CHAPTER VI. 



THE GREAT ISLAND OF KADIAK. 



Kadiak the Geographical and Commercial Centre of Alaska. — Site of the First 

 Grand Depot of the Old Russian Company. — Shellikov and his Remark- 

 able History, 1784. — His Subjection of the Kaniags. — Bloody Struggle. — 

 He Founds the First Church and School in Alaska at Three Saints Bay, 

 1786, One Hundred Years ago. — Kadiak, a Large and Rugged Island. — The 

 Timber Line drawn upon it.— Luxuriant Growth of Annual and Biennial 

 Flowering Plants. — Reason why Kadiak was Abandoned for Sitka. — The 

 Depot of the Mysterious San Francisco Ice Company on Wood Island. — Only 

 Road and Horses in Alaska there. — Creole Ship and Boat Yard. — Tough 

 Siberian Cattle. Pretty Greek Chapel at Yealovnie. — Afognak, the Larg- 

 est Village of "Old Colonial Citizens." — Picturesque and Substantial Vil- 

 lage. — Largest Crops of Potatoes raised here.— No Ploughing done ; Earth 

 Prepared with Spades. — Domestic Fowls. — Failure of Our People to Raise 

 Sheep at Kolma. — What a "Creole" is. — The Kaniags or Natives of Ka- 

 diak ; their Salient Characteristics. — Great Diminution of their Num- 

 bers. — Neglect of Laws of Health by Natives. — Apathy and Indifference 

 to Death. — Consixmption and Scrofula the Scourge of Natives in Alaska ; 

 Measles equally deadly. — Kaniags are Sea-otter Hunters. — The Penal 

 Station of Ookamok, the Botany Bay of Alaska. — The Wild Coast of the 

 Peninsula. — Water-terraces on the Mountains. — Belcovsky, the Rich and 

 Profligate Settlement. — Kvass Orgies. — Oonga, Cod-fishing Rendezvous.-^ 

 The Burial of Shoomagin here, 1741. — The Coal Mines here Worthless. 



The boldest and the most striking cape in this wilderness of bluffy 

 headlands and jutting promontories is that point which marks the 

 dividing line between the Kadiak region and Cook's Inlet — Cape 

 Douglas. It is a lofty alpine ridge or spur, abruptly thrust out at 

 a right angle to the coast, and into and over the sea for a distance 

 of three miles, where it drops suddenly with a sheer precipitous 

 fall of over one thousand feet into the waves that thunder on its 

 everlasting foundations. Baffling winds here, and turbulent tide- 

 rips distress that navigator who, coming down from the inlet, seeks 

 the harbor of St. Paul's village. He liardly regards this seared 

 and rugged headland with that admiration which the geologist and 



