FUR-SEAL FISHERIES OF ALASKA. 33 



had auy person incarcerated was a boy about eighteen years old. I 

 took him and put him in the cellar of the store and kept him there two 

 days for killing- pup seals. That is the only punishment I have inflicted, 

 except fines, under Judge Glidden's order, in regard to absentees from 

 school. I fined one or two 50 cents under the compulsory education 

 system. 



Q. What were your observations in regard to the relations between 

 the natives and the company 1 — A. They were perfectly harmonious, 

 except that the natives wanted to travel. They wanted to go to Oona- 

 laska and to San Francisco, and they would go to the company agent 

 and he would say, "Ask the officer," and they would come to me, and I 

 would tell them I had no right to order the company to convey the peo- 

 ple to San Francisco, and because I would not give an order for that, I 

 think they hated me more than the company. The fact was, I under- 

 stood, the company had taken a number of natives down to San Fran- 

 cisco to please them. They go down there and lose their money ; they 

 get robbed and they get drunk, and the company has to support them 

 all the winter and take them up in the spring. In that way they get 

 $300 or $400 in debt and it is up-hill work for the company to get the 

 debt oft" the books. That was the only objection ; they were always 

 wanting to go somewhere. They had relatives almost everywhere in 

 Alaska. They had their uncles and aunts and cousins and brothers-in- 

 law and sisters-in-law over at St. Paul, and they carried on a great 

 racket about visiting their relations and go down and have "chi petes;" 

 that means a great tea-drinking. The company has to import the same 

 kind of tea for these creatures that was served by the Russian Com- 

 pany. The company has to make a special importation of this tea from 

 China. They will not drink anything else. They do not like coffee, and 

 they must have tea. 



Q. How are they compensated by the company for their labor ! — A. 

 They are paid for taking skins 40 cents each. They are paid for labor 

 on all other work 10 cents per hour. 



And in addition to tlie natives upon the island, the company takes 

 over every year from Oonalaska about 40 natives to do the laboring 

 work. The natives on St. George and St. Paul consider themselves 

 aristocrats, and do not want to work on the lauding or anything of 

 that kind, which is only paid laborers' wages, because they can make 

 $200 or $300 by working five or six weeks. The company takes up 

 those natives from Oonalaska and pays them for doing all the labor- 

 ing work just as much as auy other hands. The Oonalaska men turn 

 in and help in the killing more than the natives, and the natives get 

 paid for all the work. 1 have seen white men doing the roughest work 

 on the killing grounds, and they receive nothing except a regular sal- 

 ary, while the natives get paid for all that work just the same. 



Q. Now, in regard to the distribution of the compensation which the 

 , natives receive "i — A. When I first went up there the distribution was 

 left entirely up to that time to a chief, who was selected by the natives 

 and the priests, and they made such distribution as to them seemed most 

 profitable. If a fellow worked pretty lively for the church he always 

 got a good share, and a good steady poker-])layer would also get a good 

 salary. They liked a good poker-player. I have seen the chief order 

 men to turn out at 12 or 1 o'clock at midnight— just at break of day, 

 you know — and go down to the rookery to get the seals up. Some of 

 the fellows were lazy and would not get out at once, and the result would 

 be the drive would be late, the day would be warm, and some of the 

 seals would die while on the drive. There were some shirkers when they 

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