BERING SEA--THE RUSSIAN FUR COMPANY--THE ALEUTS.
Bering Sea.--Unalaska.--The Pribilow Islands.--St. Matthew.--
St. Laurence.--Bering’s Straits.--The Russian Fur Company.--
The Aleuts.--Their Character.--Their Skill and Intrepidity
in hunting the Sea-otter.--The Sea-bear.--Whale-chasing.--
Walrus-slaughter.--The Sea-lion.
Bering Sea is extremely interesting in a geographical point of view,
as the temperature of its coasts and islands exhibits so striking a
contrast with that part of the Arctic Ocean which extends between
Greenland, Iceland, Norway, and Spitzbergen, and affords us the most
convincing proof of the benefits we owe to the Gulf Stream, and to
the mild south-westerly winds which sweep across the Atlantic. While
through the sea between Iceland and Scotland, a part of the warmth
generated in the tropical zone penetrates by means of marine and aërial
currents as far as Spitzbergen and the western coast of Nova Zembla,
the Sea of Bering is completely deprived of this advantage. The long
chain of mountainous islands which bounds it on the south serves as
a barrier against the mild influence of the Pacific, and instead of
warm streams mixing with its waters, many considerable rivers and deep
bays yearly discharge into it enormous masses of ice. Thus as soon as
the navigator enters Bering Sea he perceives at once a considerable
fall in the temperature, and finds himself suddenly transferred from
a temperate oceanic region to one of a decidedly Arctic character.
In spite, therefore, of their comparatively southerly position (for
the Straits of Bering do not even reach the Arctic Circle, and the
Andrianow Islands are ten degrees farther to the south than the
Feroës), those frigid waters are, with regard to climate, far less
favorably situated than the seas of Spitzbergen.
The same gradual differences of temperature and vegetation which we
find in Unalaska, the Pribilow Islands, St. Laurence, and the Straits
of Bering, within 10° of latitude, occur in the Shetland Islands,
Iceland, Bear Island, and Spitzbergen at distances of almost 20°; so
that in the Sea of Bering the increase of cold on advancing to the
north is about twice as rapid as in the waters between North Europe and
North America.
The long and narrow peninsula of Aliaska, which forms the south-eastern
boundary of this inhospitable sea, shows us its influence in a very
marked degree, for while the climate of the northern side of that
far-projecting land-tongue has a decidedly Arctic character, its
southern coasts fronting the Pacific enjoy a temperate climate. The
mountain-chain which, rising to a height of five or six thousand feet,
forms the backbone of the peninsula, serves as the boundary of two
distinct worlds, for while the northern slopes are bleak and treeless
like Iceland, the southern shores are covered from the water’s edge
with magnificent forests. While on the northern side the walrus extends
his excursions down to 56° 30´ N. lat., on the southern exposure the
hummingbird is seen to flit from flower to flower as high as 61°, the
most northerly point it is known to attain.
The Feroë Islands (64° N. lat.) have undoubtedly a no very agreeable
climate to boast of, but they may almost be said to enjoy Italian
skies when compared with Unalaska (54° N. lat.), the best known of the
Aleutian chain.
The Scandinavian archipelago is frequently obscured with fogs, but here
they are perpetual from April to the middle of July. From this time
till the end of September the weather improves, as then the southerly
winds drive the foggy region more to the north, and enable the sun to
shine during a few serene days upon the bleak shores of Unalaska. But
soon the Polar air-streams regain the supremacy, and a dismal veil
once more shrouds the melancholy island. Of Sitka, the chief town of
Aliaska, Mr. Whymper says: “It enjoys the unenviable position of being
about the most rainy place in the world. Rain ceases only when there
is a good prospect of snow.” Snow generally begins to fall early in
October, and snow-storms occur to the very end of May. There are years
in which it rains continually during the whole winter. In the Feroës
some service-trees are to be seen twelve feet high or more, while
nothing like a tree ever grew in Unalaska. The difference between the
temperatures of the summer and winter, which in the Feroës is confined
to very narrow limits, is much more considerable in Unalaska, though
here also the moderating influence of the sea makes itself felt. Thus
in summer the thermometer rarely rises above 66°, but on the other hand
in winter it still more rarely falls below -2°.
