RETURN OF THE SEARCH PARTY
lung. The surgeon dressed his wound and gave as his opinion that it would prove fatal. He was doing well, however, when we left him, and is likely to recover. The Plover Bay natives, in commenting on the affair, remarked that the St. Lawrence people were a bad, quarrelsome set, and always kept themselves in some sort of trouble.
Having procured a guide from among the natives that came aboard here, we attempted to reach Omniscot's village, but found the bay full of ice, and were compelled to go on without our winter supply of deerskins, hoping, however, to be able to get them on the east coast.
There is quite a large Chukchi settlement near the mouth of the bay, on the north side. Seven large canoe-loads of the population came aboard, making quite a stir on our little ship. They are the worst-looking lot of Siberian natives that I have yet seen, though there are some fine, tall, manly fellows amongst them. Mr. Nelson, a naturalist, and zealous collector for the Smithsonian Institution, who joined us at St. Michael, photographed a group of the most villainous of the men, and two of the women whose arms were elaborately tattooed up to the shoulders. Their faces were a curious study while they were trying to keep still under circumstances so extraordinary.
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