Gulf and Glacier; or, The Percivals in Alaska Read online

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  The Pine Cone Stories

  By WILLIS BOYD ALLEN

  6 Volumes, 12mo, cloth, $1.00 each

  PINE CONES THE NORTHERN CROSS CLOUD AND CLIFF SILVER RAGS KELP GULF AND GLACIER

  D. LOTHROP COMPANY, 364-366 Washington Street, Boston

  ON HE CAME, CRASHING THROUGH THE BOUGHS. _Page 130._]

  GULF AND GLACIER

  OR

  _THE PERCIVALS IN ALASKA_

  BY WILLIS BOYD ALLEN

  Author of the "Lion City of Africa," "Pine Cones," "Silver Rags," "The Northern Cross," "Kelp," "Cloud and Cliff," "John Brownlow's Folks," etc., etc.

  BOSTON D. LOTHROP COMPANY WASHINGTON STREET OPPOSITE BROMFIELD

  COPYRIGHT, 1892, BY D. LOTHROP COMPANY.

  TO

  The Little Captain

  CONTENTS.

  CHAPTER I. NORTHWARD BOUND 7

  CHAPTER II. FOREST AND PRAIRIE 21

  CHAPTER III. A HOME LETTER 40

  CHAPTER IV. THE GLACIER AND THE BEAR 46

  CHAPTER V. A KING'S DAUGHTER IN A FREIGHT CAR 59

  CHAPTER VI. VICTORIA AND "THE QUEEN" 68

  CHAPTER VII. SOLOMON BARANOV 93

  CHAPTER VIII. ALIVE OR DEAD? 110

  CHAPTER IX. THE SILVER-TIP 119

  CHAPTER X. ON THE MUIR GLACIER 135

  CHAPTER XI. FAIR SITKA 150

  CHAPTER XII. THE "CHICHAGOFF DECADE" 160

  CHAPTER XIII. HOMEWARD BOUND 200

  CHAPTER XIV. WONDERLAND 210

  CHAPTER XV. WHITE LILIES 228

  CHAPTER XVI. CONCLUSION 239

  GULF AND GLACIER.

  CHAPTER I.

  NORTHERN BOUND.

  "All aboard!"

  It was a bright July morning, and its gladness was reflected inthe faces of the throng that hurried to and fro, like an army ofparticularly busy ants, in the Boston and Lowell Depot.

  Way trains puffed in and out, discharging their loads of out-of-townpeople, who poured through the doorway in an almost continuous stream,carrying baskets of lunch, bunches of pond lilies and the small parcelsthat tell of every-day trips to the city.

  On the opposite side of the station stood a Canadian Pacific train. Themassive trucks and heavy English build of the tawny cars distinguishedthem from the stock required for local traffic. This was the trainwhich was to take a hundred or more passengers, without change, acrossthe broad American Continent. From the windows of those very cars,the travelers were to look out upon the rolling Western prairies, theravines and snowy summits of the Rocky Mountains, and at last, theblue waters of the Pacific. No wonder the people on this side of thestation, those departing, as well as those to be left behind, wore amore serious and anxious look upon their faces than the light-heartedsuburbans who chatted gaily on their brief daily trip of a dozen miles.

  How curiously the hundred tourists looked into one another's eyes?"Will he prove a delightful companion, I wonder?" they said tothemselves. "Is she to be a life-long friend, dating from this momentwhen our paths meet for the first time?"

  "All aboard!" shouts the conductor again.

  It has been well said that a railway station is a fit emblem of humanlife, with its brief merriment and grief, its greetings and good-bys,its clamor of coming and going.

  Be this as it may, it is probable that of the half a thousand people inthe Lowell Depot that morning, but few abandoned themselves to moralreflections. Certainly Tom Percival was not occupied with philosophicalmeditation, as he stood on the lowest step of the car "Kamloops,"looking out eagerly over the crowd that surged to and fro on theplatform beside the train.

  "Halloo, Ran!" he shouted suddenly, waving his hat and beckoning to ayoung man of about his own age, who was making his way toward the car,valise in hand.

  "All right, Tom," responded the other. "Come along, Fred," he added toa companion at his side. "Here's the 'old cabin home' for the next weekor so, I suppose."

  The three young fellows--or boys, as it is easier to call them, oncefor all--shook hands all round, and then, standing on the car platform,turned to the crowd again as the train started and slowly moved out ofthe station.

  "Good-by! good-by!"

  "Be sure to write!"

  "Bring me a totem pole from Alaska!"

  "Hurrah! hurrah!"

  And amid a medley of shouts and frantic wavings of handkerchiefs thelong train rumbled away, northward bound.

  Randolph Burton made his way into the car, followed by his cousin Tomand their chum Fred Seacomb. Randolph had just passed his Sophomoreexamination successfully at Harvard, while Tom was rejoicing over hisadmission to the Freshman class, with only one condition. Fred was apupil in a scientific school at Philadelphia. He was as dignified andscrupulously neat as ever, and his eyeglasses twinkled as of old.

  "Where are the girls?" inquired Randolph, turning to Tom.

