The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1893-09-01
A PRIMITIVE REGION.
An Unknown Portion Of the
Alaskan Border.
Sylvan Solitudes That TEEN with Big
Horn Sheep. Mouptain Coats and
Caribou-The Queerest spot
in America.

Away up in the Porcupine river coun-
try, between the Alaska international
boundary and the great divide, there is
one hundred and thirty-sixth and one
hundred and forty-frst meridians and
extending from the sixty-fourth par
allel of latitude northward to the
Arctic coast, which according to
writer in the New York Evening Post
remains to-day the sole incognita of
the North American continent There
is no other geographical district or
division between the two oceans which
has not been officially visited by gov
ernment agents, prospected by miners
or timber hunters, explored by adven-
turers or trapped over by runners Of
the fur companies. Even interior Lab
rador is better known. Only three or
four white traders whose names are of
record have ever made it an object in
all these years to penetrate into n will
derness in whose expansive area of three
hundred miles square are scarcely six
score of impecunious groveling red
skins, and whose annual proceeds OF
the chase would hardly pay collector
for the hardship of wintering where
the temperature for five months at
least persistently keeps below the zero
point. This isolated and trackless re-
gion has many characteristics of the
Yellowstone National park. 1t is much
slashed by deep canyons and bumped
by high mountains interspersed with
vast swamps, which are filed with ami
NAL remains, and upland valleys where
thermal springs gush from the TANKS
of ice-clad peaks, and tepid rivers flow
which never freeze. There are exhala-
tions of natural gas from low-lying
tracts by lake and river sides whose
odor is perceptible for long distances,
and there is also lake lying in deep
valley at the foot of Sheep mountain
which has never been known TO freeze.
The natives regard it with supersti-
tious dread, and keep aloof- Sheep
mountain is nearly four thousand feet
in height and within the arctic belt
Live mastodons were reported some
years ago to have been seen here by
Indians, but the red men undoubtedly
had mirage on the brain.
Here, in the depths of these sylvan
big-horn sheep and noun
tain goats abound, and moose roam in
such numbers, according TO the
authority of Dominion Surveyor |
9gilvie, who wintered there in 1878, !
that all the willows for miles above |
and below his camp were cropped al |
most bare. Vast numbers Of caribou |
over the hillsides in winter,
feeding upon the moss which lies /
buried under the snow, and this they /
obtain by paving away its frosty |
covering. They face uphill and pull
he snow down towards them with
heir forefeet, exposing patches of the
ucculent growth. which having
,ropped, they proceed 70 draw the
now above into its place. and 30 ad-
-ance gradually 10 the crown Of the
Iope- Some patches Of ground which I
ave been paved over were found 70
xtepd for more than mile in length
" a quarter Of nile in breadth
Mr. Ogiivie. IN the course o. his tenn
'orary sojourr while locating the IN
ernatioBai boundary line. was able TO
ecure q census Of ali The whites sad
ndizns On the route, men, women and
aiidren- sorse Of these. though IN ,
rdinateiy savage themselves, have .
1ortai fear of apprehension OF . hypo-
tieticaI tribe called Sahcnes. who ar.
aid 20 inhabii bills at the hesdwsters