MORSE AND MAHLEMOOT. 465 



over its entire coast-line, hfid not been trodden by white men, or by 

 natives, since that dismal record made by a party of five Russians 

 and seven Aleutes who passed the winter of 1810-11 on it, and 

 who were so stricken down with scurvy as to cause the death of all 

 the Russians save one, while the rest barely recovered and left 

 early the following year. We found the ruins of those huts which 

 had been occupied by this unfortunate and discomfited party of 

 fur-hunters ; they were landed there to secure polar bears in the 

 depth of winter, when such shaggy coats should be the finest. 



As we complete our review of St. Matthew and its ursine occu- 

 pation, the circuit of Alaska has been made — its impression we have 

 recorded, and the path from here home again is a bee-line to the 

 Golden Gate over 



"Nothing, nothing but the sea — 

 Vast in its immensity ? " 



