The Nome nugget., 1902-01-25

 came to the post. swore they would stand by us-and offered themselves to light on oar side, ins our coming battle with RitarOw. Here we had all the material for nice little internecine war ready at hand. If this had been noman's land We might. have indulged in dreams of conquest and empire. but here We were in Siberia, a part of the realm Of his Imperial Highness the tCZar of all of Russia, and it would have been dangerous fiibustering. Looking back k today, there is something farcical aheutit all, and it seems like a part out of.an opera boutfe; at the time, however, .it,was real enough and very far from being a laughing matter with | us.
 A decrman Of the standiag of Rita row was not q man to make idle threats. He was an adversary of strength and resources. His own retinue of cowboys, or deerboys, who would implicitly carry out his com ms nds, must have numbered at any time between fifty and one hundred big, raw -boned and muscular fellows, all of them, with voices loud enough as if they meant the men on the next mountain top to hear all, their remarks. Well, Iitarow, with his herds and herders, kept getting. near and nearer every day to the post and a crisis seemed imminent, when the whaler Alexander, Captain Tilton, one fine morning steamed into Port Luthe and anchored within less than one half mile from our post She certainly looked good to us and came well-timed.
 CapIaln Tilton had a budget of all the latest outside news, brought us our mail and we ate,at his table the first potatoes for close on to five months. The Alexander was at that time still under the Hawaiian flag, and was thereby prevented from coaling at aPort Clarence. The schooner Compeer was coming with her fall coal to meet her here in Port Luke. While wait ing her arrival, Captain Hilton blew down his boilers to give them a good overhauling, and we were having the best of times and enjoyed to the full the society and conversation of our fellows. One piece of bad news Captain Hilton had. in store for us, It was that the schooner Bonanza, which had our private mess stores aboard, shipped to Us at our expense by our agent in San Francisco, had proceeded with them on and up to Point Barrow. She had been off the heads of the bay early in July, and had found the bay full of ice. Our last years stores were about all consumed. We had shared them rather liberally with the natives right through .he winter.s and had been in con- seq uence down to hard pan for some time previous. With the best of luck. we could not expect the Bonanza back before the first of September, and then it would largely depend on the good nature of her captain and on the I,weather whether she would delay to land the five tons of stores tor us. rat her doubted at the time she would, and learned later that she did not. We had no word whatsoever from Jackson and the department, so far. Captain Hilton told us that the missionaries of Cape Prince of Wales and Port Clar- Eence had given him and his coming north tbat summer about up. The Alexander waited five days for the F fCompeer and then prepared to leave the harbOr with the intention to take her coal at sea or wherever the schooner was met with. She was in d hurry to proceed north after whales.
 Then we saw what looked like cur last chance to leave the country get up steam to depart. The Bear was busy in the north picking up the wrecked whalers, whom she had orders to carry to Seattle direct. That would finish her years work in the north. The coming back of the Bonanza was very doubtful, Dr. Jackson's coming prob- lematical and that no other vessel would call that year in this out of the way bay a certainty. Mir. Kelly made up his mind reluctlantly to shift our base of operations over to Port Clar- ence. So we packed our trunks, dis tributed the remnants of the trade goods inaear care among the different natives to buy additional deer for us, brought their accounts up to date, gave them instructions and letters to Dr. Jackson if we should happen to miss him and he should happen to come: and then 'bade good bye to all our native friends who were conyregated around us. Strange as it is, there were many visible and unmistakable expressions of seHrow on their faces; they seemed to hate to see us go, some of them even came and tried to persuade us to re- main. promising to look out for us and