The United States census of 1890 definitely enumerated 21,929 inhabitants of Alaska, and estimated the existence of about 8,400 more. Of those enumerated there were 3,922 white males and 497 white females; 82 black males; 770 "mixed" males, and 798 "mixed" females; and 2,125 male Chinese; while the native population included 7,158 males and 6,577 females. According to the same census there were in Alaska 11 organizations of the Orthodox Greek Church; with 22 edifices with a seating capacity of 2,900 and a value of $180,000. The communicants numbered 13,004. The Roman Catholic Church had 6 organizations, with 6 buildings, seating 540 persons, and valued at $9,700. There were 559 communicants. No less than 27 fire insurance companies were doing business in the Territory, and in 1889 the risks written and renewed by them aggregated $1,710,184.
The people of Alaska have been spoken of as Americans, Russians, Hydahs, Tsimpseans, Thlinkets, Aleuts, Innuits or Eskimos and Tinneh, or Athabascan Indians. Eight distinct languages and several dialects are spoken. The Tsimpseans embrace only the settlement at Metlakahtla, about one thousand people who came over from British Columbia. The Hydahs have some five or six villages on the south end of Prince of Wales Island with about nine hundred people. The Thlinkets reside in from forty to fifty villages in the Alexander Archipelago andalong the coast from Cape Fox to Copper River. All these have become partly civilized by contact with the whites and through the influence of schools and missions, and there is a large number of those who can speak English and have become excellent citizens. The Aleuts are also partly civilized, but with a civilization conforming more nearly to that of the Russians than our own. These reside upon the islands of the Aleutian chain, the Shunagin and Kodiak groups, the Aliaska Peninsula and the islands of St. Paul and St. George in Behring Sea.
There are a few Aleut half-breeds in Sitka. Many of these people talk the Russian language. The Innuits and Tinnehs cannot be said to be civilized, though their barbarism has been modified by contact with white people. The Innuits reside along the coast from Nushegak, in Behring Sea, to the eastern limit of our dominion in the Arctic region. Lieutenant Ray speaks of them as living in a state of anarchy, making no combinations, offensive or defensive, having no punishment for crimes and no government. Given to petty pilfering, they make no attempt to reclaim stolen property. They are social in their habits and kind to each other. These people are obliged to devote all their energies to procuring the necessary food and clothing to maintain life. Their intelligence is of a low order and the race is apparently diminishing. Physically they are strong and possess great powers of endurance.
The Tinnehs occupy the interior, the Yukon valley, except the portions near its mouth, and come down to the seashore only at Cook's Inlet. They are called "Stick" Indians by the Thlinkets. These people havemany traits of the North American Indians elsewhere, and may properly be designated as Indians. The other natives of Alaska are not true Indians and have not generally been treated as such by the government. They have no real tribal relations, though formerly the heads of families were recognized as chiefs and called such.
At the present time, among the Hydahs, Tsimpseans, Thlinkets and Aleuts, the so-called chiefs have very little, if any, power or influence, as such. Among the Eskimos it may be doubted if the office ever amounted to anything.
The progress of the natives of Southeastern Alaska toward civilization is steady and certain, though it must not be supposed that these people yet take high rank in learning, intelligence or morality. The educating and elevating influences of the schools and missions, though doing much, perhaps more than we should expect under the circumstances, must be continued a long time in order to effect anything like satisfactory conditions.
In some respects the physical condition of the different native tribes is alike and in others not. All are strongly built, rather short, and by their habits of living inured to hardship and endurance. The men have very light or no beards, and frequently trim the scattering hairs on their chins closely or pluck them out. The average height is less than that of Europeans. They have an Asiatic cast of features and the coast people are generally thought to have originated from Japanese stock. The Eskimos have a language very similar to the Eskimos of Labrador and almost identicalwith a small population upon the Asiatic side of Behring Strait. Physically they differ from the Eskimos of Greenland and Labrador, being more robust and healthy. All of the natives of Alaska have small and delicately-formed hands and feet and rather a massive head, straight black hair, dark eyes, high cheek bones and nut-brown complexion. All are to a large extent fish eaters, though the Tinnehs, living in the interior, or Ingalik tribes of the Yukon, are compelled to subsist to a greater extent upon game and land products.
Their dwellings, not so unlike originally, have now become quite different in style and manner of construction. Those residing in Southeastern Alaska have frame or block houses wholly above ground, with sleeping apartments partitioned off from the main or living-room where the central fireplace is located, like the state-rooms of a river steamboat, and many of the Thlinkets have substituted the modern cooking-stove and pipe for the fireplace and open chimney-hole in the roof.
These people are all self-supporting; the Hydahs, Tsimpseans, Thlinkets and Aleuts living comfortably with plenty of food and blankets. The Eskimos, especially those of the Arctic region, have a hard time of it to keep from starvation and death by freezing. The Tinnehs, or Ingaliks, have less of the conveniences, not to say luxuries of life, than any of the coast tribes. The last-named two tribes have small, poorly built, partly underground houses, and their winter dwellings are entirely covered with earth.
Mention has already been made of the town of Sitka, the capital of the Territory. It is beautifully situated,sheltered by a range of snow-covered mountains on the one side and on the other protected from the broad expanse of the Pacific Ocean and its storms by a numerous group of thickly-wooded islands. The waters of the harbor are singularly clear, so that in looking over the side of a vessel one can see the bottom at a depth of many fathoms. A warm equatorial current bathes this shore and bears into these Arctic regions many sponges, coral branches and other growths of warmer latitudes. The town itself lies clustered near the shore and presents a pleasing picture to the visitor as he approaches it from the sea. Its most conspicuous feature is the old weather-beaten and moss-grown castle which crowns a rocky hill. This structure is 140 feet long and 70 feet wide, and is built of huge cedar logs. It was for many years the official residence of the Russian governors and was at times the scene of splendid social gatherings. In its upper story were arranged a ball-room and a theatre, and the building throughout was as richly furnished as a palace in St. Petersburg or Moscow. Some of these rich furnishings still remain, though as a whole the building is in a most dilapidated condition. Another prominent building is the old Greek Church with its emerald green dome, Byzantine spire, fine chime of bells and richly decorated interior. It is liberally maintained, as indeed are all the other Greek Churches in the Territory, by the Russian Government. Most of the houses in Sitka are built of heavy logs, some of them being also clapboarded outside. During the winter about 1,000 Indians live there and the white population is composed of the government officials and agents, a few store-keepers and traders, andperhaps four or five hundred miners and prospectors from the inland regions. In midwinter there are only about six hours of daylight in each day, and in mid-summer there is for a time practically no night at all. Rain is the principal feature of the climate, and this abundance of moisture causes all vegetation to grow luxuriantly. There is an abundance of vegetables and some fruit, and domestic cattle are kept successfully. Nowhere outside of the tropics is a more luxurious natural vegetation to be found than in these islands of southern Alaska. Sitka is a neat and clean city, and as a rule is now quiet and orderly. It contains a large industrial school, attended by 200 native boys and girls, the course of study including nearly all useful industries. Twenty miles south of Sitka, on the same island, hot springs are to be found, the water of which is rich in sulphur and iron. For many generations these have been a sanitary resort of the natives, and it is not unlikely that in the near future they will be greatly visited by tourists from the United States and elsewhere. The temperature of the water is about 155° Fahrenheit, and the springs are surrounded by tropical vegetation.
