The National tribune., 1902-04-24

coats and buckled down to keep warm.
Below. they could hear loud peals of pro-
family, as the traileFs, packers. and pill
grimS pounded their dumb slaves over the
trail. Above, the wind cried and moaned
among the crags, constantly reminding
them that Winter was near at hand. The
nights were longer than the days. The
working day was cut from 10 to eight
hours. but the pay of the men had been
raised from 80 to 30 cents an hour.
MIDwISTER IN THE ARCTIC.
One day, black cloud curtained the
canyon, and the workmen looked up from
their picks and drills to find that it was
November and night. The whole theater,
stage and all, had grown suddenly dark,
but they knew, by the strange, weird noise
in the wings, that The great tragedy of
Winter was on. Hislop's horse and dog
went down the trail. Hawkins and HislOp
and Heney walked up and down among the
men, as commanding officers show them
selves on the eve of battle. Foy chaffed
the iaborerS and gave them more rope, but
no amount of leyity could prevail against
the universal feeling of dread that seemed
to settle upon the whole army. This weird
Alaska, so wild and grand, so cool and
sweet and sunny in Summer, so strangely
sad in Autumn-this many NODDED, little
known Alaska that seemed doomed ever to
be misunderstood, either overloaded or
lied abOut-what would she do to them ?
How cruel, how cold, how weird, how
wickedly wild her Winters must be! Most
men are brave, and an army of brave men
will breast great peril when Gods lamp
lights the field, but the stoutest heart
breads the darkness. These men were
sore afraid, all of them, and yet no one
was willing to be the first to fall out, so
they stood their ground. They worked
with a will born of determination and
courage.
The wind moaned hoarsely. The tenn
perature dropped to 30 degrees below
zero, but the men, in sheltered places, kept
pounding. Sometimes they would work
all day cleaning the snow from the grade
made the day before, and the next day it
would probably be drifted full again. At
times the task seemed hopeless, but Heney
had promised to build to the summit of
White Pass without stop, and Foy had
given Heney his hand across a table at
the Fifth Avenue Hotel in Skaguay
AT times, the wind blew so frightfully
that the men had to hold hands, but they
kept pegging away between blasts and in
q little while were ready to begin bridg-
ing the gulches and deep side canyons.
One day-Or one night, rather, for there
were no days then-a camp cook, crazed
ny lue tOlU anu Tie eLuleSS night, wall
dered off to die. Hislop and Heney found
him, but he refused to be comforted. He
wanted to quit, but Heney said he could
not be spared. He begged to be left alone
to sleep in the warm, soft snow, but
Heney brought him back to consciousness
and to camp.
A premature blast blew Il man into eter-
nifty. The wind moaned still more drear-
lily. The snow drifted deeper and deeper,
and one day they found that, for days
and days, they had been blasting ice and
snow, when they thought they were drill
ing rock. Heney and Foy faced each
other in the dim light of tent lamp that
night Must we give up?" asked the
contractor
NO. said Foy slowly, speaking in a
whisper; well build on snow, for it's
hard and safe, and in the spring Wen
ease it down and make a roadbed."
They did so. They built and bedded the
cross-ties on the snow, ballasted with
snow, and ran over that track until Spring
without an accident.
They were making mileage slowly, but
the awful strain was telling on the men,
and on the bank account. The President
Of the Company was almost constantly
between Washington and OF
tawa, pauSiHg now and again to reach
over to London for another bag of gold
for they were melting it up there in the
Arctic night-literally burning it up, were
these dynamiters of Foy's
HEROES OF THE WHITE PASS.
To conceive this great project, to put it
into shape, present it in London, secure
the funds and necessary concessions from
two Governments, survey and build, and
have a locomotive running in Alaska a
year from the first whoOp of the happy
had been a mighty achievement,
but it was what Heney would call dead
easy" compared with the work that con-
fronted the President at this time. On
July 90, 1897, the first pick was driven
into the ground at White Pass; just year
later the pioneer locomotive was run over
the road. More than once had the finan-
cial hackers allowed their faith in the
enterprise and in the future of the coun-
try beyond to slip away, but the President
of the Company had always succeeded in
building it up again, for they had never
lost faith in him or in his ability to see
things that were to most men invisible.
In the Summer, when the weekly reports
showed IA mile or more or less of track
laid, it was not so hard; but when days
were spent in placing a single bent in a
bridge, and weeks were consumed on a
switch-back in pinched-out canyon, it