NO. lO DRAWINGS BY JOHN WEBBER BUSHNELL II 



OONALASHKA. OCTOBER, 1778 



The ships touched at Oonalashka on the voyage northward, and 

 just three months later again came in sight of the island. This was 

 October second when they reached a bay some ten miles west of 

 Samganoodha, " known by the name of Egoochshac." Many natives 

 lived on the shore of the bay, they visited the ships " bringing with 

 them dried salmon, and other fish, which they exchanged with the 

 seamen for tobacco." The following day, October 3. the ships con- 

 tinued on to Samganoodha Harbor where they remained until the 26th 

 of the same month. There was a small village a short distance from 

 the harbor where, it is quite probable, Webber made his drawings. 



Describing the people of Oonalashka. Captain Cook wrote : " These 

 people are rather low of stature, but plump and well shaped ; with 

 rather short necks ; swarthy chubby faces ; black eyes : small beards ; 

 and long, straight, black hair ; which the men wear loose behind, and 

 cvit before, but the women tie up in a bunch." And referring to the 

 dress : " Both sexes wear the same in fashion ; the only difference is 

 in the materials. The women's frock is made of seal skin ; and that 

 of the men, of the skins of birds ; both reaching below the knee. This 

 is the whole dress of the women. But, over the frock, the men wear 

 another made of gut, which resists water ; and has a hood to it, which 

 draws over the head. Some of them wear boots ; and all of them have 

 a kind of oval snouted cap, made of wood, with a rim to admit the 

 head. These caps are dyed with green and other colours ; and round 

 the upper part of the rim, are stuck the long bristles of some sea- 

 animal, on which are strung glass beads, and on the front is a small 

 image or two made of bone. They make use of no jiaint ; but the 

 women puncture their faces slightly ; and both men and women bore 

 the under lip, to which they fix pieces of bone. But it is as uncommon, 

 at Oonalashka, to see a man with this ornament, as to see a woman 

 without it. Some fix beads to the upper lip, under the nostrils : and 

 all of them hang ornaments in their ears." ]\Iany of the peculiar 

 details of dress, mentioned in this brief description, are shown in 

 Webber's graphic sketches. 



The habitations of the natives evidently proved of much interest. 

 ■■ Their method of Iniilding," so wrote Cook, "is as follows: They 

 dig, in the ground, an oblong sciuare pit, the length of which seldom 

 exceeds fifty feet, and the breadth twenty, but in general the dimen- 



