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Shafer went with our first party as cook, and that leaves me with seventeen men to feed. I want to get in some collecting this fall and am willing to work hard now. Of course everyone of the party is industrious; we expected to work. The mosquitoes do not like me and so I have the advantage of the others. I keep a smudge burning in the tents so the boys may eat in peace.

Penelope Ship Yards, July 17.—Oh, how hot it is to-day! And the mosquitoes are rushing business, as if aware time is nearly up with them, I slept on shore last night. We had a small tent and banked it up all around tight, and then made a smudge and shut ourselves in. We killed all the mosquitoes in sight and finally got to bed for a good seven hours' sleep. There is plenty of driftwood along the beaches, and we shall not be obliged to draw on our supply of coal for a good while. Several tons of it is coming on the "Mermaid." The vessel has not yet arrived, neither have several others whose crews warned us before we left San Francisco last spring that we would not reach Kotzebue this year. And here we are a week ahead of them, and one party prospecting up the river already.