MOLASSES — XOT BRANDY. 
413 
hills, and as wc had little time to remain, we did not 
encourage them to take a long walk for nothing. 
These people seemed slightly more advanced than 
those of Ola, as far as association with tlie world was con- 
cerned. They had a better idea of the value of money, 
and had learned — in a few cases — to be impudent and 
presuming. They had also picked up a few words of 
broken English from the whalers, as well as the pre- 
viously-mentioned impudence, and were evident!}’ in the 
possession of more than one of our vices. One fellow I 
remember in particular, who, having mistaken a bottle 
of molasses, the neck of which protruded from my 
pocket, for one of brandy, beckoned me into his house, 
intimating, by words and signs, that lie had a great many 
squirrel-skins that he would like to exchange for it ; so I 
followed him, and found a house very much like that of 
the headman at Ola, only he had ducks instead of fish 
smoking overhead. 
We seated ourselves on a locker-like seat that went all 
around the hut inside of the bunks, and he immediately 
began ransacking an old chest, from which he shortly 
produced thirty or forty very inferior-looking skins, that 
were worth — judging from the price of others for which 
we had traded — probably a pint of molasses, or something 
of that sort, and which he now held up and oftercd me 
for the “hot branda,” as he pronounced bottle of brandy. 
I took the bottle out of my pocket, and, holding it up 
before him, said, “Molasses, — not brandy,” at which his 
countenance fell awfully, and lie lost all relish for trading. 
As skins were getting scarce, however, and I still wanted 
some more, I took off my silk neck-handkerchief, which 
