An unusual woman’s trip for the time, written to encourage other women to abandon their grand tours in favor of this northern one. Miss Collis proves to be a self-indulgent, spoiled wealthy New Yorker, with no sympathy for the natives who “should be coerced into good behavior” (p. 15). She was a Jewish southerner who married a Philadelphia soldier, a general in the Civil War. She travelled with him during the war and wrote a book about her experiences in a divided family. That may be a better book than this self-indulgent one.
p. 4, although she doesn’t mention specific titles advised to take on the journey, she is already reading shortly after her train leaves New York for Philadelphia and points west: …a parlour and dressing room, where we lounge peacefully and enjoyably with our books and newspapers. I am, of course, immensely absorbed in reading up the latest authorities on Alaska, my land of years of promise and; hope and, now that my dream is being realized, I proceed to delve into the most recent literature upon the subject.
p. 40: …it was quite flattering to hear my little book, “A Woman’s War Record,” spoken well of by the orator of the day. It is not worth while pausing to think what would have been the condition of this great Northwest country if these brave men had failed, nor whether the Russian eagles would not still be flying at Sitka; but I never look upon their ranks and tattered flags without a patriotic sentiment of gratitude for all they accomplished for us and for posterity.
p. 182, at Fort Simpson: It boasts of a Methodist church, an exceedingly plain structure of four walls with a cheap lot of benches, and a simple decoration of “God is love” behind the pulpit, a great contrast to the Greek church of Sitka.