as left unused, but provision was made for all, and the
ship was well manned.

I was now much gratified to learn that there were many on board whom I
had met before; that the steward, stewardess and several of the waiters
had been on duty on the steamer "Bertha" during my trip out from Alaska
the fall before, while I was upon speaking terms with a dozen or more of
the passengers with whom I had traveled from the same place. Of
passengers we had, all told, four hundred and eighty-seven. Of these
thirty-five were women. There was only one child on board, and that was
the little black-eyed girl with her Eskimo mother and white father from
Golovin Bay whom I had seen at St. Michael some months before, and who
was now going back to her northern home. She wore a sailor suit of navy
blue serge, trimmed with white braid, and was as coy and cunning as
ever, not speaking often to strangers, but laughing and running away to
her mother when addressed.

From the day we sailed from San Francisco until we reached Nome I missed
no meals in the dining salon, a pace which my English friends and others
could not follow, for they were uncomfortably ill in the region of their
digestive apparatus for several days. I slept for hours each day and
thoroughly enjoyed the trip.

During the nine days' sail from San Francisco to Unalaska, a distance of
two thousand three hundred and sixty-eight miles, I studied well the
passengers. We had preachers on board, as well as doctors, lawyers,
merchants and miners, and there were women going to Nome to start eating
houses, hotels and mercantile shops. There were several Swedish
missionaries; one, a zealous young woman from San Francisco, going to
the Swedish Mission at Golovin Bay.

This young person was pretty and pleasant, and I was glad to make her
acquaintance as well as that of three other women speaking the same
tongue and occupying the next stateroom to mine. The last named were
going to start a restaurant in Nome. As they were sociable, jolly, and
good sailors for the most part, I enjoyed their society. They had all
lived in San Francisco for years, and though not related to each other,
were firm friends of long standing and were uniting their little
fortunes in the hope of making greater ones.

The young missionary was a friend to the other three, and I found no
better or more congenial companions on board the ship than these four
honest, hard-working women, so full of hope, courage and good