The St. Johns herald., 1898-11-19

There is no doubt that the rush to the Klondike is over. The weary argonaut is returning to his home. The river beds of Alaska are as rich as ever, but the stream of discouraged and partly successful miners coming back is greater than the counter-current of stragglers who still believe that for tunes can be washed from the frozen sands in one season. The unprece- dented craze for Alaskan adventure was brought about, of course, by the natural fascination eXerted upon all men by prospects of sudden wealth.
 This motive had full rein at a time
 when industrial depression had placed
 thousands of strong and generally prac- tical men In that frame of mind which is described as waiting for something to turn up." The rich strikes of few born prospectors who had already spent years in the frozen gold fields infiamed the imaginations of the unemployed and the vague recital of hardships was belittled, if indeed 1t did not add to the allurement for men proud of their strength and ashamed of their idleness
 There is no doubt that few of these eager adventurers expected to spend more than one season in Alaska, be lieving, as many still believe, that oncO found, a paying claim can be worked continually until wealth is assured. The climate was supposed to be excessively In vryir faYso md mi frac its only menace being the rigors of the closed season. Transportation and trad. ing companies flooded the United States with roseate prospectuses and thousands borrowed money, mortgaged their homes or started badly equipped for the alluring chance to make for tunes which had at last "turled up." A successful miner recently returned from the headwaters of the Yukon partly accounts for his own success by asserting that he was there before the boom began, and is going back "be
 cause he likes it." He belongs to that rare cult which is still represented in the mining regions of the Rocky and Sierra Nevada Mountains by prospect ors who are natural recluses and con- tinue their lonely combats with the hostile elements because u,ey Hike it." The Klondike is the supreme test even for such adopts, and they are unit in the belief that success in tho Alaska placer mines must be the result of years of patient drudgery, and may never be achieved. It has been the ex, perience of all that pay dirt extracted in an Alaska winter by incessant and tedious processes cannot be washed oi banned until the succeeding summer Nor is the open season much more ia. vorable for the work of hauling and building than the winter. The mud Is as impossible as the snow drift; mid day in summer Is often too hot for either work or sleep and travel is more hazardous than ever. In the depth of winter the thermometer fingers about 50 degrees below zero. In the inter- mediate season, just before the thaw, the mercury has shown 15 degrees be- low zero early in the morning and jumped up to so above by midday, a change Of temperature which in time will destroy the most powerful consti- tuition. Scarcity of food, extremes of heat and cold, utter isolation and, above all. the endless tedium of the process which may or may not bring wealth at last. are the sharp realities which con- front the ardent pilgrim who has dreamed of sudden wealth in the Klon- dike, and send him back with faith in "the States" renewed and frightened by contrast. The gold is in the Klon- dike still and it will be mined by the hermits who found it, while the boom CTS who followed them will return to the widening avenues of industry in their own country, where the chances of success are fully as good.
 The man who invented advice never