44 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. III. No. 54. 



dance of the great king salmon, sometimes 

 reaching a weight of 130 pounds, a fish less 

 plentiful further up and which does not 

 ascend to the headwaters of the river. 



All this immense Territory has since been 

 penetrated by traders and prospectors. 

 Stern-wheel steamers have defied the cur- 

 rent, and plj' regularly on the river during 

 the season of open water. Mission schools 

 are numerous and reindeer scarce. The 

 fur trade wanes, while many thousands of 

 dollars in gold dust have been laboriously 

 extracted from the gravels. The natives 

 buy tea and fiour and dress in woolen cloth- 

 ing. With the miners whisky has reached 

 the wilderness, and the sound of the Ameri- 

 can language is heard in the land. Tame 

 reindeer have been imported from Siberia 

 with a view to their domestication by the 

 Eskimo of the Arctic coast, who are on the 

 verge of starvation at frequent intervals, 

 owing to the destruction of their food supply 

 by the whalers and walrus hunters and the 

 introduction of Winchester rifles for killing 

 the wild deer. With the alternative of 

 starvation as a stimulus, the chances of 

 success ought to be good. 



In carrj'ing out the plans which Kenni- 

 cott had meditated, but which death had 

 stayed, I had succeeded in gathering rather 

 abundant material for my friends, the orni- 

 thologists, botanists, ethnologists, and so 

 on, but to do it I had to put aside the work 

 in the department in which I personally 

 was most interested. The shores of ]S"orton 

 sound and the tundra of the Yukon valley 

 offered little in the way of moUusks or 

 other invertebrates. The desire to extend 

 our knowledge of the geographical distribu- 

 tion of the sea fauna led me to propose a 

 further exploration of the coasts of the Ter- 

 ritory, especially of the Aleutian chain, 

 under the auspices of the United States 

 Coast Survey. A geographical reconnais- 

 sance was undertaken and can-ied on dur- 

 ing five years, investigating magnetism and 



hydrology, making charts, tidal observa- 

 tions, meteorological and hypsometric notes. 

 In all this I was ably seconded by my com- 

 panions, Mark W. Harrington and Marcus 

 Baker, who need no introduction to this 

 audience. At the same time, and without 

 interfering with the regular work, the dredge 

 was kept constantly busy, and on my return 

 from field work the material for the studies 

 I had so long looked forward to was ac- 

 tually gathered. 



The region which includes the Aleutian 

 chain and other islands west of Kadiak 

 presents a striking contrast to the densely 

 wooded mountains and shining glaciers of 

 the Sitkan region to the east and the rolling 

 tundra cut by myriad rivers in the North. 

 Approached by sea, the Aleutian islands 

 seem gloomy and inhospitable. Omnipresent 

 fog wreaths hang about steep cliffs of dark 

 volcanic rock. An angry surf vibrates to 

 and fro amid outstanding pinnacles, where 

 innumerable sea birds wheel and cry. The 

 angular hills and long slopes of talus are 

 not softened by any arborescent veil. The 

 infrequent villages nestle behind sheltering 

 bluffs, and are rarely visible from without 

 the harbors. In winter all the heights are 

 wrapped in snow, and storms of terrific 

 violence drive commerce from the sea about 

 them. 



Once pass within the harbors during sum- 

 mer and the repellent features of the land- 

 scape seem to vanish. The mountain sides 

 are clothed with soft yet vivid green and 

 brilliant with many flowers. The perfume 

 of the spring blossoms is often heavy on the 

 air. The lowlands are shoulder high with 

 herbage, and the total absence of trees gives 

 to the landscape an individuality all its 

 own. No more fascinating prospect do I 

 know than a view of the harbor of TJna- 

 lashka from a hilltop on a sunny day, with 

 the curiously irregular, verdant islands set 

 in a sea of celestial blue, the shorelines 

 marked by creamy surf, the ravines by 



