600 TESTIMONY 



articles as would liave materially lielped the initives if tlsey could Lave 



Their dweiiin-s ^^^^ tliem. They labored under the disadvautage of 

 ss- living in a cold, bnrren, treeless country and having to 

 depend for building material upon the driftwood thrown uj^on their 

 shores from the rivers emptying into Bering Sea. It was, therefore, 

 impossible for them to make much progress, no matter what the teach- 

 ing or the example set before them may have been wliile living, as they 

 were, in their damp, tilthy subterranean houses; and more imjDossible 

 for them to live otherwise than underground until they were furnished 

 with fuel and building material. 



These were never supi)lied by the Eussians, and the Americans ac- 

 cordingly found them, upon the cession of the territory to the United 

 States, living in miserable, unhealthy hovels totally unfit for human 

 habitation. The supports for the thatched roofs and turf sides of their 

 houses consisted of the pieces of driftwood or the jaw bones of whales; 

 light was admitted through the opaque medium of raw sea-lion skins, 

 stretched and shaved; the chimney was a hole in the roof, over which a 

 skin was drawn to retain the heat after the fire went 



Their fuel. ^^^^^ , ^j^^^^. ^.^^^j conslstcd of watcrsoaked splinters of 



driftwood, upon which was burned the blubber of the seal or whale, 



emitting the nauseous odors of burning, rancid, ill-smelling animal fats. 



The smoke from the fire left its greasy deposits upon everything about 



the i)remises and emitted a stench endurable only by a sense of smell 



long inured to it. For light in the long winter nights they had only a 



small burning wick supported upon the surface of an open vessel of 



seal oil. Their food consisted almost wholly ot seal 



^^^^ "'^ ' meat, with rarely a meal of fish or fowl, oftentimes eaten 



raw in summer, and dried or partially dried and stored in the inflated 



stomachs of sea lions for winter. A small quantity of rye was furnished 



them, but their facilities for putting it in edible form were of the most 



primitive kind, and to this was added a limited quantity of tea and 



sugar, tobacco and rum. Their clothing was made of 



Their ck.thing. f^i^jjig or of sucli coarsc cotton or woolen cloths as were 

 imported in very limited quantities for their use. 



The work which was exacted from the natives under Russian rule 



Arduous labor un- '^^^'^ uiuch harder than has since been put upon them. 

 tierthe jius.s'iaii Com- Tlic ishiuds wcrc providcd with no teams of any descrip- 

 ^'''"'^' tion; the boats were rude affairs, built from pieces of 



driftwood, whalebone, whale sinew, and sea-lion skins; the storehouses, 

 workshops and tools were ill constructed and inconvenient; all of the 

 skins of the thousands of seals slaughtered each year were transported 

 on the shoulders of the laborers from the field to the warehouses, a 

 great amount of labor expended on each skin in cleaning and drying 

 it, and all were again shouldered from the warehouses to the boats to be 

 lightered to the vessels. In all this woik men, women, 



Remuneration ^^^^^ children participated, and each received the small 



stipend of a few kopeks per day or per skin, barely suflicientto pay for 

 the tea, sugar, coarse clothing, and articles of domestic use supplied from 

 the Company's store. Yet even this poor subsistence was furnished 

 directly or indirectly from the seals, excepting a few edible roots and 

 wild vegetables and an occasional fish or fowl at certain seasons of the 

 year. There is absolutely no other source of subsistence at the seal 

 islands. 



Since the occupation of the territory by the Americans such a change 



has taken place in the condition of the natives as occurs 



ASm-fcaJTcontroi! ' "^ i^ the transition from barbarism to civilization; and 



such a change as has brought about them those material 



