While he was resting I went
ahead, looking for the best way through the brush and rocks, then
returning, got him on his feet and made him lean on my shoulder while
I steadied him to prevent his falling. This slow, staggering struggle
from fire to fire lasted until long after sunrise. When at last we
reached the ship and stood at the foot of the narrow single plank
without side rails that reached from the bank to the deck at a
considerable angle, I briefly explained to Mr. Young's companions,
who stood looking down at us, that he had been hurt in an accident,
and requested one of them to assist me in getting him aboard. But
strange to say, instead of coming down to help, they made haste to
reproach him for having gone on a "wild-goose chase" with Muir.
"These foolish adventures are well enough for Mr. Muir," they said,
"but you, Mr. Young, have a work to do; you have a family; you have a
church, and you have no right to risk your life on treacherous peaks
and precipices."
The captain, Nat Lane, son of Senator Joseph Lane, had been swearing
in angry impatience for being compelled to make so late a start and
thus encounter a dangerous wind in a narrow gorge, and was
threatening to put the missionaries ashore to seek their lost
companion, while he went on down the river about his business. But
when he heard my call for help, he hastened forward, and elbowed the
divines away from the end of the gangplank, shouting in angry
irreverence, "Oh, blank! This is no time for preaching! Don't you see
the man is hurt?"
He ran down to our help, and while I steadied my trembling companion
from behind, the captain kindly led him up the plank into the saloon,
and made him drink a large glass of brandy. Then, with a man holding
down his shoulders, we succeeded in getting the bone into its socket,
notwithstanding the inflammation and contraction of the muscles and
ligaments. Mr. Young was then put to bed, and he slept all the way
back to Wrangell.
In his mission lectures in the East, Mr. Young oftentimes told this
story. I made no record of it in my notebook and never intended to
write a word about it; but after a miserable, sensational caricature
of the story had appeared in a respectable magazine, I thought it but
fair to my brave companion that it should be told just as it happened.
Chapter V
A Cruise in the Cassiar
Shortly after our return to Wrangell the missionaries planned a grand
mission excursion up the coast of the mainland to the Chilcat
country, which I gladly joined, together with Mr. Vanderbilt, his
wife, and a friend from Oregon.
