Jason's Gold

“Well, then, you’re going to see the elephant.”

In the boxcar in North Dakota, Jason converses with a man who panned for gold in the California rush of 1849. He refers to the quest for gold with this metaphor, but Jason does not understand that the man is disparaging the impulsive behavior of stampeders, himself and Jason included. This metaphorical tale highlights The Dangerous Allure of Wealth.

“Oh no, Jason thought. They couldn’t have. They wouldn’t. Surely they didn’t.”

In the novel’s first major complication, Jason learns that his brothers took his inheritance—the $500 left to him by his father that he planned to use to purchase an outfit and arrange packers to help carry the weighty supplies. His forward momentum stalls, but only temporarily; as a resourceful young man, he remains determined to head north even if it means unpaid passage on a steamer.

“There they were, rows upon rows of horses, stacked so closely that it would be impossible for them ever to lie down during the six-day voyage. And here were the ones who had it worst off, these closest to the heat and the clamor of the engine room. He watched for a minute. At every irregular or high-pitched sound amid the overall cacophony, they were thrown into a kicking, rearing, biting halter-jerking panic.”

Hobbs employs sensory imagery in this passage to convey the terrible sight of the crowded, scared horses in a hold on the steamer Yakima. Jason feels strong concern for them, pointing to his kindness and empathy. The plight of the horses and Jason’s concern for them also develop the theme of The Exploitative Nature of Greed. This passage also foreshadows the upcoming scenes on White Pass, where the abuse of horses continues.

“There are a thousand ways to separate a fool from his money once we know who has it and where he keeps it.”

Here, after Kid Barker cons a man and his wife into revealing the location of their savings (so that another man in the crew can pickpocket it), he reveals the role Jason is being tapped for among “Captain” Smith’s henchmen: Jason is to spread lies and fears about the availability of gold so that people will indicate where their cash is hidden. The word “fool” not only refers to those who will be robbed but also alludes to the idea of “fool’s gold,” the worthless metal that gold rushers mistook for gold. This passage therefore also implicates all the people who are leaving more comfortable lives in pursuit of gold that doesn’t exist.

“With no discussion, they headed directly toward the mounded outfits and started to shoulder the supplies to the canoes.”

Tlingit men, women, and children will pilot the dugout canoes bearing Jack, Jason, Captain Shepherd, the others, and all their supplies from Juneau to Dyea, and once arrived, up the Dyea River another five miles. In this scene in the novel, the Indigenous people express no emotion. The narrative suggests that many Indigenous people are arriving to help pack prospectors’ supplies and animals over the passes. This scene builds the theme of The Exploitative Nature of Greed, as the white prospectors think little of the impact on these families and their environment but are happy to hire them for service.

“In the chaos of all these shouting people, the mud and the rain and the dogs shaking themselves in his face, the scow pilot looked like Alaska’s version of Charon, sentenced to ferry people across the river to hell.”

This allusion helps to convey the tone of doom and destruction that accompanies descriptions of the steamers’ arrival in Dyea and Skagway. After leaving Jack London and his partners and before attempting to cross Chilkoot Pass, Jason observes panic, frustration, and anger all around him as he tries to get to shore. The allusion to Greek myth references the Charon, pilot of the ferry boat that crosses the River Acheron (or Styx, as it is named in some sources); Charon’s job is to help the dead leave the shores of the living and cross into Hades, a cold and joyless place to which all souls must go.

“Delays were frequent and endless. Mostly they waited, with no more consciousness than the tail end of a snake, not knowing what the front of the line was seeing or doing or when it might advance again, and them with it.”

This metaphor captures the ignorance of those waiting in standstills and bottlenecks along the trail to White Pass. Too many people, too heavy of outfits, too much rain, and too little planning contribute to frustratingly slow forward progress. Jason witnesses many stampeders too frustrated or angry to control their emotions; many, like Robinson and Bailey, depart in defeat. This imagery contributes to the theme of The Dangerous Allure of Wealth.

“The thorny part isn’t necessarily a bad thing.”

