CHAPTER XVIII
FIGHTING FIRE IN THE TUNDRA
The next day, June 12th, with Roger at the bow and Harry at the stern ofthe leading canoe, they started down the Kanuti River. The stream wasswift, shallow, and full of boulders, and for the first couple of daysmore of the work was done wading in the stream than by paddling. Thesecond day, particularly, it seemed to the boy that he had not been outof the water at all during the fourteen hours of the march, except forthe brief halt at noon.
The next day, however, was travel of the kind that he liked. Two smalltributaries of the Kanuti, mere mountain streams, flowed in and raisedthe water to a height where it was possible to shoot the rapids insteadof wading them, carrying the canoes. Ever since the canoe slide on theCantwell, Roger had felt quite proud of his powers as a canoeist, andthis pride was considerably heightened as he found how able he was tohandle the boat on this new stream. It was different, too, for whilethe first set of rapids had been a torrent foaming between jaggedupstanding crags of rock, this was a swift river running over heaps ofboulders, and the Indian had to judge by the swirl of the water justwhat was below.
A broad valley, through which the river wound in a very crooked way,afforded a quick day's journey, but bad rapids were then met with, whichtaxed the resources of the party to the utmost, and proved all in vainto prevent the boats from being swamped. Twice the boats went over, oncethe leading boat to Roger's great chagrin, and the second time thesecond boat, which in consequence made the boy feel much better. Noserious harm resulted as the supplies were always packed in watertightbags. There was a fall of eight hundred feet in the thirty miles ofthese rapids, so that, as Magee said, "it was a case of whistling forbrakes all the time."
The mosquitoes became very bad in the lower reaches of the river, theonly redeeming feature of which part of the trip was the immenseabundance of ducks and geese, which, being shot, were a welcome andtoothsome addition to the larder. With this to aid the quiet progress,the party soon arrived at Arctic City, at the junction of the Kanutiand Koyukuk rivers, and thence one day's paddling up the latter broadstream brought them to Bergman. This is a central trading post, andthere again they secured supplies for the last stage of the journey.
As it was already June 23d, and the hardest stretch was yet to come,little time was lost at Bergman, and three days later the voyagerscrossed the Arctic Circle and touched at Bettles, at the junction of theKoyukuk and John (or Totsenbet) rivers. There Roger saw the last whiteface he would see, other than the members of the party, until he hadcrossed the great Arctic Divide, made his bow to the not-distant NorthPole, reached the frozen ocean, and returned to civilization.
But when they came to the John River and Roger saw the force of thewaters of the stream, and learned that there was one hundred andforty-five miles of up-stream work against that current, he realizedthat all his previous experience of labor had been child's play comparedto it.
"That's going to be a pretty stiff pull, Mr. Rivers, isn't it?" saidRoger to the geologist, as he was standing by the edge of the riverjust as the boats were being launched.
"It would be, Doughty," was the answer, "that is, if it wasn't for themilking."
"Milking?" questioned the boy in surprise, doubting if he had heard theword aright.
Just then Magee replied over his shoulder.
"Yes, milking, of course. Didn't you know they had cows here to do allthe work? Sure! You've read of the cleverness of ants? Well, they're nobetter than fools compared to John River cows. They have a regularsystem. The cows up here have immensely long horns and two of them catchthe end of one horn in the bow of the canoe, and another one, a mooleycow, shoves behind, and there you are. That's what they callmilking--milking the brush, up here. Don't you expect to go up the Johnby milking the brush?" he added, turning to Rivers.
"Certainly," replied the geologist, then, seeing the lad's confusion, hecontinued, "but you mustn't mind Magee; milking the brush isn't quitethat. It's a term used to specify that way of traveling which consistsof pulling the canoes up stream by the boughs of branches along thebank. You see the John River is so swift that, if we were to depend onlyon paddling and poling, progress would be extremely slow."
"But how about tracking?" suggested the boy. "What is to prevent thecanoes being pulled along by ropes from the shore?"
