The aborigines, where not brought in contact with the government schools and missionaries, still retain their system of fetich worship, being very much under control of their medicine-men, who pretend to influence the demons of the spirit world, so feared by the average savage. Their moral degradation is extreme, and their practices in too many instances are terrible to relate. Slaves are sacrificed, as already stated, at the owner’s death, that they may go before and prepare for his arrival in the future state. Vile witchcraft is still believed in among most of the tribes, and murderous consequences follow in many cases. All kinds of barbarity are inflicted upon women, children, and slaves. We are told by Dr. Sheldon Jackson that it was surprising to see how quickly these savage practices yielded to the power of Christian teachings, and how rapidly they faded away before the influence of association with a few intelligent, conscientious white teachers. What these people need is education and Christian influence, which will work a great and rapid reform among them in a single generation. The canoes of the tribes about the Alexander Archipelago are dug out of well-chosen cedar logs, and are given the really fine lines for which they are remarkable by means of hot water and steam, together with the use of cunningly devised braces and clamps. The wood being once thoroughly dried in the desired shape, will retain it. Wondering how the exquisite smoothness was produced in forming their boats without a carpenter’s plane, it was found by inquiry that the natives dry the coarse skin of the dogfish and use it as we do sandpaper. The time spent upon the construction and ornamentation of these canoes is apparently of no consideration to the native, and the market value of the best will average one hundred dollars. It is the Alaskan’s most necessary and most prized piece of property. Some which we saw were eighty feet in length, and capable of holding one hundred men. It must be remembered that almost the entire population live on the coast or river banks in a country where there are no roads. These canoes have no seats in them; the rower places himself on the bottom, and thus situated uses his paddles with great dexterity. They are quite unmanageable by a white man who is not accustomed to them, as much so at least as a birch canoe, such as the Eastern Indians build on the coast of Maine. But the Alaskan boat is far superior to the birch-bark canoe in every respect. We saw one paddled by a boy at Pyramid Harbor, neat and new, which the lad, say twelve years of age, had dug out of a spruce log with his own hands, quite unaided. Its lines were admirable, and the finish was excellent. When the sun beats down upon these boats, the owner splashes water upon the sides about him to prevent their warping, and for this purpose carries a thin wooden scoop. When not in use they are carefully covered up to shelter them from the sun’s rays.