vania, was furnished by a benevolent friend, where he is now, a patient, Christian student. When he was asked what he would do with his education, he said: "I should like to go back to my people and help them." As the feeling will probably subside in his absence, he can, no doubt, return to his people, and influence them as no stranger could.

Dr. Sheldon Jackson, Alaska, general agent of education in Alaska; William Hamilton, Pennsylvania, assistant agent of education in Alaska; William A. Kelly, Pennsylvania, superintendent of schools for the southeastern district of Alaska.

LOCAL SCHOOL COMMITTEES.

Sitka, Edward de Groff, Charles D. Rogers, John G. Brady; Juneau, John G. Heid, Karl Koehler; Douglas, P. H. Fox, Albert Anderson; Treadwell, Robert Duncan, jr., Rev. A. J. Campbell; Fort Wrangel, Thomas Willson, Finis Cagle; Kadiak, Nicolai Kashevaroff, F. Sargent, H. P. Cope; Unga, C. M. Dederick, Michael Dowd, George Levitt.

Alaskan children in schools and private families in the States.

On the 14th of May, 1895, the Secretary of the Interior entered into a contract with Mr. David William Starrett, of Port Townsend, Wash., for the erection of a one-and-a-half-story school building and teacher's residence, 90 by 31 feet in size, for which he was to receive $2,135.25 upon the completion and acceptance of one-half of the building, and the balance, $2,609.75, upon the completion and acceptance of the whole work, making a total cost of $4,745. Hon. Lycurgus T. Woodward, United States commissioner at Unalaska, was appointed superintendent of the work. Upon the 1st of October, 1895, Mr. Woodward, in behalf of the Government, accepted the building from the contractor and certified it as complete in every respect and constructed in accordance with the plans and specifications. Whereupon the contractor sent in his bill for the balance of his pay, having received from the Government $2,135.25 upon the completion and acceptance of the first half of the work. The same mail that brought the bill of the contractor to Washington also brought information that upon the 24th day of October, 1895, said schoolhouse had been blown from its foundation and partly wrecked. The same mail brought a communication from Mr. John A. Tuck, the Government school-teacher, testifying that the building had not been constructed in accordance with the plans and specifications. This letter was referred by the ED 96 46

Commissioner of Education to the Secretary of the Interior for his information, with a request that the accounts of the contractor be held up for further information.

Under date of November 23, 1895, the Secretary returned the papers to the educational office, requesting the Commissioner of Education to make a full investigation with a view to determine whether the building was constructed in accordance with the plans and specifications. By your direction I took the opportunity of my visit to Unalaska to make a full investigation, and found that the Government school building was not constructed in accordance with the plans and specifications, and was not constructed in a workmanlike manner. It should be said here that Commissioner Woodward, who was appointed superintendent of construction, disclaimed any knowledge of carpentering or house building; more than that, while the house was in process of erection he was absent from the village and gave the work no special attention. When the carpenters and builders were through, he took their word to the fact of its being built according to specifications and gave the contractor a certificate of acceptance, so that his certificate is of no value as a statement of fact. As the building had been blown from its foundations, my first attention was given to them. The specifications required that the foundation posts should be 5 feet long. I found them from 2 feet 10 inches to 3 feet 8 inches. The specifications required the posts to be placed in the ground 3 feet 10 inches and well rammed. I found them from 10 to 15 inches only in the ground and not rammed. The specifications required the posts to be 14 inches above ground. I found them from 2 to 24 feet.

The specifications required that the sills should be well spliced and spiked to the posts. I found that they were neither spiked nor secured. No building anywhere could be expected to remain any length of time upon such a foundation, the posts being unbraced and the sills unfastened to them, so that the first windstorm had toppled the posts over and damaged the building. If, however, it had remained upon the foundation, the construction was so faulty that the building should never have been accepted. The specifications required that the joists of the second story should be 12 by 3 inches; instead they were 2 by 12. The joists were but 1 by 6; the rafters were 2 by 8, instead of 3 by 9. The roof was to be closely sheathed. Instead of that the boards were from 2 to 24 inches apart. The rafters were not tied together with collar beams, and were already spread. A heavy weight of snow would crush it in entirely. The shingling was faulty and unworkmanlike. The specifications required that the windows should be supplied with cord and weights. This was complied with only in the lower sash of the first-story windows, the upper sash being nailed solid into the frame and incapable of being lowered or raised. The window sills were poor, with insufficient pitch to throw off the rain. Thin and common glass was placed in the windows, instead of the American cylinder glass, double thick and free from all defects. Six-inch flooring was used instead of 4, which was required by the specifications. All but joints of the floor were to be well nailed; so far as taken up they were not nailed at all. In the front stairway the heading between the step and the joist of the second floor allowed but 5 feet of space, causing all grown people to stoop in ascending the main stairway of the building. The specifications required that all chimney places should be kept clear of all woodwork by a space of 1 inches. In a number of places I found the terra-cotta chimneys to be held in place by the woodwork. The specifications required that all spaces between the flues and woodwork should be filled in solidly with a mixture of slack lime and gravel; instead of this I found that the spaces between the flues and the woodwork were filled in with ends of joist, studding, and other pieces of lumber; and if the building had not blown down, it would certainly have burned down the first winter that these chimneys were used. Desiring the testimony of an expert builder, I had the work investigated by Mr. James Lamont, à carpenter of thirty-five years' experience. I also had it examined by the carpenter from the United States cutter Bear-the Government carpenter. Both of these men furnished written testimony to the fact that the building Lad not been erected according to the specifications or in a workmanlike manner. Consequently there was nothing else for me to report than that the Government should decline to accept the building from the contractor's hands.

