CHINA. 285

upon the birds at this season, gathering the
eggs, knocking down the young birds with
great sticks and feasting to their full con-
tent.
point of the United States, during a few

At Point Barrow, the most northern

days in July we found buttercups, dande-
lions and poppies sending forth their ten-
der blossoms, and even golden butterflies
floating in the chill air. As we ascended
the Yukon river, its yellow, muddy waters
often clogged the boilers of the steamer,
and we were obliged to stop until they could
be cleaned. The banks are covered with
wild roses, blue grass and other plants, but
the enormous, poisonous mosquitoes com-
pelled us to stay on board at alltimes. For
1,300 miles we ascended the river to the
gold fields of the upper Yukon, where our
journey ended. Of life in the gold regions

it need only be said that the small amount

 

of gold secured afforded but small compen-
sation for the hardship endured and we were
glad enough to avail ourselves of the first
opportunity to get back to Sitka.

_The mountains which lie back of the city
afford an ever-changing scene to the citi-
zens of the town. They are northerly ex-
tensions of the Cascades of our western
coast, culminating in ice-clad towering
peaks with an altitude of from 1,200 to 20,-
000 feet, and sending off spurs which are as
Mt. St. Elias, with its

summit 14,000 feet above the sea, lies some

yet unexplored.

two hundred and fifty miles to the north-
west, but time would not permit us to visit
it, as the steamer was just ready to sail for
Portland, which was reached in the latter
part of October, satisfied at last that I had
visited the land which seemed so delightful

on the hot summer days so long ago.”

CHINA.

+

OTHE boy who is not interested in the
| “Heathen Chinee” is rather rare in
these days, and we wonder if a trip
through Chinatown would not afford us
some instruction and possibly some amuse-
ment as well. We can nearly all of us re-
member the pictures in the old geography
labeled: ‘‘ Chinese selling rats and puppies
for pies.” The mind pictures a Chinaman

with the ever-present bamboo over his

 

shoulder and the wares of his trade dangling
therefrom. This picture has given every
boy his first impression of the everyday life
of the Chinese. The Chinaman in America
does not differ so much from the Chinaman
on his native soil. The Chinese have gath-
ered in one part of San Francisco, and that
is called Chinatown. Its great alleys, opi-
um dens, its variety of stores, shops, gro-

ceries, its places of amusement and of wor-