158 



THE FISHERIES OF THE UNITED STATES. 



39. PARAGRAPHS OF EEFEREI^CE RELATIVE TO SUBJECTS DISCUSSED IN THE PRECEDING 



MEMOIR, AND REFERRED TO AS ]¥OTE 39. 



A. Previous publications of the ■mtiTER [Section I]. — I allude, at the outset, to tlie fact that a brief digest 

 of my surveys had been published by the goverument in lS73-'74; it is entitled Condition of Affairs in AhtJika: 

 8°, 1874. Tins report was principally given up to the state of the fur-trade over all Alaska, the people and resources 

 thereof; it also contains the substance of a still briefer report of mine made upon the Pribylov islands in September, 

 1873, and was printed by the Treasury Department during my absence in Alaska. Owing to causes of which I have 

 necessarily no personal knowledge, only 75 copies of this report were struck oft'; it was illustrated by 50 quarto 

 Ijlates photographed from my drawings and paintings. 



B. St. Felix must not be confounded with Masafuera [Section 2J. — The overshadowing number of 

 fur-seals found on Masafuera and Juan Fernandez islands, just to the southwaid of this island, has caused a great 

 deal of confusion as to the existence, or not, of Arctocephalus on this island and Ambrosia islet, in ihe old records 

 and statements of Antarctic fur-sealers. It has, however, never been a very prominent rookery, but it has been one, 

 nevertheless, and hence I give its name. 



A fur-seal skin was taken from either the straits of Le Maire or Juan Fernandez as early as 1686, and presented 

 to the Museum of the Royal Society in London ; here it was first noticed as new by Dr. Grew, in 1094; but the name 

 of the donor and the locality being unknown, the matter was allowed to drop by naturalists, and Grew's descriiitions 

 were laid aside by them as obscure and apocryphal; indeed, even as late as 1823, Baron Cuvier said of the Grew 

 diagnosis, " Que taire de cette phoque — Que faire de cette otarie!" {Diet. Class. (PRist. Nat., tome xiii.) 



I say that this specimen was taken from the above localities in all probability ; because, unless it came from 

 the Falkland islands, there were no other fur-seal grounds known to navigators at so early a date. Spanish and 

 English buccaneers were, however, familiar with Juan Fernandez and Masafuera as soon as 1574-'8G, or a full 

 century prior to the receipt of the Grew specimen. These sea pirates, however, prided themselves over their swords 

 alone; so we have no record of what they really knew or did. Nevertheless, some of them, evidently, employed a 

 leisure hour or day in securing and transmitting the skin above referred to. In summing up, therefore, Heniy 

 Brewer, in 1646, at Staten land, first noticed the southern fur-seal. William Dam pier, in 1683, first called specific 

 attention to it as a fur-seal, and Dr. Grew, as above stated, first described it lormally as a new s.eal to natural 

 science. So much is due to the true literature of the Antarctic fur-seal. 



C'. Pkibylov's discovery of the islands [Section 3]. — "Anglieskie Bookta," or English bay, so-called 

 by the natives because in 1849 a large English whale (?) ship was stranded on the shoals of that reach of the coast, 

 and the wreck driven ashore there. 



D. Land and scenery [Section 4]. — This village lagoon has been filling up very perceptibly since 1808, 

 when Hutchinson and Morgan then were able to sail in a small sloop, drawing six feet of water, up to its head. 

 To-day such a vessel could not come nearer than lialf a mile to their anchorage of 1868. The principal shoaling takes 

 jtlace in a direct line here between Tolstoi Mees and the Village Hill, where a iwiky reef seems to be slowly rising, 

 l)ushed up by ice fields. The sloop yacht " Jabez Howe", which was wrecked in 1873 on Akootan, is probably the 

 last sea-going vessel that has or ever will gain an entrance to the village lagoon, St. Paul island; or swing at 

 anchor in the cove. 



E. St. Paul [Section 4].— The physical diflSculties of pedestrianism here recall vividly to my mind the recent 

 death of Mr. Edward Gill, a brother of the distinguished naturalist, Professor Gill, of the Smithsonian Institution. 

 Late in October, 1876, this young man, in company with several of the natives and two agents of the Alaska 

 Commercial Company, started out one bright morning for a walk, intending to go to Northeast point, then to return 

 by Nahsayvernia to English bay, and home to the village in the evening ; they had journeyed on this route as fiir 

 as Maroonitch, at the north shore, when a storm of wind and sleet arose which blew directly in their faces as tliey 

 came across the island to English bay. Gill sank several times from exhaustion, caused by the severe exercise of 

 walking in the sphagnum on Boga Slov and of jumping over the tussocks near the bay. Finally, at the he:;d of the 

 lagoon, and in sight of the village lights, he dropped into the long grass, utterly prostrated ; his companions, too 

 Aveak to carry him farther, struggled on, and when the relief party found him he was warm, but life had departed. 

 He was in perfect health and condition at the starting; but the chill fury of the icy gale had compassed his death. 



F. Resident natives of St. Paul, July 1, 1870, taken from Philip Volkov's lists, August 8, 1873. 



[Section 5.] 



[The names in italics were eitlier dead or absent from the island at the date of copy, August 8, 1.S73.J 



1. Philip Keemacliiicek. 



2. Effrosccnia, his wife. 



3. Ivan, his son, 



4. Daiicio, his son. 



5. Vasseelc Seedulee. 



6. Mareeva, his wife. 



7. Alexaitcler, his son. 



8. Sylvester, his sou. 



9. Eifcem Anoohvnoli. 

 10. Matioonu, his wife. 



11. Simeon, aclojited son. 



12. Marka Anelijah. 



13. Feeltcehat, his wife. 



14. Peter Peeshenkov. 



15. Matrooua, his wife. 



