The post offices in Alaska are Sitka, Fort Wrangell, | and is the name used by t illesnoo, Juneau, Jackson, Klawock, and Loring. em : Among the best known of the natives of Alaska, their ghest ambition is to build American homes, possess merican furniture, dress in American clothes, adopt merican style of living and be American citizens. people." The term "Eskim them by their neighbors, m The Innuit of Alaska are a than their brethren of Green are tall and muscular, many over in height. They have s bones, large mouths, thick 1 fresh yellow complexion. I have full beards and mousta men wear a labret under each hole cut through the lower lip REV. SHELDON JACKSON, D. D. The first American Minister to visit Alaska in the interest of Missions. ing, and all athletic sports. While they speak a common language from the Arctic to the Pacific each locality has its different dialect. Their usual dress is the parkas, made of the skins of animals and sometimes of the breasts of birds. However, where they have access to the stores of traders they buy ready-made clothing. Their residences have the outward appearance of a circular mound of earth covered with grass, with a small opening at the top for the escape of smoke. The entrance is a small door and narrow hallway to the main room, which is from twelve to twenty feet in diameter, and is without light or ventilation. Their diet consists of the wild meat of the moose, reindeer, bear and smaller fur-bearing animals; also of fish, the white whale, the walrus, seal, and various water-fowl. In the northern section they have a great aversion to salt. While they will eat with great relish decayed fish or putrid oil, they will spit out with a wry face a mouthful of choice corned beef. Men, women and children are alike inveterate smokers. While they travel continually in the summer, they have permanent winter homes. Their religious belief is quite indefinite. In a general way they believe in a power that rewards the good and punishes the bad, by sending them to different places after death. They are savages, and, with the exception. of those in Southern Alaska, have not had civilizing, educational or religious advantages. From the boundary line to Bering Strait, along the bleak Arctic coast, villages are placed here and there, ground for warmth. The with dirt, supported by raft Around Kotzebue Sound Some of the hills surroun height of a thousand feet, a of wild cotton, that in its se Into this sound empty Rivers, both large streams. where the people come in country for the purpose of t of the coast bring their oil, the Tinneh from the interio chees from Asia their reinde It is to these gathering schooners fitted out at San F with cargoes of whisky labe Rum," "Pain-killer," "Jam furs of Alaska are obtained plentiful in Kotzebue Soun Another centre of village This is a rocky point, risin elevation of 2,500 feet abov of this cape is a village of village on the mainland in great traders and travelers, on the seas, or the reindeer o and overbearing toward the eling in large companies, nass of basalt rock, with almost perpendicular sides, ising out of the ocean to the height of 700 feet. On one side, where the rock rises at an angle of forty-five legrees, the Innuit have excavated homes in the rock. Some of these rock houses are 200 feet above the ocean. There are forty of these cliff dwellings. When the surf is wildly breaking on the rocks, if it ecomes necessary for any one to put out to sea, he gets s near the surf as possible, takes his seat in his boat kyack), and at the opportune moment two companions oss him and his boat over and clear of the surf. They are oted for the manufacture of water-proof boots from the kin of the throat of the seal. They are lighter, more AN nally founded by the Russia sists of a few log houses, property of the Alaska C chapel of the Russo-Greek service by a priest from Ik where the ocean-going stear smaller steamers that ply or point the furs collected at th some of them 2,000 miles shipment to San Francisco line between the Innuit of Half a mile from the tradin thirty houses and one dance 117 ization of the people. Soor fish that ascend the mighty Yukon and Kuskokwim which was the first in Al Rivers and many smaller streams. Their fish diet is supplemented by the wonderful bird life of the country. The variety and number of wild geese and ducks is said to be greater than in any other section of the known world. To fish and fowl is added the flesh of the moose and reindeer. On the delta of the Yukon and southward to the mouth of the Kuskokwim River are from forty to fifty villages, with a population of 2,000. From the mouth of the Yukon to Anvik are fifteen or sixteen villages, with 1,345 people; while on the Kuskokwim River are some forty villages, aggregating a population of 3,654. On the lower banks of this river the high land, free from tidal overflow, is so fully occupied with houses that it is difficult for the traveler to find space to pitch a tent. In the adjacent Bristol Bay region are thirty-four villages and 4.340 people. A short portage across the building in Alaska was ere long time it was the Russ their power and operations. diak (Saint Paul) numbers 2 houses. They have a few gardens. They have a 1 priest; also stores of the A a deputy collector of cus office. A small school is Alaska Commercial Compa Opposite Kadiak is Wo They have four horses and t possesses a small ship-yard, twelve or fourteen miles lo one-half miles long at Sit vast Territory. The place Greek church, but no scho |