12 NATURAL UISTOKY COLLECTIONS IN ALASKA. 



that a hat might have been tossed agaiust the cliff, aud a few minutes later we were lying under 

 the shelter of the shore at the head of the bay. When the wind abated a little I went ashoi-e for a 

 short tramp along the beach. 



I was surprised to hear the sweet notes of the Aleutian Wren rising cheerfully in the face of 

 the storm. 



A little later the notes of the Rock Grouse {Lagopus rupestris nelsoni) were heard ; so it appears 

 that in these storm-beaten islands a gale of sufiicient power to drive lo shelter every feathered 

 inhabitant of more genial climates does not interrupt the ordinary course of life among the hardy 

 land birds. 



The next morning a fair breeze carried us speedily to our ilcstiuation. 



Sanak Island proved to be a low, windswept islet, surrounded by the numerous reefs and out- 

 lying rocljs about which the sea otter passes much of its time. A single fur trader was stationed 

 here to gather the skins and to supply the hunters with a few necessary articles. None of 

 the hunters are permanent residents, but live on other islands, some of them nearly a thousand 

 miles to the westward, and are brought here in the small trading vessels by the fur companies. 

 After a half a day passed in rambling over the island I went on board again and we returned to 

 Unalaska. 



Soon after my I'eturu I sailed on another small trading schooner for my final destination, Saint 

 Michaels. We passed through a belt of dense fog which hung about the seal islands, and but for 

 the great numbers of fur seals that swam ])layfully about us and the thousands of murres we should 

 not have been aware of our proximity to this group. Thence on for nearly two weeks we were 

 at the mercy of a series of vexatious calms. Off the Yukon mouth the sea was very muddy, and 

 fragments of drift- wooil, green pine branches, and blades of grass were plentiful more than 100 miles 

 from the delta. 



While lying from 30 to 40 miles off the mouths of this river we were in from 2i to -t fathoms 

 of water, and the sea gradually becomes more shallow toward shore, until a vessel may easily run 

 aground at low tide and yet not bo within sight of land. 



While we were becalmed in this shallow water we found that a strong offshore current with 

 a heavy swell running in made a very disagreeable combination. The swell became extremely 

 heavy and our little vessel pitched about in a most extraordinary manner, until it seemed that 

 the masts must be snapped off at the deck. At times walking on deck became an impossibility, 

 unless one could hold on by a rope or the rail. 



At length a breeze arose, and during the pale twiliglit of the next midnight wo forced a pas- 

 sage through a scattered ice-pack. During all of my later experience in this region I never saw 

 equaled the gorgeous coloring exhibited on this night by sea and sky. Along the northern hor- 

 izon, where the sun crept just out of sight, lay a bank of broken clouds tinged fiery red and edged 

 with golden and purple shades. Floating about us in stately array were the fantastic forms of 

 the sea ice, exhibiting the most intense shades of green aud blue, and the sea, for a time nearly 

 black, slowly became a sullen green, on which the white caps chased one another in quick succes- 

 sion. As the sun neared the horizon the rosy flush spread from the clouds to the sky all around 

 aud a purple tint touched the sea and ice into the most gorgeous coloring, which lasted for an hour. 

 The rush of the waves among the fragments of ice aud the grinding of the pieces among them- 

 selves and along the side of the vessel made a strange monotone that blended harmoniously with 

 the mysterious brooding twilight and the rare coloring of sea and sky. 



In a few hours we were clear of the ice and sailed into Saint Michael's Bay, where a joyful 

 salute from some ancient ship cannons, relics of the Russian rdgime, and dating back to the end 

 of the last century, expressed the feelings of the handful of white men who had been cut off" 

 from the civilized world for the i^receding ten or eleven mouths. 



Saint Michaels, one of the old Russian trading posts, is located about G5 miles north of the 

 Yukon delta aud nearly 200 miles south, by coast, from Bering Straits. It consists at present of 

 six or eight buildings, forming a rectangle, and serving as the warehouses aud other buihliugs of 

 the Alaska Commercial Company's principal depot for the fur trade of the Yukon River district. 



From June 17, 1877, the date of my arrival there, until the last of June, 1881, this place was 

 my headquarters, and here I passed the greater pait of my time. The chief olijej-t of. my stay — 



iimHtt ot. 



bsi 



