Volume 2 - ElectricCanadian.com

176 HISTORY OF THE BANKbecame adequate and creditable. After a few years theroyalty on gold was decreased to five per cent, and eventuallyabolished altogether, an export duty of two and a hah* percent, being substituted for it.In the summer of 1898 indignation mass meetings werefrequently held in the streets of Dawson. Australians, SouthAfricans and Englishmen were more prominent as agitatorsthan were the Canadians or the Americans. Up to a certainpoint the police would refrain from interfering. If that pointwas passed, however, a constable or two would shoulder a waythrough the crowd and give the excited orator advice thatcalmed his ardour. Failing to effect this, they would dispersethe meeting without difficulty, such was the power of therecord behind them.On the creeks and in the mines the same steady trendtowards improvement was exhibited. Out of trails that hadbeen quagmires, in which many a poor horse or mule hadbeen badly "staked," were evolved creditable roads. Theground in Dawson and on the creeks is workable withoutartificial heat to the depth of only a foot or a foot and a hah*below the surface; beyond that it is frozen solid and is impenetrableto the pick. At first wood fires were used to thaw thisgranite-like earth, and then the thawed dirt was excavated,this process being continued until a shaft had been sunk tobed-rock. Then the same method was used, to "drift" orburrow into the earth away from the shaft, a wooden windlassand bucket, worked by man-power, being used to hoist thedirt to the surface and establish a "dump." On the creekclaims bed-rock was reached at a depth of from twelve tothirty feet, but on some of the deepest hillside claims it didnot occur for sixty feet or a little over. There were, of course,exceptional claims of even greater depth. All supplies had tobe carried in on a man's back, or hauled by hand on a sledover the winter trail, unless the miner was able to have thembrought in by dogs, horses or mules. Wood for fires had to becut on the hills and hauled to the claim; a great deal was