Channel, between the mainland and the now famous Douglas Island. Here, on a narrow strip of land, at the foot of a deep ravine between two precipitous mountains, stands Juneau, a cluster of detached white houses, relieved here and there by the unpainted frame-work of others in process of building. The mountain rising behind it, as you approach it from the south, is deeply fissured, and seamed with snow, and the town itself is built mainly upon a huge land-slide. Not a few of the houses have apparently been built by white settlers attracted to the spot by the fabulously rich mineral deposits of the district. These have been followed by general traders, who, in addition to supplying the resident population with the necessaries of life, reap a rich harvest, during the tourist season, from the sale of sundry products of native handiwork and the skins of the various fur-bearing animals. An excellent weekly newspaper, called the Alaska Free Press, is published at Juneau. The visitor need not turn to its pages for any later news from the outside world than he is already in possession of, for Alaska has not, as yet, the advantage of telegraphic communication with the rest of the world. He will find, however, much interesting reading relative to the mining resources of the district and the Territory generally; a column or two of spicy local items and, possibly, the report of some recently returned explorer; while the business advertisements of this thriving settlement of the Far North will be by no means devoid of interest. Juneau itself, however, as a point of interest to the tourist, is soon exhausted, and his thoughts turn to the great Treadwell mine, THE RICHEST GOLD MINE IN THE WORLD, which lies across the channel on Douglas Island, whither the steamer will proceed after a brief stay at Juneau. It is by no means an easy task to deter- mine which of the many extraordinary statements relative to this valuable property that one hears from time to time are worthy of credence and which are not; and even when the truth has been approximately ascertained, there remains the difficulty of determining how much may properly be made public, and how much should be regarded as only the individual and private concern of the owners of the mine. In view, however, of the fact that the mill has, for some time, had in operation a larger number of stamps than any other mill in the world; that by the time this pamphlet leaves the press the works will con- tain more ore-crushing machinery than the five largest mines in Butte City, all combined, and that the Governor of the Territory himself places the output of the mine for 1887 at $100,000 per month, it is surely not incredible that the company should have refused $16,000,000 for its property, or that it pays a WONDERLAND. 87 dividend of loo per cent, per month, all the year round; or yet, at least to those who have seen it, that the ore actually in sight is worth about five times the amount paid to the Russian Government for the entire Territory, and that, even at the present enormous rate of production, it cannot be exhausted in less than a century. Although it cannot but interfere to some extent with the operations of the mine, visitors are, with great courtesy, shown everything that is likely to prove of interest to them. They see the natives earning $2.50 per day each in the mine, and learn to their surprise that they are better workmen than the whites; they see the ore in every stage from blasting to final separation, and though they may leave with a tinge of regret that it has not been their own luck to have made so valuable a discovery, they will none the less congratulate the owners on their magnificent possession. It will have been inferred, from what has already been said, that it is not a mere vein of gold, of varying richness and un- certain direction, that is here being worked. So far from that, the entire island is nothing less than a mountain of ore, sufficient, according to ex-Governor Stoneman of California, to pay off the whole of the national debt. Gastineau Channel not having been thoroughly explored, we retrace our course to its southern entrance, where, turning northward, we follow the wider channel that lies to the west of the island. This brings us to that remarkable and never-to-be-forgotten body of water, the Lynn Canal, where not only have we scenery surpassing in wildness and grandeur all that has preceded it, but also many glaciers, while we reach, just under the parallel of 60°, the most northerly point we shall attain on our trip. Soon after entering the canal, and when rounding Point Retreat, we see the great Eagle Glacier to the northeast, coming down from the high mountains that rise in the background. A couple of hours' sail, however, brings us to a point at which we can observe much more closely the still larger Davidson Glacier, on the opposite shore. But even here we do not go ashore, for the far-famed Muir Glacier, which we shall reach within the next twenty-four hours, has the advantage of being as much more easily accessible than its sister glaciers as it exceeds them in magnitude, beauty and general interest. How unimpressionable soever the tourist may be, a mysterious sense of awe is almost sure to take possession of him when the steamer is exploring the two inlets of Chilkat and Chilkoot, in which the Lynn Canal terminates. Not, per- haps, until vegetation has almost entirely disappeared, will he have noticed its increasing scantiness, but it will not be long before he realizes the fact that in the forbidding mountains, the bare rocks and the nineteen great ice cataracts that here discharge themselves into the sea, he sees a picture more closely resembling the scenes of the now not distant Arctic world than, probably, he will ever again have an opportunity of gazing upon. The natives of this region are that famous tribe, the Chilkats, whose dexterously woven dancing blankets are so much sought after by all visitors to Alaska who desire to take home with them the finest examples of Alaskan (8f I WONDERLAND. 89 handiwork, regardless of cost. They are made from the wool of the white mountain goat, out of whose black horns are carved the spoons and ladles already referred to. The white wool is hung from an upright frame, and into it nimble fingers weave, by means of ivory shuttles, curious and beautiful patterns from yarn dyed with a variety of brilliant colors. We have now to retrace our course some sixty-five miles to Point Retreat, where, instead of taking the easterly channel and returning to Juneau, we con- tinue almost directly southward to the point at which the waters of Lynn Canal mingle with those of Icy Strait. Here, our good ship's course is once more directed northward, and, after a brief sail, we enter the island-studded Glacier Bay, where innumerable icebergs proclaim our approach to that crowning glory of this veritable Wonderland, the famous Muir Glacier, undoubtedly the GREATEST GLACIER IN THE WORLD, outside of the Polar seas. It is hard to say which has the greater advantage — the traveler who sees it first from afar; sees it as a vast river of ice flowing down from between the mountains, with many tributaries both on the right and left, and to whom its beauties are gradually unfolded with the nearer approach of the steamer; or he who, awakened from his slumber by the thunderous roar which announces the birth of some huge iceberg, hurries on deck to gaze upon a picture without parallel in the known world — a perpendicular wall of ice, tower- ing to five times the height of the mast-head, and glowing in the sunlight like a mountain of mother-of-pearl. A recent visitor to this indescribable scene — himself possessing descriptive powers of no mean order — declares that in the narrative of his Alaska trip he would prefer to insert a series of asterisks where his description of the Muir Glacier should come; and certainly we need a new vocabulary to set forth its wondrous beauty with any degree of fidelity. While, as will be inferred from what has already been stated, its dimensions are such as to constitute it one of the physical wonders of the world, its proportions are so admirable that the traveler is less impressed with its immensity than with its utter novelty and incomparable beauty; and it is as much a revelation to those who have seen the glaciers of Switzerland or familiarized themselves with the voyages of Arctic and Antarctic explorers, as it is to those whose ideas of a glacier were of the most indefinite and inadequate character. The breadth of the glacier at its snout is fully a mile, and when, almost under its shadow, the second officer heaves the lead and sings out: "One hundred and five fathoms, and no bottom. Sir," the wonderment of the traveler is heightened by an immediate realization of the fact that this enormous ice-flow extends at least twice as far below the surface of the water as it rises above it, and that it is accordingly not less than i,ooo feet deep. But its vast dimensions and Its marvelous gradations of color, from pure white to deepest mdigo, do not alone make up that unapproachable /c?z^/^;/j'