Landsmen among Siberian exiles were
enlisted as crew of their own free will at first, but afterward, when
the horrors of wreck and scurvy and massacre became known, both exiles
and Indians were impressed by force as fur hunters for the Cossacks.
If the voyage were successful, half the {300} proceeds went to the
outfitter, the remaining half to Cossacks and crew.
The boats usually sailed in the fall, and wintered on Bering Island.
Here stores of salted meat, sea-lion and sea-cow, were laid up, and the
following spring the ship steered for the Aleutians, or the main coast
of Alaska, or the archipelago round the modern Sitka. Sloops were
anchored offshore fully armed for refuge in case of attack. Huts were
then constructed of driftwood on land. Toward the east and south,
where the Indians were treacherous and made doubly so by the rum and
firearms of rival traders, palisades were thrown up round the fort, a
sort of balcony erected inside with brass cannon mounted where a sentry
paraded day and night, ringing a bell every hour in proof that he was
not asleep.
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