"Some day," the chief of the party said, "an enterprising man will start a big farm here, to supply the posts all along the Yukon with provisions, for which they now have to pay big prices on being brought by steamer all the way from Seattle. That man will make ten times as much money as any of the gold mine operators, and besides, will be living in security and comfort." They halted for the midday stop, a few miles above the junction of the Tanana with the Yukon, and about four o'clock the canoes shot into that great river of the north. Surprised as the boy had been at the size of the Alaskan rivers, he was by no means prepared for the body of water where the Tanana joins the Yukon. "Why," he said in amaze, "I had no idea it was as big as this." "Heap big river," commented Harry, who was in the stern. The chief was in the boat, and hearing the lad's exclamation he turned to him. "This is the fifth largest river in North America," he said. "What are the others, Mr. Rivers?" the boy asked. "The Mississippi comes first of course." "Yes, and then the Mackenzie, the Winnipeg, and the St. Lawrence, in that order. But the Yukon and the St. Lawrence are just about the same size." "Well," Roger said, "it certainly is big enough." Harry grunted. "Plenty big to paddle up," he said. Then the boy noticed for the first time that there was quite a current in the river and that it was necessary to paddle up against the stream instead of rushing down as they had been able to do on the Tanana, and he buckled to his work. But they had not been breasting the current for more than an hour when one of the men in the rear boat gave a shout and pointed down the stream. Every one looked, and there, far down, could be seen a faint smoke like that of a steamer. "That looks like a steamer's smoke," said the boy. "I wonder what it can be." "Why not a steamer?" queried Rivers. The boy looked bewildered. "I don't know why not," he said, laughing; "it just didn't occur to me that any people lived about here. Are there any steamers on the Yukon?" "Lots of them. There's quite a little traffic on the river and it is good for navigation for hundreds of miles, indeed, all the way to the Canadian boundary and above. Now you see, we will get this fellow, whoever he is, to take us up to Fort Hamlin. It's just as well to save one's strength when there is no need to exert it." So the canoes took it easily, just paddling along quietly, not trying to make much headway, but on the other hand, not drifting down the stream, and commenting on the approaching steamer, as soon as she came in sight. She was a small vessel, but quite trim and ship-shape, and to Roger's eyes had a curious look of being civilized and out of place in the environment.