temples in his destruction of many of the Greek and Roman cities. His victories in the western part of the Roman Empire paved the way for

the conquest of the Romans in the Iberian peninsula and the founding of the Visigothic kingdom in Spain. See VISIGOTHS.

LAS'KA, the largest outlying possession of the United States, and its only continental possession in North America. Its area is 590,884 square miles, about one-sixth of the area of the United States proper; this is more than twice the area of Texas and slightly less

than the combined area of Alberta and British Columbia. It is a more or less regular rectangular mass, approximately 800 miles long and wide, with long, narrow extensions to the .southeast and to the southwest. Its coast line is 8,000 miles long, more than that of the entire Atlantic coast of the United States.

LOCATION MAP

Showing size with respect to the entire continent of North America.

In 1867 the United States bought Alaska from Russia for $7,200,000. This purchase was bitterly opposed by many prominent men, but was vigorously defended by others. The region had formerly been called Russian America, but Senator Charles Sumner suggested a new name, Alaska. The word is an English corruption of the native Aleut Al-ay-ek-sa, meaning great land or mainland, which was applied somewhat vaguely to the entire region, but more particularly to the long, narrow strip now known as the Alaska Peninsula.

Location. Alaska is still regarded by many people as a land of gold, fur seals, snow and ice. This popular conception is true, but it is only part of the truth. It is no more a polar country than are Norway and Sweden, which lie in almost the same latitude. Point Bar

row, the northernmost point of Alaska, is more than 1,200 miles from the North Pole, about the same distance from it as is the North Cape; and the southernmost point of the mainland is in the latitude of Glasgow and Moscow. Its location in an east-and-west line is little appreciated, for it lies far to the west of the United States. Its easternmost point is 700 miles west of San Francisco, and the westernmost point of the Aleutian Islands is in the longitude of New Zealand.

Alaska is itself a vast peninsula, but the name Alaska Peninsula is restricted to the extension in the southwest, beyond which lie the Aleutian Islands. These islands, together with the Commander Islands, which extend seaward from Siberia, form the line between Bering Sea and the Pacific Ocean. The northern shores of Alaska are washed by the Arctic Ocean. On the southeast are the islands of the Alexander Archipelago and a long strip of the mainland, which extends southward to the parallel of 54° 41' N. and shuts off nearly half of British Columbia from the Pacific Ocean.

Physical Characteristics. Alaska is divided into four parts, each of which has individualities of surface and climate. These divisions are described below.

(1) Pacific Coast. Practically the entire southern coast, from the westernmost of the Aleutian Islands to the Portland Canal, is mountainous. The coast is not unlike that of Norway, cut by many rocky fiords and straits, and its rugged beauty is the delight of thousands of visitors. Between the mountains and the sea is only a narrow ledge or shelf, and in many places the mountains rise abruptly from the water's edge to a height of 15,000 feet or more. There are many islands along the coast, the largest of which are Kodiak, in the southwest, and Baranof, Prince of Wales, Chichagof and Admiralty, in the southeast.

This remarkably picturesque region is composed of four connected mountain chains,

which vary from 50 to 200 miles in width. The long strip between British Columbia and the sea, which is called Southeast Alaska, or the Panhandle, has the Coast Range. This has no well-defined watershed, but has many peaks from 5,000 to 8,000 feet high. The Alexander Archipelago is the remains of a separate, partly submerged chain of mountains, but is usually included in the Coast Range. North of the Chilkat River and Cross Sound is the Saint Elias Range, which has its western end in the Kenai Peninsula. This range has many famous peaks-Mount Fairweather (15,290 feet), Mount Vancouver (15,666 feet), Mount Wrangell, an active volcano (17,500 feet), and Mount Saint Elias (18,024 feet), whose summit is on the international boundary. The Panhandle and the Saint Elias Range have thousands of glaciers, which fill the upper valleys. Many of them reach to the sea, into which they discharge huge icebergs, and perhaps a hundred or more are separated from the coast only by a terminal moraine (see GLACIER). The greatest of all these glaciers is the Malaspina, whose area is nearly one-tenth that of all Switzerland, but the best known is probably the Muir Glacier (both of which see).

The third of the Pacific ranges is the Aleutian, the backbone of the Alaska Peninsula. It ends in the partly sunken Aleutian Islands (which see). The Alaska Range lies a little farther inland, and like the Aleutian Range, has a number of active volcanoes. Its southern end is not noteworthy but in the north it culminates in Mount McKinley (which see), the loftiest peak in North America.

2. The Central Plateau, or Continental Alaska. North and east of the coast mountains is a vast plateau, almost the whole of which is included in the basin of the Yukon River. Only a low watershed divides the Yukon basin from the Kuskokwim, the second river in size. The plateau extends practically across the territory from east to west and has an average width of 200 miles. Near the base of the mountains it has an elevation of 4,000 to 5,000 feet, but gradually declines to 1,000 feet, near Bering Sea. Much of the country is a rolling plain, cut into many tablelands by the deep, broad valleys of the rivers.

3. The Rocky Mountains. East and north of the central plateau are the Rocky Mountains. On the east they lie almost wholly in Canada, but near the Arctic Ocean the range

turns at right angles. It extends westward and southwestward in two parallel chains called the Endicott Range. As they approach the ocean

COMPARATIVE AREAS

Maps drawn to the same scale show the surprising extent of Alaska's domain.

on the west these two chains separate, the northern being known as the De Long Mountains, and the southern as the Baird Mountains.

