The Ballad Of Yukon Jake (Begging Robert W. Service's Pardon)

Oh the North Countree is a hard countree

That mothers a bloody brood;

And its icy arms hold hidden charms

For the greedy, the sinful, and lewd.

And strong men rust, from the gold and the lust

That sears the Northland soul,

But the wickedest born, from the Pole to the Horn,

Is the Hermit of Shark-Tooth shoal.

Now Jacob Kaime was the Hermit's name

In the days of his pious youth,

Ere he cast a smirch on the Baptist Church

By betraying a girl named Ruth.

But now men quake at "Yukon Jake"

The Hermit of Shark-Tooth Shoal,

For that is the name that Jacob Kaime

Is known by from Nome to the Pole.

Map of the Alaskan Gold Fields

(1897)

He was just a boy and the parson's joy

(Ere he fell for the gold and the muck)

And he learned to pray, with the hogs and the hay

On a farm near Keokuk.

But a Service tale of illicit kale,

And whisky and women wild,

Drained the morals clean as a soup tureen

From this poor but honest child.

He longed for a bite of a Yukon night

And the Northern Light's weird flicker,

Or a game of stud in the frozen mud,

And the taste of raw red licker.

He wanted to mush along in the slush,

With a team of husky hounds,

And to fire his gat at a beaver hat

And knock it out of bounds.

Front Street in Nome, Alaska 
(1900)

So he left his home for the hell-town Nome,

On Alaska's ice-ribbed shores,

And he learned to curse and to drink, and worse.

Till the rum dripped from his pores,

When the boys on a spree were drinking it free

In a Malamute saloon

And Dan Megrew and his dangerous crew

Shot craps with the piebald coon;

When the Kid on his stool banged away like a fool

At a jag-time melody,

And the barkeep vowed, to the hard-boiled crowd,

That he'd cree-mate Sam McGee-

Then Jacob Kaime, who had taken the name

Of Yukon Jake, the Killer,

Would rake the dive with his forty-five

Till the atmosphere grew chiller.

With a sharp command he'd make'em stand

And deliver their hard-earned dust,

Then drink the bar dry of rum and rye,

As a Klondike bully must.

Without coming to blows he would tweak the nose

Of Dangerous Dan Megrew,

And, becoming bolder, throw over his shoulder

The lady that's known as Lou.

Oh, tough as steak was Yukon Jake-

Hard-boiled as a picnic egg.

He washed his shirt in the Klondike dirt,

And drank his rum by the keg.

In fear of their lives (or because of their wives)

He was shunned by the best of his pals,

An outcast he, from the comradery

Of all but wild animals.

So he bought him the whole of Shark-Tooth Shoal,

A reef in the Bering Sea,

And he lived by himself on a sea lion's shelf

In lonely iniquity.

The Bering Strait is the only marine connection between the Chukchi Sea and the Arctic Ocean to the north,
and the Bering Sea and the Pacific Ocean to the south.

But, miles away, in Keokuk, Ia.,

Did a ruined maiden fight

To remove the smirch from the Baptist Church

By bringing the heathen Light;

And the Elders declared that all would be spared

If she carried the holy words

From her Keokuk home to the hell-town Nome

To save those sinful birds.

So two weeks later, she took a freighter,

For the gold-cursed land near the Pole,

But Heaven ain't made for a lass that's betrayed-

She was wrecked on Shark-Tooth Shoal!

All hands were tossed in the Sea and lost-

All but the maiden Ruth,

Who swam to the edge of the Sea Lion's ledge

Where abode the love of her youth.

The Bering Sea,  Alaska
Tom Siebert

He was hunting a seal for his evening meal

(He handled a mean harpoon)

When he saw at his feet, not something to eat,

But a girl in a frozen swoon.

Whom he dragged to his lair by her dripping hair,

And he rubbed her knees with gin.

To his great surprise, she opened her eyes

And revealed-his Original Sin!

His eight month beard grew stiff and weird,

And it felt like a chestnut burr,

And he swore by his gizzard, and the Arctic blizzard

That he'd do right by her.

But the cold sweat froze on the end of her nose

Till it gleamed like a Tecla pearl,

While her bright hair fell, like a flame from hell;

Down the back of the grateful girl.

But a hopeless rake was Yukon Jake,

The Hermit of Shark-Tooth Shoal!

And the dizzy maid he betrayed

And wrecked her immortal soul!...

Then he rowed her ashore, with a broken oar,

And he sold her to Dan Megrew

For a husky dog and some hot eggnog,

As rascals are wont to do.

Now ruthless Ruth is a maid uncouth

With scarlet cheeks and lips

And she sings rough songs to the drunken throngs

That come from the sealing ships.

For a rouge-stained kiss from this infamous miss

They will give a seal's sleek fur,

Or perhaps a sable, if they are able;

It's much the same to her.

Oh, the North Countree is a rough countree

That mothers a bloody brood;

And its icy arms hold hidden charms

For the greedy, the sinful, and lewd.

And strong men rust, from the gold and the lust

That sears the Northland soul,

But the wickedest born from the Pole to the Horn

Was the Hermit of Shark-Tooth Shoal!

"The Ballad Of Yukon Jake"

Edward E. Paramore Jr.

(1895-1956)

American screenwriter and poet