1 86 TWO DIANAS IN ALASKA 



to accept them. We had a flask of whisky on us, 

 but refrained from handing over. The natives of 

 the coast line, from Cape Constantine to the Kus- 

 kokwim, are free more or less from the temptations 

 of strong drink, because the conditions which govern 

 navigation thereabouts are not attractive to the 

 whisky trader. Therefore, why create a want? 

 Besides, as Cecily said, we should very likely neeH 

 the contents of our flask ourselves before we had 

 done. 



How glorious it was to lie in a warm sleeping-bag 

 watching the stars twinkling in a sky of ultramarine, 

 to listen to the desolate cry of a loon, the very tongue 

 of the wilderness, and hear the plaintive snipe over- 

 head. How splendid to be so independent of any 

 camping arrangements, to require so little as to be 

 able to say any instant, " Let us rest here," no fuss, 

 no settling, no palaver of any kind. 



After a breakfast of some of the gift salmon, toasted 

 by the fire, we set out in another direction, and to 

 our vexation came on another Innuit settlement. We 

 seemed to have found a very residential part of the 

 country. The inhabitants of the coast, from the 

 mouth of the Yukon to Bristol Bay, are called In- 

 nuits, and they are the most numerous of any of the 

 tribes allied to the Eskimo. Very simple-minded 

 and kindly, it would be impossible to dislike them for 

 anything but the absolute filth of their half-under- 

 ground residences. These semi-earth houses, called 

 baraboras, beggar all description for dirt and 

 wretchedness. Some baraboras have square, wooden 