  The car was filled with passengers, all talking at once, and besiegingthe porter with questions.

  "In our 'drawing-room,' at the other end of the car," replied Tom. "Youknow father and mother have a jolly little room all to themselves, butwe shall use it as headquarters, the whole way to Vancouver."

  "Thomas alludes to Vancouver as if it were East Somerville orBraintree," remarked Fred, eying that young man calmly. "How many timesdid you say you had crossed the Continent?"

  "Don't you concern yourself about me," rejoined Tom. "If you'd groundup on this trip as I have, perhaps you'd feel on familiar terms withAssiniboia and Saskatchewan and"--

  "Oh! here he comes, talking Indian as usual," interrupted a merryvoice. "Randolph and Fred are with him."

  "Glad to see you, Miss Sibley!" said Fred, with his most elegant bow.

  "Oh! please," laughed the sunny-haired girl, "I'm going to be just'Pet' on this trip, any way. I sha'n't be seventeen till November, youknow."

  The boys seemed relieved at this declaration, and, perching on the armsof the car seats, entered into lively conversation with Pet, as well asTom's sisters, Kittie and Bess.

  The whole party, it may now be explained, had started on a journey toAlaska. The you
ng people had worked hard at their studies during thewinter, and Mr. Percival, being a man of ample means, as well as ofgood sense and thoroughly kind heart, had included in his invitationPet Sibley and Fred Seacomb, both of whom are familiar to the readersof the earlier volumes of this series.

  They had been undecided where to go for the summer, when a friend ofMrs. Percival's told her of this grand "Excursion," which was to takeits patrons from sea to sea, up the coast of Alaska, and back by wayof Yellowstone Park, all within the space of seven weeks. Carefulinquiries satisfied Mr. Percival and his wife that this was just thetrip they were looking for; places were secured, and the start was nowfairly made, as we have seen.

  "Well, boys," remarked Mr. Percival, coming up at this moment, "haveyou found your berths yet?"

  "Not yet, father," said Tom, throwing his arm lovingly over the man'sbroad shoulder. They were very near to each other, these two, and thecompanionship of this long journey was destined to bring them togethermore closely than ever before.

  "Randolph, you and Tom are next to our drawing-room, on the 'starboard'side. Fred comes next, taking the upper berth at night. Some gentlemenin the party will probably occupy the lower one. Kittie and Bess aredirectly opposite, and Miss Pet will come next."

  "How nice! Then we're all together, right in this end of the car!"

  "O, dear! I wish we had Bert and Sue Martin with us this year!"lamented Kittie. "They would just fill those two odd berths, one oneach side."

  "Can't have 'em, Kit," replied her brother. "The whole family have goneout to Portland, Oregon, with their married sister. You know she andher husband are going to live there, where he is in business, and thatleft Bert and Sue here with only their grandmother."

  "We pass through Portland, I believe," added Mr. Percival, "on ourreturn trip. We'll drop in on them if we can, for a short call."

  By this time the train was running at full speed, and the young peoplebegan to explore their surroundings. The country through which theywere passing was so familiar that they found more objects of interestwithin the car than without.

  There were a dozen other passengers in the "Kamloops," all chatteringbriskly and settling themselves into the cosey quarters they were tocall home for the next ten days.

  Fred Seacomb, as usual, began making acquaintances at once. Beforethey reached Lowell he had raised an obstinate window for one ofhis nearest neighbors, had found a missing pair of spectacles for asweet-faced old lady not far away, and had pointed out various objectsof interest (though he knew less of them than any other member of hisparty) to a bashful boy and girl of about ten and twelve respectively,in the front seats.

  People began to glance to the Percival end of the car, and their facesrelaxed into genial smiles as Tom struck up "Annie Rooney," the restchiming in melodiously. Before long their company was increased bythe two occupants of the vacant berths. They introduced themselves asRev. Rossiter Selborne and his sister, Miss Adelaide Selborne. Theyoung clergyman could not have been over thirty; his sister, a tall,pale, timid girl, was apparently of about Kittie's age. The new-comerswere evidently painfully conscious of the questioning glances withwhich they were greeted, and were anxious not to intrude; Adelaide, inparticular, looking very shy and almost ready to cry when she saw whata large party she and her brother had unintentionally joined, and howthoroughly the others all knew one another.

  Mrs. Percival soon broke the ice, however, by inviting Mr. Selborneand his sister into her drawing-room for a call, and in anotherfifteen minutes they were swept into the current of song. The youngminister proved to have a fine baritone voice, and his sister soonwon popularity by remembering second verses which everybody else hadforgotten.

  "Weirs! Weirs!" shouted the conductor. And out flew the young folks tothe platform, only to be hustled back again, barely in time to missbeing left behind. The train was special, and took no passengers beyondthe favored hundred who constituted the Excursion.

  The shores of fair Winnepesaukee were soon left behind, and the traindrew up at the Pemigewasset House, in Plymouth.

  Up the long flight of steps they scrambled, "Tom leading the way, asusual," remarked dignified Fred, peering through his eyeglasses at theother's heels, far in advance.

