e hopelessly bored passengers in the _Hannah_,
for it meant the end of another stage in this wearisome journey.

[Footnote 74: In 1901 the diggings around Circle City produced about
L30,000.]

There is nothing exciting or even picturesque about a modern Alaskan
mining camp. Bowlers and loud checks have superseded the red flannel
shirt and sombrero, and while missions and libraries abound, Judge Lynch
and the crack of a six-shooter are almost unknown in these townships,
the conventional security of which would certainly have amazed and
disgusted the late Bret Harte. When last I travelled down the Yukon,
Circle City (now called Silent City) was known as the "Paris of Alaska,"
and there was certainly more gaiety, or rather life, of a tawdry,
disreputable kind here than at Forty Mile, the only other settlement of
any size on the river, for Klondike was not then in existence. Circle
City could then boast of two theatres, a so-called music hall, and
several gambling and dancing saloons, which, together with other dens of
a worse description, were now silent heaps of grass-grown timber. In
those days the dancing rooms were crowded nightly, and I once attended a
ball here in a low, stuffy apartment, festooned with flags, with a
drinking bar at one end. The orchestra consisted of a violin and guitar,
the music being almost drowned by a noisy crowd at the bar, where a
wrangle took place on an average every five minutes. One dollar was
charged by the saloon-keeper for the privilege of a dance with a gaily
painted lady (of a class with which most mining camps are only too
familiar), who received twenty-five cents as her share of the
transaction. The guests numbered about sixty, and about a third that
number of dogs which had strayed in through the open doorway. When an
attendant (in shirt-sleeves) proceeded to walk round and sprinkle the
rough boards with resin, the dancers fairly yelled with delight, for a
hungry cur closely followed him, greedily devouring the stuff as it
fell! But although in those days the Yukon gold-digger was as tough a
customer as ever rocked a cradle in the wildest days of Colorado, there
was a rough and friendly _bonhomie_ amongst the inhabitants of Circle
City which is now lacking in the Klondike metropolis.

Between Rampart and Circle Cities we experienced an annoyance almost as
great as that caused by the mosquitoes, in the shape of clouds of
pungent smoke caused by forest fires. In these densely wood