h in air shows that game has been sighted, and a
large circle, perhaps a mile in circumference, is at once formed around
the otter, each baidarka trying to get in the first successful shot. To
the man who first hits home belongs the skin, but as an otter can stay
under water twenty minutes, and when rising for air exposes only his
nose, a long and exciting chase follows.

Some natives patrol the small island shores, and during the winter make
a good harvest picking up dead otters which have washed ashore. This
happens in winter, because it is during severest weather that the otter
freezes his nose, which means death. The pelts from these frozen
animals, however, bring only a small price.

In earlier days nets were spread beneath the water around rocks shown by
the hair rubbings to be resting places of otter. The method was often
successful, as the poor beast swam over the trap in gaining his rock,
but when leaving dove well below the surface, and was caught. This
barbarous custom, together with the netting of ducks in narrow
passageways, has, fortunately, long been a thing of the past.

In Kadiak Village, we met a Captain Nelson, the first man down from the
north that spring, who had sledded from Nome to Katmai on Shelikoff
Straits in two months. At Katmai he was held up several days, his men
refusing to cross the straits until the local weather prophet, or
astronom, as he is called, gave his consent. Seven hours of hard
paddling carried them over the twenty-seven miles, the most treacherous
of Alaskan narrows.

These astronoms are relics of an interesting type, who formerly held
firm sway over the natives. They are supposed to know much about the
weather from reading the sunrises, sunsets, stars, moon and tides, and
often sit on a hilltop for hours studying the weather conditions. They
are still absolutely relied upon to decide when sea otter parties may
start on a trip, and are looked up to and trusted as chiefs by the
people of the villages in which they live.

At Wood Island we heard of Messrs. Kidder and Blake, two other sportsmen
from Boston, who had already left for their hunting grounds in Kaluda
Bay.

The spring was backward, and the bears still in their dens, but Merriam
and I decided to take the North American Company's schooner Maksoutoff
on its spring voyage around the island, when it carries supplies and
collects furs from the natives. We were to sail as far as Kaguiac, a
small village on the south