After Sitka, the most important settlement in the Territory, is Fort Wrangell. It is beautifully situated at the mouth of the Stickhin River, where there is an excellent and capacious harbor, surrounded by imposing mountains. The town consists of rather more than 100 houses, and includes about 500 permanent inhabitants. There are two or three large stores for the sale of goods to the natives and for the purchase of furs and other natural products, as well as the quaintmanufactures of the Indians. There is also a flourishing industrial school for the Indian girls. A leading native industry here is the manufacture of jewelry from silver and ivory. In this the natives are very expert, producing most elaborate patterns and copying any designs given to them with the most patient and unfailing fidelity.
When the United States took possession of Alaska a great many active and ambitious men on the Pacific coast were imbued with the idea that much that was really valuable in Alaska in the line of furs and the precious metals would be developed to their great gain and benefit if they gave the subject the attention which it deserved. Accordingly, many expeditions were fitted out at San Francisco, Puget Sound, and other points on the Pacific coast, and directed to an examination of these reputed sources of wealth in that distant country. Many years have now rolled by, and in that time we have been enabled to judge pretty accurately of the relative value of this new territory in comparison with that of our nearer possessions, and it is now known that the fur-trade of Alaska is all and even more than it was reputed to be by the Russians.
In this connection the most notable instance, perhaps, of the great value of these interests may be cited in the case of the seal islands. It will be remembered that at the time of the transfer, when the most eloquent advocates of the purchase were exhausting the fertility of their brains in drumming up and securing every possible argument in favor of the purchase, though the fur trade of the mainland, the sea-otter fisheries, and the possible extent of trade in walrus oil and ivory weredwelt upon with great emphasis, these fur-seal islands did not receive even a passing notice as a source of revenue or value to the public. Yet it has transpired, since the government has been wise enough to follow out the general policy which the Russians established of protecting the seal life on the Pribylof Islands, that these interests in our hands are so managed and directed that they pay into the treasury of the United States a sum sufficient to meet all the expenses of the government in behalf of Alaska, beside leaving a large excess every year.
Of other resources, such as the adaptation of the country for settlement by any considerable number of our people as agriculturists or husbandmen, and its actual value as a means of supplying gold and silver, coal or timber, it must be said that as yet no very remarkable gold or silver mines have been discovered, nor have there been any veins of coal worked that would in themselves sustain any considerable number of our people or give rise to any volume of trade.
The timber of Alaska in itself extends over a much larger area of that country than a great many surmise. It clothes the steep hills and mountain sides, and chokes up the valleys of the Alexander Archipelago and the contiguous mainland; it stretches less dense, but still abundant, along that inhospitable reach of territory which extends from the head of Cross Sound to the Kenai peninsula, where, reaching down to the westward and south-westward as far as the eastern half of Kadiak Island, and thence across Shelikof Strait, it is found on the mainland and on the peninsula bordering on the same latitude; but it is confined to the interioropposite Kadiak, not coming down to the coast as far eastward as Cape Douglas. Here, however, it impinges on the coast or Cook's Inlet, reaching down to the shores and extending around to the Kenai peninsula. From the interior of the peninsula, above referred to, the timber-line over the whole of the interior of the great area of Alaska will be found to follow the coast-line, at varying distances of from 100 to 150 miles from the seabord, until that section of Alaska north of the Yukon mouth is reached, where a portion of the coast of Norton Sound is directly bordered by timber as far north as Cape Denbigh. From this point to the eastward and northeastward a line may be drawn just above the Yukon and its immediate tributaries as the northern limit of timber of any considerable extent. There are a great number of small water-courses rising here that find their way into the Arctic, bordered by hills and lowland ridges on which some wind-stunted timber is found, even to the shores of the Arctic Sea.
In thus broadly sketching the distribution of timber over Alaska it will be observed that the area thus clothed is very great; yet when we come to consider the quality of the timber itself, and its economic value in our markets, we are obliged to adopt the standard of the lumber-mills in Oregon and Washington. Viewed in this light, we find that the best timber of Alaska is the yellow cedar, which in itself is of great intrinsic value; but this cedar is not the dominant timber by any means; it is the exception to the rule. The great bulk of Alaskan timber is that known as Sitkan spruce, or balsam fir. The lumber sawed from this stock is naturally not of the first quality. These treesgrow to their greatest size in the Sitka or Alexander Archipelago. An interval occurs from Cross Sound until we pass over the fair-weather ground at the foot of Mount St. Elias, upon the region of Prince William Sound and Cook's Inlet, where this timber again occurs, and attains very respectable proportions in many sections of the district, notably at Wood Island and portions of Afognak, and at the head of the Kenai peninsula and the two gulfs that environ it. The abundance of this timber and the extensive area clothed by it are readily appreciated by looking at the map, and are rendered still more impressive when we call attention to the fact that the timber extends in good size as far north as the Yukon Valley, clothing all the hills within that extensive region and to the north of Cook's Inlet and Kenai peninsula, so that the amount of timber found therein is great in the aggregate. The size of this spruce timber at its base will be typified in trees on Prince of Wales Island 50 feet and over in height, with a diameter of at least three feet. They have not grown as fast as they would have grown in a more congenial latitude to the south, such as Puget Sound or Oregon; hence when they are run through the saw-mill the frequent and close proximity of knots mar the quality and depress the sale of the lumber. Spruce boards are not adapted to nice finishing work in building or in cabinet-ware, or, indeed, in anything that requires a finish and upon which paint and varnish may be permanently applied, for under the influence of slight degrees of heat it sweats, exuding minute globules of gum or rosin, which are sticky and difficult to remove.