"The timber and brush come right down to the water's edge," was thereply. "There are no bars and level banks such as there were in theupper part of the Dall River, just before we came to the portage, and ofcourse it is almost out of the question to pull or tow a canoe, when thebanks are so thick that you would have to cut a trail in order to getthrough yourself. The trees and undergrowth overhang the river for quitea distance. Therefore all that can be done is to pull the boats up alongthe branches, hand over hand, one man poling in the stern. Of course,every few yards the boats get entangled and have to be pushed and pulledout. It's the only way, but it's back-breaking work."
It was, there was no doubt about that, and Roger added another chapterto his ideas of what hard work meant. The current of the river was soswift that it was useless to try and paddle up against it, while keepingin the middle of the stream, the banks were so thick and wooded thattracking was impossible, and "milking the brush" required incrediblelabor, because it meant keeping the canoe so near the bank that it wasgrounding or striking snags or becoming entangled in roots constantly,or misbehaving itself in some way.
IN ICY WATER UNDER A BURNING SUN.
Taking a canoe up a glacier-fed current in the height of an Alaskansummer.
_Photograph by U.S.G.S._]
Then to make a change, a long rapid would appear, and the only way tonegotiate it was to lift the canoes shoulder-high, all the partytogether under the one canoe, and climb up that rapid with the ice waterperhaps up to the waist, and a cruel, drenching spray whipping intotheir faces. In the meantime, if the mosquito veils were thrownback--and few things are more uncomfortable than a wet mosquito veilflopping about the face, why, then those torturing pests got in a fullday's work; the while that a hot Alaskan summer sun blazed above themand blistered face, arms, and neck, exposed alternately to vivid sun andicy spray.
On July 5th, the spruce, which had thinned out rapidly during the coupleof days preceding, came to a sudden end, the northern limit of timberhaving been reached. Nothing seemed to impress on Roger so clearly thefact that he was now in the Arctic Circle as the thought that he was ina climate so rigorous and gale-swept in winter that no tree could grow.A few stunted willow bushes, here and there, still remained, whensheltered on the bank of the river, but trees, as such, worthy of thename, there were none of any sort whatever.
"I never realized," said Roger, "that there was no timber of any kind inthe far north. What do the Eskimos burn for fuel?"
"Have you ever seen pictures of stoves or fireplaces in the Eskimo snowhut?" was the answer. "They depend on the heat of their own bodies in ahut without any ventilation, on the flame of blubber lamps, andoccasionally, on a little driftwood which may have come down into theArctic Ocean from some immense stream like the Mackenzie, which, flowingthousands of miles, has passed in its upper reaches through a timberedcountry."
But by the time that the boy had reached this northern limit of sprucehe had lost all idea of time. The days and nights seemed one perpetualnightmare. When asleep he dreamed that he was wading, or tracking, orpoling, and when awake he felt as though he were working in his sleep.It seemed to him that he had spent years and years on an icy river, andthat fate had tied him to it for ever and ever. By the time that twofull weeks of it had passed by, the boy no longer had any thought ofreaching the summit, that this toil could stop was a thought incredible,and though his muscles, stiffened and well-trained, continued to dotheir full man's share of the work, the mental strain was intense.
Rivers and Gersup were considerably troubled over the fact that theboy's strength showed no signs of giving way, and they would almostrather have seen him break down physically than continue
his workdoggedly, yet like a machine. It became hard, toward the end of thetrip, to make him answer a question, and it would have to be repeatedseveral times before the boy could grasp it. Orders regarding the workhe seemed to understand at once, but other matters fell on deafenedears.
The older men tried to sting him into life in many ways. They attackedhis pride, they endeavored to insult him, they reasoned with him, butthere was no response, the heavy and sunken eyes regained no luster, thehard-set jaw never relaxed, and the channels of speech seemed frozen.This went on as the river shallowed until, when the John had become sosmall that further work by water was impossible, Rivers gave word for aportage.
