144 MANAGEMENT OF THE SEAL ROOKERIES. 



improvemeut. moiitlis of tliG year.^ Tliey were then as well off 

 as well-to-do workingmeii in the Qiiited States, 

 but received much larger wages. No man was 

 compelled to w^ork, but received pay through his 

 chief for the work accomplished by him. A na- 

 tive could at any time leave the islands, but their 

 easy life and love for their home detained them. 

 When I first went there (1870) the women did a 

 good share of manual labor, but when I came 

 away (1877) the hard work was done by the 

 men. I do not recall a single instance in history 

 where there has been such a marked change for 

 the better by any peoj^le in such a short time as 

 there has been in the Pribilof Islanders since the 

 United States Government took control of these 

 islands."^ Evidence might be multiplied on this 

 point, but the foregoing testimony of eye-witnesses 

 of the relative conditions of the natives under the 

 Russian Company and again under that of the 

 American Government is sufficient to show that 

 the management of the Pribilof Islands by the 

 United States has raised the inhabitants in a few 

 years from a state of ignorance, wretchedness, 

 and semibarbarism, which seventy years of the 

 Russian Company's occupation had failed to 

 alleviate, to a condition of liberty and civiliza- 



>■ See photograph, of school, Vol. II, pp. 9, 163. 

 2 Vol. II, p. 162. 



