FUR-SEAL FISHERIES OF ALASKA. 115 



established on the seal islands. As these natives live here, they live 

 as a single family in each settlement, having one common pnrpose in 

 life, and only one. What one native does, eats, wears, or says is known 

 at once to all the others, jnst as whatsoever any member of our household 

 may do, will soon be known to all of us who belong to its organization. 

 Hence, if they steal or quarrel among themselves, they keep the matter 

 wholly to theujgelves, and settle it to their own satisfaction. Were 

 there rival villages on the islands and diverse people and employment, 

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



As it is, the agent of the Treasury Department is clothed with all the 

 power necessary to fully maintain order up here. He is recognized and 

 respected as the trusted representative of the Secretary of the Treas- 

 ury, who is the supreme temporal ruler of their little commonwealth: 

 and, as such, he is never disobeyed. 



Seal meat is their staple food, and in the village of St. Paul they 

 consume on an average fully HOO pounds a day the year round.* They 

 have been, bj^ the permission of the Secretary of the Treasury, allowed 

 every fall to kill 5,000 or G,000 seal pups, or an average of 22 to 30 

 young kotickie for each man, woman, and child in the settlements. 

 The i)ups will dress 10 pounds each. But that is now prohibited. This 

 shows an average consumption of nearly 600 pounds of seal meat by 

 each person, large and small, during the year. To this diet the natives 

 add a great deal of jDutter and many sweet crackers. They are pas- 

 sionately fond of butter — no epicure at home or butter taster in Goshen 

 knows or appreciates that article better than these peo])le do. If they 

 could get all that they desire they would consume 1,000 i)ounds of but- 

 ter and 500 [)Ounds of sweet crackers every week, and indefinite quan- 

 tities of sugar — the sweetest of all sweet teeth are found in the jaw of 

 the average Aleut. But it is, of course, unwise to allow them full swing 

 in this matter, for they would turn their barrels into fermenting tanks, 

 if they had full access to an unlimited supply of saccharine food. If 

 unable to get sweet crackers, they will eat about 300 pounds of hard 

 or pilot bread every week, and in addition to this nearly 700 pounds of 

 flour at the same time. Of tobacco they are allowed 50 pounds a week; 

 candles, 75 pounds ; rice, 50 pounds. They burn, strange as it may seem, 

 kerosene oil here to the exclusion of the seal fat, which literally overruns 

 the island. They ignite and consume over 600 gallons of kerosene oil 

 a year in the village of St. Paul alone. They do not fancy vinegar very 

 much; perhaps 50 gallons a year is used up here. Mustard and pep- 

 per are sparingly used, 1 to 1^ pounds a week for the whole village. 

 Beans they peremptorily reject; for some reason or other they can not 

 be induced to use them. 



Those who go about the vessels contract a taste for split-pea soup, 

 and a few of these peas are sold in the village store. Salt meat, beef, or 

 pork they will take reluctantly, if it is given to and pressed upon them: 

 but, they will never buy it. 1 remember in this connection seeing 2 bar- 

 rels of prime salt pork and a barrel of prime mess salt beef opened in 

 the company's store shortly after my arrival in 1872, and, though the 

 people of the village were invited to help themselves, 1 think I am right 

 in saying that the barrels were not emptied when I left the island in 



1873. They use a very little cotfee during the year, not more than lOO 

 pounds; but of tea, a great deal, about 100 chests every year; I can say 

 truly, that they do not drink less than a gallon of tea apiece per diem. 

 The amount of this beverage which they sip, from the time they rise in 



'This estimate was based on a population of 235 men, women, and children, in 



1874, at St. Paul. To-day, there are only 213 souls in this village, July 31, 1890. 