The other timber trees in south-eastern Alaska, Kadiak and Cook's Inlet may be called exceptional. But one very valuable species of yellow cedar (C. nutkanensis) is found scattered here and there within the Alexander Archipelago and on the thirty-mile strip. Here this really valuable tree is found at wide intervals in small clumps, principally along shoal water-courses and fiords, attaining a much greater size than the spruce, as frequently trees are found 100 feet high, with a diameter of five and six feet. The lumber made from these is exceedingly valuable, of the very finest texture, odor and endurance, and is highly prized by the cabinetmaker and the ship-builder.
Thus it will be seen that the forests of Alaska are altogether coniferous, as the small bodies of the birch and the alder and willow thickets on the lower Yukon and Kuskokvim Rivers can scarcely be considered to come under this head. Aside from the yellow cedar, which is rare, the timber wealth of Alaska consists of the Sitka spruce, which is not only abundant and large (trees of from three to four feet in diameter being quite common in south-eastern Alaska and Prince William Sound), but also generally accessible.
To give even an approximate estimate of the area of timbered lands in Alaska is at present impossible, in view of our incomplete knowledge of the extent of mountain ranges, which, though falling within the timber limits, must be deducted from the superficial area of forest covering.
A few small saw-mills, of exceedingly limited capacity, have been erected at various points in south-eastern Alaska, to supply the local demand of trading-posts and mining-camps, but finished building lumber is stilllargely imported even into this heavily-timbered region. In all western Alaska but one small saw-mill is known to exist, which is on Wood Island, St. Paul Harbor, Kadiak. This mill was first set up to supply saw-dust for packing ice, but since the collapse of that industry its operations have been spasmodic and not worth mentioning. Lumber from Puget Sound and British Columbian mills is shipped to nearly all ports in western Alaska for the use of whites and half-breeds, while the natives in their more remote settlements obtain planks and boards by the very laborious process of splitting logs with iron or ivory wedges. On the treeless isles of the Shumagin and Aleutian groups, as well as in the southern settlements of the Aliaska peninsula, even firewood is imported from more favored sections of the territory and commands high prices.
The fisheries cover a very large area, but their value and importance, in consequence of the limited market afforded for exportation on the Pacific coast, has not been fully developed. The supply certainly is more than equal to any demand.
The soil of Alaska is not sterile, being at many points of the requisite depth and fertility for the production of the very best crops of cereals and tubers. The difficulty with agricultural progress in Alaska is, therefore, not found in that respect. It is due to the peculiar climate.
Glancing at the map the observer will notice that hydrographers have defined the passage of a warm current, sufficient in volume and high enough in temperature to traverse the vast expanse of the North Pacific from the coast of Japan up and across a little to the southward of the Aleutian Islands, and then deflecting down to the mouth of the Columbia River, where it turns, one branch going north up along the coast of British Columbia by Sitka, and thence again to the westward until it turns and bends back upon itself. The other grand arm, continuing from the first point of bifurcation, in its quiet, steady flow to the Arctic, passes up to the northeastward through the strait of Behring. This warm current, stored with tropical heat, gives rise naturally, as it comes in contact with the colder air and water of the north, to excessive humidity, which takes form in the prevalent fog, sleet and rain of Alaska, as noted and recorded with so much surprise by travelers and temporary residents from other climes. Therefore, at Sitka, and, indeed, on the entire seaboard of South Alaska and the Aleutian Islands, instead of finding a degree of excessive cold carried over to the mainland across the Coast range, which the latitude would seem to indicate, we find a climate much more mild than rigorous; but the prevalence of fog clouds or banks, either hanging surcharged with moisture or dissolving into weeks of consecutive rain, so retard and arrest a proper ripening of fruits and vegetables in that climate that the reasonable certainty of success in a garden from year to year is destroyed.
When we look at Alaska we are impressed by one salient feature, and that is the remarkable distances which exist between the isolated settlements. It is not at first apparent, but it grows on the traveler until he is profoundly moved at the expenditure of physical labor, patience and skill required to traverse any considerable district of that country.
The Sitkan district is essentially one of rugged inequality, being mountainous on the mainland to the exclusion of all other features, and equally so on the islands. It is traversed here, there and everywhere by broad arms of the sea and their hundreds and thousands of lesser channels.
Land travel is simply impracticable. Nobody goes on a road; savages and whites all travel by the water. Perhaps the greatest humidity and the heaviest rainfall in the Alaskan country occur here. The equable and hot rigorous climate permits of free navigation at all seasons of the year, and it is seldom, indeed, that the little lakes and shallow lagoons near the sea-level are frozen so firmly as to allow of a winter's skating.
The Aleutian and Kadiak districts are quite as peculiar in themselves and as much individualized by their geological age and formation as is the Sitkan division. They hold within their boundaries a range of great fire-mountains—grumbling, smoking, quaking hills; some of these volcanic peaks being so lofty and so impressive as to fix in the explorer's eye an image superb and grand, and so magnificent as to render adequate description impossible. Like the Sitkan district, the Aleutian and Kadiak regions are exceedingly mountainous, there being very little low or level land compared with the sum total of their superficial area; but in that portion extending for 1,100 miles to the westward of Kadiak, nearly over to Asia, bare of timber, a skeleton, as it were, is presented to the eye and strikes one with a sense of an individuality here in decided contrast with that of the Sitkan country. The hills not clothed with timber are covered to their summits in most cases with a thick crop of circumpolar sphagnum, interspersed withgrasses, and a large flora, bright and beautiful in the summer season. To thoroughly appreciate how much moisture in the form of fog and rain settles upon the land, one cannot do better than to leave the ship in the harbor, or the post where he is stationed, and take up a line of march through one of the narrow valleys near by to the summit of one of the lofty peaks. He will step upon what appeared from the window of the vessel a firm greensward, and sink to his waist in a shaking, tremulous bog, or slide over moss-grown shingle, painted and concealed by the luxuriant growth of cryptogamic life, where he expected to find a free and ready path.
"Passing from this district," says Mr. Petroff, "a very remarkable region is entered, which I have called the Yukon and the Kuskokvim divisions. I have during two summers traversed the major portion of it from the north to the south, confirming many new and some mooted points. This region covers the deltoid mouth of a vast river, the Yukon, and the sea-like estuary—the Amazonian mouth of another—the Kuskokvim, with the extraordinary shoals and bars of Bristol Bay, where the tides run with surprising volume. The country itself differs strikingly from the two divisions just sketched, consisting, as it does, of irregular mountain spurs planted on vast expanses of low, flat tundra. It is a country which, to our race, perhaps, is far more inhospitable than either the Sitkan or Kadiak divisions; yet, strange to say, I have found therein the greatest concentrated population of the whole Territory. Of course, it is not by agricultural, or by mining, or any other industry, save the aboriginal art of fishing and the traffic of the fur trade that the people live; and, again,when the fur-bearing animals are taken into account, the quality and volume of that trade are far inferior to those of either of the previously named divisions, and we find the natives existing in the greatest number where, according to our measure of compensation, they have the least to gain.
