234 OUR ARCTIC PROVINCE. 



fires ; and, in the spring and fall, frost works through and drips 

 and trickles like rain adown the walls. The present frame-houses 

 occupied by the natives owe their dryness, their warmth, and pro- 

 tection from the piercing ' ' boorgas " to the liberal use of stout 

 tarred paper in the lining. An overpowering mustiness of the hall- 

 ways, out-houses, and, in fact, every roofed-in spot, where a stove is 

 not regularly used, even in the best-built residences, is one of the 

 first disagreeable sensations which the new arrivals always experi- 

 ence when they take up their quarters here. Perhaps, if it were 

 not for the nasal misery that floats in from the killing-grounds to 

 the novice, this musty, moldy state of things up here would be far 

 more acute, as an annoyance, than it is now. The greater grief 

 seems to soon fully absorb the lesser one ; at least, in my own case, 

 I can affirm the result. 



As they lived in early time, it was a physical impossibility for 

 them to increase and multiply ; * but, since their elevation and their 

 sanitary advancement are so marked, it may be reasonably expected 

 that those people for all time to come will at least hold their own, 

 even though they do not increase to any remarkable degree. Per- 

 haps it is better that they should not. But it is exceedingly for- 

 tunate that they do sustain themselves so as to be, as it were, a 

 prosperous corporate factor, entitled to the exclusive privilege of 

 labor on these islands. As an encouragement for their good be- 

 havior the Alaska Commercial Company, in pursuance of its enlight- 

 ened treatment of the whole subject, so handsomely exhibited by 

 its housing of these people, has assured them that so long as they 

 are capable and willing to perform the labor of skinning the seal- 

 catch every year, so long will they enjoy the sole privilege of par- 

 ticipating in that toil and its reward. This is wise on the part of 

 the company, and it is exceedingly happy for the people. ' They 

 are, of all men, especially fitted for the work connected with the 

 seal-business no comment is needed nothing better in the way 



* The population of St. Paul in 1880 was 298. Of these, 14 were whites 

 (13 males and 1 female), 128 male Aleutians, and 156 females. On St. George 

 we have 92 souls : 4 white males, 35 male Aleutians, and 53 females, a total 

 population on these islands of 390. This is an increase of between thirty and 

 forty people since 1873. Prior to 1873 they had neither much increased nor 

 diminished for fifty years, but would have fallen off rapidly (since the births 

 were never equal to the deaths) had not recruits been regularly drawn from 

 the mainland and other islands every season when the ships came up. 



