nd more abundant,
some of them arching their broad delicate fronds over one's shoulders,
while in similar situations the tallest of the five grasses that were
seen reaches a height of nearly six feet, and forms a growth close
enough for the farmer's scythe.

Not a single tree has yet been seen on any of the islands of the chain
west of Kodiak, excepting a few spruces brought from Sitka and planted
at Ounalaska by the Russians about fifty years ago. They are still
alive in a dwarfed condition, having made scarce any appreciable growth
since they were planted. These facts are the more remarkable, since in
Southeastern Alaska lying both to the north and south of here, and on
the many islands of the Alexander Archipelago, as well as on the
mainland, forests of beautiful conifers flourish exuberantly and attain
noble dimensions, while the climatic conditions generally do not appear
to differ greatly from those that obtain on these treeless islands.

Wherever cattle have been introduced they have prospered and grown fat
on the abundance of rich nutritious pasturage to be found almost
everywhere in the deep withdrawing valleys and on the green slopes of
the hills and mountains, but the wetness of the summer months will
always prevent the making of hay in any considerable quantities.

The agricultural possibilities of these islands seem also to be very
limited. The hardier of the cereals--rye, barley, and oats--make a good
vigorous growth, and head out, but seldom or never mature, on account
of insufficient sunshine and overabundance of moisture in the form of
long-continued drizzling fogs and rains. Green crops, however, as
potatoes, turnips, cabbages, beets, and most other common garden
vegetables, thrive wherever the ground is thoroughly drained and has a
southerly exposure.

_SAINT LAWRENCE ISLAND._

Saint Lawrence Island, as far as our observations extended, is mostly a
dreary mass of granite and lava of various forms and colors, roughened
with volcanic cones, covered with snow, and rigidly bound in ocean ice
for half the year.

Inasmuch as it lies broadsidewise to the direction pursued by the great
ice-sheet that recently filled Bering Sea, and its rocks offered
unequal resistance to the denuding action of the ice, the island is
traversed by numerous ridges and low gap-like valleys all trending in
the same general direction, some of the lowest of these transverse
valleys having been degraded nearly to the level o