140 OUK ARCTIC PROVINCE. 



along under easy way, uutil the whole fleet of twenty or thirty craft 

 is launched. The trader stands by the rail and shakes the hand of 

 each grimy hunter as he steps down into his kyack, calling him, in 

 pigeon-Kussian, his " loobaiznie droug," or dear friend, and bids 

 him a hearty good-by. Then, as the last bidarka drops, the ship 

 comes about and speeds back to the port which yesterday morn- 

 ing she cleared from, or she may keep on, before she does so, to 

 some harbor at Saanak, where she will leave at a preconcerted 

 rendezvous a supply of flour, sugar, tea, and tobacco for her party. 



If the weather be not too foggy, and the sea not very high, the 

 bidarkies are deployed into a single long line, keeping well abreast, 

 at intervals of a few hundi'ed feet between. In this manner they 

 paddle slowly and silently over the water, each man peering sharj)ly 

 and eagerly into the vista of tumbling water just ahead, ready to 

 catch the faintest evidence of the presence of an otter, should that 

 beast ever so slyly present even the tip of its blunt head above 

 for breath and observation. Suddenly an otter is discovered, ap- 

 parently asleep, and instantly the discoverer makes a quiet signal, 

 which is flashed along the line. Not a word is spoken, not a 

 paddle splashes, but the vigilant, sensitive creature has taken the 

 alarm, and has turned on to its chest, and with powerful strokes of 

 its strong, webbed hind feet, has smote the water like the blades of 

 a propeller's screw, and down to depths below and away it speeds, 

 while the hunter brings his swift bidarka to an abrupt standstill 

 directly upon the bubbling wake of the otter's disappearance. He 

 hoists his paddle high in the air, and holds it there, while the 

 others whirl themselves over the water into a large circle around 

 him, varying in size from one-quarter to half a mile in diameter, 

 according to the number of boats engaged in the chase. 



The kahlan has gone down — he must come up again soon some- 

 where within reach of the vision of that Aleutian circle on the waters 

 over its head ; fifteen or twenty minutes of submergence, at the 

 most, compel the animal to rise, and instantly as its nose appears 

 above the surface, the native nearest it detects the movement, raises 

 a wild shout, and darts in turn toward it; the yell has sent the 

 otter down again far too quickly for a fair respiration, and that is 

 what the hunter meant to do, as he takes up his position over the 

 spot of the animal's last diving, elevates his paddle, and the circle 

 is made anew, with this fresh centre of formation. In this method 

 the otter is continually made to dive and dive again without scarcely 



