The Land of Tomorrow

be even after he has done his best. He may just as well acknowledge his shortcomings in the outset and crave his readers'

to reach which one must journey thousands of miles! So, whenever a man from Nome speaks of Alaska he means that part of it which he himself knows,-the Seward Peninsula. The man from Cordova, or Valdez, talks of the Prince William Sound country and calls it Alaska! The man from Juneau speaks of Alaska, but all that he means is the southeastern coast. This is why so much that is written of the country is cont

g her story. When the Russian-American company was under the administration of that able and high-minded official, Baron von Wrangell, Michael Trebenkoff was sent out to establish a trading-post on Norto

t quite an amount of money widening and improving it in order that, by its use, the worst part of the sea voyage from St. Michael to the Yukon river might be avoided. But it was misdirected effort. The boats do not use it because of its narrowness. The canal, at the mouth of which i

R THE TRAILS AT KOTLI

LOCATED ONE OF THE FIN

HOUSAND FURS RE

octagonal block house inside of which the diminutive but still-defiant rusty cannon arouse the interest of all visitors. In the stormy pioneer days, so we are told, these l

on exhausted, when ships from the Atlantic began coming around the Horn, when every part of the Pacific began to hum with Alaskan business,-the tide of traffic found it necessary to separate. One part of it sailed through the Inside Passage to Skagway. The other took the Outside Passage and entered through St. Michael. It is not a v

to the Northern Navigation Company. This was the fact that the lower part of the Yukon River below Lake Lebarge was free from ice from a month to six weeks earlier than that part of the river which lay between Lake Lebarge and Dawson. The method of the White Pass and Yukon Company held an unquestionable advantage in the saving of fuel. But as the greater number of the principal mining towns and supply points for the different mining districts lay below Lake Lebarge it was but natural that large shipments of freight for early summer delivery were consigned to the Northern Navigation Company, at St. Michael. A great rivalry sprang up between these two companies. Keen competition followed. But it w

into her lap. She had to build extensive shipyards, install machine shops and build river craft. Stores, warehouses, dwellings and an hotel were built at St. Michael. Rival companies were organized,-the Alaska Exploration Company, the Alaska Development Company, and many others. Only two of these survived for any length of time, however. One was a Chicago concern-the

the winter it is sometimes tragically stormy-terrific high winds with no forests to break them. In summer, however, it is delightful and most picturesque. It is covered by the tundra-Russian moss-always fresh and beautiful, lying

arka, made of drill in summer and of fur, beautiful in design, in winter, shod in mukluks. At every turn one will find their handiwork for sale-carved ivories from walrus tusks, baskets, fur boots. Should one wish an ivory cribbage board there is no other place, with the possible exception of Nome, where he will find so large a variety from which to choose. As for the Eskimo woman,-well,