peeped into this part of the country, and many of the explorations and surveys were of the most extended nature; but, at about the time of which I speak, the knowledge of the inland passage to the bulk of the people, even in these parts so near to it, was nearly as musty as the old volumes on the library shelves that gave the most information. In fact, but little knowledge or interest was to be found regarding these parts. Their history of development from that embryonic state where everything told is regarded as bordering on the mythical, to where a line of ocean steamers visits them with crowded passenger lists, is the usual history of such developments. The inland passage to Alaska may be said to practically extend from Tacoma, in Washington Territory, at the head of Puget Sound, to Chilkat, Alaska, at the head of Lynn Channel, a distance of nearly 1,100 miles, where the tourist taking a sea voyage has high shores in close proximity on either side of him, except a few places here and there, where a short communication with the ocean outside is to be had. But this "inland passage," so called, is not the only one leading between the points named. It is, rather, a Broadway in New York City, a Pennsylvania avenue in Washington, State street in Chicago,--i. e., the main way; but every few miles a vessel could turn off down another passage as readily as a pedestrian or vehicle could down a side street, and, continuing a short way, return to the main thoroughfare again. Probably all the channels and straits and sounds and inlets in this part of Alaska, British Columbia and Washington Territory, susceptible of navigation by fair-sized ocean and river steamers, and all of them connecting with each other in a perfect network of waterways, would, if placed end to end, reach from a quarter to a third of the way around the world. Many of them are so illy charted--or not charted at all--that no craft of value would trust herself to follow their courses, while some of the smaller ways, but probably none the less picturesque, have yet to bear the first white man on their bosom. The most picturesque of all the ways through this intricacy of picturesque channels has been selected, carefully surveyed, and experienced pilots conduct the vessels to and from Alaska on its waters. The whole length of the passage is heavily timbered with various kinds of pine, fir, hemlock, cedar and spruce. Here and there avalanches from the mountain tops have swept through the dense timber, like a sickle through so much grain; and, although in a few years the growth is restored, yet the varying shades of green in the old and new growth of trees, running in perpendicular stripes up the steep hillsides, plainly show the ancient and recent devastations. Prettily situated Indian villages dot the narrow, shelving shores at rare intervals along the passage; and, when these nomads of the Northwest are seen, which is not infrequent, the chances are more than