MORAVIAN MISSIONS.

Bethel.-Missionaries, Rev. and Mrs. John H. Kilbuck, Mr. and Mrs. Benjamin Helmich, Miss Mary Mack, J. H. Romig, M. D., Miss P. King. Not long ago two American gentlemen traveling in Alaska approached the Kuskokwim district. They heard the natives everywhere in the region talking about the "Kilbuckamuks," and expected to meet with some tribe hitherto unknown to ethnologists. Presently they reached Bethel, where they found the missionaries, and discovered

that the new tribe consisted of the converts in the neighborhood of Bethel, who were thus nicknamed, much as their teachers might deprecate it. The enrollment of pupils in the school was 33. Six of the boys formed an advanced class under special instructions, so that in the course of time they may be efficient assistants in the work of uplifting their people.

Last fall Miss King, the trained nurse at the station, in getting into a native boat had a narrow escape from drowning in the Kuskokwim River. The water was deep where she fell in, and but for the timely assistance of one of the oarsmen the accident would have been serious. Through the winter Mr. Helmich was at work building a 40-foot boat. He had few tools, and says that no one realizes how many little things go to make a boat until he makes every piece himself. Finally the boat was launched, a complete success. May the Swan have a long life of usefulness. A feature of the work of the Moravians in the Kuskokwim is a series of trips to villages in that region. Sixteen such trips were made between November and May, covering a distance of 1,500 miles. The benign influences of Christian civilization are making themselves widely felt. In helping the unfortunate the people have shown a hearty willingness to do what they could. Thanksgiving Day was the time set for a general contribution to help the poor. In all the villages between Bethel and Ougavig, as well as at these two places, the people brought to the chapels dried salmon, white fish, money, fur for barter and for clothing, tea, and flour. Many a poor unfortunate heart was gladdened by a gift from this store.

Ougavig.-Missionaries, Rev. and Mrs. E. L. Weber. The new schoolroom is commodious and satisfactory in every way. The enrollment was 25. Owing to high water, the mission family were compelled to live with the native trader on the other side of the river for ten days during May.

Carmel.-Missionaries, Rev. and Mrs. John Schoechert, Misses Mary and Emma Huber. The scarcity of food seems to have been more severely felt here than at the other stations in this region, and there was great suffering in the village on account of it. The school has become more attractive, so that all applicants could not be received. It seems impossible to retain the girls longer than their thirteenth or fourteenth year, when parents insist on removing them, as it is considered their duty to be married at that age.

Eight journeys into the neighboring region were made, either by dog team or bidarka. The longest trip occupied twenty-three days, the distance being estimated at 800 miles. On other occasions 200 to 400 miles were traversed. The mission property has been improved by the erection of a storehouse, the purchase of a log house, and the construction of a new dock.

BAPTIST MISSIONS.

The work of the Baptist Church in Alaska is confined to the school and mission work of the Woman's American Baptist Home Missionary Society, with headquarters in Boston. Their work first commenced in 1886, when Mrs. W. E. Roscoe, wife of the Government teacher at Kodiak, was commissioned by the ladies to do such mission work as she could. In the spring of 1893 Mr. Roscoe, having resigned his position as teacher at Kodiak, was sent with his wife by the missionary society to establish a Baptist mission home and orphanage at Wood Island, one of the smaller islands in the harbor of Kodiak. In the midst of much opposition and petty persecution, he secured the material and erected a large two-story building for the use of the mission. This building is beautifully located on a small freshwater lake about 100 yards from the seashore. In June, 1895, he was relieved of the care of the station by the arrival of the Rev. and Mrs. P. Curtis Coe, allowing Mr. Roscoe and his family to return to California for the education of their children. Mr. Roscoe was very successful in laying the foundations of the present prosperous mission. In July Miss Hattie Snow was appointed to assist at the station. Mr. and Mrs. Coe and Miss Snow and Miss L. Goodchild compose the present mission force. During last summer and fall Mr. Coe, with the assistance of the mission boys, cleared one side of the front yard of stumps, and secured hay for the family cow, taught the boys carpentering, and looked after things generally. The girls have taken lessons in making and mending clothes and in cooking. During the winter a night school was held for the natives of the village, and on the Sabbath preaching was sustained both at Wood Island and at Kodiak. The first Baptist Church of Alaska was organized July 26, 1896, and on the following 26th of September work was commenced on a chapel building. There are 25 children in the orphanage.

