12 OUR ARCTIC PROVINCE. 



ceived the idea of taking the charter of the Russian Company them- 

 selves, and offered a sum far in excess of what had accrued to the 

 Imperial treasury at any time during the last forty years' tenure of 

 the old contract. The negotiations were briskly proceeding, and 

 were in a fair way to a successful ending, when it informally be- 

 came known to Secretary Seward, who at once had his interest ex- 

 cited in the subject, and speedily arrived at the conclusion that if it 

 was worth paying $5,000,000 by a handful of American merchants 

 for a twenty years' lease of Alaska, it was well worthy the cost of 

 buying it out and out in behalf of the United States ; inasmuch as 

 leasing it, as the Russians intended to, was a virtual surrender of it 

 absolutely for the period named. In this spirit the politic Seward 

 approached the Russian Government, and the final consummation of 

 Alaska's purchase was easily effected,* May, 1867, and formally 

 transferred to our flag on the 18th of October following. 



If the Russian Government had not been in an exceedingly 

 friendly state of mind with regard to the American Union, this some- 

 what abrupt determination on its part to make such a virtual gift 

 of its vast Alaskan domain would never have been thought of in St. 

 Petersburg for a moment. Still, it should be well understood from 

 the Muscovitic view, that in presenting Russian America to us, no 

 loss to the glory or the power of the Czar's Crown resulted ; no sur- 

 render of smiling hamlets, towns or cities, no mines or mining, no 

 fish or fishing, no mills, factories or commerce nothing but her 

 good will and title to a few thousand poor and simple natives, and 

 a large wilderness of mountain, tundra-moor and island-archipelago 

 wholly untouched, unreclaimed by the hand of civilized man. Rus- 

 sia then, as now, suffered and still suffers, from an embarrassment of 

 just such natural wealth as that which we so hopefully claim as 

 our own Alaska. 



* $7,200,000 gold was paid by the United States into the Imperial treasury 

 of Russia for the Territory of Alaska ; it is said that most of this was used in 

 St. Petersburg to satisfy old debts and obligations incurred by Alaskan enter- 

 prises, attorneys' fees, etc. So, in short, Russia really gave her American pos- 

 sessions to the American people, reaping no direct emolument or profit whatso- 

 ever from the transfer. 



