that the bottom of the slot will be about at the height of a sable’s head when he stands erect.  The stem of another smaller tree is then trimmed, one of its ends raised to a height of three feet by a forked stick set in the ground, and the other bevelled off so as to slip up and down freely in the slot cut for its reception.  This end is raised to the top of the slot and supported there by a simple figure-four catch, leaving a nearly square opening of about four inches below for the admission of the sable’s head.  The figure-four is then baited and the trap is ready.  The sable rises upon his hind legs, puts his head into the hole, and the heavy log, set free by the dropping of the figure-four, falls and crushes the animal’s skull, without injuring in the slightest degree the valuable parts of his skin.  One native frequently makes and sets as many as a hundred of these traps in the fall, and visits them at short intervals throughout the winter.  Not content, however, with this extensive and well organised system of trapping sables, the natives hunt them upon snow-shoes with trained dogs, drive them into holes which they surround with nets, and then, forcing them out with fire or axe, they kill them with clubs.

The number of sables caught in the Kamchatkan peninsula annually varies from six to nine thousand, all of which are exported to Russia and distributed from there over northern Europe.  A large proportion of the whole number of Russian sables in the European market are caught by the natives of Kamchatka and transported by American merchants to Moscow.  W.H.  Bordman, of Boston, and an American house in China—­known, I believe, as Russell & Co.—­practically control the fur trade of Kamchatka and the Okhotsk seacoast.  The price paid to the Kamchadals for an average sable skin in 1867 was nominally fifteen rubles silver, or about eleven dollars gold; but payment was made in tea, sugar, tobacco, and sundry other articles of merchandise, at the trader’s own valuation, so that the natives actually realised only a little more than half the nominal price.  Nearly all the inhabitants of central Kamchatka are engaged directly or indirectly during the winter in the sable trade and many of them have acquired by it a comfortable independence.

Fishing and sable-hunting, therefore, are the serious occupations of the Kamchadals throughout the year; but as these are indications of the nature of the country rather than of the characteristics of its inhabitants, they give only an imperfect idea of the distinctive peculiarities of Kamchadals and Kamchadal life.  The language, music, amusements, and superstitions of a people are much more valuable as illustrations of their real character than are their regular occupations.