. Alaska and the Klondike. er was over, but any officers whose presence was requiredin Juneau would be obliged to leave the Seward Peninsulabefore the freeze-up, about the 20th of October, and couldnot reach home again till the next summer. Still greater difficulties would lie in the w^ay of officerschosen from other sections. The telegraph line fromValdez to Eagle, and Rampart, and Ft. Gibbon, and , and Nome is now completed, and will bring theremote parts of this vast expanse closer together, in thesense of communication, but the difficulties of travel re-main and will till railroa
. Alaska and the Klondike. er was over, but any officers whose presence was requiredin Juneau would be obliged to leave the Seward Peninsulabefore the freeze-up, about the 20th of October, and couldnot reach home again till the next summer. Still greater difficulties would lie in the w^ay of officerschosen from other sections. The telegraph line fromValdez to Eagle, and Rampart, and Ft. Gibbon, and , and Nome is now completed, and will bring theremote parts of this vast expanse closer together, in thesense of communication, but the difficulties of travel re-main and will till railroads or wagon roads, the necessityof which has already been pointed out, are constructed. These facts of the remoteness of the different groups ofpopulation from each other without adequate means oftransportation are practical difficulties in the way of thesatisfactory operation of a territorial form of governmentwhich many of the people of Alaska duly recognise and onaccount of which they are willing to stand up among their. 254 ALASKA AND THE KLONDIKE clamorous friends who are eager for home rule, as theycall it, antl contend that the conditions are not ripe. The expression of sentiment varied according to Ketchikan to Skagway the predominating sentimentwas for territorial government; along the Yukon we heardalmost nothing said about it, at Nome opinion w^as dividedagain and was no doubt fairly represented in the vote ofthe citizens committee on the address presented to thesenatorial committee. That address, among other things,asked for territorial government, but the vote of the com-mittee on that proposition was 12 for to 11 against it. The Alaskans expect that country to become some partof the L^nited States, that several states will be carvedout of that great district which will be admitted to theUnion, and they talk that way. The Nome memorial soexpresses the hope of that community. They probably donot know it, but just that possibility is one thing w^hicliop
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