Jamie Dunavant offers this comment as Jason comes out of his food poisoning fugue. As a new character in the narrative introduced in this scene, Jamie is clever, spirited, confident, and caring—exactly what Jason’s exhausted, wounded spirit needs after witnessing the horrors of White Pass and experiencing terrible sickness. She refers here to Jason’s last name in a pun on “Hawthorn”; she means that Jason’s inner strength will serve him well. Her words also convey some of Jamie’s experience with the harshness of the Canadian interior. The comment foreshadows the prickliness Jason will learn to use in staving off future challenges.

“They ain’t only gone, kid, they’re halfway there by now. […] Those brothers of yours are at the head of this entire stampede, if that’s any consolation.”

The stampeder’s comment is deeply ironic; Jason feels no consolation at the thought of his brothers’ fortuitousness. Their fast passage out of Seattle and their excellent timing in arriving at Lake Bennett means that Jason is further behind them than he originally thought. Missing them after wasted days on White Pass is especially regrettable; Jason is astounded at his bad luck.

“The wind was out of the north, blowing against them. How was he going to get past the Yellow Legs?”

Jason is becoming more accustomed to thoughtful rather than rash choices, but he also knows himself well enough to realize that if he cannot make it to Dawson City before winter, he will certainly give up—there is no waiting listlessly until spring for him. Hobbs uses rhetorical questions in Jason’s interior monologue to build tension; Jason asks himself how to get out of sticky situations and learns to rely on himself for answers.

“It must be at least midnight. He could still see, so why stop? Once onto Marsh Lake, he made out the different camps of Klondikers by their white canvas tents. In the silence he floated past them. He was no longer the caboose on the last train trying to reach Dawson.”

Once the blustery conditions of Lake Bennett are behind him, Jason decides to take his canoe past Fort Sifton, the Mountie checkpoint, at night, thereby eluding the authorities who might turn him away for lack of food. This metaphor of a caboose sums up Jason’s victorious feeling as he and King cruise easily on the connecting waterway toward Marsh Lake. This momentary victory boosts Jason’s spirits; the confident tone highlights his emotions, elevating the story’s overall mood in this part of the narrative.

“Don’t lose any strokes with that paddle of yours until you get past Laberge. I’m counting on you to come up big.”

After gratefully accepting Jack London’s help along his journey, Jason, ironically, is briefly ahead of Jack and his party at the box canyons. Ever encouraging, Jack expresses his confidence in Jason with this bit of dialogue, but the sentiment includes a warning too: Jason must travel quickly to get past Lake Laberge, infamous for freezing before the rest of the river. Jason’s race against time and competition with winter is never far from his mind in this section of the narrative, which increases the suspense and promotes a fast pace.

“No time to reach the rifle. Time only to run.”

In a game-changing moment of high suspense and physical action, the moose that Jason assumed was dead leaps up and attacks. The short, choppy fragments here connote panic and decisions made instinctively. Jason’s luck turns once again as the moose charges. The author employs irony once again, as Jason is collecting rose hips (a treatment for scurvy) to bring to his brothers; in the interest of health, Jason is terribly injured.

“A few weeks would be too late.”

After the moose attack and several days’ stay in Robert Henderson’s care, Jason faces a terrible choice: He can either attempt to float in his weakened, injured condition down the Yukon, or stay in the cabin until he heals from the moose attack, letting go of his hopes of reaching Dawson City for seven months. Though he reckons that his strength and capabilities will return in just weeks, he knows that, by then, the river will freeze, preventing passage. He chooses wisely to stay put, marking a crucial turn in his coming-of-age journey. His choice builds the theme of The Transformational Nature of Adventure.

“He kept looking upstream for straggling Klondikers who might take him down to Dawson. None came. Ravens and gray jays were the only living things in the country, it seemed, besides him and the dog and the wolves in the distance. Their howling seemed to drive a cold nail deeper in to this heart with each passing day.”