But the chief was far too wise a leader not to be prudent as well asurgent, and he knew that there were times when a rest would be wise formost of the party, and imperative for Roger. He had not dared to giveanything to the boy, because of the need of travel the next day, but nowthat a short rest was in sight, he mixed up from the little medicinechest a sleeping draught of triple strength, and made the boy take itdown. Through the entire night and the whole of the next day Roger sleptunmoving, and when evening came, Rivers and Gersup discussed whetherthey should wake him.
"Let him sleep, if he wants to," put in Magee, who had heard the talk;"sure he can't be gettin' into any harm while he's asleep, an' if it'srest he wants, I think it's better not to wake him."
"But, Magee," said the chief, "sometimes a man gets into one of thosesleeps and nothing will rouse him after."
"Of course, there's a risk, but if the boy's brain needs sleep so badas all that, I should think the shock of waking him would be bad."
And so it was decided to let the lad sleep as long as he would. Allthrough that second night he slept, though it was almost full daylightthe whole night through, and all the next morning, till about threeo'clock in the afternoon, when he stirred, looked around languidly, andfell to sleep again. He woke at five o'clock, and sat right up, his eyeclear and the leaden weight upon his tongue loosened.
The men crowded round with questions, and Roger learned that they hadreached the head of the pass, but he had retained no memory whatever ofthe last ten days of the trip. He buckled to and ate steadily for anhour and a half, to the huge joy of the cook, and then curled up forsome more sleep, awakening the next morning bright and chipper as thoughhe were in Washington before the trip had been begun.
On July 17th, therefore, the lad being quite himself again, three daysafter their arrival at Anaktuvuk Pass, at the head of the John River,Rivers gave the word for the portage to be begun. It was a twelve-mileportage and hard going, for though, unlike all the previous carries,there was no timber to intercept, and through which a trail must be cut,the entire work was over the tundra.
The moss-plains of the Arctic slopes, brilliant with wild flowers andfragrant with heather and gorse, which surround the Polar Seas the worldaround, come almost first in the list of objectionable travel. Even inthe blazing heat of a summer where the sun shines for twenty-two hoursout of twenty-four and the heat is nothing short of tropical, two feetbelow the surface the spade would touch perpetual frost, a factor of noimportance to the branching-rooted tundra moss. Centuries of centuriesof growth and decay have created a network of roots, rotten, spongy, andwet, so that walking over it resembles treading on soaked sponges twofeet deep.
But that nothing may remain to be thought of in the viciousness of thatfooting, every six or eight inches apart, tufts of grass and moss, knownas "niggerheads," hard and round, stick up a foot high. If the unwarytraveler decides to walk on these as on the stones of a ford crossing,he finds them slippery and insecure, they turn under his foot, and givehim the experience of a twisted ankle; while, on the other hand, if heshould endeavor to walk between them he runs a fair chance of trippingupon those hummocks and falling headlong in the oozy moss. Indeed, hecan hardly walk at all.
THUS FAR WITH THE BOATS, AND NO FARTHER!
The beginning of a portage at the summit of a divide; often a road mustbe cut through the brush.
_Photograph by U.S.G.S._]
The portage took two days, Rivers making a forced march, and the cookwas left at the new camp with the first day's supplies, the carry beingto Cache Lake, a large slough which forms the headwaters of theAnaktuvuk River. Early the next morning the rest of the party returnedto the old camp, where they had left the canoes, to bring them over tothe Lake for their trip down to the Arctic Ocean.
Towards evening, as they were returning, and had just ascended a littleknoll, Roger hurried up to the chief of the party.
"Mr. Rivers," he said, "there seems to be a lot of smoke over there, inthe direction of the camp."
The geologist looked up sharply and then turned.
"Quick, boys," he said, "take the boats to that pond"--the tundra wasdotted with small stretches of water--"and anchor them in the middle.The tundra is on fire, and if it's going to spread the boats must besaved. Harry, you go ahead to the camp." He dropped his pack and brokeinto a run.
Bulson, grasping the situation, stuck one of the punting poles deep intothe shallow bottom and made fast the canoes to it in the middle of theslough. Then, with the rest of the men he followed the Indian and thechief for the camp. Roger's light weight and his training on the trackhad made him a good runner, but he did not try to outdistance the othermen, and of course Harry was out of sight.
