THE THIRST FOR GOLD IN ALASKA.

Otago Witness, Issue 2416, 28 June 1900, Page 68

THE THIRST FOR GOLD IN ALASKA.

(Ainslee's Magazine, U.S.)

Alaska is full of men who have leaped to sudden fortune, and the storias of their triumphs serve as inspiration to all touched with the fever of discontent. Take, for instance, the story of Alex. M'Donald, one of the best-known characters in, the Yukon Valley. He is a great, lumbering-Scotch-man — born in Nova Scotia — who up to the time of the Klondyke discoveries never had an idea of winning a greater fortune than that of the day labourer. He worked from mining camp to mining camp all along the North-west. So slow was he and so awkward in his work — his feet entirely in his way' and his bulk a misfit for the size of prospect holes — that he was reputed never to be able to hold a job for longer than three weeks. He was at Dawson shortly after the first locations were made on the Klondyke. He went out with numerous stampedes, but never arrived in time to locate a paying claim. Finally he stumbled across a newspaper man named Hunt, who had a claim on Bonanza Creek. Hunt had become discouraged because he had not the funds necessary to develop it. This claim M'Donald purchased for SOOdol and set about developing it in his usual slow and aimless fashion. Finding the claim fairly rich, he put on a force of labourers and in a few weeks had taken out SO.OOOdoI. This sum he used immediately to purchase otlier claims. All that year he bought right" and left everything of promise that was offered him, often mortgaging the claims thus bought to buy still other ground. Many ef the ventures came to nought, but a few gave such phenomenal returns that speedily he took the rating of a millionaire. Out of one flaim on Jill Dorado Creek he shovelled 20.000dpl in 12 hours. To-day he is probably wcrth between two and three million dollars.

At first sight it would seem that the like good ]uck might fa 1 1 to any man, but the reality runs much the other way. The man of quick intelligence, of judgment and decision is not the man v/lio ordinarily achieves this sudden vreallh. It is the man who is too stupid to know the risks he is talcing, and it is the reckless man ■who plunges wildly and misses no desper?te chance, who seem favourites of the jcod of chance. . . . Here is a typical illustration of the eytrame hardships of the life. Midilielon was a young Englishman, slight and small and accustomed to all the refinements of civilised life. He had enough money to buy a modest outfit, but had never camped out or roughed it before this time. He and his partner vent in by the Ginlkoot Pass in 1897 and tramped the whole vrav. They had a sledge and four Irish ■betters, with 12001b of freight. The pirtner being the stronger, buckled himself into the harness and pulled as leader of the tesm. Middlemen's duty wos to walk behind the sledge and push. There are no roads, properly speaking, in Alaska. [Except in winter the trails are sloughs of icy raud ".vorked soft by the feet of the gold 'seekers. The slueli is always over the shoes, and an unguarded step will plunge the walker to the waist. The Canadian Government has done nothing to better the condition of the trails. This fact, coupled with the exorbitant fees charged the miners by that Government, has led the prospsctors, at more than one point on the trails, to set up boards with this derisive moito :— " Millions for tribute, but not one cent for roads." The gold seeker himself carefully refrains from doing anything more to the trails than will serve to help him out of present difficulties and to carry him on his way. The nrsb important thing Middleton learned was to swear. Everybody swears in. Alaska. . . . The whole life goes on at such high pressure that everybody is on the verge of madness. It is the strain of the thing that counts. Middleton had his turn with the rest. Once, when slipping, he saved his footing by hanging to the sledge. His partner, feeling the drag, promptly cursed him for adding to the locd. When Middleton got down and pushed harder to make up for lost time, his .^partner sulked and his head reeled with the added effort. When one of the ,dogs dropped on the snow to rest, the sledge stopped, and each man turned furiously on the other. The words came hot and fast. Middleton noticed all at once that he was not talking, but simply screaming, and that he could not help it. Then things went away from him. When he came to himself his partner's arms were around him, and his partner's voice, as tender as a woman's, was saying to him : " There ! there! Take a brace, oldjman. In a minute you'll be all right." in 10 minutes Middleton was all right, and they were both laughing and plodding as before. It is this sorb of thing that makes up the daily tragedy of the trails.