16 CRUISE OF THE STEAMER CORWIN. 



Uaving Icarnod tbat by proceeding to Belkofaky I could obtain definite information of viola- 

 tion ot law, on the 12th I left for that i)lace, arriving there on the 14th. The most searching 

 inquiries, however, dev. loped iiotliiiij,'. On tlie following day I <Tnised to the eastward, touching 

 at Unga and Sand Point. On the IGth 1 visited Coal Harbor. While cruising about among 

 these islands I boarded and examined all the vessels encountered, without finding evidence of 

 other than legitimate trade. 



September 20 I returned to Ounalaska, and received by the steamer St. Paul a letter fronj 

 the Department under date of August 21, inclosing a copy of a letter from Mr. Moulton, a special 

 agent at the seal islands. In niferenco thereto I would respectfully state that I had already 

 boarded the schooner VanderbUt without finding evidence of illegal traffic. Special Agent (Hid- 

 den, at St. Paul, did not think there would be any trouble at that place, and I am satisfied if any 

 raid is attempted on the seal rookeries that the Government force on the island is amply sutlicieut 

 to prevent it if anything like a respectable lookout is kept. 



From the company's agent at Ounalaska I learned that a new volcano had been seen by Cap- 

 tain Hague, of the steamer Dora, on Tchuginadok Island (one of the Four Mountains), in latitude 

 52° 48' north and longitude 109^ 55' west. Volcanoes in active operation have frequently been 

 observed in these mountains, but for the past four years they have been inactive. Whether the 

 one reported is a new eruption or an old crater returned to activity the agent was unable to say. 

 As much as I desired to visit and examine this phenomenon, the very crowded condition of the 

 vessel and the suft'ering of my crew and passengers precluded the idea. At the date of my 

 leaving, a day without rain was an exception in these latitudes, and severe storms were frequent. 

 On September 24 one of the most severe gales that it has ever been my fortune to witness in these 

 waters visited Ounalaska. In this small land-locked and inountaiu-walled harbor the water was 

 lashed into foam by the fury of the wind ; the air was filled mast-head high with moisture picked 

 up from the surface, and it seemed almost impossible that the two chains by which we were 

 moored could stand the shock of the descending " wooleys." The accommodations of the vessel 

 gave shelter from rain, storms, and frosts to only one half of the people on board at one and the 

 same time; the men were scantily clad, and complaints to the surgeon were becoming every 

 day more frequent. Fearing that an epidemic might arise from the damp and overcrowded 

 quarters, inwhich opinion I was sustained by Dr. Yemans, I considered a return to San Fran- 

 cisco imperative. 



There was no means of getting these people to San Francisco other than on the Corwin. The 

 steamer St. Paul was bound to Petropaulowski, in Asia, ami the steamer J)ora had not si)ace and 

 would not sail until November. At Ounalaska accommodations and food for so large a number 

 of persons could not be supplied for any length of time, and if there had been I should not have 

 felt justified in leaving these people here unguarded where there is no protection of the law. 



Having coaled and watered ship, I loft for San Francisco September 25, arriving at the port 

 of destination October 5, after an unusually jjleasant voyage. 



On my arrival I found that Lieutenant Lutz had brought the schooner Adele safe to this port, 

 and had made arrangements for turning her over to the proper oflScers, in compliance with orders 

 that I had issued for his guidance. 



I wish to again call the attention of the Department to the injustice that is being done the 

 harmless people of northern Alaska by depriving them of breech-loading arms. No evil results 

 can come of the repeal of the law in so far as it applies to them, and a manifest act of humanity 

 would be accomplished by so doing. They are a peaceful race. They have no tribal alBliations 

 and no chiefs, their "omalik" being the head of a family. They live apart in small villages; 

 communication is difticult, and their languages dillerent. With the exception of She-sho lik, a 

 town on Kotzebue Sound, where they congregate during the summer to the number of twelve to 

 fifteen hundred for the double purpose of catching salmon and white whale and trading, no con- 

 siderable number of them are ever together, and it is not within the range of possibility that any 

 combination can be etiected for warlike purposes. 



Again the wholesale slaughter of the walrus by whalers.has so diminished the numbers of that 

 aquatic mammal as to almost deprive these people of their main source of animal food. Those 



