32 ALASKA INDUSTRIES. 



they liave ijlumbed and regulated, so that it supplies them with water 

 now and renders the hxbor next to nothing, compared with the former 

 difficulty. But to-day, when water is wanted in the Aleutian houses 

 at St. Paul, the man has to get it; the woman does not. He trudges 

 out with a little wooden firkin or tub on his back and brings it to the 

 house. 



Bome of the natives save their money, but there are very few among 

 them, perhaps not more than a dozen, Avho have the slightest econom= 

 ical tendenc3^ What they can not spend for luxuries, groceries, and 

 tobacco they manage to get away with at the gaming table. They 

 iiave their misers and their spendthrifts, and they have the usual Small 

 proj)ortion who know how to make money and then how to spend ii^ 

 A few among them who are in the liabit of saving have opened a reg- 

 ular bank account Avith the company. Some of them have to-day two 

 or three thousand dollars saved, drawing an interest of 9 per cent. 



"When tlie shij)s arrive and go the great and necessary labor of 

 lightering their cai'goes off and on from the roadsteads where they 

 anchor is i^rincipally performed by these people, and they are paid so 

 much a day for their labor — from 50 cents to $1, according to the 

 Character of the service- they render. This operation, however, is 

 much dreaded by the ship captains and sea-going men, whose habits 

 of discipline and automatic regularity and effect of working render 

 them severe critics and impatient coadjutors of the natives, who, to 

 tell the truth, hate to do anything after they have pocketed their 

 reward for sealing, and when they do labor after this, they regard it 

 as an act of very great condescension on their part. 



As they are living to-day up there there is no restraint, such as the 

 presence of policemen, courts of justice, fines, etc., which we employ 

 for the suppression of disorder and maintenance of the law in our own 

 land. They understand that if it is necessary to make them law- 

 abiding and to punish crime that such officers will l)e among them ; 

 and hence, perhaps, is due the fact that, from the time that the Alaska 

 Commercial Company has taken charge, in 1870, there has not been 

 one single occasion where the simplest functions of a justice of the 

 peace would or could have been called in to settle any difficulty. This 

 speaks eloquently for their docile nature and their amiable disposition. 



Food. — Seal meat is their staple food, and in the village of St. Paul 

 they consume on an average fully 500 pounds a day the year round; 

 and they are, by the permission of the Secretarj^ of the Treasury, 

 allowed everj^ fall to kill 5,000 or 6,000 seal pups, or an average of 

 22 to 30 young "kotickie" for each man, woman, and child in the 

 settlements. The pups will dress 10 pounds each. This shows an 

 average consumption of nearly GOO j)ounds of seal meat b}^ each i)er- 

 son, large and small, during the year. To this diet the natives add 

 a great deal of butter and many sweet crackers. They are passion- 

 ately fond of butter. No epicure at home or butter tastei' in Goshen 

 knows or appreciates that article better than these jjeople do. If they 

 could get all that they desire, they would consume 1,000 pounds of 

 butter and 500 pounds of sweet crackers every week, and indefinite 

 quantities of sugar. The sweetest of all sweet teeth are found in the 

 jaw of the average Aleut. But it is, of course, unwise to allow them 

 full swing in this matter, for they would turn their stomachs into 

 fermenting tanks if they had full access to an unlimited supply of 

 saccharine food. The company allows them 200 pounds a week. If 

 unable to get svv^eet crackers, they will eat about 300 pounds of hard 

 or pilot bread every week, and in addition to this nearly 700 pounds 