  Down again to the train--how familiar and home-like the old "Kamloops"looks, already! "All aboard!" Hurrah! Off we go again! Singing oncemore--this time the "Soldier's Farewell"; Tom striking it a third toohigh, and going all to pieces on the second "Farewell"--on and on andon, faster and faster and faster, up the beautiful Passumpsic Valley,along the shores of Memphremagog.

  "Look!" cries Bess. "There's a shower on the hills!"

  The clouds hang, black and sullen, along the mountain-tops. Dash!comes the rain in long exclamation points all over the window-panes. Aglittering flash of lightning, trees bowing in the wind, rain pouringin torrents.

  Suddenly a brilliant light strikes again through the windows, restingon Pet's golden hair--not lightning this time, but the blessedsunshine, in long, slanting rays from the west. Even the boys catchtheir breath with delight and something like awe as they see the cloudsrolling away over the mountains.

  At about sunset, the principal "conductor" of the Excursion, whom wewill call Mr. Houghton--a jolly, good-natured gentleman, who won firstthe confidence and then the regard of his hundred charges, at thevery outset--came through the car announcing that at about half-pasteight they would be in Montreal, where the train would wait for themforty-eight hours, the next day being Sunday.

  In due time the cars thundered over the long steel bridge betweenCaughnawaga and Lachine, the lights of Montreal twinkled out of thedarkness, and our friends were soon on their way to the Windsor, wherethey were to spend the next two days.

  Sunday was as fair as the most exacting traveler could wish. The largeparty scattered during the forenoon, most of them going to church.Randolph and Tom, with the girls, left the hotel early and walked for amile or more through the streets of the city.

  There were many French inhabitants, as the shop signs showed. In alittle common, they saw the sign, "_N'allez pas sur le gazon_"--apolite way of putting our familiar "Keep off the grass." The names ofthe streets carried them back to old times, when the whole province washeld by France--"_Ste. Monique_," "_Ste. Genevieve_," etc. Funny littlemilk carts went bobbing along over the rough pavements, and funnylittle babies toddled along the uneven board sidewalks.

  Their walk soon brought them to a lofty granite building with twosquare towers--the cathedral of Notre Dame.

  People were flocking in at the doors, and the young Americans went withthem.

  It was like entering a great, dimly-lighted cavern. All the walls andpillars and ceiling were glowing with soft, dark crimson and goldencolors. The church was crowded with worshipers, not only on the mainfloor, but in two immense galleries, one above the other. At thefurther end was the high altar and the figure of the crucified Saviour,beneath which the priests were conducting the service of the RomanCatholic Church. One could just hear their deep voices, mingling withthe music of the choir and organ.

  In front of the travelers was a swarthy Indian, with long, glossy blackhair. Little children knelt on the marble pavement in the midst of thecrowd. Members of wealthy French families passed down the aisle totheir pews. All around were poor people, many of them following theservice with their prayer-books.

  Leaving Notre Dame, the Percivals turned their steps to St. George'sChurch near the hotel, where there was an Episcopal service, and agood sermon by a bluff, hearty Scotchman, one of whose phrases clung toTom's memory for many a day.

  "If you know of anything you ought to do," said the good rector, "don'tsit down and think about it, but do ut!"

  "'Do ut!'" repeated Tom to himself as he left the church with the rest."That's a good motto for me, any way. 'Do ut!'"

  A quiet drive around Mount Royal--giving them a glorious view ofMontreal--filled the afternoon.

  As they looked down on the multitude of roofs and steeps, Mr. Percivalreminde
d them that it was the chief city of Canada, with a populationabout half as large as that of Boston. In 1535 it was a little Indianvillage called Hochelaga, which was in that year visited by JacquesCartier. Two hundred and fifty years ago, the French established atrading-post here, and its business has grown, until to-day its docksare lined with warehouses, its river front shows the black hulls ofgreat ocean steamers, and railroads converge from east, west and south.

  We will close this first chapter with an extract from Kittie's letterto Susie Martin, written late Monday afternoon.

  MONTREAL, _July 21, 18--_.

  DEAR SUE:

  Bess has written you about our starting away from Boston day before yesterday, and the splendid ride we had, and the showers, and everything. We are getting to like that quiet Mr. Selborne a good deal. His sister is dreadfully afraid of everything, and keeps saying, "O, Ross!" whenever he does anything out of the primmest kind of behavior. I guess we girls shock her awfully; but perhaps she needs electricity treatment; she isn't strong, you know, poor thing.

  This afternoon we all went out to Lachine in a queer little train of cars, and then went on board a big steamer for the return trip down the river. Such a scramble for good places! It was really wonderful, dear, going down those rapids. You felt the great ship settle under your feet, and once we headed so straight for a rock in the middle of the river that I said "Ow!" right out loud. The other passengers didn't laugh much, either, and even Tom, poor fellow, really looked white.

  Well, we have repacked our trunks which we sha'n't open again until we reach some sort of a queer place called Banff, next Saturday. We go on board our train again at half-past seven. Bess and I are expecting lots of fun in our compartment. I do hope we shall see you in Portland....

  Affectionately, KITTIE M. PERCIVAL.