Plunging over and through the tundra, however, with veins swollen almostto bursting with the heavy going, the men kept on, no one speaking,though once, as a sheet of flame shot up, Gersup pointed with hisfinger. It was a welcome sight, on topping a small rise, to see in thedistance that two of the three tents were still standing, though ringedround with a smoldering fire; in the foreground the blackened figures ofthe cook and the Indian, working for their lives, and the chief justpounding into the camp. With never a pause, save when some fellowtripped and fell, the men tore over the rough ground until they reachedthe flames. Under the vigorous work of all hands an impression began tobe made, and two hours later the fire was under control.
"How did it happen, George?" the chief asked.
Twice the cook tried to answer, but the pungent smoke and the exertionhad made him almost speechless, and he could only whisper hoarsely.Though the fire was officially out, every few minutes a puff of smokewould reveal a smoldering root of moss, and all night through two menwatched, two hours apiece, to see that it did not break out anew. Andthese men never had five minutes' quietude, for the fire, which had beenburning unseen in the network of roots for hours, would suddenly send upa flame, and the whole line of that smoldering glow would have to bebeaten and drenched out.
As the cook described it later, the fire did not appear for over an hourafter the party had left, and when the smoke first arose, he did not paymuch attention to it, merely thinking that it was one of the circles of"smudges" which had been lighted the night before all round the camp tokeep the mosquitoes away, and which had not been properly put out. Helooked up a couple of times, but not for another hour did he notice anychange, and then he saw a faint vapor rising near the first.
Thinking by this time that it might be as well to go and keep the firefrom spreading, he strolled over to the column of smoke. But he had notcome within thirty feet of the place when he found that he was walkingover a glowing furnace, the tundra being red hot between the green mossabove, which would not burn, and the wet roots below. Each step he took,of course, put out the fire under his footstep by pressing the glowingmoss into the substratum of water, but it created a current of air tothe moss around that footstep, and looking behind he saw smoke arisingfrom every impress of his foot.
At this point he became alarmed, and instead of making a circle aroundthe camp of moss thoroughly beaten down and soaked, he started to try tobeat out the existing fire, an almost hopeless task, for the reason thatthe flames crept under the surface unseen and almost unfelt, onlybetraying their presence by a faint film of vapor. By the time that herealized that he should have devoted his energy to m
aking a fireguardaround the camp, the tundra was burning too close to the tents for himto be able to dare stop checking it long enough to start protectiveremedies.
In spite of all his labor, however, the fire reached one of the smallertents, where some of the maps were kept, and the dry canvas and mosquitonetting, catching alight suddenly, went up in the air as though it hadbeen a fire balloon, and blazing fragments of the tent, falling on thetundra about, gave source to a dozen more fires. George rushed over thered-hot tundra and carried the maps, which, though scorched, were notbadly injured, to the main tent, and then devoted himself to encirclingthat tent thoroughly with beaten and wetted moss, watching to see thatno spark crossed and that no treacherous fire crept along between theroots of the moss.
Matters were at this point when the Indian appeared, and with one manwatching the tents and the other beating out the fire progress was made,the danger being entirely averted when the whole party arrived. Theperil over, the other members of the party went back for the canoes,bringing them into the camp late in the evening.
The next morning all boarded the canoes to cross Cache Lake, which,connected with a score of other sloughs, led to the initial streams ofthe Anaktuvuk, the main tributary of the Colville, which latter riverflows into the Arctic Ocean. They had paddled perhaps two miles when theIndian gave a guttural grunt and pointed to the shore that they hadleft. There, rising high in the clear air, was a column of faint bluesmoke.
"They say you can't put out a tundra fire," said Rivers, "and I begin tobelieve it."
"Then how long do you suppose that will burn?" asked Roger.
"Until the winter puts about a foot of snow over it, I suppose," thegeologist answered, "and it'll hate to quit even then."