Letter from [John Muir] to [Louie Strentzel Muir], 1881 Jun 21.

• Main Author: John Muir
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: Scholarly Commons 1881
• Subjects: John Muir; correspondence; letters; author; writing; naturalist; California; correspondent; mail; message; post; exchange of letters; missive; notes; epistle; Arctic; Indian; Plover Bay; Yukon; Ermine; Moose
• Online Access: https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/jmcl/10651; https://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/context/jmcl/article/35584/type/native/viewcontent/fullsize.jpg

[2] 01014When we were still 50 miles from here a linnet came to meet us & flew about the rigging & then a heavy burly bumblebee as if to tell us about the sunlight & guide us to it in safety. On the day of our arrival from [Plover?] [Bay?] a little steamer came into the harbor from the upper Yukon towing three large boats loaded with traders Indians & furs All the furs they had gathered during the winter. We went across to the store room of the company to see them, a queer lot they were whites & Indians as they unloaded their furs. It was worth while to look at the furs too Big bundles of bear skins brown & black, wolf, fox, beaver, marten, ermine, moose wolverine wild cats many of them with claws spread & hair on end as if still alive & fighting for their lives. Some of the Indian chiefs the wildest animals of all, & the more notable of the traders not at all wild sane in dress but rather gentle & refined in [in margin: 1000 miles on [this?][steamer?] whenever I like, & his wife a nice lady sends you an invitation to come & make your home here while I am away] until far down between the rocking tussocks This covering is composed of a plush of mosses chiefly sphagnum about 8 inches on a foot deep resting on ice that never melts, with about half of the surface of the moss is covered with white & yellow & red & gray lichens & the other half is planted more or less with grasses sedges heathwarts & creeping willows & a flowering plant here & there such as prinula & purple spiked pedicularis. Out in this grand solitude,-solitary as far as man is concerned – we met a great many of the arctic grouse, ptarmigan cackling & screaming at our approach like old laying hens, also plovers snipes curlews sand pipers loons in ponds, & ducks & geese & finches & wrens about the crater & rocks at its base; We leave here for another cruise in the Arctic this evening hoping to return to this point in time to send letters by the ...