"This country, outside of these detached mountain regions and spurs, is a great expanse of bog, lakes, large and small, with thousands of channels between them, and sluggish currents filled with grasses and other aqueous vegetation, indicated to the eye by the presence of water-lilies.
"The traveler, tortured by mosquitoes in summer, blinded, confused and disturbed by whirling 'purgas,' snow and sleet in winter, finding the coast rendered almost inaccessible by the vast system of shoaling which the current of the great Yukon has effected, passes to the interior, whose superficial area comprises nearly five-sixths of the landed surface of the Territory.
"Here is an immense tract reaching from Behring Strait, in a succession of rolling, ice-bound moors and low mountain ranges for 700 miles, an unbroken waste, to the boundary line of British America. Then, again, from the crests at the head of Cook's Inlet and the flanks of Mount St. Elias northward over that vast area of rugged mountain and lonely moor to the east—nearly 800 miles—is a great expanse of country, over and through which not much intelligent exploration has been undertaken. A few traders and prospectors have gone up the Tennanah and over the old-established track of the Yukon; others have passed to the shores of Kotzebue Sound overland from the Koyukuk.Dog-sled journeys have been made by these same people among the natives of the Kuskokvim and those of the coast between Bristol Bay and Norton Sound. But the trader as he travels sees nothing, remembers nothing, but his trade, and rarely is he capable of giving any definite information beyond the single item of his losses or his gains through the regions he may traverse. We know, however, enough to say now, without much hesitation, that this great extent which we call the interior is by its position barred out from occupation and settlement by our own people, and the climatic conditions are such that its immense area will remain undisturbed in the possession of its savage occupants."
The fur trade, which is at present the most important Alaskan industry, consists of two general branches, the trade in land furs and that in the furs of marine animals. The former has not, in late years, decreased in volume, though a decline has been noticed in the supply of certain sections. The land furs now exported from Alaska consist of the skins of bears, brown and black, three or four kinds of foxes, including the very valuable silver and blue foxes, otters, martens, beavers, minks, muskrats, lynxes, wolves and wolverines. The sea-otter and the fur-seal supply the pelagic furs, the seal being by far the more important of the two. Indeed, at present the fur-seal constitutes wholly one-half of Alaska's natural wealth. The value of the seal-skins shipped from the Territory and sold in European markets during the twenty-three years of American occupancy down to 1890 aggregates about $33,000,000. In the same period the value of other furs was $16,000,000, and of all other exports only about$14,000,000. The canned salmon product, which dates only from 1884, has amounted to nearly $7,000,000, and the value of the cod-fish taken since 1868 has been fully $3,000,000. The supply of fish of various kinds in Alaska is practically inexhaustible, but the stores lavished upon the natives of that country by bountiful nature could not be more wastefully used than they are now. Any development in the fishing industry must necessarily be an improvement, causing a saving in the supply. The proportion of Alaskan fish brought into the markets of the civilized world, when compared with the consumption of the same articles by the natives, is so very small that it barely deserves the name of an industry of the country. The business, however, shows a decided tendency to increase in magnitude, and within the last few years the shipments of salted salmon in barrels from the Kadiak-Aleutian divisions have been steadily increasing.
Next in importance to furs and fish are to be ranked gold and silver. The first gold mines of real importance were opened at the end of 1880, near the present settlement of Juneau. At present there are three or four gold producing quartz mines which ship the precious metal to the United States, the largest of them being the Treadwell or Paris mine, which supplies a mill with 240 stamps. There are also paying mines in the Yukon region which have produced for some years past gold dust to the value of from $40,000 to $90,000 a year. The total value of the gold found in Alaska since 1867 is about $4,000,000, but probably as large a sum has been expended in the same time in prospecting and opening and equipping the mines. The annualoutput of silver is insignificant, amounting to only about $3,000.
Coal has been discovered in various parts of the Territory, but it is all of the lignite variety. Only one of the veins is at present operated, and it is situated on Herendeen Bay, on the north side of the Alaska peninsula. Other veins near Cape Lisburne are utilized by the ships which visit that region every year, but are not otherwise systematically worked. Large deposits of copper and of cinnabar are known to exist, but they are far inland and not readily accessible.
Fourth in importance among the resources of Alaska must be ranked timber. It is not at present, however, an actual source of wealth, since its exportation is prohibited by the United States Government and even the utilization of the forests for local use for lumber and fuel is much restricted.
The whaling industry is conducted by New Bedford and San Francisco firms, chiefly north of Behring Strait, but cannot properly be included among the resources of Alaska. During the season of 1890 the product of this industry amounted to 14,567 barrels of oil, 226,402 pounds of whalebone, and 3,980 pounds of walrus ivory, besides considerable quantities of beaver, bear and white fox furs.
"In this survey of the wealth and resources of Alaska the observer is struck," says Mr. Petroff, in the census report, "with one rather discouraging feature: that all these vast resources, the products of land and sea, are taken out of the country without leaving any equivalent to the inhabitants. The chief industries, such as salmon canneries, cod fisheries, mines, and the furtrade, are carried on with labor imported into Alaska and taken away again, thus taking out of the country the wages earned. Every pound of subsistence for these laborers, as well as all of the clothing they use, is carried by them into Alaska. The shipping of Alaska, which has become of considerable value, is also carried on wholly by non-residents of the Territory, and this state of affairs extends even to the important tourists' travel to the south-eastern district of Alaska. Not only the passage-money, but the whole cost of subsistence of these tourists during their stay in Alaska goes to the California owners of the steamship lines. To give an idea of the magnitude of this traffic it is only necessary to state that the number of tourists' tickets sold each season exceeds 5,000, each ticket representing an expenditure of not less than $100, making a total of $500,000.
"The insignificant payments for furs and labor to natives are absorbed entirely in the purchase of small quantities of food and raiment. The spectacle of so vast a tract of country being thus drained continually for twenty-three years without receiving anything to speak of in return, cannot probably be equalled in any other part of the United States and perhaps of the world. At the same time the only prospect for a change in these circumstances by immigration and settlement of people who could supply the demand for labor and develop the industries as residents of the country would appear to be still in the far-distant future."
