388 FUR-SEAL FISHERIES OF ALASKA. 



and answer from personal knowledge the several questions you have propounded to 

 me. 



No. 1. "That it (Alaska Commercial Company) has redueed the native population 

 to a condition of helpless dependence, if not slavery, and that its oppression and 

 robbery of the natives are notorious." 



In answer to this it might be sufficient to say the entire charge is false, but con- 

 sidering the gravity of the charges made against your company, I will treat them 

 more at length. As to the first part of the chaxge, I have to say that in conversa- 

 tion with old Kerick Buteriu, the most intelligent native on the island of St. Paul, and 

 Antoue Mellovedove, a bright, intelligent, young man, son of the old governor of the 

 island under Russian rule, I learned that before the lease of the island to the Alaska 

 Commercial Company the natives lived in miserable huts half under grouud, some 

 of which are still standing unoccupied. They received from the Russians 10 cents a 

 day for their labor in taking and curing seal skins, and packing on their backs was 

 the only mode of collecting the skins and delivering ±heni to the boats. Old Kerick 

 has frequently told me he was the highest salaried man among the natives, being 

 head carpenter, and the most he ever received from the Russians was $60 per annum. 

 The books in the Treasury agent's otifice on the island show his annual pay for sealing 

 alone since the Alaska Commercial Company took charge to be over $500 per annurii, 

 and in addition the company pay him a monthly salary of $10 for looking after the 

 small boats, etc. ; they also made him a present of a frame cottage, in which he has 

 for years lived with his family. If this be dependence and slavery, then the charge 

 is true. 



This man's case fairly represents the condition of the whole population on the two 

 islands. 



Under the lease the company is not required to furnish the natives houses, physi- 

 cians, medicines, etc., free, yet it is afact that comfortable frame houses were built 

 and given rent free as fast as the material could be transported after the lease was 

 made, and the natives were lifted from a condition of slavery and privation, by your 

 company's generosity, to one of free American citizenship and comfort; to them, luxury. 

 I have never seen gieater care and more considerate treatment bestowed on any people 

 in the States than the company's doctors show in ministering to the natives on the 

 fur-seal islands as well as at Oonalaska; and that the natives on the main-land may 

 have the benefit of a physician they send one every spring on the first vessel visiting 

 the coast line, to the eastward of Oonalaska and north as far as St. Michaels. All 

 this is a free-will ottering to the natives. The natives on the seal islands complete 

 their year's work in less than three months, for which they receive in cash from your 

 company over $500 to the man ; in addition you contribute to them,/ree, physicians, 

 medicines, coal, salt salmon, salt to cure blubber, eight months^ schooling annually, and 

 comfortable houses, and they have fresh seal meat as long as the seals remain, Avhich 

 is nine months each year. The natives have absolutely nothing to do for nine months 

 of the year, and have now on deposit drawing 4 per cent, interest, $64,732.11. If 

 this is " dependence and slavery," then the pai-ties making charge No. 1 should turn 

 their attention to any of the great cities of the highly civilized States East, and re- 

 form the condition of the laboring classes who toil for their employers ten hours each 

 day for tivelve months a year, receiving therefor less money than you pay the natives 

 for three months' work, whilst the poor white laborer gets nothing for the comfort of 

 his family except what he can pay out of his hard-earned wages. 



Ihave neverknown an instance of abuse of natives by your agents or employes, 

 and when the Treasury agent has occasion to reprimand a native, no greater punish- 

 ment can be held over them than to threaten them with transportation to Sitka, where 

 they could not get your company to work for. 



As to the second clause of No. I, the charge of " oppression and robbery of the na- 

 tives are notorious." 



It must be a most malicious and reckless man who would give expression to so base 

 a falsehood. Your company maintains a store on each of the seal islands, well 

 stocked with goods such as are found in any well-regulated merchandise store; the 

 goods are sold at reasonable prices, quite as low as the same goods could be bought 

 at retail in the cities of this coast. Your local agents each year submit to my in- 

 spection, if desired, your invoices, and by close observation in the store and famil- 

 iarity with prices charged I have ample opportunity of knowing that your trading 

 with Alaska natives is entirely just and fair, as much so as if oi)position stores were 

 established alongside of yours. 



No. 2. "That it compels acceptance by the natives, on pain of starvation, of such 

 beggarly prices as manages invariably to keep them in debt and at its mercy." 



The natives on the fur-seal islands have but little to sell ; the company, however, 

 buy at fair prices for cash or goods anything they may have to otter, whilst on the 

 Aleutian chain the company send out from Oonalaska, in their vessels, hunting par- 

 ties, and place them on the best hunting grounds, free of any cost to them, charging 

 only each native with his supply of provisions; at the close of the season they are 

 returned to their homes in the same manner, and each hunter is credited with his 