Of course no corn of any kind can possibly ripen in a climate like
this, but the damp and cool temperature favors the growth of herbs.
In the moist lowlands the stunted willow-bushes are stifled by the
luxuriant grasses; and even on the hills, the vegetation, which is
of a decidedly Alpine character, covers the earth up to the line of
perpetual snow; while several social plants, such as the _Lupinus
nootkeanus_ and the _Rhododendron kamtschadalicum_, decorate these
dismal regions with their brilliant color. The lively green of the
meadows reminds one of the valley of Urseren, so well known to all
Alpine tourists. The mosses and lichens begin already at Unalaska to
assume that predominance in the Flora which characterizes the frigid
zone.
[Illustration: 99. SITKA.]
A few degrees to the north of the Aleutian chain, which extends in a
long line from the promontory of Aliaska to Kamchatka, are situated
the Pribilow Islands, St. George and St. Paul, which are celebrated in
the history of the fur-trade, the former as the chief breeding-place of
the sea-bear, the latter as that of the sea-lion. Chamisso was struck
with their wintry aspect, for here no sheltered valleys and lowlands
promote, as at Unalaska, a more vigorous vegetation. The rounded backs
of the hills and the scattered rocks are covered with black and gray
lichens; and where the melting snows afford a sufficient moisture,
sphagnum, mosses, and a few weeds occupy the marshy ground. The frozen
earth has no springs, and yet these desolate islands have a more
southerly situation than the Orkneys, where barley grows to ripeness.
Before these islands were discovered by the Russians they had been
for ages the undisturbed home of the sea-birds and the large cetacean
seals. Under Russian superintendence, some Aleuts have now been settled
on both of them. The innumerable herds of sea-lions, which cover the
naked shores of St. George as far as the eye can reach, present a
strange sight. The guillemots have taken possession of the places
unoccupied by their families and fly fearlessly among them, or nestle
in the crevices of the wave-worn rock-walls, or between the large
boulders which form a bank along the strand.
Still farther to the north lies the uninhabited island of St. Matthew
(62° N. lat.). A settlement was once attempted; but as the animals
which had been reckoned upon for the winter supply of food departed,
the unfortunate colonists all died of hunger.
Fogs are so frequent about the island of St. Laurence that navigators
have often passed close by it (65° N. lat.) without seeing it. Chamisso
was surprised at the beauty and the numbers of its dwarfish flowering
herbs, which reminded him of the highlands of Switzerland, while the
neighboring St. Laurence Bay, in the land of the Tchuktchi, was the
image of wintry desolation. In July the lowlands were covered with
snow-fields, and the few plants bore the Alpine character in the most
marked degree. Under this inclement sky, the mountains, unprotected by
vegetation, rapidly fall into decay. Every winter splits the rocks, and
the summer torrents carry the fragments down to their feet. The ground
is everywhere covered with blocks of stone, unless where the sphagnum,
by the accumulation of its decomposed remains, has formed masses of
peat in the swampy lowlands.
On sailing through Bering’s Straits, the traveller may see, in clear
weather, both the Old and the New World. On both sides rise high
mountains, precipitously from the water’s edge in Asia, but separated
from the sea by a broad alluvial belt on the American side. The sea
is deepest on the Asiatic border, where the current, flowing from the
south with considerable rapidity, has also the greatest force. Here
also whales may be often seen, and large herds of walruses.
In former times the baidar of the Esquimaux was the only boat ever
seen in the straits, and since Semen Deshnew, who first sailed round
the eastern point of Asia, European navigators had but rarely passed
them to explore the seas beyond; but recently this remotest part of the
world has become the scene of an active whale-fishery.
[Illustration: 100. A BAIDAR.]
The shores of Bering Sea are naked and bleak, and the numerous
volcanoes of the Aleutian chain pour out their lava-streams over
unknown wildernesses. But the waters of the sea are teeming with life.
