CEUISE OF STEAMER CORWIN IN ARCTIC OCEAN. 



21 



people of the village had died of faiuiue, as near as we coidd make out from a very imperfect iuter- 

 pretation, and that food became so scarce they were obliged to eat dried walrus skins and their 

 dogs, having but one dog left, when happily the capture of a whale afforded timely relief. A 

 number of these fur and feather-clad aborigines, having their heads shaved after the manner of 

 Zurbaran's pictures of monks in the middle ages, were clamorous in iniimrtuning for whiskey, and 

 the chief of the village refused to sell us a few reindeer skins unless we gave him liquor in exdiange, 

 this too while the poor reuiaining dog, looking wistfully up into his face, seemed to be a living 

 warning not to try as a remedy the hair of tlie dog that had bitten the village. 



To attribute the late cause of death among these people entirely to intemperance admits of 

 some doubt. It seems impossible for them, owing to lack of means, to have procured enough driidc 

 to last more than a few days, or at least during the short stay of any trading vessel that may have 

 arrived. Then again it is probable that some epidemic intiuence was the main factor, if we may 

 rely upon the statement of a whaling captain who visited the island during the time vso many were 

 dying. He tells me that the disease was what he calls " measles or black tongue." Admitting the 

 prevalence of sickness of this kind among an improvident and shiftless people, starvation must 

 follow as an inevitable and necessary result. Similar conditions liaving prevailed among the 

 Asiatic Eskimo of Plover Bay and East Cape, many of whom have died in the last few years, it 

 would, perhaps, be nearer the truth to say that the mortality in question was due to the combined 

 influences of intemperance, sickness, and starvation. 



EFFECTS OF CUM ATE. 



At Saint Michael's, almost under the Arctic Circle, I found tliat pulmonary troubles and the 

 constitutional effects of syphilis prevailed among the small poi)alation to an alarming extent. Here 

 also, as in most every northern place we touched at, the wicked thirst for rum exercised a domi- 

 nating influence. The winters are long ami cold, with high winds and gales and a great deal of 

 snow; the thermometer falls to — 450, aii<l the winter previously to our coming was so severe that 

 owing to the great and long continued cold Eskimo dogs and wild geese are reported to have 

 frozen to death. The accompanying meteorological summaries from the records of the Signal Office 

 jiive a more detailed account of the weather: 



GENERAL REMARKS. 



1879: July.— Cold and damp; rain or fogr Hourly every day. 



August.— Cold and rainy. 



September. — Winter commenced the lant of the month ; remarkably early. 



Octoljer.— Almost a continuous aeries of gale^ all the month. 



November.— Series of gales the last of the month. 



December.— Mild temperatures and ^zt^,len the last half of month, ending abruptly in severely cold weather. 

 Station: Saint Michael's, Alaska. 

 1380 : January.— Remarkably high barometer the first of month ; long continued cold weather with high winds the last. 



February. — A continuous series of gales accompanied by snow all the month. 



March.— Extraordinarily large snow fall during the month ; but the accompanynig gales, as in February, prevented measurement. 



April. — Ver>- cold ; unusually fine weather toward the last of month, but low temperatures still prevailed. 



May —Winter continued unbroken until the 18th inst., when it became suddenly warm, and the water-fowl began arriving. 



