THE FUR SEAL INDUSTRY OF ALASKA. 375 



that spring from the decaying viscera until this volatile tension causes it to give away ; fortu- 

 nately the line of least resistance to that merciful retort is usually right where it is adjacent to 

 the soil, so both putrescent fluids and much of the stench thereof is deodorized and absorbed 

 before it can contaminate the atmosphere to any great extent. The truth of my observation will 

 be promptly verified if the skeptic chooses to tear open any one of the thousands of gas-distended 

 carcasses in the fall that were skinned in the killing season ; if he does so, he will be smitten by 

 the worst smell that human sense can measure; and should he chance to be accompanied by a 

 native, that callous individual, even, will pinch his grimy nose and exclaim, it is a "keeshla 

 pahknoot!" 



At the close of the third season after the skinning of the seal's body it will have so rotted and 

 sloughed away as to be marked only by the bones and a few of the tendinous ligaments; in other 

 words, it requires from thirty to thirty-six months' time for a seal carcass to rot entirely away, 

 so nothing but whitened bones remain above ground. The natives govern their driving of the seals 

 and laying out of the fresh bodies according to this fact ; for they can, and do, spread this year 

 a whole season's killing out over the same spot of the field previously covered with such fresh 

 carcasses thr"ee summer's ago ; by alternating with the seasons thus, the natives are enabled to 

 annually slaughter all of the "holluschickie" on a relatively small area, close by the salt-houses, 

 and the village, as I have indicated on the map of Saint Paul's. 



DESCRIPTION OP KILLING-GROUND OP SAINT PAUL. The killing-ground of Saint Paul is a 

 bottomless sand flat, only a few feet above high water, and which unites the village hill and the 

 reef with the island itself; it is not a stone's throw from the heart of the settlement in fact, it is 

 right in town not even suburban. 



DESCRIPTION OF THE KILLING-GROUND AT SAINT GEORGE. On Saint George the "hollus- 

 chickie" are regularly driven to that northeast slope of the village hill, which drops down gently 

 to the sea, where they are slaughtered, close by and under the houses, as at Saint Paul ; those 

 droves which are brought in from the North Rookery to the west, and also Starry Ateel, are fre- 

 quently driven right through the village itself. This slaughtering field of Saint George is hard 

 tufa and rocky, but it slopes down to the ocean rapidly enough to drain itself well ; hence the 

 constant rain and humid fogs of summer carry off that which would soon clog and depiive the 

 natives from using the ground year after year in rotation, as they do. Several seasons have 

 occurred, however, when this natural and heavenly cleansing of the ground above-mentioned has 

 not been as thorough as murt be to be used again immediately ; then the seals were skinned 

 back of the village hill, and in the ravine to the west on the same slope from the summit. 



This village site of Saint George to-day, and the killing-grounds adjoining, used to be, during 

 early Russian occupation, in Pribylov's time, a large sea-lion rookery, the finest one known to 

 either island, Saint Paul or Saint George. Natives are living there who told me that their fathers 

 had been employed in shooting and driving these sea-lions so as to deliberately break up the breed- 

 ing-ground, and thus rid the island of what they considered a superabundant supply of the 

 Eumetopias, and thereby to aid and encourage the fresh and increased accession of fur-seals from 

 the vast majority peculiar to Saint Paul, which could not take place while the sea-lions held the 

 land. 



* The Saint Paul village site is located wholly on the northern slope of the village hill, where it drops from its 

 greatest elevation, at the flag-staff, of 125 feet gently down to the sandy killing-flats below and between it and the 

 main bod of the island. The houses are all placed facing the north, at regular intervals along the terraced streets, 

 which run east and west. There are sixty-four or seventy native houses, ten large and smaller buildings of the com- 

 pany, the treasury agent's residence ; the church, the cemetery crosses, and the school building are all standing here 

 in coats of pure white paint. The survey of the town site, when rebuilt, was made by Mr. H. W. Mclntyre, of the 

 Alaska Commercial Company, who himself planned and devised tie entire construction. No offal or decaying refuse 