Gigantic algæ, such as are never seen in the torrid zone, form, round
the rocky coasts, vast submarine forests. A host of fishes, whales,
walruses, and seals, fill the sea and its shores, and innumerable
sea-birds occupy the cliffs. But these treasures of the ocean, which
for ages furnished the Aleuts and other wild tribes with the means
of existence, have also been the cause of their servitude. Had the
sea-otter not existed, the wild children of the soil might possibly
still be in possession of their ancient freedom; and but for the
sea-bear and the walrus, the whale and the seal, the banners of the
Czar would scarcely have met the flag of England on the continent of
America.
As the whole fur-trade of the Hudson’s Bay Territory is concentrated
in the hands of one mighty company, thus also one powerful association
enjoys the exclusive commerce of the eastern possession of Russia. The
regions under the authority of the Russian Fur Company[14] occupy an
immense space, as they comprise not only all the islands of Bering Sea,
but also the American coasts down to 55° N. lat. The extreme points of
this vast territory are situated at a greater distance from each other
than London from Tobolsk, but the importance of its trade bears no
proportion to its extent.
The company, which was founded in the year 1799, under the Emperor
Paul, had, in 1839, thirty-six hunting settlements on its own territory
(the Kurile Islands, the Aleutic chain, Aliaska, Bristol Bay, Cook’s
Inlet, Norton Sound, etc.), besides a chain of agencies from Ochotsk
to St. Petersburg. Its chief seat is New Archangel, on Sitka, one of
the many islands of King George III.’s Archipelago, first accurately
explored by Vancouver. The magnificent Bay of Norfolk, at the head of
which the small town is situated, greatly resembles a Norwegian fjord,
as we here find the same steep rock-walls bathing their precipitous
sides in the emerald waters, and clothed with dense pine forests
wherever a tree can grow.
A number of islets scattered over the surface of the bay add to the
beauty of the scene. The furs collected by the company are chiefly
those of sea-bears, sea-otters, foxes, beavers, bears, lynxes, American
martens, etc., and are partly furnished by the subjects of its own
territory (Aleuts, Kadjacks, Kenaïzes, Tchugatchi, Aliaskans), who
are compelled to hunt on its account, and partly obtained by barter
from the independent tribes of the mainland, or from the Hudson’s Bay
Company. The greater part is sent to Ochotsk or the Amoor, and from
thence through Siberia to St. Petersburg; the rest to the Chinese
ports, where the skins of the young sea-bear always find a ready market.
Of all the aboriginal tribes which inhabit the vast territory of
Russian America, the most worthy of notice is that of the Aleuts.
Less fortunate than their independent relatives, the Esquimaux of the
north--who in the midst of privations maintain an imperturbable gayety
of temper--these islanders have been effectually spirit-broken under a
foreign yoke. In 1817 the cruel treatment of their masters had reduced
them to about a thousand; since that time their number has somewhat
increased, the company having at length discovered that man is, after
all, the most valuable production of a land, and that if depopulation
increased still further, they would soon have no more hunters to supply
them with furs.
Every Aleut is bound, after his eighteenth year, to serve the company
_three years_; and this forced labor-tax does not seem at first sight
immoderate, but if we consider that the islanders, to whom every
foreign article is supplied from the warehouses of the company, are
invariably its debtors, we can not doubt that as long as the Aleut
is able to hunt, he is obliged to do so for the wages of a slave.
The Bishop Ivan Weniaminow, who resided ten years at Unalaska, draws
a picture of this people which exhibits evident marks of a long
servitude. They never quarrel among each other, and their patience is
exemplary. Nothing can surpass the fortitude with which they endure
pain. On the other hand, they never show excessive joy; it seems
impossible to raise their feelings to the pitch of delight. Even after
a long fast, a child never grasps with eagerness the proffered morsel,
nor does it on any occasion exhibit the mirth so natural to its age.
In hunting the marine animals, the Aleuts exhibit a wonderful skill
and intrepidity. To catch the sea-otter, they assemble in April or
May at an appointed spot, in their light skin boats, or baidars,
and choose one of their most respected chiefs for the leader of the
expedition, which generally numbers from fifty to a hundred boats.
