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[Illustration: SLEDDING UP THE CHILKAT VALLEY]




                             GOLD-SEEKING

                          ON THE DALTON TRAIL

                     _BEING THE ADVENTURES OF TWO
                      NEW ENGLAND BOYS IN ALASKA
                     AND THE NORTHWEST TERRITORY_


                                  BY

                          ARTHUR R. THOMPSON


                              Illustrated


                BOSTON LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY 1900




                          _Copyright, 1900_,

                     BY LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY


                         _All rights reserved_


      UNIVERSITY PRESS. JOHN WILSON AND SON. CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A.




                                  TO

                     My Comrade of Many Camp-Fires

                         DEXTER WADLEIGH LEWIS




                                PREFACE


Among my first passions was that for exploration. The Unknown--that
region of mysteries lying upon the outskirts of commonplace
environment--drew me with a mighty attraction. My earliest
recollections are of wanderings into the domains of the neighbors, and
of excursions--not infrequently in direct contravention to parental
warnings--over fences, stone-walls, and roofs, and into cobwebbed
attics, fragrant hay-lofts, and swaying tree-tops. Of my favorite tree,
a sugar maple, I remember that, so thoroughly did I come to know every
one of its branches, I could climb up or down unhesitatingly with eyes
shut. At that advanced stage of acquaintance, however, it followed
naturally that the mysteriousness, and hence the subtle attractiveness,
of my friend the maple was considerably lessened.

By degrees the boundary line of the unknown was pushed back into
surrounding fields. Wonderful caves were hollowed in sandy banks.
Small pools, to the imaginative eyes of the six-year-old, became
lakes abounding with delightful adventures. The wintry alternations
of freezing and thawing were processes to be observed with closest
attention and never-failing interest. Nature displayed some new charm
with every mood.

There came a day when I looked beyond the fields, when even the river,
sluggish and muddy in summer, a broad, clear torrent in spring, was
known from end to end. Then it was that the range of low mountains--to
me sublime in loftiness--at the western horizon held my fascinated
gaze. To journey thither on foot became ambition's end and aim. This
feat, at first regarded as undoubtedly beyond the powers of man unaided
by horse and carry-all (the thing had once been done in that manner on
the occasion of a picnic), was at length proved possible.

What next? Like Alexander, I sought new worlds. Nothing less than real
camping out could satisfy that hitherto unappeasable longing. This
dream was realized in due season among the mountains of New Hampshire;
but the craving, far from losing its keenness, was whetted. Of late it
has been fed, but never satiated, by wider rovings on land and sea.
Perhaps it is in the blood and can never be eliminated.

Believing that this restlessness, accompanied by the love of
adventure and out-of-door life, is natural to every boy, I have
had in mind particularly in the writing of this narrative those
thousands of boys in our cities who are bound within a restricted,
and it may be unromantic, sphere of activity. To them I have wished
to give a glimpse of trail life, not with a view to increasing their
restlessness,--for I have not veiled discomforts and discouragements in
relating enjoyments,--but to enlarge their horizon,--to give them, in
imagination at least, mountain air and appetites, journeys by lake and
river, and an acquaintance with men and conditions as they now exist
in the great Northwest.

The Dalton trail, last year but little known, may soon become a much
travelled highway. With a United States garrison at Pyramid, and the
village of Klukwan a bone of contention between the governments of this
country and Canada, the region which it traverses is coming more and
more into notice. I would only add that natural features, scenery, and
people, have been described faithfully, however inadequately, and the
story throughout is based upon real happenings. Should any of my young
readers pass over the trail to-day in the footsteps of David and Roly,
they would find, save for possible vandalism of Indians or whites, the
cabins on the North Alsek and in the Kah Sha gorge just as they are
pictured, and they could be sure of a welcome from Lucky, Long Peter,
and Coffee Jack.




