406 ALASKA INDUSTRIES. 



bones and n few of tlie tendinous ligaments. In other words, it requires 

 from thirty to thirty-six months' time for a .seal carcass to rot entirely 

 away so nothing but whitened bones remain above ground. The natives 

 govern their driving of the seals and laying out of the fresh bodies 

 according to this fact, for they can and do spread this year a whole 

 season's killing out over th same spot of the field previously covered 

 with such fresh carcasses three summers ago. By alternating with the 

 seasons, thus, the natives are enabled to annually slaughter all of the 

 holluschickie on a relatively small area close by their salt houses and 

 the village, as [ have indicated on the map of St. Paul. 



DESCRIPTION OF THE KILLING GROUND AT ST. GEORGE VILLAGE. 



On St. George the holluschickie are regularly driven to that northeast 

 slope of the village hill which drops down gently to the sea, where they 

 are slaughtered close by and under the houses, as at St. Paul. Those 

 droves which are brought in from the North rookery to the west, and 

 also Starry Arteel, are frequently driven right through the village itself. 

 This slaughtering field of St. George is hard tufa and rocky, but it 

 slopes down to the ocean rapidly enough to drain itself well. Hence 

 the constant rain and humid fogs of summer carry off that which would 

 soon clog and deprive the natives from using the ground year after year 

 in rotation, as they do. Several seasons have occurred, however, when 

 this natural cleansing of the ground above mentioned has not been as 

 thorough as must be, to be used again immediately. Then, the seals 

 were skinned back of the village hill, and in the ravine to the west, on 

 the same slope from the summit. 



This village site of St. George to-day, and the killing grounds adjoin- 

 ing, used to be during early Russian occupation, in Pribilov's time, a 

 large sea-lion rookery, the finest one known to either island, St. Paul 

 or St. (ieorge. Natives are living there who told me that their fathers 

 had been employed in shooting and driving these sea lions so as to 

 deliberately break up the breeding ground, and thus rid the island of 

 what they considered a superabundant supply of the Uumetopias, and 

 thereby to aid and encourage the fresh and increased accession of fur 

 seals from that vast majority ])eculiar to St. Paul, which could not take 

 place while the sea lions held the laud. 



These killing grounds at the villages of St. George and St. Paul 

 islands are the chief slaughtering fields. But another killing ground 

 at Zapadnie is established on St. George, with a small salt house, in 

 which the skins as taken, are temporarily cured, and then transx)orted 

 over the trail on the backs of donkeys, to the village salt houses for 

 final salting and bundling. On St. Paul, at Northeast Point, a regular 

 salt house and killing ground has been ordered and maintained by our 

 people, ever since 18G8, and some 25,000 to 30,000 skins have been regu- 

 larly taken there every year since 1870, until last season (1890), when 

 only a trifle over 6,000 were scraped up. Also, on St. Paul, a small kill- 

 ing ground has been establislied at Stony Point, or Tonkie Mees, ever 

 since 1870. A salt house was built there then : but, during the last four 

 or five years, so few seals have been secured in its vicinity that teams 

 have gone and now go up from the village on the killing days, and haul 

 the fresh pelts directly down to the village salt houses. Another kill- 

 ing ground at Zapadnie, St. Pauls, close by "Antone's House," has been 

 used ever since 1879; but no salt house is erected here, since the natives 

 now row one of their big skin lighters or "bidarrahs" right over from 

 the village to this spot, and sail back with the catch for each day's work. 

 Nowhere else on either island have seals been killed by the lessees, 

 since 1870. 



