The brigades of sea-otter hunters far exceeded in size and wild daring the platoons of beaver hunters, who ranged by pack-horse and canoe from Hudson Bay to the Rocky Mountains. The Russian ship, provisioned for two or three years, would moor and draw up ashore for the winter on one of the eleven hundred Aleutian Islands. Huts would be constructed of drift-wood, roofed with sea-moss; and as time went on even rude forts were erected on two or three of the islands--like Oonalaska or Kadiak--where the kelp-beds were extensive and the hunting was good enough to last for several years. The Indians would then be attracted to the camp by presents of brandy and glass beads and gay trinkets and firearms. Perhaps one thousand Aleut hunters would be assembled. Two types of hunting boats were used--the big 'bidarkie,' carrying twenty or thirty men, and the little kayak, a { 36} mere cockle-shell. Oiled walrus-skin, stretched taut as a drum-head, served as a covering for the kayak against the seas, a manhole being left in the centre for the paddler to ensconce himself waist-deep, with oilskin round his waist to keep the water out. Clothing was worn fur side in, oiled side out; and the soles of all moccasins were padded with moss to protect the feet from the sharp rocks. Armed with clubs, spears, steel gaffs and rifles, the hunters would paddle out into the storm.
There were three types of hunting--long distance rifle-shooting, which the Russians taught the Aleuts; still hunting in a calm sea; storm hunting on the kelp-beds and rocks as the wild tide rode in with its myriad swimmers. Rifles could be used only when the wind was away from the sea-otter beds and the rocks offered good hiding above the sea-swamps. This method was sea-otter hunting _de luxe_. Still hunting could only be followed when the sea was smooth as glass. The Russian schooner would launch out a brigade of cockle-shell kayaks on an unruffled stretch of sea, which the sea-otter traversed going to and from the kelp-beds. While the sea-otter is a marine denizen, it must come up to breathe; and if it does not come up frequently of its { 37} own volition, the gases forming in its body bring it to the surface. The little kayaks would circle out silent as shadows over the silver surface of the sea. A round head would bob up, or a bubble show where a swimmer was moving below the surface. The kayaks would narrow their surrounding circle. Presently a head would appear. The hunter nearest would deal the death-stroke with his steel gaff, and the quarry would be drawn in. But it was in the storm hunt over the kelp-beds that the wildest work went on. Through the fiercest storm scudded bidarkies and kayaks, meeting the herds of sea-otter as they drove before the gale. To be sure, the bidarkies filled and foundered; the kayaks were ripped on the teeth of the rock reefs. But the sea took no account of its dead; neither did the Russians. Only the Aleut women and children wept for the loss of the hunters who never returned; and sea-otter hunting decreased the population of the Aleutian Islands by thousands. It was as fatal to the Indian as to the sea-otter. Two hundred thousand sea-otters were taken by the Russians in half a century. Kadiak yielded as many as 6000 pelts in a single year; Oonalaska, 3000; the Pribylovs, 5000; Sitka used to yield 15,000 a { 38} year. To-day there are barely 200 a year found from the Commander Islands to Sitka.