Over the Rocky Mountains to Alaska

Over the Rocky Mountains to
Alaska, by

Charles Warren Stoddard This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere
at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it,
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Title: Over the Rocky Mountains to Alaska
Author: Charles Warren Stoddard
Release Date: October 3, 2007 [EBook #22871]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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Over the Rocky Mountains to Alaska
BY
CHARLES WARREN STODDARD

Third Edition
ST. LOUIS, MO., 1914
Published by B. HERDER 17 South Broadway
FREIBURG (BADEN) Germany
LONDON, W. C. 68 Great Russell Str.

Copyright, 1899, by Joseph Gummersbach.
--BECKTOLD-- PRINTING AND BOOK MFG. CO. ST. LOUIS,
MO.

To KENNETH O'CONNOR, First-District-of-Columbia Volunteers,
Gen'l Shafter's Fifth Army Corps, Santiago de Cuba: IN MEMORY OF
OUR HOME-LIFE IN THE BUNGALOW.

NOTE.
The Author returns thanks to the Editor of the Ave Maria for the
privilege of republishing these notes of travel and adventure.

CONTENTS.
Chapter. Page. I. Due West to Denver 7 II. In Denver Town 18 III. The
Garden of the Gods 29 IV. A Whirl across the Rockies 40 V. Off for
Alaska 47 VI. In the Inland Sea 56 VII. Alaskan Village Life 66 VIII.
Juneau 74 IX. By Solitary Shores 86 X. In Search of the Totem-Pole 98
XI. In the Sea of Ice 111 XII. Alaska's Capital 124 XIII. Katalan's Rock
136 XIV. From the Far North 148 XV. Out of the Arctic 159

CHAPTER I.
Due West to Denver.
Commencement week at Notre Dame ended in a blaze of glory.
Multitudes of guests who had been camping for a night or two in the
recitation rooms--our temporary dormitories--gave themselves up to the
boyish delights of school-life, and set numerous examples which the
students were only too glad to follow. The boat race on the lake was a
picture; the champion baseball match, a companion piece; but the
highly decorated prize scholars, glittering with gold and silver medals,
and badges of satin and bullion; the bevies of beautiful girls who for
once--once only in the year--were given the liberty of the lawns, the
campus, and the winding forest ways, that make of Notre Dame an
elysium in summer; the frequent and inspiring blasts of the University
Band, and the general joy that filled every heart to overflowing,
rendered the last day of the scholastic year romantic to a degree and
memorable forever.
There was no sleep during the closing night--not one solitary wink; all
laws were dead-letters--alas that they should so soon arise again from
the dead!--and when the wreath of stars that crowns the golden statue
of Our Lady on the high dome, two hundred feet in air, and the
wide-sweeping crescent under her shining feet, burst suddenly into
flame, and shed a lustre that was welcomed for miles and miles over
the plains of Indiana--then, I assure you, we were all so deeply touched
that we knew not whether to laugh or to weep, and I shall not tell you
which we did. The moon was very full that night, and I didn't blame it!
But the picnic really began at the foot of the great stairway in front of
the dear old University next morning. Five hundred possible presidents
were to be distributed broadcast over the continent; five hundred sons
and heirs to be returned with thanks to the yearning bosoms of their
respective families. The floodgates of the trunk-rooms were thrown
open, and a stream of Saratogas went thundering to the station at South
Bend, two miles away. Hour after hour, and indeed for several days,
huge trucks and express wagons plied to and fro, groaning under the

burden of well-checked luggage. It is astonishing to behold how big a
trunk a mere boy may claim for his very own; but it must be
remembered that your schoolboy lives for several years within the
brass-bound confines of a Saratoga. It is his bureau, his wardrobe, his
private library, his museum and toy shop, the receptacle of all that is
near and dear to him; it is, in brief, his sanctum sanctorum, the one
inviolate spot in his whole scholastic career of which he, and he alone,
holds the key.
We came down with the tide in the rear of the trunk freshet. The way
being more or less clear, navigation was declared open. The next
moment saw a procession of chariots, semi-circus wagons and
barouches filled with homeward-bound schoolboys and their escorts,
dashing at a brisk trot toward the railroad station. Banners were