It has been repeatedly stated that among the natives of Alaska no trace of gesture or sign language can be found.  The universal spread of the Russian language in former times as a medium of trade and general intercourse has certainly prevented observations of this primitive linguistic feature in all the vast regions visited by the Russians.  On the other hand, the homogeneous elements of the Innuit tongue, spoken along the whole seacoast from the Arctic to the Alaskan Peninsula, and the Island of Kadiak, has, to a great extent, abolished all causes for the employment of sign language between tribes in their mutual intercourse.  Basing their opinions upon what they saw while touching upon the coast here and there, even the acknowledged authorities on Alaskan matters have declared that sign language did not and could not exist in all that country.  Without entering into any lengthened dispute upon this question, I venture to present in the subjoined pages a succinct account of at least one instance where I saw natives of different tribes converse with each other only by means of signs and gestures within the boundaries of Alaska.

In the month of September, 1866, there arrived on the Lower Kinnik River, a stream emptying its waters into Cook’s Inlet, two Indians from a distant region, who did not speak the Kenaitze language.  The people of the settlement at which the strangers made their first appearance were equally at a loss to understand the visitors.  At last a chief of great age, bearing the name of Chatidoolts (mentioned by Vancouver as a youth), was found to be able to interpret some of the signs made by the strangers, and after a little practice he entered into a continued conversation with them in rather a roundabout way, being himself blind.  He informed me that it was the second or third time within his recollection that strangers like those then present had come to Kinnik from the northeast, but that in his youth he had frequently “talked with his hands” to their visitors from the west and east.  He also told me that he had acquired this art from his father, who, as the old man expressed himself, had “seen every country, and spoken to all the tribes of the earth.”  The conversation was carried on with the help of the old man’s sons, who described to their blind parent the gestures of the strangers, and were instructed in turn by him with what gestures to reply.

This being an entirely new experience to me I at once proceeded to carefully make notes of the desultory talk, extending over several days.  My object, primarily, was to make use of the signs for purposes of trade in the future.

The notes thus obtained contain a narrative of the two strangers, interpreted to me at the time by Chatidoolts.  I shall present each sign or sentence as I noted it at the time, with only casual reference to that incomplete and frequently erroneous interpretation.

The two Indians wore the pointed hunting shirt of tanned moose-skin, ornamented with beads and fringes which is still common to the Kutchin tribes.  They were not tattooed, but ears and noses were encumbered with pendants of dentalium and a small red glass bead.  Their feet were clothed in moccasins.  One of them had a rifle of English manufacture, and his companion carried two huge knives, one of them of copper evidently of native manufacture.