The fur-gathering industry still holds the foremost rank in Alaska, and the most important of its productsare the pelts of the sea-otter and the fur-seal. It is among the Aleutian Islands that these animals are chiefly taken. The otter is widely distributed throughout the archipelago. But the fur-seal is taken almost exclusively upon the Pribyloff or Fur-seal Islands, where they resort in incredible numbers. The taking of these interesting animals is controlled by the Alaska Commercial Company, which has enjoyed a monopoly of the lucrative trade since Alaska came into the possession of this country. The actual work of killing the animals and removing the skins is done by the native Aleutians, in the Company's employ, and the operation, albeit sanguinary, is highly picturesque.
In former times, says Mr. Ivan Petroff, the Aleutian hunters prepared themselves for sea-otter expeditions by fasting, bathing and other ceremonies. The sea-otter was believed to be possessed of a very strong aversion to the female sex, and consequently the hunter was obliged to separate himself from his wife for some time prior to his departure, and also to prepare the garments he was to wear, or at least to wash with his own hands such of his garments as had been made by women. On his return from a successful hunt the superstitious Aleut of former times would destroy the garments used during his expedition, and before entering his hut dress himself anew from head to foot in clothing prepared by his faithful spouse during his absence. The hunting garments were then thrown into the sea. One old man stated, in explanation of this proceeding, that the sea-otters would find the clothing and come to the conclusion that their late persecutor must be drowned, and that there was no further danger. With the spread of theChristian religion among the sea-otter hunters most of these superstitious ceremonies were abolished, but even at the present day the sea-otter hunter occupies a prominent position in the community and enjoys great social advantages. Anything he may want which is not in the possession of his own family will be at once supplied by his neighbors, and weeks, and even months, are spent in careful preparation of arms, canoes and implements.
The mode of hunting the animal has not essentially changed since the earliest times. A few privileged white men located in the district of Ounga employ firearms, but the great body of Aleutian hunters still retain the spear and in a few instances the bow and arrow. The sea-otter is always hunted by parties of from four to twenty bidarkas, each manned by two hunters. From their village the hunters proceed to some lonely coast near the hunting-ground, either in their canoes or by schooners and sloops belonging to the trading firms, a few women generally accompanying the party to do the housework in the camp. In former times, of course, this was not the case. The tents of the party are pitched in some spot, not visible from the sea, and the hunters patiently settle down to await the first favorable day, only a smooth sea permitting the hunting of sea-otter with any prospect of success. In the inhospitable climate of Alaska weeks and months sometimes pass by before the patient hunters are enabled to try their skill. A weatherwise individual, here yclept "astronome," generally accompanies each party, giving due notice of the approach of favorable weather and the exact time when it is best to set out, and few Aleuts are boldenough to begin a hunt without the sanction of this individual. At last the day arrives, and after a brief prayer the hunters embark fully equipped, and in the best of spirits exchange jokes and banter until the beach is left behind; then silence reigns, the peredovchik or leader assumes command, and at a signal from him the bidarkas start out in a semicircle from fifty to one hundred yards distant from each other, each hunter anxiously scanning the surface of the water, at the same time having an eye upon the other canoes. The sea-otter comes up to the surface to breathe about once in every ten minutes, the smooth, glossy head remaining visible but a few seconds each time.
As soon as the hunter spies an otter he lifts his paddle as a signal and then points it in the direction taken by the animal, and the scattered bidarkas at once close in a wide circle around the spot indicated by the fortunate discoverer. If the animal comes up within this circle the hunters simply close in, gradually beating the water with their hands to prevent the escape of the quarry; but very often the wary animal has changed his direction after diving, and the whole fleet of canoes is obliged to change course frequently before the final circle is formed. As soon as the otter comes up within spear's throw one of the hunters exerts his skill and lodges a spear-head in the animal, which immediately dives. An inflated bladder is attached to the shaft, preventing the otter from diving very deep. It soon comes up again, only to receive a number of other missiles, the intervals between attacks becoming shorter each time, until exhaustion forces the otter to remain on the surface and receive its death wound. The bodyof the animal is then taken into one of the bidarkas and the hunt continues if the weather is favorable. On the return of the party each animal killed is inspected by the chief in the presence of all the hunters and its ownership ascertained by the spear-head that caused the mortal wound, each weapon being duly marked. The man who first struck the otter receives from two to ten dollars from the owner. The skins of the slain animals are at once removed, labelled and classified according to quality by the agents of the trading firms and carefully stored for shipment. It frequently happens that a whole day passes by without a single sea-otter being sighted, but the Aleut hunters have a wonderful patience and do not leave a place once selected without killing some sea-otters, be the delay ever so long. There are instances where hunting parties have remained on barren islands for years, subsisting entirely on "algæ" and mussels cast from the sea. On the principal sea-otter grounds of the present time, the Island of Sannakh and the neighborhood of Belkovsky, the hunting parties seldom remain over four or five months without securing sea-otters in sufficient number to warrant their return. Single hunters have sold sea-otters to the value of eight hundred dollars as their share of such brief expeditions, but payment is not made until the return of the party to their home station.
As soon as the result of a day's hunt has been ascertained, the chief or leader reminds the hunters of their duty toward the Church, and with their unanimous consent some skin, generally of a small animal, is selected as a donation to the priest, all contributing to reimburse the owner. The schools also receive donations of thiskind, and the skins thus designated are labelled accordingly and turned over to the trading firms, who place the cash value at the disposal of the priest. Rivalry in the business of purchasing sea-otter skins has induced the various firms to send agents with small assortments of goods to all the hunting-grounds, as an inducement to the members of parties to squander some of their earnings in advance.
The method of killing the sea-otter is virtually the same in all sections frequented by it.
The killing of fur-seals is accomplished entirely on land, and has been reduced almost to a science of the greatest dispatch and system. The able-bodied Aleuts now settled upon the two islands of Saint Paul and Saint George are, by the terms of the agreement between themselves and the lessees, the only individuals permitted to kill and skin the seals for the annual shipment as long as they are able to perform the labor efficiently within a given time. For this labor they are remunerated at the rate of forty cents per animal. Life-long practice has made them expert in using their huge clubs and sharp skinning-knives, both implements being manufactured expressly for this use. These men are as a class proud of their accomplishments as sealers, and too proud to demean themselves in doing any other kind of work. For all incidental labor, such as building, packing, loading and unloading vessels, etc., the lessees find it necessary to engage laborers from the Aleutian Islands, these latter individuals being generally paid at the rate of one dollarper diem.
The work connected with the killing of the annualquota of fur-seals may be divided into two distinct features, the separation of the seals of a certain age and size from the main body and their removal to the killing-ground forming the preliminary movements; the final operation consisting of another selection among the select, and killing and skinning the same. The driving as well as the killing cannot be done in every kind of weather, a damp, cool, cloudy day being especially desirable for the purpose.
