The Forest Republican. [volume] (Tionesta, Pa.) 1869-1952, 1892-01-06
THE WONDERS OF ALASKA
LOVELY GARDENS IN THE MIDST
OF VAST FIELDS OF ICE.

Fields of Luscious Fruit Along a
Glaciers Edge-Experiences of
an Exploring Party.
Strawberries and mosquitoes seem to
be equally plentiful in the neighborhood
of Mount st. Elias, according to the tes-
timony of Mr.. Israel @. Russell, who has
just returned to Washington from that
region of eternal ice and snow in Alaska,
where the highest peak in North America
rises to an altitude of 10, 900 feet from
glacier 1000 square miles in area and as
big as all those of the Alps put together.
Along the edge of the glacier, oil the
way from Icy Bay to Yakutat Bay, there
extends strip of green coast which is
covered with luxuriant vegetation.
Strawberry vines cover the ground for
miles, and the verdant fields are Redeemed
as far the eye can reach with luscious
fruit, which compares favorably in point
of size and flavor with the finest grown
in temperate latitudes. There are buckle
berries, too, aud ''saimon berries, (which
are something between blackberries and
raspberries, but of giant size, measuring
nearly two inches in diameter. All the
lowlands are carpeted with violets, but.
tercups, yellow monkey flowers, and
other wild blossoms. Here aud there,
in the midst of the vast ice fields, are the
loveliest gardens watered by the melting
snow.
There are plenty of grizzly bears in
the vicinity of Mount st. Elias, but Mr..
Russell did not find them very danger
Gus. He says that his encounters with
them reminded him of killing pigs. OF
brown and black bears he saw and shot
a great many. The expedition met with
enough perils, however, to satisfy the
most adventurous geographical explorers.
Nearly all of the climbing had to be done
up steep walls of ice and snow by cat
ting steps. At almost any time a slip
would have prec;pitated the party down
the frozen precipices thousands of feet.
On one occasion they were descending
when they found that an avalanche had
carried away the steps which they had
made in going up. The impromptu stair
case was destroyed for 800 feet, and they
had to lower a man by rope to chop
out another, there being no other way
of getting down. Such accidents as
this were not uncommon. Avalanches
were continually falling, rushing down
the slopes with the speed of railway
trains and with a roar like thunder that
could be heard twenty miles away.
One night about II o'clock the party
was passing over bad place in the Agas.
siz glacier. Two men were in the lead,
drawing Aed. Suddenly they disap-
peared from sight, having fallen into
tissure in the ice. Luckily they were
caught upon a projecting ledge at the
depth of about twenty feet, else they
would never have been seen again. They
were hauled out with ropes. The next
day, in the same neighborhood, Mr. Rus
sell CHANGED to looked behind him and
saw that the ice field over which he had
just passed was gone, leaving an enor-
nous hole of unknown depth. Another
time one of his men tumbled into a
crevasse, and was only saved by the pack
fastened to his shoulder, which inter.
rupted his progress through a twist in
the frozen tunnel that had yawned for
him.
The Agassiz glacier is one of the four
| great glaciers which, together with about
a thousand small ones, flow out from the
mountains at the north to the mighty
Malaspina glacier, pouring their streams
! of ice continually into this vast frozen
sea. This glacier of Malaspina, from
1900 to 1000 feet thick, Is interesting
not merely because of its enormous size,
but also by reason of the fact that it is
the only one now in existence of the
same type as the glacier which formerly
covered all of this continent as far south
as Philadelphia and st. Louis, leaving
traces that are visible to this day in
scratches on the rocks.
Where the land in that region is bare
Of ice the vegetation attains an almost
tropical luxuriance, and the Arctic jun
giles are we'll nigh impossible to the ex-
plorer. One of the chief obstacles en-.
countered in threading them is plant
known aa the "devil's club" which
grows TO height of ten or fifteen feet,
its stems running along the ground for
some distance and then turning upward.
7 Every part of its surface, even to the
ribs of the leaves, is thickly set with
spines, which infict painful wounds,
and, breaking of in the flesh, cause fes-
teIing sores. In the Lucia Glacier oc-
ours most interesting feature, in the
shape of glacial river which comes out
from a mountain through an archway of
ice, flows for mile and half in plain
view, and then is lost to sight in another
tunnel. Where the stream emerges finally
is unknown. No explorer has as yet
been bold enough to enter the tunnel
and drift through, after the fashion Of
Allan Quatermain aud Umslopogaas. The
greatest risk in such an undertaking
would be from falling blocks Of ice. At
the mouth of the tunnel there are al
ways confused noises and rhythmic vi
, brations to be heard from the dark re-
cesses within. The air is filled with
pulsations like deep organ notes, and it
requires but little Imagination to trans
form these strange sounds into the voices
and songs of inhabitants of the neither
world. II used to be supposed that
Mount st. Elias was volcano, and sea
captains sailing on the Pacific have often
beheld what they imagined to be smoke
issuing from Its summit; but this is a