Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1912-12-25

above to many degrees below zero, to
believe the stories from the Arctics
coming in lately about men stampeding
in temperatures of from so to 20 below
zero to the new Yukon territory gold
diggings on Sixty Mile creek, east of
Dawson City said Frank Fantius of
Chicago, who was in the rush TO the
Klondike in 1S969and 1897.
II am sure the gold hunters of the
North are doing just what it is as
serted they are doing. They have
reached p degree of resourcefulness and
hardness that is little short Of mar
velous. Some of them travel hundreds
of miles in such frigid weather as that
country always has at this time of the
year, through sections where there is
not a. single human habitation, reach
their destination without froSting so
much as a little finger. and set about
the work of going TO bedrock for gold
with as little evidence Of suffering as
If walking along Michigan avenue in
May sunshine.
1.-THE slogan of everybody is hustle
and they go about getting their meals.
water and fuel with such vim that they
seldom need aid either in camp or on
the march. When, IN rare instances,
one of party becomes ill or exhausted
he is usually buclkled in a sleeping bag
yen the sled with supplies and carried
along with the expedition. II sometimes
% becomes necessary 10 place a hot iron
at the feet of the ailing, and onee in a
great while party is forced to stop
for a time build snow house and give
special care to the disabled. Those
Klondikers, however, are about the
grittiest men on the North American
continent, and where one falls by the
wayside 1000 will go through to the
finish and be ready to assail mother
earth with torch, pick and shovel an
hour after they reach the promised
land.
They accomplished the seemingly
impossible by going prepared for the
excessive frigiditv they know they are
going to encounter. Their coats are fur
inside and out, their underwear is
heavy and close knit, and their trous-
ers are of sheepskin upon which there
is q growth of wool from two or three
inches in length. They. carry with them
fur lined sleeping bags. whicha they
place as much out of the wind as pos
sible at night and creep intoi them,
carefully drawing head and hands irt-
side. Up there men do not travel alone.
Two, three or five 'mush' over the tun.s
dra together, having a sled and four.
to six. of the wolf dogs common in the
Yukon country. Upon the sled they
carry their provisions, and, contrary
to the general belief in the states. there
is always some sort of wood for fuel
to be feund-willow, cottonwood, fir or
pine.
These gold hunters Gas Mark Twain
said of another band of pioneers on
the occasion of their scaling the Rocky
Mountains to reach California before
the civil wary are no simperirg, dam
ty, kid gloved weaklings, but stall
wart, dauntless braves, brimful of push
and energy. ana royalty endowed with
every attribute that goes to make up
peerless and magnificent manhood--the
very pick of the worlds glorious ones
"A considerable number of men whe
are racing this winter for the head
waters of the Yukon, Sixty Mile Greek
and their tributaries. are pioneers of
Alaska and Yukon Territory. and they
realize as no tenderfeot' can how much
of banana there may bf. a. the end
of their northlana rainbow. Some of
them remember that in the little creek
Just out of Dawson City in 1896 George
Carmack. discoverer, and his party OF
half breeds took out of placer claims
S1200 in eight days; that once two men
in two days gathered $4,000 in nuggets
varying in size from a pinhead TO A
pea; that three Swedes put gold TIC
their credit at the rate of 81 minute
all the winter of 1897 and 1898; that
William Ogilvie Canadian government
surveyor, found $500 in gold in single
pan, and that of the 800 claims staked
on bonanza Creek not ono proved a
failure
s"It win not be known until May or
June next whether the men who are
now rushing to SixtyMile Creek land
y in rich pay dirt They viii be
Obliged to pursue the Klondike method
of alternately thawing the frozen
ground with big fires and throwing the
loose dirt on dumps ready for washlhS
in the spring. In the mean time pro-
visions up there, / learn from form
er pal at Skagway, have jumped 20
prices that make those of Chicago, con-
sidered outrageously high. seem de-
/ eidcdly small So-called butter is sell
! ing at 81 q pound; eggs, $3.50 dozen;
sugar, 80 cents a pound: oranges and
lemons, rs cents apiece; potatoes anc
onions, 10 cents pound; ham and ba :
con, 81 a pound; kerosene, $1.25 gal
Ion; hay, $40 a ton
,fn the British possessions, in which
| this new gold country is located, the
rules are much stricter than in the
United States. For instance, creek
claim, one running along stream, is
by law $50 feet long. and may not be
more than 1000 feet wide. 1t is requir-
ed that other placer claims shall not
be more than go feet square. More
over, the Canadian government re-
serves every alternate 10 claims. To
prevent useless occupation of a claim,
il is stipulated that if an oceupier fails
to work his property for Y consecutive
hours his right to it is forfeited. There
are dozens of other rules in force in
the British Arctics, but in spite of
them, it is asserted, Illegal jumping of
claims is almost unknown there
Chicago News.
Odfish on Giving.
"Of all times of the year" said Dr.