Such hunting-parties are annually organized from the Kurile Islands to
Kadjack, and consequently extend their operations over a line of 3000
miles. On the first fine day the expedition sets out and proceeds to a
distance of about forty versts from the coast, when the baidars form
into a long line, leaving an interval of about 250 fathoms from boat
to boat, as far as a sea-otter diving out of the water can be seen, so
that a row of thirty baidars occupies a space of from ten to twelve
versts. When the number of the boats is greater, the intervals are
reduced. Every man now looks upon the sea with great attention. Nothing
escapes the eye of the Aleut; in the smallest black spot appearing but
one moment over the surface of the waters, he at once recognizes a
sea-otter. The baidar which first sees the animal rows rapidly towards
the spot where the creature dived, and now the Aleut, holding his oar
straight up in the air, remains motionless on the spot. Immediately
the whole squadron is on the move, and the long, straight line changes
into a wide circle, the centre of which is occupied by the baidar with
the raised oar. The otter, not being able to remain long under water,
reappears, and the nearest Aleut immediately greets him with an arrow.
This first attack is seldom mortal; very often the missile does not
even reach its mark, and the sea-otter instantly disappears. Again the
oar rises from the next baidar; again the circle forms, but this time
narrower than at first; the fatigued otter is obliged to come oftener
to the surface, arrows fly from all sides, and finally the animal,
killed by a mortal shot, or exhausted by repeated wounds, falls to the
share of the archer who has hit it nearest to the head. If several
otters appear at the same time, the boats form as many rings, provided
their number be sufficiently great.
The boldest of all hunters, the Aleuts of the Fox Islands, pursue the
sea-otter also in winter. If, during the summer chase, the rapidity and
regularity with which all the movements are performed, and the sure
eye and aim of the archers command the spectator’s admiration, this
winter chase gives him occasion to wonder at their courage. During
the severest winter-storms the otter shelters himself on the shore of
some small uninhabited island or on a solitary rock, and after having
carefully ascertained that no enemy is near, coils himself up and falls
asleep. While the storm still rages, two Aleuts approach the rock in
two single baidars from the leeward. The hunter in the foremost baidar
stands upright, a gun or a club in his hand, and waits in this position
till a wave brings him near to the summit of the rock. He now springs
on land, and while his companion takes care of the baidar, approaches
the sleeping otter and shoots it or kills it with his club. With the
assistance of his companion who has remained on the water, he springs
back into his baidar as soon as the crest of a wave brings it within
his reach.
The sea-bear is nearly as valuable as the sea-otter to the fur company,
as the woolly skin of the young animal is the only one of the whole
seal tribe which is reckoned among the finer peltry. The sea-bears are
chiefly killed on the Commodore and Pribilow islands, particularly on
St. Paul, where they are hunted by a certain number of Aleuts located
there under Russian superintendence. The chase begins in the latter
part of September, on a cold, foggy day, when the wind blows from the
side where the animals are assembled on the rocky shore. The boldest
huntsmen open the way, then follow the older people and the children,
and the chief personage of the band comes last, to be the better able
to direct and survey the movements of his men, who are all armed with
clubs. The main object is to cut off the herd as quickly as possible
from the sea. All the grown-up males and females are spared and allowed
to escape, but most of the young animals are sentenced to death. Those
which are only four months old (their furs being most highly prized)
are doomed without exception; while of the others that have attained an
age of one, two, or three years, only the males are killed. For several
days after the massacre, the mothers swim about the island, seeking and
loudly wailing for their young.
From October 5 St. Paul is gradually deserted by the sea-bears, who
then migrate to the south and re-appear towards the end of April, the
males arriving first. Each seeks the same spot on the shore which he
occupied during the preceding year, and lies down among the large
stone blocks with which the flat beach is covered. About the middle of
May the far more numerous females begin to make their appearance, and
the sea-bear families take full possession of the strand. Each male
is the sultan of a herd of females, varying in number according to
his size and strength; the weaker brethren contenting themselves with
half a dozen, while some of the sturdier and fiercer fellows preside
over harems 200 strong. Jealousy and intrusion frequently give rise
to terrible battles. The full-grown male sea-bear, who is about four
or five times larger than the female, grows to the length of eight
feet, and owes his name to his shaggy blackish fur, and not to his
disposition, which is far from being cruel or savage.
