What wonderful eyes they must
have! Nothing that moves in all this icy wilderness escapes the eyes
of these brave birds. This is one of the loveliest mornings I ever
saw in Alaska; not a cloud or faintest hint of one in all the wide
sky. There is a yellowish haze in the east, white in the west, mild
and mellow as a Wisconsin Indian Summer, but finer, more ethereal,
God's holy light making all divine.
In an hour or so I came to the confluence of the first of the seven
grand tributaries of the main Muir Glacier and had a glorious view of
it as it comes sweeping down in wild cascades from its magnificent,
pure white, mountain-girt basin to join the main crystal sea, its
many fountain peaks, clustered and crowded, all pouring forth their
tribute to swell its grand current. I crossed its front a little
below its confluence, where its shattered current, about two or three
miles wide, is reunited, and many rills and good-sized brooks glide
gurgling and ringing in pure blue channels, giving delightful
animation to the icy solitude.
Most of the ice-surface crossed to-day has been very uneven, and
hauling the sled and finding a way over hummocks has been fatiguing.
At times I had to lift the sled bodily and to cross many narrow,
nerve-trying, ice-sliver bridges, balancing astride of them, and
cautiously shoving the sled ahead of me with tremendous chasms on
either side.
