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A quick change of boats at Juneau had raised their spirits, enabling them to complete the second stage of their journey in less than the expected time, and the southward run, out from the breath of the Arctics into a balmier climate, had removed nearly the last trace of their suffering from the frost.

In a row, against the opposite wall, were the gambling games. The crap-table was deserted. One lone man was playing at the faro-table. The roulette-ball was not even spinning, and the gamekeeper stood by the roaring, red-hot stove, talking with the young, dark-eyed woman, comely of face and figure, who was known from Juneau to Fort Yukon as the Virgin.

"There's where you're mistaken, my friends; I haven't had anything to eat for two days, and when a stranger offered me a swallow of whiskey to keep up my strength, I took it, as a medicine. If it hadn't been for that, I'd have flunked right in the street sure as you live. What are you doing, if I may ask, in Juneau?"

"'Never, she said, and her eyes looked into mine with the straightness of truth. 'I had one husband, only him I call the Ox; and I reckon he's still down in Juneau running the hash-joint. Look him up, if you ever get back, and you'll find he's rightly named. "And look him up I did, two years afterward. He was all she said solid and stolid, the Ox shuffling around and waiting on the tables.

At the doorway, as we passed it, was posted a hand-lettered placard announcing that the ladies of Juneau would on the evening in question give a grand ball in honor of the passengers of the Ancon. Tickets, 50 cents. It began to drizzle. We dodged under the narrow awnings of the shops, and bargained blindly in the most unmusical lingos.

We saw it sail away erratically, as though its pilot no longer had it under control. Then it suddenly burst into flame and came quivering down in a long, lengthening spiral of smoke. That night the second of the meteors landed on the earth. It fell near Juneau, Alaska, and was accompanied by the same phenomena as the one we were watching.

Why" he drew in a deep breath "it's nine times as large as the state of Washington, twelve times as big as the state of New York, and we bought it from Russia for less than two cents an acre. If you put it down on the face of the United States, the city of Juneau would be in St. Augustine, Florida, and Unalaska would be in Los Angeles.

I've sent word to Tim that I'll be at Juneau by next steamer, and have two of the likeliest younkers with me on the coast; then we'll head for the Upper Yukon, and bime-by hire a ship to bring back all the gold we'll scoop in." "It seems to me that we have nothing to do in the premises, Jeff." "Nothing 'cept to git the youngster ready."

We gotta pick up a couple o' A.B.'s in Juneau, if so be we can." "How about the loot?" objected Strokher. "If one of those hands gets between decks he might smell a sea-otter, now. I put it to you he might." "My son," said Hardenberg, "I've handled A.B.'s before;" and that settled the question.

Later it was called Rockwell and Harrisburg; and finally Juneau, the name it still bears with more or less dignity.