The San Francisco call., 1898-06-14
Ten Thousand Go1d-Seek- CTS Carnped at Bennett
 and Lindernan.
Sam Wall, Now Returning to the Klondike, Tells of Tragedies
 Along the Trails.


 the island in Lake Bennett.
 Many deaths no doubt have occurred similar to that referred to in Lake Lin- derman, no actual knowledge of which may be had. A mile east of Bennett and a hundred yards out from shore dog is lying beside hole in the fast thinning ice. He has been there for several days. No one may venture on the ice to reach him and he refuses to answer calls from the shore. Beside another such hole in the ice in Lake Linderman, plainly visible from shore when the ice foe is in, lie mans hat and a stick.
 The weather is beautiful. The sun is as warm as it is at this season in San Francisco. The mosquitoes are here, busy and multiplying. Daylight extends practically through the twen- ty-four hours and work goes with 1t in very many of the busy boat yards that form almost the one industry of these little cities on the lakes. Linderman and Bennett are without doubt the busiest towns of their size in the world to-day No idle individual lives within their boundaries.
 The town of Linderman as it comes into view from the hill top where the trail leads over the divide from Long Lake, looks like the camp of an army. Bennett is also little more than a city
 
 it. When the ice shall have passed out leaving the way clear this big army will fold its tents and the two cities will sail and fade away. My notion is that that day will present a spectacle the equal of any of those that have pre- ceded it in this remarkable drama.
 The Northwest mounted police are taking many precautions as against fa- talitieS and accidents that may be ex- pected to follow the movement of so many men, not only not in concert and without organization, but every man competing with every other for pre- cedence When they move there will be a fiotilla of about 4000 small boats on the water, all headed in the same di- rection, all striving to reach their desti- nation, if not first at least as near the front as possible.
 To prevent crush an order is out from dhe police headquarters limiting the number of boats that shan leave on any one day. This order may have some effect, but how it may be en- forced it is difficult to see. Boats are being inspected also and those that are taking passengers are required to have a certain worthiness. Canvas, sec tional and other boats of doubtful stamp are forbidden to take any but their owners. Every boat is being numbered by the police, its number in black, six inches in length, being painted on the nose of the craft and the names of all those who go with it registered. This is a precaution to enable the authorities to follow the his, tory of boat and occupants after they leave here.
 The stampede is practically at standstill east and south of the noun tain tops. Every vessel that comes north brings a certain contingent of men bound ''in," but the number is scarcely appreciable in this crowd. The trails on the south or "outward' side of the mountains have already become muddy and full of trouble for packers, and along the whole length of both the Skaguay and Chilkoot trails is strewn with dead horses and dogs, the traveller being scarcely at any time out of the sight and, most of all. out of the stench of one or the other. At one place on the Skaguay trail there are the bodies of a dozen horses piled together. Many of these were crippled and filled during the winter, but for the most part they make up the wrecka e of last summer and fall that have lain under the snow all winter and are now uncovered by the sun to the great distress of those who have to pass this way.
 The falling off in freight transporta- tion has relieved a great number of horses of their occupation and they are roaming about Dyea and Skaguay pick ing up precarious living where they can. Many of these will be taken down the river to Dawson. Both Dyea and Shaguay however, are living in the full hope of a return or resumption of the stampede, deeming it almost certain to follow the arrival of the first treasure ship at San Francisco. Almost all the traffic is going over the Chilkoot trail that Is by way of Dyea-as the Skag- uay trail is reported to be almost im- IL TD..1lI the rival town of Skaguay, and her peo- pie are cheerful in the hope of the pro- posed railway.
 Dyea has completed her dock and wharf, by which deep water vessels may now discharge direct there at any stage of the tide, and the day of the lighter is done. Freight is transported in wagons from Dyea to the canyon and from the canyon by means of the Chilkoot Railroad and Transport Company's wire trolley and by pack mules to the summit. Even the Indians no longer use their own shoulders for this purpose. From the scales to the summit there are no less than four diff ferent wire lines. For, especially dur ing the winter, while the snow made it comparatively easy, very many hauled their own goods on sleds as far as the scales and entrusted them to the trolley from there to the SUI init.
 The carriage. or SoOQS or every de- scription over this formidable moun- tain pass by means of overhead wires is another of the odd and interesting things developed by the great stam- pede The Chilkoot Railroad and Trans port Company claims to be able to carry 175 tons of freight from Canyon City, at the very foot of the mountain, to and over the summit in one day. It can run through the twenty-four hours if necessity requires. The method is very simple. A fixed cable is sus- pended by means of towers On this buckets are suspended and travel by means of wheels, grooved so as to fit to and ride easily over the wire. Lower down and nearer the bucket a clutch is fixed that takes hold of a travelling wire which carries the bucket along. It is the principle of the cable car re- versed, having the wheels overhead and travelling upon suspended track with the moving cable little lower down and immeolately above the car. The towers upon which the wire ropes are suspended are placed about one hundred yards apart on ordinarily level ground, but there is no atternpt to follow the undulations of the land. The buckets ride from hill top to hill top. there being one place where over a mile of rope is suspended from towers