Holbrook argus., 1906-03-31
GEAR Ik ALASKA.
RusslaSs Ruler Still Holds Sway Over
 Some of Our People.

VuRao1 oI tdr-dWdy AldSku, uuuer AIueE- ican rule, where the Czar of Russia gt1ll holds the faithful allegiance of hundreds of former subjects, where his word a. the head of the Russiah church means more to the people than a law of the United States Congress or ruling of the United States courts, says the Brooklyn Eagle. These peo- pie are descendants of mixed Russian and native stock, and tho active prose lyting of the representatives of the Russian church has kept them loyal to the little father and has led them to accept him as their temporal ruler, although forty years have passed since the signing of the treaty which con- veyed the country to the United States. In these settlements the Russian Ian guage Is almost exclusively spoken, missions are maintained by the Rus. sian church and schools conducted un. der the auspices of those missions. In many respects the people are as thor oughly Russian in both appearance and allegiance as are the people in the outlying portions of Siberia on the op- posite coast of Boring Sea.
 Of the 6O,OOO people living in Alaska one-sixth are communicants of the Russian orthodox church. The church maintains in the district 18 parishes, BS missions and 30 schools, having to- tai of TAO children in attendance. The total enrolment in the 33 public schools maintained in the district by the United States government is 2, 100, only three times as large as that at Russian schools. Tn all there are 108 missions maintained in Alaska by diff ferent religious denominations, of which the Russian church maintains 5S, the Presbyterian church 21, the Ro- man Catholic church 10, the Episcopal church 14, the Baptist Home Mission Society 2, the Methodists 6, the Swe- dish Evangelical Union 5, the Friends Society 3, the Congregational church and the Norwegian Evangelical Lu- theran 5. These figures show that while the Russian religious influence Is hardly the dominant influence among the native population, since many of the churches, notably the Congrega- tional and Episcopal, devote their ener- gies largely to the white settlements. 1t Is notable in this connection that the Russian missions are maintained in remote settlements, where the popu- lation is chiefly native or mixture of native and Russian.
 It is difficult for most Americans to understand how an absolute autocrat like the Czar of Russia has so long held the unswerv1ng allegiance of mil lions of people, extending from the Baltic Sea ot Boring Strait and from the Caucasus to the Arctic. A key to this enigma may be found in any one of the thousands of modest homes in the district of Alaska. In the humble cabin of the average Indian river pilot on the Yukon River, in the shack of the Aleut fisherman, on any of the Aieutian Islands or in the miserable igloo of the Eskimo reindeer herder at Point Barrow may be found hanging side by side two highly colored prints; one that of the meek and lowly Naza- rene and the other that of the Czar of Russia, the head of the Russian Greek eastern orthodox church. In each of the Russian missions the Russian speaking priests and missionaries per sistently instruct their parishioners that the power of the Czar is not only temporal but spiritual as well, and that no loyal and devout member of the church should take up arms against the little father" or in any respect disregard his wishes or commands. An act of disloyalty to the Czar, they are taught, would be an act of disloyalty to the church, and, despite their pover- tv and ipnorance the natives of Alas