"Many people have an idea that Dawson City is completely isolated and can communicate with the outside world only once in every twelve months. That is a big mistake, however. Circle City, only a few miles away, has a mail once each month, and there we have our mail addressed. It is true the cost is pretty high, $1 a letter and two for a paper; yet by that expenditure of money we are able to keep in direct communication with our friends on the outside. "In the way of public institutions our camp is at present without any, but by next season we will have a church, a music hall, a schoolhouse and a hospital. The last institution will be under direct control of the Sisters of Mercy, who have already been stationed for a long time at Circle City and Forty-Mile Camp. "Nearly a score of children were in Dawson City when I left, so I donated a lot and $100 for a school. No one can buy anything on credit in Dawson. It is spot cash for every one, and payment is always gold dust. Very few have any regular money." All experts estimate that the minimum supply of provisions which a man should take to Klondyke is 1,000 pounds, though several say they wouldn't venture in without at least one ton, as the season over the Juneau route closes up by September 15. The rush promises to be unprecedented, and a large number of prospectors, after being landed at Juneau, will find it impossible to get their supplies transported. Like all other great mining rushes, this promises to be full of disappointments. A new route to the Klondyke will be opened next spring. It is overland from Juneau to Fort Selkirk, on the Yukon, and is entirely by land. Captain Goodall, of the Pacific Coast Steamship Company, inspected it this Summer, and reported it practicable. It is about 700 miles long, and it crosses the divide over Chilkat Pass, which is lower and more easily crossed than the Chilkoot Pass. No lakes or rivers are on the route, but the trail runs over a high level prairie. Old Pioneer Dalton, after whom the trail is named, is now driving a band of sheep on the trail to Dawson City, where he expects to arrive in August, with fresh meat for the miners. This Dalton trail is well adapted for driving stock, but for men the tramp is too long. "Dawson is not like most of the mining camps. It is not a 'tough' town. Murders are almost unknown. "The miners are a quiet and peaceable kind of men, who have gone there to work, and are willing that everybody else shall have an equal chance with themselves. A great deal of gambling is done in the town, but serious quarrels are an exception. As a gambling town I think it is equal to any that I have ever seen; and this, by the way, is always the test of a mining camp's prosperity. Stud poker is the usual game. They play $100 and oftentimes $200 or $500 on the third card."