CRUISE OF STEAMER CORWIN IN THE ARCTIC OCEAN. OAR 
MEDICAL AND SURGICAL REMARKS. 
No serious epidemics have occurred at Saint Michael’s since 1840, when small-pox was intro- 
duced by the Russians. This is probably the northern limit of that disease on the Pacific Ameri- 
can coast. Of 550 cases occuring at Saint Michael’s and Kolmakovsky 200 died, and a famine 
ensued because of the death of so many of the hunters and providers.* 
This post having been for a long time in possession of the Russians before the Alaskan 
purchase, numerous half-breeds are found in the vicinity, for whom the so-called strumous diath- 
esis seems to have the preference. ‘That diseases of the Jatter character have prevailed for some 
time may be assumed from examination of an aboriginal skull exhumed from the neighboring grave- 
yard at Saint Michael’s. There is shown extensive necrosis of the bones composing the apex of the 
skull, also of the temporal and occipital bones and the left half of the inferior maxilla. 
It appears that variola prevailed among the Alaskans previously to the Russian occupation, 
for several early Spanish navigators mention having noticed the marks of small-pox among the 
natives of Sitka Bay and Port Bucareli on Prince William Sound. ‘The first mention is made by 
Don Francisco Antonio Maurelle, who explored the coast in 1775. “Journal of a Voyage in 1775 
to explore the coast of America northward of California,” published in English, Edinburgh, 
1802. The other reference is “ Relacion del Viaga Heche por los Goletas dutil y Mexicana en el 
ano de 1792, Madrid, 1801.” 
Hagemeister (Repor t on Russian Colonies, 1820) says that the first vaccine matter was brought 
to Alaska in 1808 by the ship Neva, and the surgeon. Mardhorst, who introduced vaccination, 
instructed the agents of the company in performing the operation. From Tikhmenieff we learn 
that7400 natives and 1 Russian died of small-pox at Sitka in 1836, and the disease being earried to 
Kodiak the following year, in March, it caused the death of 737 people. 
On the Alaskan Peninsula vaccination seems to have afforded protection from the disease, for 
but 27 deaths occurred out of 243 cases. At Ounalaska there were 180 cases, of which 130 died. 
At Cook’s Inlet, the natives refusing to be vaccinated, the mortality is reported to have been greater, 
but no figures are given. The last cases occurred there in 1840. The reappearance of small-pox 
was noticed at Sitka in 1862, and it traveled northward, but vaccination is alleged to have lessened 
the mortality of previous epidemics. 
On reaching Saint Lawrence Bay, Siberia, a native was taken aboard at his own request with 
a view to utilize his services, as he spoke a little English. This fellow had a fatuous expression 
of countenance and a choreie affection which kept up an intermittent twitching of his head. After 
several days he suffered from constipation and insomnia, for which the usual remedies were admin- 
istered, with the effect best described in the patient’s own phraseology when questioned at morning 
sick call: “Lass night big sick; to-day small sick; all same bime by good.” However, the bustle 
and stir on board a steam-vessel, with the unusual surroundings, caused a return of the insomnia, 
and the fellow’s state of mind was not improved by seeing our collection of aboriginal crania nor 
by the chaff and gibes of the men in the forecastle, who made him believe that he was to be taken 
to San Francisco in a box as an anatomical curiosity, all of which causes tended to produce an 
illusion of the imagination that exercised a despotism over his weak and uncultivated intellect. 
High authority asserts that all suicides originate either from insanity or moral cowardice. Here 
undoubtedly is an instance in which the disorder of the relations between mental and physical 
functions was of such a nature as to destroy the current presumptions founded on these relations 
as existing in health—the man stabbed himself and jumped into the sea. Happily he was fished 
aboard with great promptness, a boat being alongside at the time. An inspection showed a pene- 
trating wound of the chest just under the left nipple, the knife having entered several inches ; blood 
and air escaped from the wound every time the patient coughed, and the hand placed over the 
surface of the chest showed extensive effusion of blood into the thoracic cavity with the peculiar 
mucous bubbling or gurgling of traumatopnea. With such a formidable array of symptoms the 
patient ought to have perished promptly from asphyxia, notwithstanding the application of an 
occlusive dressing to the wound, a tight roller bandage around the chest, and the administration 
of the usual aaaane and opiate. After considerable delirium, LGR by orthopnea, it was 
* Tikhmenieff: Historical Been of the ee Colmes Vol. 1, p- 311- 13. 
H. Ex. 105. 