Armed with a short spear, a single Aleut does not hesitate to attack
the colossal whale. Approaching cautiously from behind in his baidar
until he reaches the head, he plunges his weapon into the animal’s
flank under the fore fin, and then retreats as fast as his oar can
carry him. If the spear has penetrated into the flesh, the whale is
doomed; it dies within the next two or three days, and the currents
and the waves drift the carcass to the next shore. Each spear has its
peculiar mark by which the owner is recognized. Sometimes the baidar
does not escape in time, and the whale, maddened by pain, furiously
lashes the water with his tail, and throws the baidar high up into
the air, or sinks it deep into the sea. The whale-fishers are highly
esteemed among the Aleuts, and their intrepidity and skill well deserve
the general admiration. Of course many of the whales are lost. In the
summer of 1831, 118 whales were wounded near Kadjack, of which only
forty-three were found. The others may have been wafted far out into
the sea to regale the sharks and sea-birds, or driven to more distant
shores, whose inhabitants no doubt gladly welcomed their landing.
Wrangell informs us that since 1833 the Russians have introduced the
use of the harpoon, and engaged some English harpooners to teach the
Aleuts a more profitable method of whale-catching, but we are not told
how the experiment has succeeded.
The company, besides purchasing a great quantity of walrus-teeth from
the Tchuktchi of the Bering’s Straits and Bristol Bay, send every year
a detachment of Aleuts to the north coast of Aliaska, where generally a
large number of young walruses, probably driven away by the older ones,
who prefer the vicinity of the polar ice, spend the summer months.
The walruses herd on the lowest edge of the coast which is within
reach of the spring tides. When the Aleuts prepare to attack the
animals, they take leave of each other as if they were going to face
death, being no less afraid of the tusks of the walruses than of the
awkwardness of their own companions. Armed with lances and heavy axes,
they stealthily approach the walruses, and having disposed their ranks,
suddenly fall upon them with loud shouts, and endeavor to drive them
from the sea, taking care that none of them escape into the water, as
in that case the rest would irresistibly follow and precipitate the
huntsmen along with them. As soon as the walruses have been driven
far enough up the strand, the Aleuts attack them with their lances,
striking at them in places where the hide is not so thick, and then
pressing with all their might against the spear, to render the wound
deep and deadly. The slaughtered animals tumble one over the other
and form large heaps, whilst the huntsmen, uttering furious shouts
and intoxicated with carnage, wade through the bloody mire. They then
cleave the jaws and extract the tusks, which are the chief objects of
the slaughter of several thousand walruses, since neither their flesh
nor their fat is made use of in the colony. The carcasses are left on
the shore to be washed away by the spring tides, which soon efface the
mark of the massacre, and in the following year the inexhaustible north
sends new victims to the coast.
Sir George Simpson, in his “Overland Journey round the World,” relates
that the bales of fur sent to Kiachta are covered with walrus hide; it
is then made to protect the tea-chests which find their way to Moscow,
and after all these wanderings, the far-travelled skin returns again
to New Archangel, where, cut into small pieces and stamped with the
company’s mark, it serves as a medium of exchange.
The skin of the sea-lion (_Otaria Stelleri_) has but little value in
the fur-trade, as its hair is short and coarse, but in many other
respects the unwieldy animal is of considerable use to the Aleut.
Its hide serves to cover his baidar; with the entrails he makes his
water-tight kamleika, a wide, long shirt which he puts on over his
dress to protect himself against the rain or the spray; the thick webs
of its flippers furnish excellent soles for his boots, and the bristles
of its lip figure as ornaments in his head-dress.
[Illustration: 101. FORT ST. MICHAEL.]