Animals of Kadyak.
The natives differ considerably in dress and language from the inhabitants of the other Fox Islands: and several species of animals were observed upon Kadyak, which are not to be found upon the other islands, viz. ermines, martens, beavers, river otters, wolves, wild boars, and bears: the last-mentioned animal was not indeed actually seen by the Russians, but the prints of its feet were traced. Some of the inhabitants had clothes made of the skins of rein-deer and jevras; the latter of which is a sort of small marmoset. Both these skins were probably procured from the continent of America[56]. Black, brown, and red foxes were seen in great numbers; and the coast abounds with sea-dogs, sea-bears, sea-lions, and sea-otters. The birds are cranes, geese, ducks, gulls, ptarmigans, crows, and magpies; but no uncommon species was any where discovered. |Productions.| The vegetable productions are bilberries, cranberries, wortleberries, and wild lily-roots. Kadyak likewise yields willows and alders, which circumstance affords the strongest proof that it lies at no great distance from the continent of America. The extent of Kadyak cannot be exactly ascertained, as the Russians, through apprehension of the natives, did not venture to explore the country.
Account of the Inhabitants.
The inhabitants, like those of the Aleütian and nearer islands, make holes in the under-lips and through the gristle of the nose, in which they insert the bones of birds and animals worked into the form of teeth. Their clothes are made of the skins of birds, foxes, sea-otters, young rein-deer, and marmosets; they sew them together with sinews. They wear also fur-stockings of rein-deer skins, but no breeches. Their arms are bows, arrows, and lances, whose points, as well as their small hatchets, are of sharp flint: some few make knives and lance points of rein-deer bones. Their wooden shields are called kuyaky, which amongst the Greenlanders signifies a small canoe. Their manners are altogether rude. They have not the least disposition to give a courteous reception to strangers: nor does there appear amongst themselves any kind of deference or submission from one to another.
Their canoes are some of them so small as to contain only one or two persons; others are large baidars similar to the women's boats of the Greenlanders. Their food consists chiefly of raw and dried fish, partly caught at sea with bone hooks, and partly in rivulets, in bagnets made of sinews platted together. They call themselves Kanagist, a name that has no small resemblance to Karalit; by which appellation, the Greenlanders and Esquimaux on the coast of Labradore distinguish themselves: the difference between these two denominations is occasioned perhaps by a change of pronunciation, or by a mistake of the Russian sailors, who may have given it this variation. Their numbers seem very considerable on that part of the island, where they had their fixed habitations.
The island Kadyak[57] makes, with Aghunalashka, Umnak, and the small islands lying between them, a continued Archipelago, extending N. E. and E. N. E. towards America: it lies by the ship's reckoning in 230 degrees of longitude; so that it cannot be far distant from that part of the American coast which Beering formerly touched at.
The large island Alaksu, lying Northward from Kadyak where Pushkaref[58] wintered, must be still nearer the continent: and the account propagated by its inhabitants of a great promontory, called Atachtak, stretching from the continent N. E. of Alaksu, is not at all improbable.
Although the conduct of the islanders appeared more friendly, yet on account of their numbers Glottoff resolved not to pass another winter upon Kadyak, and accordingly prepared for his departure. He wanted hoops for repairing his water-casks; and being told by the natives that there were trees on the island at no great distance from the bay, he dispatched on the 25th of April Lukas Ftoruskin with eleven men for the purpose of felling wood. Ftoruskin returned the same day with the following intelligence: that after rowing along the South coast of the island forty or fifty versts from the haven, he observed, about half a verst from the shore, a considerable number of alders, similar to those found in Kamtchatka, growing in vallies between the rocks. The largest trunks were from two to four vershocks in diameter. Of this wood he felled as much as he had occasion for; and returned without having met with either islander or habitation.
Departure from Kadyak, May, 1764.
They brought the vessel down the creek in May; and, after taking in all the peltry and stores, left Kadyak on the 24th. Contrary winds retarded their voyage, and drove them near the island Alaksu, which they passed; their water being nearly exhausted, they afterwards landed upon another island, called Saktunk, in order to procure a fresh stock. |Arrival at Umnak.| At last on the 3d of July, they arrived again at Umnak, and anchored in a bay which Glottoff had formerly visited. He immediately went ashore in a baidar, and soon found out his former hut, which was in ruins: near it he observed another Russian dwelling, that had been built in his absence, in which lay a murdered Russian, but whose face none of them knew. Glottoff, resolving to procure further information, went across the island the 5th of July, accompanied by sixteen of his crew. He discovered the remains of a burnt vessel, some prayer books, images, &c.; all the iron work and cordage were carried off. Near the spot he found likewise a bathing room filled with murdered Russians in their clothes. From some marks, he concluded that this was the vessel fitted out by Protassoff; nor was he mistaken in his conjectures.