As it is the habit of the young male seals up to the age of four years to lie upon the ground back of the so-called rookeries or groups of families that line the seashore, the experienced natives manage to crawl in between the families and the "bachelors," as they were named by the Russians, and gradually drive them inland in divisions of from 2,000 to 3,000. It is unsafe to drive the seals more than five or six miles during any one day, as they easily become overheated and their skins are thereby injured. When night comes on the driving ceases, and sentries are posted around each division, to prevent the animals from straying during the night, occasional whistling being sufficient to keep them together. In the morning, if the weather be favorable, the drive is continued until the killing-ground is reached, where the victims are allowed to rest over night under guard, and finally, as early as possible in the morning, the sealers appear with their clubs, when again small parties of twenty to thirty seals are separated from their fellows, surrounded by the sealers, and the slaughter begins. Even at this last moment another selection is made, and any animal appearing to the eye of the experienced Aleut to be either below or above thespecified age is dismissed with a gentle tap of the club, and allowed to go on its way to the shore, rejoicing at its narrow escape. The men with clubs proceed from one ground to the other, immediately followed by the men with knives, who stab each stunned seal to the heart to insure its immediate death. These men are in turn followed by the skinners, who with astonishing rapidity divest the carcasses of their valuable covering, leaving, however, the head and flippers intact. Only a few paces behind the skinners come carts drawn by mules, into which the skins are rapidly thrown and carried away. The wives and daughters of the sealers linger around the rear of the death-dealing column, reaping a rich harvest of blubber which they carry away on their heads, the luscious oil dripping down their faces and over their garments.
The skins, yet warm from the body, are discharged into capacious salt-houses and salted down for the time being like fish in bins. This treatment is continued for some time, and after the application of heavy pressure they are finally tied into bundles of two each, securely strapped, and then shipped.
According to the terms of the treaty between the United States and Russia, the boundaries of Alaska are as follows:
"Commencing from the southernmost point of the island called Prince of Wales Island, which point lies in the parallel of 54° 40´ north latitude, and between the 131° and 133° west longitude (meridian of Greenwich), the said line shall ascend to the north along the channel called Portland Channel, as far as the point of the continent where it strikes 56° north latitude; from this last mentioned point, the line of demarcation shall follow the summit of the mountains situated parallel to the coast as far as the point of intersection of the 141st degree of west longitude (of the same meridian) and finally from the said point of intersection the said meridian line of the 141st degree in its prolongation as far as the frozen ocean.
"With reference to the line of demarcation laid down in the preceding article it is understood:
"1st. That the island called Prince of Wales Island shall belong wholly to Russia (now by this cession to the United States).
"2d. That whenever the summit of the mountains which extend in a direction parallel to the coast from the 56th degree of north latitude to the point of intersection of the 141st degree of west longitude shall prove to be at the distance of more than ten marine leaguesfrom the ocean, the limit between the British possession and the line of coast which is to belong to Russia as above mentioned (that is to say, the limit to the possessions ceded by this convention), shall be formed by a line parallel to the winding of the coast, and which shall never exceed the distance of ten marine leagues therefrom."
The boundary, in 1825, when this description was made, was a theoretical one based on the charts placed before the negotiators, which they doubtless assumed to be a substantially correct expression of geographical facts. The country through which the line passes was then substantially unexplored.
Much survey work has been done in recent years, with the object of determining more accurately the boundary between Alaska and the British possessions in North America; but the task is not yet complete. The general outlines of the country, however, are familiar to all, and recent maps indicate its boundaries on all sides with substantial accuracy. The whole territory may be roughly divided into six parts, as follows:
1. The Arctic division, containing 125,245 square miles, and comprising all that portion of the North American continent between the one hundred and forty-first meridian in the east and Cape Prince of Wales, or Behring Strait, in the west, the Arctic Ocean in the north, and having for its southern boundary a line indicating the watershed between the Yukon River system and the streams emptying into the Arctic and impinging upon the coast of Behring Sea just north of Port Clarence.
2. The Yukon division, containing 176,715 squaremiles, and comprising the valley of the Yukon River as far as it lies within our boundaries and its tributaries from the north and south. This division is bounded by the Arctic division in the north, the one hundred forty-first meridian in the east, and Behring Sea in the west. The southern boundary lies along a line indicating the watershed between the Yukon and the Kuskokvim, Sushetno, and Copper Rivers, and runs from the above-mentioned meridian in the east to the coast of Behring Sea, in the vicinity of Hazen Bay, in the west. The island of St. Lawrence, in Behring Sea, is included in this division.
3. The Kuskokvim division, containing 114,975 square miles, bounded on the north by the Yukon division, and comprising the valleys of the Kuskokvim, the Togiak, and the Nushegak Rivers, and the intervening system of lakes. The eastern boundary of this division is a line running along the main Alaskan range of mountains from the divide between the Kuskokvim and Tennanah Rivers down to the low, narrow isthmus dividing Moller Bay from Zakharof Bay, on the Alaska peninsula. Behring Sea washes the whole west and south coasts of this division, which also includes Nunivak Island.
4. The Aleutian division, containing 14,610 square miles, and comprising the Alaska peninsula westward of the isthmus between Moller and Zakharof Bays and the whole chain of islands from the Shumagin group in the east to Attoo in the west, including also the Pribylof or fur-seal islands.
5. The Kadiak division, containing 70,884 square miles, and comprising the south coast of the Aliaskapeninsula down to Zakharof Bay, with the adjacent islands, the Kadiak group of islands, the islands and coasts of Cook's Inlet, the Kenai peninsula, and Prince William Sound, with the rivers running into them. The main Alaskan range bounds this division in the north and west. Its eastern limit is the one hundred and forty-first meridian, which intersects the coast-line in the vicinity of Mount St. Elias, while the south shores of the division are washed by that section of the North Pacific named the Gulf of Alaska.
6. The south-eastern division, containing 28,980 square miles, and comprising the coast from Mount St. Elias in the north to Portland Canal, in latitude 54° 40', in the south, together with the islands of the Alexander Archipelago between Cross Sound and Cape Fox. The eastern boundary of this division is the rather indefinite line established by the Anglo-Russian and Russian-American treaties of 1824 and 1825 respectively, following the summits of a chain of mountains supposed to run parallel with the coast at a distance not greater than three marine leagues from the sea between the head of Portland Canal and Mount St. Elias.
