Gloucester County Democrat. (Woodbury, N.J.) 1878-1932, 1899-03-02

ny "a cldental to the klon-
szss<a dixie exodus is the
IN coming of several
words and phrases
that enrich our language. The best of
these is the term ..cold feet. 1t fits
both the climate and the situation so
beautifully With the newcomer at
Dawson the ordinary homesickness one
feels in a strange place is double dyed
md intensified He finds himself paying
4 dollar pound for beefsteak and cook
ing it himself. The prospects for get
ting work or a gold mine are not at all
what he Thought them in his mind be-
fore he came there Like tidal wave
comes over him the realization that this
is the coolest. cruelest world he ever
saw
In this state of mind, unless he has
the staying qualities of the true blue
blood. the chances are that he will sell
out his whole outfit for little or nothing
and run back home as fast as the Yu-
kon steamboat can carry him. Then do
men at Dawson jeer at him, thrusting
their tongues into their cheeks and cry
ing after him in the streets, Gold feet,
cold feeti" Two-thirds of those who
give it up and come away from the
Klondike poor do so because they have
'.cold feet. .
White men Travelled and traded up
and down the Yukon 90 years before
the Klondike excitement. The trade
was profitable, and the life of absolute
unrestraint suited them. In course of
time not a few of them took Indian
squaws for wives. The squaw waited
on the white man like dog and was
content to live as the people of her race
did; therefore she was an exceedingly
cheap wife. Occasionally she developed
an overfondness for whisky, but for
even that she was dependent ON her
master Here was white male superior
ity recognized at its true worth. The
white male sovereign basked in his SOW
ereignty and sank to the level of his
environment while he basked One of
these Indian traders on the Yukon.
man highly educated and of polished
manners, has an Indian wife and IL
half breed children, and he would give
his eyes to get out Of it.
The turn was called on the old time
trader when the gold rush to the Klon-
dixie came. Other white men, merchants
and traders of new blood, fiocked to the
settlements along the Yukon Some of
them took their own white lady wive.
with them They also took with them
wearing apparel and goods such as
white women wanted, silks. handsome
fur garments and shirt waists.
Then the fun began 1t is said that
when the lady missionaries in Africa
persuaded the Hottentot women to weal
milliners' hats and bonnets they knew
the thing was done and that the heath
en- would adopt Christianity It may
have been the shirt waist that did the
work ON the Yukon, or perhaps these
perky little tar shoes At any rate the
Indian wives began to murmur at theiI
lot, began to demand gewgaws and even
hired girls.
Captain John j. Healy took his wife
with him when he organized the trad
DONio dltOllA lliC uhOil- 44lS- IlGdil
was the first white woman ON the river.
Wherever she vent she interested her
self kindly in the people about her. At
the rude funerals of the miners she
placed Klondike flowers on the collins
and rendered such services as becomes
a woman's gentle touch.
The squaw wives noticed the defer
ence with which she was treated. OBJ
served her clothes. and straightway
they saw great light They demanded
like clothes and like treatment They
also made another demand extremely
awkward for their white masters. In
brief it was this. MARRY me ON pa
per. For all her submissiveness
squaw has temper, and she can make
herself unpleasant more emphatically
and more vociferously rnan the white
woman can. The squaw wife was no
longer cheap. The white men protested.
.Healy, you are breaking us up,
they said
"Al right. That's what l want to
do, replied Healy. In the interest of
both virtue and trade this seemed to
him goodly thing.
The advent of the shirt waist and tan
shoe in a place points unerringly to the
permanently of refined and enlight-
ened Christian civilization.
Today, more pitiable than that of
any other creature in the Klondike and
along the Yukon, is the lot of the
squaw man, as the husband of an
Indian wife is called. Other white men
regard him with peculiar aversion some
how, know not just why. He is the
social Ieper of the northwest / have
heard his fellow countrymen ON board
ship on which he and his family were
travelling express the charitable wish
that they could throw him overheard
He finds himself caught and over
whelmed by the advancing wave of that
civilization he has defied. Its beauty
its comfort and cleanliness, its social
advantages, now that he has cut him
self off from them forever, appeal to
him as paradise appeals to lost soul
Especially grief comes to the squaw
man who has in trade or mining struck
it rich. Perhaps visions OF some sweet
heart he was too poor TO win in his
early days come back To him. Maybe
she is single yet maybe she is a widow.
He looks at the stolid faced Indian
sqnaw wife and her dusky brood, and
in bis Thought he does not bless either
them or himself He offers to buy her
off. to give her any sum of money she
wants if She will quietly drop out. She
will not She sticks like bur. heard
Of one sqnaw man who offered his wife
$50, 900 to release him, but she refused.
Another one actually did succeed in
hnyipg his freedom for SO. 900.