Gilyak Man
For catching sturgeon they use a circular net five feet across at the opening, and shaped like a shallow bag. One side of the mouth is fitted with corks and the other with weights of lead or iron. Two canoes in mid stream hold this net between them, at right angles to the current. The sturgeon descending the river enters the trap, and the net proceeds of the enterprise are divided between the fishermen.
It requires vision or a guide to find a fishing station, but the sense of smell is quite sufficient to discover where salmon are dressed and cured. The offal from the fish creates an unpleasant stench and no effort is made to clear it away. The natives and their dogs do not consider the scent disagreeable and have no occasion to consult the tastes or smell of others. The first time I visited one of their fish-curing places I thought of the western city that had, after a freshet, ‘forty-five distinct and different odors beside several wards to hear from.’
Above Mariensk the Amoor valley is often ten or twenty miles wide, enclosing whole labyrinths of islands, some of great extent. These islands are generally well out of water and not liable to overflow. Very few have the temporary appearance of the islands of the lower Mississippi. Here and there were small islands of slight elevation and covered with cottonwoods, precisely like those growing between Memphis and Cairo.