The Arctic division is situated almost entirely above the Arctic circle and is known to explorers only from observations made along the seacoast. The interior consists doubtless of frozen plains and low ranges of hills, intersected by a few shallow and sluggish streams. The only rivers known to emerge from this part of Alaska are the Colville, the Kok, the Inland or Noatak, the Kooak, the Selawik and the Buckland. There are many villages scattered along the coast and others arereported to exist further up on all these rivers. The coast settlements are visited every year by many vessels engaged in whaling, hunting and trading. Their inhabitants possess great commercial genius and energy, and carry on an extensive traffic with the natives of the Asian coast, their common trading-ground being at Behring Strait.
The only mineral of any value that is found on this coast is coal, of which there are several good veins at Cape Lisburne. The chief attraction for the navigators who visit the coast are furs, oil and walrus ivory. The whaling industry is already beginning to decline here as it has done in every other region of the world. Many seals are found here and polar bears are numerous. A few reindeer are found on the coast and moose and mountain sheep are said to be numerous in the interior. Muskrats and squirrels abound everywhere and their skins are offered for sale in large quantities. Foxes also are plentiful, especially the white variety, and their skins are much sought for by the American and European markets. Aquatic birds of all kinds are found in countless hosts. The only fish of value is the salmon.
About thirty villages are known in this region, their total population being a little over 3,000.
The Yukon division is the largest and in many respects most important of all. As this volume is so largely devoted to a description of the great river and the country it traverses little need be said regarding it here. Numerous trading posts have been established and the waters of the river are plied by steamboats. No mineral deposits in large paying quantities have yetbeen discovered, but it is believed that important gold mines will yet be found. The river abounds in fish and the forests which border it in game. High as the latitude is the summers are very warm and the vegetable growths of the country are luxuriant. The coast line of this division is particularly dreary. It is inhabited by a hardy race of seal and walrus hunters, who occupy numerous small villages. At Port Clarence, just south of Cape Prince of Wales, three or four villages are clustered around a fine harbor. King's Island or Oukivok is a small, high island, surrounded by almost perpendicular cliffs of basalt. On it is a village composed of about forty houses, which are simple excavations in the side of the cliffs. The inhabitants live almost entirely by walrus and seal hunting. On the shores of Golovin Sound small deposits of lead and silver have been found. The most important point on the coast is St. Michael, where there are several trading agencies. The Island of St. Lawrence belongs properly to this division. It had originally a population of about 1,000, but famine and disease have diminished it to one-half that number. The people are Asiatic Esquimaux. There are in all this division of Alaska about seventy-five known settlements, with a total population of nearly 7,000, of whom perhaps about twenty-five are white, 2,500 Athabaskan and the rest Esquimaux.
The Kuskokvim division is, on the whole, poor in such natural products as white men desire, and it has therefore been little visited. It contains a few mineral deposits, however, including cinnabar, antimony and silver. Game and fur bearing animals are not as numerous as in other parts of Alaska, but there are manyseals in the sea and river, and minks and foxes are quite numerous. Many salmon are also found in the river and they form a leading article of food for the natives. There are nearly a hundred villages in this division with about 9,000 inhabitants, nearly all of them being Esquimaux.
The Aleutian division comprises the western part of the Alaska peninsula and the long range of islands extending toward the Asiatic coast. These islands appear to be merely a continuation of the Alaskan range of mountains. Many of them contain volcanic peaks, some of which are still active, and all the islands are mountainous. The soil is altogether treeless save for some dwarf willows, but there is a luxuriant growth of grass. On this account it was once thought that cattle could be successfully raised here, but the long and stormy winters made the experiment a failure. The people of these islands are doubtless of Esquimau origin, although distinct in language and in habits from the remainder of that race. Their twenty-five or thirty villages are inhabited by about 2,500 people, perhaps 100 of the number being white. Their principal industry consists in fishing and taking seals, sea-otters and other marine animals.
The Kadiak division comprises the southern side of the Alaska peninsula, numerous adjacent islands and the coast of the mainland eastward to Mount St. Elias. Its inhabitants are of Esquimau stock and resemble greatly those of the Kuskokvim division. The coast is frequented by great numbers of walrus, which animal provides the inhabitants with food, material for their canoes and ivory, which is used for money and as anobject of trade. Many whales are also taken here. On the land there are numerous reindeer, brown bears and foxes, otters and minks. The island of Kadiak has for a century and a quarter been one of the most important portions of this division of Alaska. It was here that some of the earliest Russian settlements were made, and the population at the present time is considerable. There are several villages devoted almost entirely to the building of ships and boats.
North of the Kadiak group is the great estuary known as Cook's Inlet, which was first visited by the Russian traders a hundred years ago and was the scene of many desperate conflicts between rival settlers as well as between the Russians and the natives. The natives here are almost giants in size and are strong, active and war-like. Their houses are superior to those of the Esquimaux, being constructed above ground of logs and bark. They are expert fishermen, and the waters in this region abound in salmon and other fish, and the land in huge bears, moose, mountain sheep, wolves and numerous smaller animals, while geese and ducks and other wild birds are found by the million. Timber exists here in great abundance, especially in the valley of the Copper River. There are about fifty villages in the Kadiak division with a population of 4,500.
The Southeastern division consists of the narrow strip of coast-land from Mount St. Elias southward to Portland Canal. It is densely wooded and exceedingly mountainous. The coast is deeply indented with bays and sheltered by islands. The principal trees are spruce and yellow cedar. On many of the islands of the Alexander Archipelago coal has been discovered.Copper and gold have also been found. The fur trade is not now nearly as valuable as in former years, although it is still large and profitable. The waters swarm with salmon, halibut, herring and other fish. The climate is not nearly as cold as might be expected in this latitude, but the rainfall is very heavy, an average of 250 days in the year being stormy. The fifty or more villages contain a total population of nearly 8,000, including about 300 whites.
We know, says Dr. Grewgink, the eminent Russian scientist, of no more extensive theatre of volcanic activity than the Aleutian Islands, the Alaska peninsula, and the west coast of Cook's Inlet. Here we have confined within the limits of a single century all the known phenomena of this kind: the elevation of mountain chains and islands, the sinking of extensive tracts of the earth's surface, earthquakes, eruptions of lava, ashes and mud, the hot springs and exhalations of steam and sulphuric gases. Not only does the geological formation of most of the islands and a portion of the continent point to volcanic origin or elevation, but we have definite information of volcanic activity on twenty-five of the Aleutian Islands. On these islands forty-eight craters have been enumerated by Veniaminof and other conscientious observers, and in addition to these we have on the Alaska peninsula four volcanoes, two on Cook's Inlet, one on Prince William Sound, one on Copper River, and one in the vicinity of Sitka (Mount Edgecombe); three other peaks situated between Edgecombe and the Copper River have not been definitely ascertained to be volcanic. The distance from the Wrangell volcano, in the vicinity of Copper River, to the SitkanIsland is 1,505 nautical miles. We have every reason to believe that the Near Islands (the westernmost of the Aleutian group) are also extinct craters; and thus we find one continuous chain of volcanoes from Wrangell to the Commander Islands (Behring and Copper), pointing to the existence of a subterranean channel of lava finding its outlet or breathing-hole through the craters of this region. The nearest volcanoes to the south of this line are Mount Baker on the American continent, in latitude 48° 48', and the craters of the Kurile chain of islands on the coast of Asia. That a subterranean connection exists between this long line of craters is indicated by the fact that whenever volcanic activity grows slack in one section of the chain it increases in violence at some other point, an observation which has been confirmed by all observers.
