Here we decided to camp for the night, and found the house, which was empty, rather smoky and uncomfortable. Tuesday, 27th.—Making an early start for Nuláto, we proceeded up the river, the temperature being about twenty-eight below zero. About eleven o'clock, arrived at an open space nearly two miles long, bounded on the south by a sharp blaff known as the Shamán Mountain. Here a seam of coal had been reported, and, stopping for a moment, I ascertained that the report was correct. Reserving a careful examination for some other occasion, I started ahead of the dogs, following the old tracks on the snow, and soon left the brigade behind me. In half an hour I reached a point on the river where a party of three Russians were engaged in setting. fish-weirs under the ice. An old fellow, whose head shook like that of a Chinese mandarin, informed me that the post of Nuláto was only a mile beyond. A steady walk of nearly an hour convinced me that it was nearer three miles, but I soon espied the stockade and two turrets at no great distance. Ascending the bank, I went into the enclosure, and, inquiring for the Americans, was directed to a low building on one side. On entering I was soon shaking hands with Ketchum, and with Whymper, who was already engaged in sketching. We were congratulated on our quick trip from Ulúkuk, and exchanged items of news. The noise of the dogs was soon heard, and we were busily engaged in unloading and storing the goods, as well as unharnessing the dogs, who seemed as glad as anybody that their journey had come to a satisfactory conclusion. cause. CHAPTER II. Arrival at Nulato, and introduction to the Creole bidarshik. — Description of the post and its inhabitants. Adjacent points. - History. - The Nulato massacre and its - Barnard's grave. - Daily life at Nulato. - Larriown. — Koyukun Indians. - Ingaliks. Kurilla. Plans for the coming season. - Examination of a coalseam..- Nuklukahyet chief. - Christmas festivities. - New Year's and erection of the first telegraph pole. - Aurora. Keturn of Ketchum. - Collections in Natural History. Indian rumor. - Cannibalism. — Russian ingenuity. - Founding of Fort Kennicott. Departure of Ketchum and Mike on their winter journey to Fort Yukon. - Arrival of our bidarra. — Trip to Wolasatux' barrabora. — Scarcity of food. First signs of spring. - Robbing a grave. - First goose. - Indian children. - Rescue of the bidarshik. — Anecdote of Major Kennicott and erection of a monument to his memory. Formation of alluvium. - Preparations for our journey. Breaking up of the ice on the Yukon. H AVING finally arrived at Nuláto, which I proposed to make my head-quarters, and having rested from the fatigue of the journey, I was introduced to Iván Pávloff, the bidárshik or commander of the trading-post. He was a short, thickset, swarthy, low-browed man, a half-breed between a Russian and a native of Kenái, and was legally married to a full-blooded Indian woman, named Marina, the widow of a previous bidárshik, by whom he had a large family of children. He appeared to be a good-humored fellow, though the Indian clearly predominated in him. While evidently understanding nothing of the object of the collections and observations which I proposed to make, he yet assured me that I should be welcome to any information or assistance I might need. A disagreeable servility marked his intercourse with the Americans and full-blooded Russians, the latter regarding him with unconcealed contempt on account of his Indian blood, notwithstanding his responsible position. This accounted for the expression which might often be observed on his face while conversing with him. It seemed a mixture of stupidity and low cunning, as if he were apprehensive that some covert ridicule, or attempt at overreaching, lay hidden in the conversation addressed to him. He was an insatiable drinker, and ungovernable as a mad bull when drunk, though at other times quiet and unexcitable. He was continually pestering us with requests for liquor, until I was obliged to poison all the alcohol intended for collecting purposes. Notwithstanding his faults, most of which were hereditary, he brought up his children and treated his wife as well as his light allowed him to do. He had a large proportion of generosity and hospitality in his character, was unusually free from any disposition to immorality, and was never known to sell any furs, purchased by him and belonging to the Russian American Company, to any of our party, as he might easily have done. He could not read or write, and the accounts were kept by an assistant called Yágor Ivánovich. He cherished in his heart a dislike to the Americans on account of their superior energy and intelligence, which led them to regard him with no very respectful eye. When he was drunk, the bitter and unfounded prejudices which he cherished came to the surface; otherwise we should hardly have suspected them. I have been thus careful in drawing his portrait, not because the individual is of any particular consequence, but because he is in many respects a type of the largest class of the civilized inhabitants of Russian America. They are known among the Russians as Creoles. The other inhabitants of the post of Nuláto were two Russians, the only whites beside ourselves, named Kárpoff and Paspílkoff (the Pomóghnik, or assistant, who kept the accounts, was a Creole, like the bidárshik); an old Yakút, named Yagórsha, who was a curiosity in himself; two half-breeds; and a few Indians; while a nearly equal number of Indian women were employed in and about the post. The fort was a large one, two sides and a part of the third formed by buildings, the remainder a stockade, thus enclosing a large yard. On one side was a long structure, containing two rooms, which served for the bidárshik and his assistant and their families. These rooms were separated by a covered space from. the rest of the building, which contained a magazine for tradinggoods and furs, a store-room where fish were kept, and another, which was principally occupied by our goods. Opposite to this was another building of the same size, containing one large room, separated in the same way from a small one, in both of which workmen and their families lived. Each of them was surmounted with a turret pierced for guns, and in one of these were two antique, rusty, and almost useless six-pounders. The third side was occupied by a low-studded building, about twenty feet long and ten wide, which we occupied; a shed, where fuel might be kept dry; the bath-house, and a shed used to cook in, and called by courtesy the povárnia, or kitchen. The front of the yard was closed in by a stockade about sixteen feet high, of pointed logs set upright in the ground, and was provided with a large gate. The houses were of round logs; the roofs, nearly flat and covered with earth, could be reached by means of steps provided for the purpose. The windows were all of the parchment, or seal intestines, before mentioned, and the buildings were warmed by the universal peechkas, the seams of the walls being calked with dry moss. Directly across from the fort, which faces the river, is a low island, less than a mile long. The river is narrow here, being by exact measurement only a mile and a half wide. The latitude of the fort is nearly 64° 42' north, and the longitude 157° 54′ west. The variation of the compass is nearly thirty-two degrees to the eastward. A mile and a furlong east-northeast is a small creek, a raging torrent in the spring, called Klat-kakhátne by the Indians, literally "Stop-a-bit River." Half a mile west-southwest is the mouth of the Nuláto River, from which the post takes its name, though it was originally called Fort Derábin, from its builder and first bidárshik. Between these two streams the land is low, gradually rising from the river into low hills, and for the most part densely wooded. A short distance from its mouth the Nuláto River receives two streams of no great size. Its total length is about twenty miles, inclusive of windings. The opposite bank of the Klat-kakhátne rises abruptly into a rocky, precipitous bluff, affording a fine view down the river. Not far below the mouth of the Nuláto the river-bank rises, but not so abruptly, into bluffs |