160 THE FISHERIES OF THE UNITED STATES. 



226. AJcoolena, his mother. 



227. Kerick Tarakanov. 



228. Domian M. Kok (John Frator). 



229. Oolyahnah, his wife. 



230. Anua, his daughter. 



231. Salomayah, Artamanov's daughter. 



White men in charge. 



1. Dr. Mclntyre. 



2. H. W. Mclntyre. 



3. Dr. Cramer. 



4. John M. Morton. 



5. Chas. Bryant. 



6. D. Webster. 



7. , a cooper. 



8. , a carpenter. 



WHAT CONSTITUTES A NATIVE OF ST. PAUL. There has been some petty divergence of opinion on the 

 island as to who are the real " natives" thereof, because these natives enjoy certain privileges that are very valuable 

 them and coveted by all outside Alaskan brethren. 



In this connection the people living here are divided into three classes; that is, the males: 



First. The natives, properly speaking, or those who have been born and raised upon the Pribylov islands; not 

 V over one-quarter of the present adult population can lay claim to this title. 



Second. The people who were living thereon, but not born natives at the time of the transfer of all Alaska, 

 July, 1867; this class constitutes a majority of the citizens of the two islands as they exist to-day. 



Third. The people who were living and working as sealers on the Pribylov islands at the date of the granting 

 by the government of the present lease to the Alaska Commercial Company, August 31, 1870. 



Of the above three divisions, strict justice and true equity unite in recognizing the third class as the natives of 

 the Pribylov islands. This settles the question also to the best satisfaction of these people themselves, and removes 

 every quibble of dispute in the premises. Accurate records of the men, women, and children living on each island 

 at the date of the lease in 1871 can be found in the church registers on both St. Paul and St. George. 



CURIOUS DERIVATION OF NATIVES' NAMES. Any one at all acquainted with the Eussian language will not 

 fail to notice that the names in the above list have some odd derivations, relating to physical peculiarities, defects, 

 and other originations that are more or less comical in their suggestions. I was told by a very bright Eussian, who 

 spent a season here, 1871-'72, as special agent of the Treasury Department, that the Aleutian ancestors of these 

 people when they were converted and baptized into the Greek Catholic church received their names, bran new, 

 from the fertile brains of the priests, who, after exhausting the common run of Muscovitic titles, such as our 

 Smiths and Joneses, were compelled to fall back upon some personal characteristics of the new claimant for civilized 

 nomenclature. Thus we have to-day on the seal-islands a " Stepan Bayloglazov", or " Son of a White Eye", " Oseep 

 Baizyahzeekov", or "Sou of a Man without a Tongue". A number of the old Eussian governors and admirals 

 of the imperial navy are represented here by their family names, though I do not think, from my full acquaintance 

 with the name-sakes, that the distinguished owners in the first place had anything to do with their physical 

 embodiment on the Pribylov islands. 



CAUSES OF DEATH AMONG THE PEOPLE. The principal cause of death among the people, by natural infirmity, 

 on the seal-islands, is the varying forms of consumption and bronchitis, always greatly aggravated by that inherited 

 scrofulous taint or stain of blood which was, in one way or another, flowing through the veins of their recent 

 progenitors, both here and throughout the Aleutian islands. There is nothing worth uoticiug in the line of nervous 

 diseases, unless it be now and then the record of a case of alcoholism superinduced by excessive quass drinking. 

 This "makoolah" intemperance among these people, which was not suppressed until 1876, was a chief factor to the 

 immediate death of infants ; for, when they were at the breast, the mothers would drink quass to intoxication, and 

 the stomachs of the newly-born Aleuts or Creoles could not stand the infliction which they received, even second- 

 hand. Had it not been for this wretched spectacle, so often presented to my eyes in 187H-'73, 1 should hardly have 

 taken the active steps which I did to put the nuisance down ; for it involved me, at first, in a bitter personal 

 controversy, which, although I knew at the outset it was inevitable, still weighed nothing in the scales against the 

 evil itself.* 



A few febrile disorders are occurring, yet they yield readily to good treatment. The chief source of sickness 

 used to arise from the wretched character of the barrabkies in which they lived; but it was, at first, a very difficult 

 matter to get frame houses to supplant successfully the sod-walled and dirt-roofed huts of the islands. 



DIFFICULTY OF GETTING SUITABLE HOUSES. Many experiments, however, were made, and a dozen houses 

 built, ere the result was as good as the style of primitive housing, when it had been well done and kept in best 



*This evil of habitual and gross intoxication, under Russian rule, was not characteristic of these islands alone, it was universal 

 throughout Alaska. Sir George Simpson, speaking of the subject, when in Sitka, April, 1842, says: "Some reformation certainly was 

 wanted in this respect; for of all the drunken, as well as of all the dirty places that I had visited, New Archangel [Sitka] was the worst. 

 On the holidays in particular, of which, Sundays included, there are one hundred and sixty-five in the year, men, women, and even 

 children were to be seen staggering about in all directions." [Simpson: Journei/ Around Hie World ; 1841-'42, p. 88.] 



Surprise has often been genuine among those who inquire, over the fact that there is no law officer hero at either village, and 

 wonder is expressed why such provision is not made by the government. But, when the following fads relative to this subject are 

 understood, it is at once clear that a justice of the peace and his constabulary, would bo entirely useless, if established on the seal- 

 islands. As these natives live here, they live as a single family in each settlement, having one common purpose in life and only one ; what 

 one native does, eats, wears, or says, is known at once to all the others, just as whatsoever any member of our household may do will soon 

 be known to us all who belong t its organization ; hence if they steal or quarrel among themselves, they keep the matter wholly to 

 themselves, and settle it to their own satisfaction. Were there rival villages on the islands and diverse people and employment, then tlio 

 case would be reversed, and need of legal machinery apparent. 