From all information on the subject at our disposal it appears that the craters of Mount Fairweather, Cryllon, and Edgecombe, and Mount Calder (Prince of Wales Island), have not been active since the middle of the last century, and as the universal law of volcanic activity seems to place the frequency of eruptions in an inverse ratio to the height of the volcanoes, we might reasonably expect that the season of rest for these craters will be a prolonged one; but how terrible and devastating must be the awakening of the sleeping furnaces when it occurs. With regard to Mount St. Elias, we have many authentic data as to its volcanic nature. Belcher and Wrangell consider that the black ridges descending from the summits of the mountains, and the fact that the glaciers on Copper River exhibit a covering of vegetation, as proof of the volcanic character of the mountain. The first phenomena may rest entirely upon an optic delusion, as it is not at all certain that the black streaks consist of lava or ashes, while the appearance of vegetation on the surface of glaciers on Copper River is very probably due to the fall of volcanic ashes; the latter phenomenon may be traced as easily and with far more probability to the Wrangell volcano.
One of the most impressive physical features of the whole Territory is the stupendous glacier at Muir Inlet. This ice-field, says a recent writer, enters the sea with a front two or three hundred feet above the water and a mile wide. Fancy a wall of blue ice, splintered into columns, spires and huge crystal masses, with grottoes, crevices and recesses higher than Bunker Hill Monument and a mile in width! It is a spectacle that is strangely beautiful in its variety of form and depth of color, and at the same time awful in its grandeur. And not alone is the sight awe-inspiring. The ice-mountain is almost constantly breaking to pieces with sounds that resemble the discharge of heavy guns or the reverberations of thunder. At times an almost deafening report is heard, or a succession of them, like the belching of a whole park of artillery, when no outward effect is seen. It is the breaking apart of great masses of ice within the glacier. Then some huge berg topples over with a roar and gigantic splash that may be heard several miles, the waters being thrown aloft like smoke. A great pinnacle of ice is seen bobbing about in wicked fashion, perchance turning a somersault in the flood before it settles down to battle for life with the sun and the elements on its seaward cruise. Thewaves created by all this terrible commotion even rock the steamer and wash the shores miles away. There is scarcely five minutes in the whole day or night without some exhibition of this kind. There are mountains each side of the glacier, the one upon the right, or south shore, being the highest. High up on the bare walls are seen the scoriated and polished surfaces produced by glacial action. The present glacier is retrograding quite rapidly, as may be seen by many evidences of its former extent, as well as by the concurrent testimony of earlier visitors. On either side is a moraine half a mile in width, furrowed and slashed by old glacial streams which have given place in turn to others higher up the defile as the glacier recedes. These moraines are composed of earth and coarse gravel, with occasional large boulders. On the north side the material is more of a clayey sort, at least in part, and the stumps of an ancient forest have been uncovered by the action of a glacial river, or overwhelmed by the icy flood. Some scientists claim these forests are in reality pre-glacial, and many thousands of years old. The interior of the great moraines is yet frozen, and at the head of one of the little ravines formed by former glacial river discharges, a little stream still trickles forth from a diminutive ice cavern. Notwithstanding the contiguity of the ice itself, and the generally frigid surroundings, blue-bells and other flowers bloom on the moraine. In the centre of the glacier, some two miles from its snout, is a rocky island, the top of some ancient peak the great mill of ice has not yet ground down.
It is interesting to see how the massive stream of iceconforms itself to its shores, separating above the obstacle and reuniting below. On approaching or departing from Muir Inlet, the voyager may look back upon this literal sea of ice and follow its streams up to the snowfields of the White Mountains, which form the backbone of the peninsula between Glacier Bay and Lynn Canal. The following facts relating to the Muir glacier, its measurement and movement, are derived wholly from Professor Wright's notes. Roughly speaking, the Muir glacier may be said to occupy an amphitheatre which has the dimensions of about twenty-five miles from north to south, and thirty miles from east to west. The opening of this amphitheatre at Muir Inlet is toward the south south-east. It is two miles across from the shoulder of one mountain to the other at the outlet. Into the amphitheatre pour nine glaciers, and the sub-branches that are visible make the affluents more than twenty in number. Four of the main branches come in from the east, but these have already spent their force on reaching the focus of the amphitheatre. The first tributary from the south-west also practically loses its force before reaching the main current. The main flow is from two branches coming from the north-west and two from the north. The motion is here much more rapid. Observations made upon three portions of the main glacier, respectively 300, 1,000 and 1,500 yards from the front, showed the movement to be 135 feet at the first point, 65 at the second and 75 at the third, per day. The summit of the lower point was a little over 300 feet above the water, the second 400 feet and the third considerably more, probably 500 feet. The motion rapidly decreased on approaching the medial moraines broughtdown by the branches from the east. Along a line moving parallel with that of the greatest motion, and half a dozen miles east from it, the rate observed at two points was about 10 feet per day. Thus we get an average daily motion in the main channel of the ice flow, near its mouth, of about 40 feet across a section of one mile. The height of the ice above the water in front, at the extreme point, was found to be 226 feet. Back a few hundred feet the height is a little over 300 feet, and at a quarter of a mile 400 feet. A quarter of a mile out in front of the glacier the water is 85 fathoms, or 510 feet deep. Thus Professor Wright estimates that a body of ice 735 feet deep, 5,000 feet wide and 1,200 feet long passed out into the bay in the thirty days he was there, this movement and discharge taking place at the rate of 149,000,000 cubic feet per day. He says that after the fall of a large mass of ice from the glacier into the bay, the beach near his camp two and one-half miles distant from the glaciers, would be wrapped in foam by the waves. One of many large masses he saw floating about projected some 60 feet out of water, and was some 400 feet square. Estimating the general height of the berg above the water to be 30 feet, and its total depth 250 feet, the contents of the mass would be 40,000,000 cubic feet.