Within an hour they had stowed their equipment in the dory and pushed
off, all of them rowing and paddling. They thought they would soon be
across the bay, whose opposite shore looked quite close; but they were
somewhat startled to see how long it took them actually to make the
distance, which must have been some six or eight miles. The bay,
however, remained quiet and their progress was steady, although they
were all very tired by the time they landed on the opposite beach, at
the mouth of the valley which they purposed to explore.

"It seems wilder over here," said John. "Look how rough the mountains
seem and how thick the timber is on above there. And I don't see any
barabbara over here."

"There's something that looks like one, back from the beach a little
way," said Jesse, pointing out what seemed like a low heap of earth.
They went over and found it to be, indeed, the ruins of an old
barabbara, which looked as though it had not been occupied for a
lifetime. The roof had fallen in and the walls were full of holes, so
that it was quite unfit for occupancy. They left it and passed up the
beach, where they saw the ruins of several other houses, no doubt
occupied by natives very long ago. Beyond this a short distance, not far
from a deep path which was worn in the tundra by the wild game, they saw
a number of rude posts standing at different angles, loosely embedded in
the soil, and in some instances fallen and rotting in the grass. Some of
these had rude cross-arms at their tops, others two cross-arms, the
lower one nailed up at a slant. The boys regarded these curiously, but
Skookie seemed anxious to move on.

"Why, what's up, Skookie? What's the matter?" asked Rob. "What do these
posts mean, that look like crosses?"

"Dead mans here--plenty, plenty dead mans, long time," said Skookie. "No
mans live here now. I'm not like dis place."

"Why," said Rob, "they're graves, and these are crosses--I think that
one with the double arms must be one of the old Russian crosses. Was
there ever a village here, Skookie?"

The Aleut lad nodded his head. "Long times, my peoples live here some
day. Russian mans come here, plenty big boats; plenty shoot my peoples.
Dose Russian mans make church here, show my peoples about church.
Bime-by Russian mans go way. Bime-by my peoples get sick, plenty sick;
all die, all dead mans here. My peoples go way, never come back no more.
I'm not like dis place." He shuddered as he looked at the