4. The Arctic Slope. North of the Endicott Range is the only true Arctic section of Alaska. Its southern part, a belt about eighty miles wide, is a plateau, with a maximum altitude of 2,500 feet near the foothills of the mountains. In the north the plateau ends abruptly, and beyond lies an uninteresting coastal plain which extends to the Arctic Ocean. Neither the plateau nor the coastal plain has yet been fully explored.

Climate. The great differences in the character of the surface have an important influence on the climate, and consequently on the plant and animal life. Only in the northern fourth or possibly third is the climate distinctly Arctic. Except for about two months in midsummer, the Arctic Ocean is closed by ice, and the average annual temperature is 24° F. below freezing, or 8° above zero. On the Arctic coast rainfall is only eight to ten inches a year, but along Bering Sea it is from twenty to thirty inches.

The interior has less rainfall and great extremes of temperature. At Eagle, near the Canadian boundary, temperature of 90° F. in summer and -76° F. in winter are not rare. Throughout the basin of the Yukon, the first of October marks approximately the beginning of winter. The snowfall is heavy, and from December to March the average temperature is -20° F. In May the rivers thaw, and summer comes quickly in June. The Alaska summer is a season of almost unbroken daylight. The sun shines brilliantly for eighteen to

twenty hours a day, and in the remaining hours there is twilight. Clouds are practically unknown. Even in summer, however, the nights are cool, and frosts in July are not uncom

mon.

The climate in the coast regions is far different. Southeast Alaska has a temperate climate, like that of the coast of Northwestern United States, and the thermometer seldom registers higher than 75° or lower than zero. The moist winds from the southwest bring abundant rains along the coast and heavy snows on the south slopes of the mountains. The rainfall averages more than ninety inches a year, and even when there is no rain there are heavy fogs. At the western end of the Aleutian Islands it rains or snows most of the timeaccording to one observer at least on five days in each week. The southern part of Bering Sea is always foggy, but to the north the moisture in the air rapidly decreases.

Animal and Plant Life. The animal life of Alaska includes an astonishing variety of mammals, birds, insects and other classes. In the interior swarms of flies, mosquitoes and gnats make life miserable during the summer months. Moose are still seen occasionally in the forests, and deer are found in the southeast. Caribou were formerly plentiful, and before the coming of the white man constituted almost the sole support of the natives. Their meat was food; their skins were made into clothing, and their bones into needles and other simple tools. The destruction of the caribou herds by the white man finally threatened starvation for the In

thrive and in part, at least, solve the problem of food and clothing; they now number about 50,000 (see REINDEER). Among the smaller animals are wolves, foxes, beavers, weasels and minks. The ptarmigans are plentiful, and eagles are common along the Atlantic coast. Each animal here named is described elsewhere under its title.

Fisheries. It is the marine animals, however, which are of the greatest economic importance, especially the fur seal and the salmon. The home of the fur seal (which see) is the Pribilof Islands, and the value of the seal skins taken from these islands has already reached a total of more than six times the price paid by the United States for the whole of Alaska. So rapidly did the sealing industry grow that the extinction of the herd was threatened (see BERING SEA CONTROVERSY). In April, 1910, the

THE FARM Potatoes

was built in 1878; since then the industry has steadily increased until the annual catch is worth about $20,000,000. The total value of the salmon catch from 1868 to 1915, inclusive, was about $200,000,000, nearly thirty times the original cost of Alaska. The catch of cod shows little variation from year to year, but the catch of herring and halibut is steadily increasing. The young herring are packed, chiefly at Juneau, as sardines.

Plant Life. The plant life of Alaska does not show as great variety as the animal life. The Pacific coastal region, especially in the southeast, has rich forests of hemlock, spruce and red cedar, with considerable willow and cottonwood. Probably the most characteristic Alaskan tree is the tide-land, or Sitka, spruce. The interior has extensive areas of black and white spruce, poplar, white birch and alder.

Hay,Forage

Sundry Vegetables

Milk, Cream

Eggs

Cabbage

Animals sold,slaughtered

Butter

Berries

Silver Copper

A Gold

THE FACTORY

Lumber, Timber

Salmon canned

15

United States cancelled all existing leases under which seal fisheries were operated, and in 1912 entirely prohibited the killing of seals for a period of five years after January 1, 1913. The sea-otter and the walrus were formerly plentiful, but are now nearly extinct.

The whaling industry is no longer as important as in the early part of the nineteenth century, because the whales are fewer and keep to the north. The natives occasionally kill a whale for blubber, but the commercial importance of the animal is due to the baleen, or whale bone.

Of the fishes taken in Alaska waters the most important are herring, cod, halibut, and most valuable of all, salmon. The largest salmon fishery in the world is on Kodiak Island, on the Karluk River. The Nushagak River and Bristol Bay form another great salmon fishingground. The first salmon cannery in Alaska

With care the stand of timber should always be abundant for local uses, but in the past lumbering has been so carelessly done that the government has felt it necessary to create two forest reserves. The Tongass National Forest includes Southeast Alaska, and the Chugach National Forest extends from Cook Inlet to Controller Bay.

The remainder of Alaska has few trees. Near the Arctic Circle the willows become mere shrubs two or three feet high, and all other trees are gnarled and small. Grasses are abundant in many sections, but the most distinctive features of the plant life are the mosses, which cover one-fourth of all Alaska. These vary in color from pure white to deep brown and green. The tundras, which include the coastal region from the Aleutian Islands northward to Point Barrow and eastward to the Canadian boundary, are covered with

A SMILING GARDEN IN ALASKA.

As far north as Fairbanks, where this picture was taken, gardens are common, even though the growing season is short. Fairbanks is over 350 miles from the tempering winds of the ocean.