METHODIST MISSIONS.

The work of the Methodist Church in Alaska is carried on under the auspices of the Woman's Home Missionary Society. On the 20th of January, 1880, the

board of missions of the Methodist Episcopal Church in New York selected Unalaska, the commercial metropolis of western Alaska, as the proper place for the commencement of missions. Through a combination of circumstances, however, work was not commenced at that point until the summer of 1889, when Mr. and Mrs. John A. Tuck, Methodists from Maine, were sent out to establish a school and home. In 1890 the home was commenced by the bringing to Mr. and Mrs. Tuck of two orphan (waifs) girls from the island of Attoo, a thousand miles west of Unalaska. The teachers were in a small story-and-a-half cottage (half of which was used as a schoolroom) and unprepared to receive any children into their family. But the waifs had to be received; there was nowhere else for them to go. Other girls, finding that two had actually received a home, came and refused to be driven away, and some weeks later six additional orphan girls were sent down from the seal islands by the United States Treasury agent, and the school continued to grow until 35 girls were being sheltered, clothed and fed, and instructed. During the years 1889, 1890, and 1891 the mission was a contract school with the Government; but in 1892, in obedience to the action of the parent society, the women were compelled to withdraw from the work so important and so successfully commenced. To disband the home, however, and turn out into the street the many homeless orphans that had for a little time experienced the comforts of a Christian home was to send them forthwith to a speedy ruin, and was not to be thought of for a moment. Mr. and Mrs. Tuck did bravely and heroically at their end of the line. Friends in the East assisted by raising money to tide them over, well knowing that when the authorities of the Methodist Episcopal Church understood the real condition of things they would authorize the women to resume their work in the home. This belief was borne out by after results. In 1893 the work was again resumed by the church, and hailed with prayerful enthusiasm by church brothers and Methodist women whose hearts had been touched and sympathy enlisted at the sad condition of the natives of western Alaska. The school has been so successful that through all that region it is held up as a model for other schools to pattern after.

Capt. M. A. Healy (a Roman Catholic) sent me the following testimony:

"REVENUE MARINE STEAMER BEAR, "Port of Unalaska, Alaska, November 9, 1892.

"The Rev. SHELDON JACKSON,
"Bureau of Education, Washington, D. C.

"MY DEAR DOCTOR: I have brought six girls from the seal islands to the Jesse Lee School. Two years ago I brought down a like number. I am constrained by this part I have had in providing scholars for the school to give you my views of its character and accomplishments, with the hope that they may excite interest in its behalf among its founders and supporters.

"In all my experience in the country I have seen nothing that has rendered so much good to the people. From its situation it has tributary to it this whole western end of the Territory, where there are numbers of children and poor waifs, many the offspring of white fathers, growing up without the care of homes or the education and training of Christian parents.

"Professor and Mrs. Tuck have labored zealously and well to teach the scholars the necessities and requirements of decent living, and train them to become good housekeepers and proper wives and mothers. But they are cramped by the means and accommodations at hand. The school is already crowded to its utmost capacity and can not take many whom it would be a mercy to give its protection, and who could be received with a suitable building and support.

"I am sure the ladies of the Methodist society, could they understand the condition and field of the school and how well it is conducted, would become interested in its behalf and provide it with better facilities with which to continue and enlarge its work for the elevation of these poor neglected members of their sex. "I can not be accused of bias, for I am of an entirely different religious belief. Professor and Mrs. Tuck know nothing of my writing. I am prompted by my interest in the country and the improvement of its people, and can not remain blind to good to humanity by whomever performed.

"M. A. HEALY,

"Captain, United States Revenue Marine."

In October, 1894, the Woman's Home Missionary Society voted $3,560 for a new building, 72 by 36 feet in size, with two full stories and an attic. This building was erected in the summer of 1895, but unfortunately was so poorly constructed by the contractor that it may have to be taken down and rebuilt from the foundation. If it should not be necessary to make this radical change, yet it will cost