This figurative language conveys loneliness and represents a strong shift in the tone of the narrative as compared to the previous chapters’ victorious smooth sailing toward Dawson City. As a young man who always prided himself on his independence, Jason would now, ironically, happily and gratefully accept the help of strangers who could transport him the rest of the way. The metaphor of the “cold nail” symbolizes Jason’s solitude and suggests that it will present a challenge that is not only painful but potentially deadly.

“Lay Charlie down on the floor there—right here on the middle of the floor where we can hold him down.”

Charlie’s uncle, George Maguire, barks orders to his fellow travelers. It dawns on Jason that they intend to amputate the young boy’s lower leg and foot, as it is gangrenous from frostbite and poisoning his blood. Even the worst of Jason’s experiences thus far on his adventure have not prepared him for this horror, and he leaves the cabin while the “surgery” takes place. The repeated emphasis on the “floor” highlights the bleak conditions, since the floor is hard and unsanitary.

“What about grub? Do we have enough?”

As Charlie recovers from the amputation and resulting fever, he becomes more aware of his situation and plight. His question to Jason voices Jason’s latest conflict and biggest fear in this part of the story: He knows that their food will run out but is not sure when. To keep Charlie hopeful in his recovery, Jason lies and says they have plenty. This action demonstrates indirectly that Jason is caring and compassionate.

“You know, you’ve got a memory for names, Charlie, and a way with a story. You should be a newspaper reporter.”

Jason sums up his impressions of Charlie’s storytelling abilities after Charlie reveals the events that impelled the start of the gold rush, including the roles played by Robert Henderson and George Washington Carmack. One of Jason’s notable character traits is his love of writing, stories, and works of literature, and his compliment contributes to the motif of literature in the novel.

“Ours is the folly.”

These ironic words are written in the farewell note left by Samuel Whitaker and Villy Champlain, two stampeders caught unprepared for winter on the trail to Dawson City. Jason discovers their corpses, frozen solid, in a cabin 40 miles upriver from the cabin he currently shares with Charlie. The choice of words reveals that the men knew at the end how foolish they were in abandoning common sense for dreams of gold and contributes to the theme of The Dangerous Allure of Wealth.

“Few knew the geography of Canada’s Northwest. It was terra incognita.”

Included in the historical interlude in Chapter 22, which catalogs the winter hardships of various individuals, groups, and camps trapped by frozen temperatures on the way to Dawson City, this line means “[i]t was unknown, unexplored territory” and refers to the northwest region of Canada. The Latin phrase shrouds the idea of unexplored land in a sense of glory and mystery, highlighting the allure of this region for people seeking wealth and adventure who eventually come to realize the dangers of a region like this.

“Let’s paddle. […] Who knows how many are on our heels.”

Jason is impatient to reach Dawson City after waiting through the long winter. His words are prophetic; in fact, he and Charlie beat thousands of other stampeders who are eagerly waiting to sail downriver too. Though Jason demonstrates his desire to move ahead quickly, his sentiment does not represent his old desire to find gold at any cost but his new realization that his brothers are more valuable to him than wealth. He wants to get to them as soon as he can.

“Dawson was a carnival, a perpetual carnival. Jason and Charlie laughed their way through the auction of the first ‘cackleberry’ laid in Dawson City—the egg sold for five dollars. They saw a miner from the creeks pay fifteen dollars for an eight-month-old newspaper that was soaked in bacon grease.”

In stark contrast to Dyea and Skagway, the boomtown atmosphere of Dawson City in the spring is lively but controlled, as this carnival metaphor indicates. Many come to Dawson now not to strike gold but to cash in on the crowds with new business ventures and services. This causes overinflation of prices—which some are willing to pay. This scene builds the theme of The Exploitative Nature of Greed.

“I didn’t even know what I was looking for until I found it.”

Jason sums up the life lesson learned over the long winter as he bids farewell to Jamie Dunavant. Though he believed that he wanted gold and made most decisions before the moose attack with the thought of wealth as his primary motivator, Jason realizes now that family and personal fulfillment will always be more valuable than money. His words prove that he has come of age and conclude the novel with the theme of The Transformational Nature of Adventure.