These barabaras were sometimes warmed only by lamps; but usually a fire was built in the centre, directly under the opening in the roof. Mats and skins were placed on shelves, slightly elevated above the floor, around the walls. Many persons of both sexes and all ages lived in these places; frequently several dwellings were connected by tunnels and had one common hole-entrance. The filth of these airless habitations was nauseating.
Their household furniture consisted of bowls, spoons, buckets, cans, baskets, and one or two Russian pots; a knife and a hatchet were the only tools they possessed.
The huts were lighted by lamps made of flat stones which were hollowed on one side to hold oil, in which dry grass was burned. Both men and women warmed their bodies by sitting over these lamps and spreading their garments around them.
The natives used the bidarka here, as elsewhere.
They buried their dead on the summits of hills, raising little hillocks over the graves. Cook saw one grave covered with stones, to which every one passing added a stone, after the manner fancied by Helen Hunt Jackson a hundred years later; and he saw several stone hillocks that had an appearance of great antiquity.
In Unalaska to-day may still be seen several barabaras. They must be very old, because the native habitations of the coast are constructed along the lines of the white man's dwellings at the present time. They add to the general quaint and picturesque appearance of the town, however. Their sod roofs are overgrown with tall grasses, among which wild flowers flame out brightly.
(Unalaska is pronounced Oö-na-las'-ka, the a's having the sound of a in arm. Aleutian is pronounced in five syllables: Ä-le-oo'-shi-an, with the same sound of a.)
The island of Unalaska was sighted by Chirikoff on his return to Kamchatka, on the 4th of September, 1741.
The chronicles of the first expeditions of the Russian traders—or promyshleniki, as they were called—are wrapped in mystery. But it is believed that as early as 1744 Emilian Bassof and Andrei Serebrennikof voyaged into the islands and were rewarded by a catch of sixteen hundred sea-otters, two thousand fur-seals, and as many blue foxes.
Stephan Glottoff was the first to trade with the natives of Unalaska, whom he found peaceable and friendly. The next, however, Korovin, attempted to make a settlement upon the island, but met with repulse from the natives, and several of his party were killed.