ELEVEN YEARS IN THE YUKON.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 53, 20 July 1912, Page 1 (Supplement)

ELEVEN YEARS IN THE YUKON.

DANCING IX DAWSON CITY. j li'rom 1808 to 1909—eleven years—the j Hon. Stratford Tollemache, as he tells us i in his "Reminiscences of the Yukon," was employed in mining and trapping in the Yukon. He was in the midst of the great gold rush, and lie gives many interesting pictures of the Klondyke craze, its humors and its tragedies. He was in Dawson City in the summer of 1898, with its thirty thousand inhabitants, mostly under canvas. There is no one so free with his money as the gold-miner, and • sometimes a man would squander in the course of a single evening the proceeds I of months of hard and dangerous labor,, amounting to thousands of dollars. The cost of a very simple evening's amuse--1 inent in Dawson was considerable. The j main street was lined with shops and restaurants, and saloons abounded —all : temptations to the men with gold dust or nuggets. There were several dance-halls in the place, all of which were well patronised, each dance-hall possessing a primitive sort of band, and from ten to twenty 1 girls. Dancing commenced about 8 p.m., ] and continued till about six o'clock in the morning. Waltzes, interspersed with "kitchen lancers," were usually played, I while one dollar was the recognised price j for each dance, the owner of the hall I taking care that the dances were extremely short, so that as many dollars as possible might be collected. A drinking bar was attached to the place, and after each dance the man was expected ! to escort his .partner to the bar and buy a drink for her and for himself, which cost one dollar more. The girls were paid fifty dollars, or £lO a week, by the owner of the dancehall, while many of ! them received valuable presents in the shape of gold nuggets from different admirers. Introductions were unnecessary as anyone was entitled to ask a girl for a dance who was not engaged, and she was not allowed by the management to refuse. In those clays the slightest rumor of a ■ cold find would cause streams of men to stampede out of Dawson, and wily steam- ' boat owners or the proprietors of wayi side road-houses (primitive inns) were not above circulating such rumors and benefiting immensely from the increased 1 business that resulted. Occasions } some wary and experienced old miner would steal out of the city at night with dof-sledges containing his provisions and equipment; but he was sure to be seen bv someone, and in the morning he would find behind him a trail of prospectors who, assuming from the secrecy of his departure that he had "struck it ncli, had followed.