WONDERFUL SEAL ISLANDS, 235 



of manual labor, skilled and rapid, could be rendered hj any body 

 of men, equal in numbers, living under the same circumstances, all 

 the year round. They appear to shake off the periodic lethargy of 

 winter and its forced inanition, to rush with the coming of summer 

 into the severe exercise and duty of capturing, killing, and skinning 

 the seals, with vigor and with persistent and commendable energy. 



To-day only a very small proportion of the population are de- 

 scendants of the pioneers who were brought here by the several 

 Russian companies in 1787 and 1788 ; a colony of one hundred and 

 thirty-seven souls, it is claimed, principally recruited at Oonalashka 

 and Atkha. 



The Aleutes on the islands as they appear to-day have been so 

 mixed in with Russian, Koloshian, and Kamschadale blood that 

 they present characteristics, in one way or another, of all the vari- 

 ous races of men from the negro up to the Caucasian. The pre- 

 dominant features among them are small, wide-set eyes, broad and 

 high cheek-bones, causing the jaw, which is full and square, to 

 often appear peaked ; coarse, straight, black hair, small, neatly- 

 shaped feet and hands, together With brownish-yellow complexion. 

 The men will average in stature five feet four or five inches ; the 

 women less in proportion, although there are exceptions to this 

 rule among them, some being over six feet in height, and others 

 are decided dwarfs. The manners and customs of these people to- 

 day possess nothing in themselves of a barbarous or remarkable 

 character aside from that which belongs to an advanced state of 

 semi-civilization. They are exceedingly polite and civil, not only 

 in their business with the agents of the company on the seal- 

 islands, but among themselves, and they visit, the one with the 

 other, freely and pleasantly, the women being great gossips ; but, 

 on the whole, their intercourse is subdued, for the simple reason 

 that the topics of conversation are few : and, judging from tlieir 

 silent but unconstrained meetings, they seem to have a mutual 

 knowledge, as if by sympathy, as to what may be occupying each 

 other's minds, rendering speech superfluous. It is only when un- 

 der the influence of beer or strong liquor that they lose their natu- 

 rally quiet and amiable disposition. They then relapse into low, 

 drunken orgies and loud, brawling noises. * Having been so long 



* This evil of habitual and gross intoxication under Russian rule was not 

 characteristic of these islands alone. It was universal throui;hout Alaska. Sir 





