CHAPTER XII.

INNUIT LIFE AND LAND pp. 374-411

“Nooshagak;” Wide Application of an Innuit Name.—The Post and River.—Countless Pools, Ponds, and Lakes of this District bordering Bristol Bay.—The Eskimo Inhabitants of the Coast.—The Features and Form of Alaskan Innuits.—Light-hearted, Inconstant, and Independent.—Their Dress, Manners, and Rude Dwellings.—Their Routine of Life.—Large and Varied Natural Food-supplies.—Indifferent Land Hunters, but Mighty Fishermen.—Limited Needs from Traders’ Stores.—Skilful Carvers in Ivory.—Their Town Hall, or “Kashga.”—They Build and Support no Churches here.—Not of a real Religious Cast, as the Aleutians are.—The Dogs and Sleds; Importance of Them here.—Great Interest of the Innuit in Savage Ceremonies.—The Wild Alaskan Interior.—Its Repellent Features alike Avoided by Savage and Civilized Man.—The Indescribable Misery of Mosquitoes.—The Desolation of Winter in this Region.—The Reindeer Slaughter-pen on the Kvichak River.—Amazing Improvidence of the Innuit.—The Tragic Death of Father Juvenals, on the Banks of the Great Ilyamna Lake, 1796.—The Queer Innuits of Togiak.—Immense Muskrat Catch.—The Togiaks are the Quakers of Alaska.—The Kuskokvim Mouth a Vast Salmon-trap.—The Ichthyophagi of Alaska.—Dense Population.—Daily Life of the Fish-eaters.—Infernal Mosquitoes of Kuskokvim; the Worst in Alaska.—Kolmakovsky; its History.