At the present time the Americans are taking their goods into the new country free of duty, and are making what purchases they need in Alaskan towns.

Prominent men in Canada are demanding that custom officials shall be placed at all the Canadian mountain passes.

It is expected that the taxing of the Americans will produce a large income for the Government.  One Canadian firm has offered $50,000 for the privilege of collecting the customs for ten years.

A cry has gone up that imposing duties on the miners will make their lot still harder than it is at present, but this will not be heeded.  Men who start out expecting to make a large fortune in a few months ought to be willing to pay handsomely for the privilege.

Besides establishing custom-houses, the Canadian Government is seriously discussing the idea of making foreign miners pay a heavy royalty for the right to work in the mines.

There was some talk of excluding aliens—­that is, all who are not British subjects—­from working on the gold-fields, and thus keeping the Canadian find for Canadians.

You remember the Kootenai matter (see page 850), and how the Canadian Government made it impossible for aliens to take up claims, and insisted that all mine owners must give up their citizenship in other countries and become British subjects.  There was some talk of doing the same thing at Klondike, but it was thought that such a course would make a great deal of trouble, and that it would be much simpler to force each man to pay a certain sum of money (fifty dollars a day has been suggested) for his right to work in the gold-fields.

It is strange how the search for gold brings envy, hatred, malice, and all uncharitableness in its train.

No sooner was gold discovered than Canada began to fret because America was profiting by it, and America began to fume because Canada wanted to make her profit out of the great find.

Ugly threats were made of what the American miners would do if Canada tried to make things hard for them.  In consequence the Secretary of War has been asked to establish a military post on the route to the gold-fields in Alaska, to protect the American miners if Canada interferes unreasonably with them.

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This seems to be a great year for the finding of gold.

A discovery has just been made in Trinity County, Cal., which leads people to hope that the mother lode of the Californian gold-fields has been found.

This main lode had been lost sight of north of El Dorado County, but its reappearance in Trinity has caused a great deal of excitement and turned many gold-seekers thither, in preference to the frozen Klondike region.  The first discovery of gold in California was made in what is now El Dorado County, and it was in consequence of the gold find that the county got its name.

El Dorado was the name of a mythical king, about whom the most astonishing stories were told.  He was supposed to be lord of a country where gold was as plentiful as dust.  It was in search of these golden lands that many of the famous discoverers undertook their voyages.