ALASKA SALMON INVESTIGATIONS IN 1900. 
187 
piling cans who were not more than 6 years of age, and who received 50 cents a day. 
They demand and receive their wages daily. 
Formerly the wage of adult males was $1.50 per day, but in the early part of this 
season a “walking delegate,” in the shape of a “tyone” (chief), appeared at the can- 
neries and the natives struck for $2 and promptly got it. 
Money seems to have no value to the native except to satisfy his immediate wants, 
and the traders cater to their taste for gewgaws by supplying them with things for 
which they have no use. They have a fancy for cuckoo clocks and watches, though 
they can not read the time; cheap jewelry and perfume; and a silk dress is more than 
tempting. One woman was noticed wearing - the usual skin trousers and boots, and 
over all a velvetine dress, well tucked up, and as greasy as if it had been soaked in a 
pot of rancid oil. As before mentioned, the canneries supply board to all the natives 
employed; the food is abundant to the point of wastefulness; it is of excellent qual- 
ity, well cooked, in large variety, and given with a generous hand; none need go 
hungry; even the hundreds of sled dogs from the villages greet the cannery ships, 
gather around the canneries during the season, and grow fat, sleek, lazy, and good 
natured. 
Of the large supplies of food carried up in the spring a considerable quantity 
usually remains over when the cannery closes. This is stored at some of the can- 
neries and the watchman is instructed to distribute food in case of distress. 
A large amount of salmon is cured by the natives for their own use and for the 
dog supply during the winter. These fish are caught with the greatest ease. A 
small piece of condemned gill net is obtained from a cannery and is stretched between 
poles planted in line from high to low water mark. When the tide falls the net is 
frequently so full of fish that they can not all be utilized. Nets were noticed in which 
it appeared as if nearly every mesh held a fish, and others were seen in which the 
meshed fish were decaying, the natives being too lazy to remove them "in proper time. 
(See plate ix.) 
There can be no doubt that the canneries have benefited the native by adding to 
his physical comfort. The fish supply for his use has not been reduced; on the con- 
trary, the cannery has placed in the hands of the native a means for taking fish far 
superior to anything he ever dreamed of, and if lie is willing to work he can earn 
money and procure civilized comforts. Whether his contact with the fishermen and 
Chinese during their yearly visits adds anything to his moral well-being is a question, 
but he suffers no more here than natives do in all parts of the world when they come 
in contact with our civilization. 
At Nushagak a large number of tyones called on board to pay their respects to 
the commanding officer. In answer to an inquiry, they said they had no complaints 
to make and they were satisfied with the surrounding conditions. 
CANNERY WASTE. 
The waste in the Bristol Bay district is strikingly large, due, in the first place, 
to the greater abundance of fish, and, secondly, to the necessity for rushing the pack 
on account of the short season. To the novice who is accustomed to see fish only in 
a market, where salmon are sold at from 10 to 20 cents per pound, this waste is the 
first thing to impress him. It is probably within the limit when it is said that the 