CONTENTS


    CHAPTER                                                         PAGE

       I. A LETTER FROM ALASKA                                         1

      II. BUYING AN OUTFIT                                             7

     III. FROM SEATTLE TO PYRAMID HARBOR                              18

      IV. THE FIRST CAMP                                              28

       V. THE GREAT NUGGET, AND HOW UNCLE WILL HEARD OF IT            38

      VI. ROLY IS HURT                                                47

     VII. CAMP AT THE CAVE                                            54

    VIII. SLEDDING                                                    60

      IX. KLUKWAN AND THE FORDS                                       69

       X. A PORCUPINE-HUNT AT PLEASANT CAMP                           77

      XI. THE MYSTERIOUS THIRTY-SIX                                   88

     XII. THE SUMMIT OF CHILKAT PASS                                 101

    XIII. DALTON'S POST                                              112

     XIV. FROM THE STIK VILLAGE TO LAKE DASAR-DEE-ASH                120

      XV. STAKING CLAIMS                                             127

     XVI. A CONFLAGRATION                                            135

    XVII. THROUGH THE ICE                                            142

   XVIII. BUILDING THE CABIN                                         149

     XIX. THE FIRST PROSPECT-HOLE                                    157

      XX. ROLY GOES DUCK-HUNTING                                     166

     XXI. LAST DAYS AT PENNOCK'S POST                                175

    XXII. A HARD JOURNEY                                             182

   XXIII. THE LAKE AFFORDS TWO MEALS AND A PERILOUS CROSSING         192

    XXIV. DAVID GETS HIS BEAR-SKIN                                   201

     XXV. MORAN'S CAMP                                               210

    XXVI. HOW THE GREAT NUGGET NEARLY COST THE BRADFORDS DEAR        216

   XXVII. AN INDIAN CREMATION                                        223

  XXVIII. THE PLAGUE OF MOSQUITOES                                   231

    XXIX. LOST IN THE MOUNTAINS                                      238

     XXX. WASHING OUT THE GOLD                                       248

    XXXI. DAVID MAKES A BOAT-JOURNEY                                 256

   XXXII. CHAMPLAIN'S LANDING                                        264

  XXXIII. ALONE IN THE WILDERNESS                                    272

   XXXIV. RAIDED BY A WOLF                                           279

    XXXV. A LONG MARCH, WITH A SURPRISE AT THE END OF IT             289

   XXXVI. HOW DAVID MET THE OFFENDER AND WAS PREVENTED FROM
            SPEAKING HIS MIND                                        297

  XXXVII. HOMEWARD BOUND                                             306

 XXXVIII. A CARIBOU, AND HOW IT WAS KILLED                           314

   XXXIX. DANGERS OF THE SUMMER FORDS                                321

      XL. SUNDAY IN KLUKWAN                                          331

     XLI. THE ROBBERS AT LAST                                        339

    XLII. PYRAMID, SKAGWAY, AND DYEA.--CONCLUSION                    348




                             ILLUSTRATIONS


                                                                    PAGE

 SLEDDING UP THE CHILKAT VALLEY                           _Frontispiece_

 PYRAMID HARBOR, PYRAMID MOUNTAIN IN THE DISTANCE                     26

 MAP OF THE DALTON TRAIL                                              28

 A CURIOUS PHENOMENON BESIDE THE TRAIL                                89

 THE CAMP OF THE MYSTERIOUS THIRTY-SIX                                93

 "PRESENTLY SOME LITTLE YELLOW SPECKS WERE UNCOVERED"                131

 CHILDREN OF THE WILDERNESS                                          192

 RAFTING DOWN THE NORTH ALSEK                                        265

 A HERD OF CATTLE.--YUKON DIVIDE IN THE DISTANCE                     267

 FORDING THE KLAHEENA                                                325

 "SALMON BY THE THOUSAND"                                            349




                             GOLD-SEEKING

                                  ON

                           THE DALTON TRAIL




CHAPTER I

A LETTER FROM ALASKA


In a large, old-fashioned dwelling which overlooked from its hillside
perch a beautiful city of Connecticut, the Bradford family was
assembled for the evening meal. It was early in February, and the wind,
which now and then whirled the snowflakes against the window-panes,
made the pretty dining-room seem doubly cozy. But Mrs. Bradford
shivered as she poured the tea.

"Just think of poor Will," she said, "away off in that frozen
wilderness! Oh, if we could only know that he is safe and well!" and
the gentle lady's brown eyes sought her husband's face as if for
reassurance.

Mr. Bradford was a tall, strongly built man of forty-five, with
light-brown hair and mustache, and features that betrayed much care
and responsibility. Upon him as treasurer had fallen a great share
of the burden of bringing a large manufacturing establishment through
two years of financial depression, and his admirable constitution had
weakened under the strain. But now a twinkle came into his gray eyes as
he said, "My dear, I hardly think Will is suffering. At least he wasn't
a month ago."

"Why, how do you know?" asked Mrs. Bradford. "Has he written at last?"

For answer Mr. Bradford drew from the depths of an inside pocket a
number of letters, from which he selected one whose envelope was torn
and travel-stained. It bore a Canadian and an American postage stamp,
as if the sender had been uncertain in which country it would be
mailed, and wished to prepare it against either contingency.

At sight of the foreign stamp Ralph,--or "Roly," as he had been known
ever since a certain playmate had called him "Roly-poly" because of his
plumpness,--aged fifteen, was awake in an instant. Up to that moment
his energies had been entirely absorbed in the laudable business of
dulling a very keen appetite, but it quickly became evident that his
instincts as a stamp collector were even keener. He had paused in the
act of raising a bit of bread to his mouth, and made such a comical
figure with his lips expectantly wide apart that his younger sister
Helen, a little maid of nine, was betrayed into a sudden and violent
fit of laughter, in which, in spite of the superior dignity of eighteen
years, their brother David was compelled to join.

"Yes," said Mr. Bradford, "I received a letter from Will this
afternoon. Suppose I read it aloud." Absolute quiet being magically
restored, he proceeded as follows:--

RAINY HOLLOW, CHILKAT PASS, Jan. 9, 1898.

 DEAR BROTHER CHARLES,--I am storm-bound at this place, and waiting for
 an opportunity to cross the summit, so what better can I do than write
 the letter so long deferred?

 I have been as far west as the Cook Inlet region, and have acquired
 some good coal properties. While there I heard from excellent
 authorities that rich gold placers have been discovered on the Dalton
 trail, which leads from Pyramid Harbor to Dawson City, at a point about
 two hundred miles inland. I thought it best to investigate the truth of
 this rumor, and am now on the way to the designated locality, with an
 Indian guide and dog-team.

 Now, as you know, I was able to take claims for you as well as for
 myself in the Cook Inlet country, by the powers of attorney which you
 sent me, but in the Canadian territory to which I am going the law does
 not allow this, and you can only secure a claim by purchase, or by
 being here in person to take it up.

 I don't suppose you are in a position to buy claims; but it struck
 me, Charles, that it would be a grand good thing if you could leave
 that work of yours